Pickle translation

[phawkins at spamnotconnact.com]

>>>>> "WA" == William Annis <annis at biostat.wisc.edu> writes:

WA> # Then I open the pickle file in my trusty swiss-army editor, Emacs,
WA> # and forward-char 823962 times, and this is where I end up:
WA> <snip>
WA> g29
WA> ssg34
WA> g62
WA> sg36
WA> I1
WA> sg37
WA> S'Holt-Winters models on base load and net'
WA> sba(iKiosk.transports.stranger_e
WA> stranger_e
WA> p772                            **** first char of this line


Hmmm.  My principle on mystery bugs like this is, if you can't fix it,
try breaking it further... sometimes, like smashing swiss watches, you
learn an awful lot from the bits.

What happens if you copy the pickle file to a new file, 
and tweak the surrounding characters?  And I presume you have emacs in
binary mode... but what exactly is in the whitespace between
stranger_e and p772?

Does this happen to other pickle files?  If so, does the point it
happen at have any significance -- eg, is it always at 823962 characters
-- which *would* point to a bug in pickle -- or at similar
combinations of characters (ditto!)


-- 
Patricia J. Hawkins
Hawkins Internet Applications, LLC