# The Length of the Needle **URL:** \ **Category:** About This Message Board\ **Created:** [November 5, 2001, 6:25pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-length-of-the-needle/91640 "2001-11-05T18:25:16Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 7\ **Page:** 1
**Author:** ![Ice\_Wolf](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/i/dfb087/32.png) [@Ice\_Wolf](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Ice_Wolf)\ **Post date:** [November 5, 2001, 6:25pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-length-of-the-needle/91640/1 "2001-11-05T18:25:16Z")
Just had the following pop-up while trying to access the last post in a Pit thread: > [@](#): > > **Warning:** 1 is not a MySQL result index in **admin/db\_mysql.php** on line **82** > > **Warning:** The length of the needle must not be 0 in **global.php** on line **69** Funky stuff to be reading first thing in the a.m. I just back-clicked and tried again. Got through the second time. Thought I’d let you know. ---
**Author:** ![Duck\_Duck\_Goose](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/50afbb/32.png) [@Duck\_Duck\_Goose](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Duck_Duck_Goose)\ **Post date:** [November 5, 2001, 7:36pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-length-of-the-needle/91640/2 "2001-11-05T19:36:46Z")
Yeah, don’t worry about it, it’s just the Gray Men testing a few things down the street… 😃 Seriously, don’t fret, it does this occasionally, when the hamster’s wheel that powers the server needs a couple drops of 3-in-1 oil. [sub]squeak… squeak… squeak… squeak…[/sub] ---
**Author:** ![Derleth](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/b9e5f3/32.png) [@Derleth](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Derleth)\ **Post date:** [November 5, 2001, 11:14pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-length-of-the-needle/91640/4 "2001-11-05T23:14:22Z")
Just as I thought: The servers that run this show are all shooting dope. They need a needle of a nonzero size to penetrate. Penetrate _what_ is best left unimagined. [sub]kandy korn! kandy korn![/sub] 😃 ---
**Author:** ![TubaDiva](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/tubadiva/32/507_2.png) [@TubaDiva](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/TubaDiva)\ **Post date:** [November 5, 2001, 11:22pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-length-of-the-needle/91640/5 "2001-11-05T23:22:50Z")
That’s vB’s way of saying “we’re about to have a problem.” We need a board reset, apparently. I’ll alert the techs, thanks for letting us know. your humble TubaDiva Administrator ---
**Author:** ![AHunter3](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/ahunter3/32/368_2.png) [@AHunter3](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/AHunter3)\ **Post date:** [November 6, 2001, 1:25am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-length-of-the-needle/91640/6 "2001-11-06T01:25:55Z")
[Not](http://boards.straightdope.com/sdmb/showthread.php?threadid=71917) the first time! ---
**Author:** ![iadoraeudora](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/i/bbe5ce/32.png) [@iadoraeudora](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/iadoraeudora)\ **Post date:** [November 6, 2001, 4:33am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-length-of-the-needle/91640/7 "2001-11-06T04:33:15Z")
A “needle” is the term for what you are searching for in a C++ subroutine. You’ll find such statements as “The mychar class provides these functions :- …Replace all occurences of string ‘needle’ with ‘str’ in the haystack ‘val’ replace(char \*needle, char \*str)” ---
**Author:** ![Ice\_Wolf](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/i/dfb087/32.png) [@Ice\_Wolf](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Ice_Wolf)\ **Post date:** [November 6, 2001, 8:26am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-length-of-the-needle/91640/8 "2001-11-06T08:26:52Z")
Hey – so I did good? Wow!