Drush rundown

because sometimes drupal apis surprise you :-)

What I tend to do is simply code the thing in steps, and heavily error-check at each step. Lots of internal error checking and posting of messages. And of course test it on your dev version of the site first if you can.

ex: in my "update all articles" sample code from the presentation

• After my db_query("select nid from {node} where type='article' and status=1;") I output the $article_node_rows->countQuery()->execute()->fetchField(); to see if the # of rows looks right.
• Then I add the while loop, with just the echo line (that should actually be) "goodnight article $node->author_id : $node->nid : $node->title: $node->field_publish_date\n"; and I'd let that run to spot check
• Finally I'd put in my $node->save();, backing up the DB and hitting |enter| with crossed fingers
• If there were no errors I'd "drush cc all" and do a bunch of after-check to see if I need to roll-back in a hurry.

Does that make me a bad person?

--Jason