this is unrelated but pigeon% ./ruby -ve 'p Marshal.load Marshal.dump 123456789012345678' ruby 1.4.6 (2000-08-16) [i686-linux] 123456789012345678 pigeon% pigeon% /usr/bin/ruby -ve 'p Marshal.load Marshal.dump 123456789012345678' ruby 1.6.3 (2001-03-19) [i686-linux] 2788225870 pigeon% normal ? Guy Decoux