Shell script

[DCT Jared]

>>be fine. PHP isn't particularly designed for system administration, however.

>Compared to Python (or even Perl) it isn't particularly designed, period.

Apples and oranges. You're comparing natural language design
to artificial language design. The over-designed Python serves a different 
purpose from PHP, not mutually exclusive but overlapping.

And Perl _is_ specifically designed for system administration, with
the ability to do web scripting bolted on, whereas PHP is specifically 
designed for web scripting, and has no business even being
mentioned as a system administration tool, even though it has 
its own portable EXE and could do so in a pinch.

To each function, its own tool. For a web scripting language that 
anyone, including the unwashed masses, can learn: PHP. For a 
web scripting language that will attract the purist minority of academia: 
Python. For practical extraction and reporting, web or not: Perl.

And Apache to bind them all together.

-Jared