PERL question

[Pretender]

What's the command to run a program, and could you give me an example of how to use it?

Thanks

 

[GL]

exec() and system() I believe are the two functions.

If I remember correctly, exec runs the program and never returns, whereas system runs the program and does return.

The parameters for both I think are just the name of the command on the console.

-GL

 

[Pretender]

alright, if I wanted to run
C:\windows\notepad.exe C:\file.txt
(C:\file.txt being the the argument to open notepad), would this be correct:

system("C:\windows\notepad.exe C:\file.txt"

 

[GL]

Yeah, that looks fine. Although, you probably should just go ahead and experiment with it.

-GL

 

[Pretender]

I've been experimenting with it for quite a while and haven't gotten it to work.

 

[GL]

Hmm...well I've heard of some problems spawning processes in Perl on a Win32 platform. What version of Perl are you using? I've had pretty good luck with ActiveState's port.

-GL

 

[Pretender]

ActivePerl 5.6.0.618 on Win98.

 

[Pretender]

Aha! The problem was I was supposed to use single quotes rather than double quotes. It took me 12 freaking hours to solve that. Aaargh

 

[RedRooster]

I believe a statement closed off with ` (the thing under ~) also works.
ie.
`c:\\windows\notepad.exe`