system("some_command");

if ($? == -1) {
    die "failed to execute: $!\n";
}
elsif ($? & 127) {
    die "child died with signal %d, %s coredump\n",
   ($? & 127),  ($? & 128) ? 'with' : 'without';
}
else {
   die "child exited with value %d\n", $? >> 8;
}

##</code><code>##

use IPC::System::Simple qw(run);

run("some_command");

##</code><code>##

use IPC::System::Simple qw(run);

run("foo");               # No meta-chars, shell never used
run("bar | bar");         # Meta-chars, shell always used.
run("foo", "bar", "<baz") # Multi-arg, shell never used.