A race condition could happen, if something changes to the file between the time I check the existence, and the time I read the file. However, the file is pretty static:

With the network involved, it doesn't have to be the file that changed. Any temporary resource state in the fabric between you and the actual file could -- breifly -- manifest itself as in an inability to open the file.

I'd suggest cutting out the possibility of a race by just opening the file. And if the open fails, retry some number of times before logging an error:

for my $try ( 1 .. RETRIES ) {
  if(open(my $rule_fh,'<',$rule_file)) {
    last;
  }
  if( $try == RETRIES ) {
    die "Can not read file $rule_file : $! / $^E";
  }
}
[download]

With the network involved, it doesn't have to be the file that changed. Any temporary resource state in the fabric between you and the actual file could -- breifly -- manifest itself as in an inability to open the file.

That sounds frightening. I didn't expect this ... thought that in this case the underlying software layer (CIFS) would take care about such glitches. Just to get some idea ... what kind of resource state could, for example, cause such an effect?

I think I will follow your suggestion to do a retry....

-- 
Ronald Fischer <ynnor@mm.st>

Just to get some idea ... what kind of resource state could, for example, cause such an effect?

I don't know much about CIFS, but in general, anything that crosses a network can be subject to temporary timeouts.

Take for example, that even in blocking mode, accept() can return without a valid connection for a variety of reasons.

Looking at the wikipedia description, Level 2 OpLocks look like a possibility. I'm not sure what timeouts are involved with the SMB protocol, but if the network is heavily congested or the serving node is bogged down, the client could timeout before the server gets around to responding.

Any code that deals with a network should allow for these possibilities.

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