Why I can't remove trailing slash

anaconda_wly has asked for the wisdom of the Perl Monks concerning the following question:

Replies are listed 'Best First'.
Re: Why I can't remove trailing slash by daxim (Curate) on Apr 19, 2013 at 15:42 UTC
You neglect to call `main`. The escaping notation is broken, you specified `$path` to have the literal string `\\127.0.0.1\ak\`. Better use single quotes: `my $path = '\\\\127.0.0.1\\c$\\bak\\';` [download] or avoid nasty backslash escaping with heredoc: `my $path = <<'UNC'; \\127.0.0.1\c$\bak\ UNC chomp $path;` [download]	[reply] [d/l] [select]
Re: Why I can't remove trailing slash by kennethk (Abbot) on Apr 19, 2013 at 15:44 UTC
Because you never call the `main` subroutine. `use strict; use warnings; sub main { my $path = "\\\\127.0.0.1\\c\$\\bak\\"; $path =~ s/\\$//; print __FILE__.__LINE__." path $path\n"; return; } main();` [download] or even better `use strict; use warnings; my $path = <<'EOT'; \\127.0.0.1\c$\bak\ EOT $path =~ s/\\$//; printf "%s %s path %s\n", __FILE__, __LINE__, $path;` [download] Unlike C or Java, you don't need a main subroutine; the script just runs in the order it's written, like a shell script. Note as well that I had to escape your `$` since `"` interpolates - you were inserting $\ into your `$path` assignment. If you'd actually run your subroutine, you would have gotten a warning. #11929 First ask yourself `How would I do this without a computer?' Then have the computer do it the same way.	[reply] [d/l] [select]
Re: Why I can't remove trailing slash by choroba (Cardinal) on Apr 19, 2013 at 15:43 UTC
Have you run `main()`? Also note that `$\` is a variable to be interpolated in double quotes. `\b` also has a special meaning (`chr 8`). لսႽ† ᥲᥒ⚪⟊Ⴙᘓᖇ Ꮅᘓᖇ⎱ Ⴙᥲ𝇋ƙᘓᖇ	[reply] [d/l] [select]
Re: Why I can't remove trailing slash by blue_cowdawg (Monsignor) on Apr 19, 2013 at 15:47 UTC
I want to remove the trailing slash in the path but the code print nothing. Why? Added exactly one line to your code and got results. Here's the new code: `#!/usr/bin/perl -w use strict; use warnings; sub main { my $path = "\\\\127.0.0.1\\c$\\bak\\"; $path =~ s/\\$//; print __FILE__.__LINE__." path $path\n"; return; } main();` [download] and here are the results: `$ ./hackslash.pl Use of uninitialized value $\ in concatenation (.) or string at ./hack +slash.pl line 6. ./hackslash.pl8 path \\127.0.0.1\ak` [download] What I think you really wanted was to add a backslash before the $ since normally that would have been interpoloated resulting in : `# note the backslash in front of the dollar sign my $path = "\\\\127.0.0.1\\c\$\\bak\\";` [download] giving you: `$ ./hackslash.pl ./hackslash.pl8 path \\127.0.0.1\c$\bak` [download] Creating a sub without calling it will act as a NOOP. Peter L. Berghold -- Unix Professional Peter -at- Berghold -dot- Net; AOL IM redcowdawg Yahoo IM: blue_cowdawg	[reply] [d/l] [select]
Re^2: Why I can't remove trailing slash by anaconda_wly (Scribe) on Apr 20, 2013 at 01:32 UTC
Thank you all.... Funny question. My head freezed. And all replies wonderful.	[reply]
Re: Why I can't remove trailing slash by space_monk (Chaplain) on Apr 19, 2013 at 15:46 UTC
Hmmm...where to start? :-) Its not really clear what you're trying to do here. For one thing you didn't execute the main() routine. Perl does not run any method unless you tell it to, unlike C. Use single quotes for your path variable. The $\ in it produces an error. Did you really mean to use the record separator variable here? If you are editing/manipulating file paths use some of the standard libraries for doing so (e.g. File::Basename). If any of my proposed solutions have minor errors, it's because I don't waste my genius on trivial matters. :-P	[reply]