Question regarding options like -i -n -p

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

Hello monks :) I understand that option like -i do something like this around the script:

#!/usr/bin/perl
    while (<>) {
        if ($ARGV ne $oldargv) {
            rename($ARGV, $ARGV . '.bak');
            open(ARGVOUT, ">$ARGV");
            select(ARGVOUT);
            $oldargv = $ARGV;
        }
        s/foo/bar/;
    }
    continue {
        print;    # this prints to original filename
    }
    select(STDOUT);
[download]

My question here is, let's say you want to use -i and to destroy the .bak files generated by your script after it has processed all your files (I am forced to make backups because I'm on windows). How can you "access", I mean write some code after the line: select(STDOUT) in the code above? Thanks a lot!

Comment on Question regarding options like -i -n -p Download Code

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Re: Question regarding options like -i -n -p by Corion (Patriarch) on May 29, 2013 at 20:28 UTC
I would keep a list of files to delete, and delete them in an `END` block: `push @CLEANUP, $ARGV if $oldargv ne $ARGV; END { unlink $_ for @CLEANUP };` [download] ... of course, that somewhat circumvents the idea of backup files, as that END block will still wipe all files ...	[reply] [d/l] [select]
Re: Question regarding options like -i -n -p by Laurent_R (Canon) on May 29, 2013 at 20:34 UTC
I am not sure of what you want exactly, but if you want to get rid of bakcup files, you can do something like this: `$ perl -i.bak -pe 's/ / /g; END {unlink ".bak"}' file.txt` This is nix syntax, but I guess you could have this untested equivalent under Windows: `perl -i.bak -pe "s/ / /g; END {unlink qq/*.bak/}" file.txt`	[reply] [d/l] [select]
Re^2: Question regarding options like -i -n -p by AnomalousMonk (Archbishop) on May 29, 2013 at 21:16 UTC
I don't remember about (and cannot test (and don't want to bother looking up)) unlink under nix, but under Windoze it doesn't do wildcards. But this sure works (for Windose): `>perl -wMstrict -le "unlink glob '.bak'; "` [download]	[reply] [d/l]
Re^3: Question regarding options like -i -n -p by Laurent_R (Canon) on Jun 01, 2013 at 21:24 UTC
Yes, you are right, my mistake. The unlink function does not take wildwards, also not under *nix. So the use of the additional glob function would be necessary to get it to work.	[reply]
Re: Question regarding options like -i -n -p by SuicideJunkie (Vicar) on May 29, 2013 at 20:25 UTC
If you want to do more than just simple file munging, then a one-liner on the command prompt is probably not for you. Populate a .pl file with the code, and add some extra code to the end, comments and strict and warnings, and even newlines for readability. Then run that script. ~~If you tell us what it is you want to do, there may be a trick for it, but in general, just make a "real" script.~~ See below posts for deleting backup files at the end.	[reply]