open(CONFIG, "+<", "c:\\blah.txt" or die "Can't open blah.txt: $!");

should look like this:

open(CONFIG, "+<", "c:\\blah.txt") or die "Can't open blah.txt: $!";

The   'or die...'   bit is not part of the   open(...).

Update: The suggestion of John M. Dlugosz regarding the regex modifier is also promising (depending on the nature of the data). But /m is the one you want to explore, not /s.

These are often confused:
        /m   allows ^ and $ to match embedded \n
        /s   allows . (dot) to match newlines
 

The easiest way to modify a file in place is probably to use Perl's nifty in-place editing feature. Here's one way of doing it:

#!/usr/bin/perl -i.bak
# in-place editing; save the original file with a .bak extension

use Win32::Console;
use strict;


open(STDERR, ">error.log") or die "Can't open error log: $!\n";

my $con = Win32::Console->new();

$con->Mode(ENABLE_WINDOW_INPUT | ENABLE_PROCESSED_INPUT |
           ENABLE_LINE_INPUT | ENABLE_ECHO_INPUT |
           ENABLE_PROCESSED_OUTPUT | ENABLE_WRAP_AT_EOL_OUTPUT);

$con->Display;

$con->Write("Please enter the agent ID number: ");

chomp(my $port = <STDIN>);

$con->Write("The port number to use is $port.\n"); #Debug stuff, this 
+works

{
  local @ARGV = "c:\\blah.txt";
  # set up a temporary @ARGV for in-place editing

  while (<>) {
    s/serverport 111$/serverport $port/;
    print;
  }
}
[download]

See perlrun for more about Perl's -i command line switch.

Thanks for the suggestions. I'm still getting the same error with your code as I mentioned in my post below - can't find c:\blah.txt, no such file or directory. But the file is definitely there...Maybe it's a Win32 thing??

Thanks,

Glenn

Just checking, the file really is in the root directory of the C drive?

You might try specifying the file simply as 'blah.txt' (without any path), chdir-ing to the directory containing 'blah.txt', and running your script from there.

Any ideas??

Thanks,

Glenn

First you can drop the Windows centric paths and use / instead of \ Perl will supply Windows with the correct path delimiters for the platform automagically changing / into \ as required.

The path is not however your problem. As you open the file for read/write you need to remember that at the end of the read you are at EOF so you need to seek the begining of the file and also truncate it to 0 unless you want to run the risk of getting crap at the end. I have added as die to the print CONFIG (remove the seek and truncate and you will get the error). This runs fine now. BTW don't open STDERR ">error.log" without including some path info. Even ./ for the current working directory makes it obvious where to look for this file. Also when you read data in from a file the newlines will still be there so you don't need to add more in your substitution

  open(CONFIG, "+<c:/blah.txt" ) or die "Can't open blah.txt: $!";
  my @configfile = <CONFIG>;
  seek CONFIG, 0, 0;  # go to start of file for overwrite
  truncate CONFIG, 0; # get rid of old file
  foreach my $configfile (@configfile) {
      $configfile =~ s/serverport 111$/serverport $port/;
      print CONFIG $configfile or die $!;
  }
  close(CONFIG);
  close(STDERR);
[download]

cheers

tachyon

s&&rsenoyhcatreve&&&s&n.+t&"$'$`$\"$\&"&ee&&y&srve&&d&&print

Thanks for your suggestions. However, using c:/blah.txt still gives me the "can't find file" error. I've also tried variations like the filename in all caps, capitalizing the drive letter, even trying /blah.txt, thinking perhaps perl will translate that to the root of my only hard drive. No such luck.

Other thoughts??

Thanks,

Glenn

Thanks again,

Glenn