no output from debug prompt

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

Hi Monks;

I'm using MacOS Mavericks and iterm2.

I ssh in to a Linux box.

I have a simple perl script on which I want to use the built-in perl debugger (on the Linux box).

The perl version on the linux box is v5.8.8 (yes I know, ancient).

The problem: no output other than the debug prompt when I am inside the debugger.

Where does the problem lie?
5.8.8 perl debugger is broken?
iterm2 doesn't like the perl debugger?
The perl debugger output is being discarded by ssh?

I'm going to try to simplify the problem by using perl locally on the mac, but that is a very recent version (v5.16.2). If that works, I still don't know where to look to solve the problem.

Hints please.

Thanks,
Ken Wolcott

Status Update: This problem occurs on iterm2 on hte MacOS Mavericks box itself using the local perl version. So is this a problem with iterm2 or a configuration with iterm2?

Status Update #2: This problem does not occur using the Terminal provided with MacOS Mavericks, therefore it must be an Iterm2 problem and will pursue the issue there.

Comment on no output from debug prompt

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Re: no output from debug prompt by educated_foo (Vicar) on Dec 24, 2013 at 02:40 UTC
I used iTerm many years ago, but the built-in Terminal.app has greatly improved since then, to the point that it's actually usable. What does iTerm offer these days?	[reply]
Re: no output from debug prompt by QM (Parson) on Dec 24, 2013 at 14:35 UTC
What did you try to run? There are a lot of reasons that you might not get any output, including waiting for user input, or crossed wires between file descriptors. I would first try: `perl -demo` [download] and see what you get. If that works, then your script is probably to blame. If it doesn't work, it may be some wonky interaction between the debugger, ssh, and iterm2. The debugger does some magic with STDERR, for instance, that makes it awkward when a script uses it for something too. -QM -- Quantum Mechanics: The dreams stuff is made of	[reply] [d/l]
Re^2: no output from debug prompt by kwolcott (Acolyte) on Dec 25, 2013 at 05:18 UTC
Thanks for your reply. The root cause was that in iterm2 my setting for the bold font was white, which is the same color as I have for my background. Thanks, Ken	[reply]