On a server you normally can't assume someone is logged in all the time, so your server process is bound to fail at creating a window one way or another. The normal way to go about what you want to do is write messages to a log, and when someone is logged into the server and wants to see the messages, they tail the logfile (or equivalent), in other words the user launches the viewer process instead of the server. Another solution is that the server process can provide a socket that the "log viewer/control" program can connect to, and the server writes messages there and optionally receives commands. Also, why not have your "backend.pl" running continually?