works on command line but not in script

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

Hi all,

I have a quoting quandry question ;)

I have a command that works fine on the command line of a unix shell...

> doorway $user@$host.$display 'MSG Hello user.'
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That works exactly as expected... now... in a script

my $command  = "doorway";
my $location = "$user\@$host.$display";
my $arg      = "'MSG Hello user'";
my $ret      = system($command, $location, $arg,);
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The "doorway" command is printing '-1' and $ret is set to '0'. I don't understand. Can anyone tell if my quoting is the problem? The $arg must have the single-quotes in the shell so I assume it needs them passed somehow to the system command.

Thanks for any help.

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Re: works on command line but not in script by blakem (Monsignor) on Nov 30, 2001 at 05:31 UTC
I see two possible issues with this but I don't really know what your intent is.... First, the single quotes around $arg probably shouldn't be there. In the shell command they are used to distinguish one argument from the next, which is unnecessary with the list form of `system` Second, where are $user $host and $display coming from? You might want to check the value of $location to be sure its what you expect..... perl variables and enviornment variables are different beasties. In short, give this a shot: `my $command = "doorway"; my $location = "$user\@$host.$display"; print "Location = $location\n"; my $arg = "MSG Hello user"; my $ret = system($command, $location, $arg,);` [download] -Blake	[reply] [d/l] [select]
Re: works on command line but not in script by qslack (Scribe) on Nov 30, 2001 at 08:32 UTC
Try using the full path to doorway -- it might be that your Perl program's $PATH is different from your shell's. Quinn Slack perl -e 's ssfhjok qupyrqs&&tr sfjkohpyuqrspitnrapj"hs&&eval&&s&&&'	[reply]