coreolyn, i've been following this node very closely. you can see by my replies that i have been trying to solve a similar issue. i was never satisfied with my implementation... mostly due to tilly's constant, nagging reminders to use select :)

well, i did a little investigation on select, and i found some interesting things you'll appreciate. for instance, select is only implemented on sockets in Win32. hrmm. also, open2/open3 cannot redirect input/output in a child process via fork in Win32. i'm afraid a lot of the code you have there is not doing anything useful.

here's a list of links for more information:

perlport
IO::Select on Windows
stdin-socket without fork()??

here's a test script to verify select is in fact, not working. can_write, can_read, and has_exception all come back undef on Win32... (see below)

#!/usr/bin/perl
use IO::Select;
# create typeglobs and add to selector
$output_select = IO::Select->new( *CMD_ERR, *CMD_OUT, *CMD_IN );
# test selector methods
$cnt = $output_select->count();
print "count:     $cnt\n";
@bob = $output_select->handles();
print "list:      @bob\n";
@bob = $output_select->can_write(10);
print "write:     @bob\n";
@bob = $output_select->can_read(10);
print "read:      @bob\n";
@bob = $output_select->has_exception(10);
print "exception: @bob\n";
close(CMD_IN);
close(CMD_OUT);
close(CMD_ERR);
[download]

i'm now working on a client / server solution for executing external programs and redirecting output using sockets. as soon as i have something solid, i'll be sure to post it, and /msg you with the node_id.

thank you for using microsoft ;-D

~Particle