$ret_val = `system call`;

that is what i have now, and $ret_val doesn't take the output. the system call's input comes from the keyboard and executes it on the remote computer. the code i have is:

$cmd = <$client>;

also had:

chomp($cmd = <$client>);

the system call code is:

system("$cmd");

i also tried writing the system call's output to a text file and print it on the remote computer like this:

system("$cmd > cmd");
open(OUT, "cmd");
print $client "$cmd";

but the system call's command doesn't work, with chomp() or without. the error message is:

: command not found