And the reason you can't see my variables from the included script is because my declares a lexical variable which will falls out of scope at the end of a file (as lexical variables are declared into the surrounding file scope by default). So your alternatives are to either export your variables by implementing import() and turning your file into a module (perhaps not ideal for your situation), or using package variables which are visible throughout the execution of a program.

Filter::Include was the solution, thank you for that advice (and for your authorship). My intention was to write tests for a module. The test routines directly use not explicitly exported symbols in the module. I split the module and the tests in separate files, so I had to fully qualify the not explicitly exported symbols - very uncomfortable and not adequate for a module that knows so much about the the other. A workaround was "BEGIN { `cat x-module x-test>x`}; use x", but that was very ugly. "use Filter::Include; include "x-test" is much nicer. But there keeps one problem: Line numbering isn't considered; the including file and the included file are handled as one big file, so line numbers after the first inclusion are wrong. Bye, jds00.

Thanks for the heads up on line numbering. As of version 1.4 that should be corrected thanks to the #line directive (although you'll also need Module::Locate, but it's dependencies are few and common).
HTH

_________
broquaint

   use My_Module;
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   perldoc perl
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           perlmod             Perl modules: how they work
           perlmodlib          Perl modules: how to write and use
           perlmodstyle        Perl modules: how to write modules with
+ style
           perlmodinstall      Perl modules: how to install from CPAN
           perlnewmod          Perl modules: preparing a new module fo
+r distribution
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   perldoc perlmodlib
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 One of the perl command line flags is "-P" which instructs perl to run the C preprocessor upon the source of the script.

 So "test.pl":

print "Before\n";
#include "test2.pl"
print "After\n";
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 And test2.pl:

print "During\n";
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 Will do the right thing if you run "perl -P test.pl" - producing:

Before
During
After

 However I suspect this isn'te really what you want to do - and the replies mentioning modules are the real solution to your problem.

 (OT: Using ActivePerl 'perl -P' crashes immediately under Windows, and has as long as I can remember. Weird.)

I'd have to say, this all sounds like a really bad idea. You are asking for trouble by doing it this way as opposed to using modules with "use" or "require." You'll end up creating all kinds of action-at-a-distance problems that will make your code much harder to debug and maintain. I would strongly advise you to use modules instead.