Hi Folks, My code is actually doing what I want it to, but I'm curious about some unexpected behavior so I am here to ask those who might know. :-)

My script sends a system command to TFS to attempt to extract a build label in order to assess if that build has been baselined. This is my mock-up to test the code:

$tf="C:\\Program Files (x86)\\Microsoft Visual Studio 10.0\\Common7\\I
+DE\\tf.exe";
$buildLabel = "the build label";
$/ = undef;

BuildCheckedInToTFS();

sub BuildCheckedInToTFS(){
    my $checkedIn = 0;
    print "Verifying build label exists in TFS...\n";
    `\"$tf\" labels /owner:theOwner \"$buildLabel\"  > "TFSLabelInfo.t
+xt"`;
    open TFSLABEL, "TFSLabelInfo.txt" or die $!;
    my $TFSLabel = <TFSLABEL>;
    close TFSLABEL;
    if ($TFSLabel =~ /$buildLabel/){
        $checkedIn = 1;
        print "Build $buildLabel has been checked-in to TFS.";
    }
    else {
        print "Baselining failed. \n:" +
            "Build $buildLabel has not been checked-in to TFS.";
    }
    return $checkedIn;
}
[download]

For those who are curious, I use the returned value in another portion of the script. Anywho, it is doing just what I want- it reports whether or not the build label in question is present. This is just an audit script so that's all I need. However, when I was just testing the tf command and all I had was this

$tf="C:\\Program Files (x86)\\Microsoft Visual Studio 10.0\\Common7\\I
+DE\\tf.exe";
$buildLabel = "the build label";
`\"$tf\" labels /owner:theOwner \"$buildLabel\"`;
[download]

in my script it produced no apparent result. When I would run the script there would be a pause as though some work were taking place, then the command prompt would simply reappear and there would be no output on the screen. I figured it was checking the mapped drive so I added the redirection to see if something would come of that. As soon as I did, the text file appeared and I got the expected result (a listing of the labels matching the specs). What I don't understand is why I get no output in the command window when I run the tf command via my Perl script. When I simply run the command at the command prompt I get the expected output (a listing of the labels matching the specs) in the window, but when I run it via my script I get nada in the command window. I even tried putting in an echo command and still the same thing - a pause followed by the command prompt. I would expect nothing to show in the window if the output is being redirected, but I don't get why it is happening when the output is not redirected.

This doesn't matter in terms of the function of this script, but I'm curious to know the reason why. I am new to Perl and perhaps what you might call an advanced beginner at programming, so if you need to get very technical a link to a detailed explanation would really be welcome. Thanks in advance!

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