I can and I do. But this routine log not only $! but any messages, and thus expect _correct_ scalars - i.e. if it contain non-ASCII chars then it must be Unicode string (utf8::is_utf8 should return true).

At every point where app receive text from outside world (stdin,@ARGV,CGI params,network,database) it decode from bytes to Unicode using known encoding. At every point where app output text to outside world (stdout,files,logs,network,etc.) it encode Unicode into bytes using known encoding. Between input and output all text in scalars is in Unicode. Now, we get $! somewhere in the middle of the app, and turns out this is one more "receive from outside world" point where we should decode bytes to Unicode - but doing this everewhere we may get $! is too unconvenient.

In reply to Re^2: encoding for $! by powerman
in thread encoding for $! by powerman

Title:
Use:  <p> text here (a paragraph) </p>
and:  <code> code here </code>
to format your post, it's "PerlMonks-approved HTML":


  • Posts are HTML formatted. Put <p> </p> tags around your paragraphs. Put <code> </code> tags around your code and data!
  • Titles consisting of a single word are discouraged, and in most cases are disallowed outright.
  • Read Where should I post X? if you're not absolutely sure you're posting in the right place.
  • Please read these before you post! —
  • Posts may use any of the Perl Monks Approved HTML tags:
    a, abbr, b, big, blockquote, br, caption, center, col, colgroup, dd, del, details, div, dl, dt, em, font, h1, h2, h3, h4, h5, h6, hr, i, ins, li, ol, p, pre, readmore, small, span, spoiler, strike, strong, sub, summary, sup, table, tbody, td, tfoot, th, thead, tr, tt, u, ul, wbr
  • You may need to use entities for some characters, as follows. (Exception: Within code tags, you can put the characters literally.)
            For:     Use:
    & &amp;
    < &lt;
    > &gt;
    [ &#91;
    ] &#93;
  • Link using PerlMonks shortcuts! What shortcuts can I use for linking?
  • See Writeup Formatting Tips and other pages linked from there for more info.