Convenient to say that we are not talking about something as an excuse for ignoring my point. I have stated a reasonable criteria for error checking.

As far as I can tell, I didn't ignore your points:

• I understood your "reasonable criteria" to mean approximately "if it takes you six months to write the code to cater to a certain unlikely error condition, don't do it (unless your employer wants you to)", and that's something I certainly agree with. My response was that this criterion doesn't apply to this thread.
• I thought it would be clear that I also disagree with "Check only for errors you can reasonably expect", but I'll say it explicitly: the definition of "reasonably" can vary wildly, because you're posting to a public forum where any number of strangers might copy and paste your code into any number of versions of Perl on any number of operating systems (which is why many monks write code examples with that in mind, or state explicitly what OSes and Perl versions their code applies to, mention caveats, and code defensively).
• You also seem to be saying that fork returning undef is rare, to which my response was to question your certainty of this point, because I don't see any evidence provided for it, and I think it's better to err on the side of caution in situations like this.

You are of course always welcome to clarify or explain if I missed a point or misunderstood something.

On the other hand, I don't see how accusations of trolling are keeping the discussion on point. In all your replies I have not yet seen a response to my central point: You can't be certain that on any of the systems (including the OP's) where this code might be run in the future, fork will never return undef.

"oh you didn't check e.g. close $fh for an error code in your example program"

People correcting each other like that happens all the time here, and that on its own is not "trolling". What happens less frequently is that people take offense at having errors/flaws/oversights/etc. pointed out to them.

What you people have done is made it impossible to help OPs without feeding the trolls.

What "we people" are doing is maintaining an environment where quality control of each other's posts is a completely normal thing. Sure, sometimes it stings a little to have a mistake pointed out to me. But there are lots of ways to handle the situation: Accept corrections graciously, try to give a reasonable argument against the correction, or find a middle ground like adding a mention of a caveat, or sometimes even just letting the reply stand on its own as an addendum.

Even after re-reading mr_mischief's initial reply, I can detect no ill will in its writing, and certainly nothing that would warrant an accusation insult of "you are a poseur who intends to disrupt and disinform the audience".

On the other hand, almost every one of your posts in this thread has contained insults, whether veiled or direct. So don't be surprised about a negative response or be disappointed if I stop feed^H^H^H^Hresponding :-P

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