What you need is at least partially an adaptation of Inside-out objects. 
# note the package level shared hash; this will store the 
# actual values of the active attribute.
my %active : shared;

# CONSTRUCTOR
sub new {
 local *IN;
 my $self = {};
 $self->{active} = \$active{$self} = 1;                    # This vari
+able must be shared between threads.
 $self->{in} = undef;
 $self->{thread} = undef;
 open(*IN, "a_program" ) or ${$self->{active}} = 0;
 $self->{in} = *IN;
 $self->{thread} = threads->new(\&reader, $self);      # Start thread
 bless($self);
 return $self;
}

[download]
Then you can access the shared value as ${$self->{active}}, or as $active{$self} if you're in the package...

At least, I think this will work; it would be nice if I had 5.8.0 installed here to test it :)
--
Mike

In reply to Re: OO and Threads conflict? by RMGir
in thread OO and Threads conflict? by Anonymous Monk

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.