Grand, that works beautifully. I would not have opened Win32API::File on my own. Just to wrap it up, it looks like this, once fit to my program:

my $hPipe = createFile( $PIPE_NAME, "rwe" )
    or die "Can't read from [$PIPE_NAME]: $^E\n";

$^E = 0; # Clear possibly misleading errors out.
no strict 'subs';
OsFHandleOpen( PIPE, $hPipe, "rw" )
    or die "Can't associate Perl handle: $! ($^E)\n";
use strict 'subs';

[download]
The 'e' portion of the "rwe" arg to createFile() causes an error if the file doesn't already exist, which is the behavior I want. If the pipe server isn't running, I need to know.

I expect there's a better way to quiet the complaint about the filehandle being a bareword, too.

Since I'm not reporting $^E unless there's an error, is it necessary to clear it ahead of time?

Thanks for the prompt answer to something that turned out trickier than I thought.

In reply to Tye, that does the job. by Coleoid
in thread How do I open a r/w named pipe as a file? *Should* be simple... by Coleoid

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