I write my Perl scripts on Debian and have started testing them on ActivePerl, in hopes of releasing them to Win32-only cow-orkers.

The snippet below shows the first obstacle in my cross-platform efforts - no SIGARLRM on Win32.   This shouldn't be a show-stopper, as there *must* be alternatives for user-input timeout.   So far I've found Term::Prompt.   Any monks used that module?   What other methods should I consider for timing-out on user input?

BTW, thanks to converter, mothra, dws and Petruchio for suggestions in CB of *cough* dubious practicality {grin}

    cheers,
    Don
    striving toward Perl Adept
    (it's pronounced "why-bick") 

#!/usr/bin/perl -w

# alarum.pl
# 2001-04-26

use strict;
use Term::ReadKey;

my $pass;

print "\n",
    "  Prompting for password\n",
    "    (*not* echoed to screen nor written to disk)\n\n",
    '    Enter password:';
ReadMode('noecho');
eval {
    local $SIG{ALRM} = sub { die "ALARUM" };
    alarm(60);
    chomp($pass = <STDIN>);
    alarm(0);
    };
if ($@ =~ /ALARUM/) {
    print "\n\n",
        "  Sorry - you waited too long before entering a password.\n",
        "  Try again, if you want.\n\n";
    ReadMode(0);
    exit;
    }
ReadMode(0);

[download]

In reply to cross-platform timeout on user input by ybiC

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.