Actually, I completely understand the ramifications of using the unsafe signals...

Making a blanket statement is not necessarily wise... there are almost always exceptions to the rule.

The fact remains that there are instances where the unsafe signals are required (say for timeouts involving DBD::Oracle). Avoiding the unsafe signals should be done when possible, when it is unavoidable, prepare for the worst.

The perl engine should be fixed to make these 'unsafe' signals to be 'safe' (other engines are able to do this... so I see no reason why the perl engine can not be fixed).

Until that happens, we will have to use unsafe signals when absolutely necessary and when there is no other option.

Once again, the 'trading systems' was just an example of short maintenance windows.