#!/usr/bin/perl -w
# forks_test.pl
use forks;

my $pid = open(CLI, "$ENV{HOME}/bin/cli all -D |") or die "couldn't fork: $!\n";
my $output = '';
while(<CLI>) {
#chomp($_);
if ($_ =~ /\w+.*/) {
$output .= $_;
print "$_\n";
} else {
}
}
close(CLI);

[prompt> ./forks_test.pl
cat: write error: Broken pipe

Any ideas out there about this one? I am using perl 5.8.5 on a RH9 linux box.

This works just fine as soon as I comment out forks.

Then leave use forks; commented out. Problem solved.

That may sound like sarcasm, but it's also good advice. You do not need forks.pm in order to use fork or the forking open.

Read the documentation on forks and you'll discover that it is a way of emulating the threads api. for those situations where threads are (or were) unreliable.

For what you are doing in this snippet, you do not need and should not be using forks.

So stop forking around and stop trying to use the module for things that it was not intended for :)

You might also try reading http://perlmonks.com/index.pl?node=Writeup%20Formatting%20Tips

---

Examine what is said, not who speaks.

"Efficiency is intelligent laziness." -David Dunham
"Think for yourself!" - Abigail
"Memory, processor, disk in that order on the hardware side. Algorithm, algoritm, algorithm on the code side." - tachyon

Thanks for your response.
I didn't make myself as clear as I should have. In my original post I meant I was using threads (but didn't want to because of their unreliability and processor + memory intensive consumption).

I then realized I might be able to use forks.pm and not have to change any of my threads code (plus I thought it might even be faster due to the speed of the system fork in linux). When I tried this is when I ran into several problems, one of which was the filehandle error. I slimmed it all down to one little script just to show that there was an issue with the forks.pm module and opening filehandles.

Thanks for all the help already given and for any future advice, about perl as well as site etiquette. :)