use 'select' to change default output handle for entire script

richz has asked for the wisdom of the Perl Monks concerning the following question:

I am using select to change the default output filehandle to STDERR. I want the default output filehandle to be STDERR even for any subroutines I call. Is there anyway to do this? Basically I want to say at the top of my script:

unless(-t STDERR) {
  select STDERR;
}
[download]

and I want this to take effect for the entire script including subroutines.

Comment on use 'select' to change default output handle for entire script Download Code

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Re: use 'select' to change default output handle for entire script by ikegami (Patriarch) on Nov 19, 2004 at 16:02 UTC
Is there any reason to believe `select` doesn't do all of that? `$ cat > script.pl print('!', $/); select(STDERR); sub test { print('@', $/); } test(); ^D $ perl script.pl 2>stderr ! $ cat stderr @ $` [download] Are you worried that someone will `select` something else?	[reply] [d/l] [select]
Re^2: use 'select' to change default output handle for entire script by richz (Beadle) on Nov 23, 2004 at 19:03 UTC
No, i had reason to believe select doesn't do that but it was my fault...I was launching the scripts from a Win32 app and CreateProcess() wasn't using the one in my PATH beucase of the search order blah blah. Bottom line, you're right and select does all of what I wanted.	[reply]
Re: use 'select' to change default output handle for entire script by nimdokk (Vicar) on Nov 19, 2004 at 14:32 UTC
I suppose you could do something like: `open STDOUT, ">>&STDERR" or die "Cannot redirect STDOUT to STDERR. $!" +;` [download]	[reply] [d/l]
Re^2: use 'select' to change default output handle for entire script by richz (Beadle) on Nov 19, 2004 at 14:38 UTC
Hmm, but then if I really wanted to use STDOUT I'd have to reopen it right?	[reply]
Re^3: use 'select' to change default output handle for entire script by rev_1318 (Chaplain) on Nov 19, 2004 at 15:51 UTC
Then first open a filehandle to your old STDOUT, before redirecting STDOUT: `open OLDSTDOUT ">&STDOUT" or die "oops: $!"; open STDOUT ">&STDERR" or die "oops: $!"; print OLDSTDOUT "Still to STDOUT..\n";` [download] Paul	[reply] [d/l]