Hi,

Why you don't use Compress::Zlib or some other module on CPAN?

You are forking your process, so I don't understand why you are forking again...

I would only fork one time, and load a module in the child process which would open the compressed file and grep it the Perl way.

Updated: Seems like people prefer to put minus points before thinking about what really happen... so I explain it the long way

You fork your main program for then launch the external commands using backsticks (``) but why you use they if you don't are using the output from the command inside the backsticks?

Why you use gunzip and grep when you have modules and bultin functions that give you the same capabilities?

Your external command call is insecure, Why? Because you are missing the ENVIRONMENT, besides some rules, one of the most important is not to execute programs without using the full path to the program:

'/bin/gunzip' instead of 'gunzip'
[download]

I know that this doesn't answer your question, but I think you can learn more from the answer I'd give you, than if I just answered yours.

Take a look at perlsec and some basic documentation about secure sh scripting.

Regards,