Do you have a "Win2K and IIS setup" that knows about `ps` ?? After copy-pasting your code to ady.pl, execution on my w2k goes like this:

C:\_wo_ww>perl ady.pl
'ps' is not recognized as an internal or external command,
operable program or batch file.

C:\_wo_ww>

And which version of windoze that knows anything from HUP?

I think you may wish to clarify by answering the question "what's running where?"

There's another puzzle for me, the doubled-backticks around ps, used as if for quoting: Is this a browser artifact or typo or ???