I can't confirm that:

perl -le "system('start /min cmd.exe')"
# starts a minimized command window, just as expected
# This is perl, v5.8.5 built for MSWin32-x86-multi-thread
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So maybe show us your code - you get bonus points if you can reduce it to the following four lines:

my $cmd = "..."; # this is the important part you have to supply
print "Trying to launch '$cmd'\n";
system($cmd) == 0
    or warn "Couldn't launch '$cmd': $!/$?";
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I tried to reproduce your problem in Win2k with ActivePerl 5.6.1 and on WinXP with ActivePerl 5.6.0, 5.6.1, 5.8.0 and 5.8.8 using

perl -e "system('start /min notepad');"
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but it worked fine every time. Could you provide more info, such as the code you are using?

and

$ perl -e 'system("cmd /c start /min notepad") and die $!;'
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works with Cygwin's Perl. (But note the required "cmd /c")

---

_Search, Ask, ^Know

Hi,

I am having trouble with the "start" command.

Here is the contents of the PERL5SHELL environment variable:

    c:\>echo %PERL5SHELL%
    cmd.exe /c
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Calling the "dir" command works fine:

    c:\>perl -e "system(\"dir\")"
     Datenträger in Laufwerk C: ist SYSTEM
     Volumeseriennummer: CA02-1E1F
    
     Verzeichnis von c:\
    
    03.08.2012  14:24    <DIR>          cygwin
    09.10.2012  18:01    <DIR>          Daten
    ...
    10.10.2012  08:59    <DIR>          Windows
                   2 Datei(en),         15.460 Bytes
                  15 Verzeichnis(se), 144.527.847.424 Bytes frei
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Calling "start dir" from Perl does not work:

    c:\>perl -e "system(\"start dir\")"
    start: dir: Das System kann die angegebene Datei nicht finden.
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Calling "start dir" directly opens a new window with the output from above:

    c:\>start dir
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Any idea what might cause this behaviour??

Yours

Markus