Thanks again. Like I mentioned in the original post, I wasn't quite sure what some of the stuff was doing. Not much "fork" experience and what I was using was just bits n pieces I found via google. Using your last post, this is what I came up with and still seems to work just fine. I like doing just the exit instead of the kill.

#!/etrade/bin/perl
for ($i=0; $i<=10; $i++) {
        wait_for_a_kid() if keys %pid_to_node > 3;
        $pid = fork;
        if ($pid) {
                ## parent does...
                $pid_to_node{$pid} = $i;
        }
        else {
                print "$i $$\n";
                local $SIG {ALRM} = sub {
                        print "\tKilled PID $$\n";
                        exit(1)};
                alarm 2;
                eval {
                        ## child does...
                        &Test;
                };
        }
}
## final reap:
1 while wait_for_a_kid();

sub wait_for_a_kid {
        my $pid = wait;
        return 0 if $pid < 0;
        delete $pid_to_node{$pid} or warn("Why did I see $pid ($?)\n")
+, next;
}

sub Test {
        sleep 5;
}
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