Global symbol .... requires explicit package name at

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

UPDATE: SOLUTION PROVIDED

I have a written a working Perl script (my first one). The interpreter complains when I turn on 'use strict'. I get the following error message: "Global symbol $files requires explicit package name at...line 19...line 20...line 24".

My code:

#!/usr/bin/perl
use warnings;
use strict;

my @files;
my $downloadpath = "/home/content/c/r/e/creatingzion/html/downloads";
my $timestamp = time();
my $modified_time; #[9] in the list of file attributes.
my $age_of_file;
my $time_to_live = 3600;

#return a list of all the mp3 files in the downloadpath
opendir(DIR, $downloadpath);
@files = grep(/\.mp3$/,readdir(DIR));
closedir(DIR);
#end comment

#compare each file's last modified time with the current time and dele
+te any files older than the time to live in seconds.
foreach $files (@files)
{    $modified_time = (stat($downloadpath."/".$files))[9];
    print $modified_time;
    $age_of_file = $timestamp - $modified_time;
    if($age_of_file >= $time_to_live)
        {unlink($downloadpath."/".$files);}
}
#end comment
[download]

The only thing I can think of and only thing my research indicates is that I need to use a lexical variable. But I'm doing that already.

UPDATE: Thank you both for you help.

Comment on Global symbol .... requires explicit package name at Download Code

Replies are listed 'Best First'.
Re: Global symbol .... requires explicit package name at by toolic (Bishop) on Oct 19, 2009 at 17:52 UTC
foreach $files (@files) I would change this line to: `foreach my $file (@files)` [download] That would distinguish a single file from your array of files. Of course, you must change every instance of `$files` to `$file` inside your foreach loop. See also Foreach Loops	[reply] [d/l] [select]
Re: Global symbol .... requires explicit package name at by bv (Friar) on Oct 19, 2009 at 18:06 UTC
use diagnostics `Global symbol "$files" requires explicit package name at 1.pl line 19. Execution of 1.pl aborted due to compilation errors (#1) (F) You've said "use strict" or "use strict vars", which indicates + that all variables must either be lexically scoped (using "my" or +"state"), declared beforehand using "our", or explicitly qualified to say which package the global variable is in (using "::").` [download] The variable `$files` isn't lexical. `foreach` (and `for`) uses `$_` by default, but if you specify a variable name before the list, it's roughly equivalent to `foreach (@files) { $files = $_; #etc...` [download] So to be properly `strict`, you need to use `my`. Here are some examples of odd places where you would have to use `my`: `for my $i ( 0 .. 10 ) { print "$i\n" } open my $fh, '<', "/etc/passwd"; while (my $line = <>) { next if /^\s#/ }` [download] `print pack("A25",pack("V",map{1919242272+$_}(34481450,-49737472,6228,0,-285028276,6979,-1380265972)))`	[reply] [d/l] [select]
Re^2: Global symbol .... requires explicit package name at by GrandFather (Saint) on Oct 19, 2009 at 19:55 UTC
The variable $files isn't lexical. foreach (and for) uses $_ by default, but if you specify a variable name before the list, it's roughly equivalent to `foreach (@files) { $files = $_; #etc...` [download] Actually, not even roughly! The loop variable is an alias to each element of the list processed by the for loop so indicating an equivalence using assignment is quite misleading. The OP should note that a for loop variable is magical and is only valid within the scope of the loop. A same named variable outside the loop, even if declared as a lexical variable using my, is a different animal to the loop variable. Consider: `use strict; use warnings; my $var = 42; print "before: $var\n"; for $var (1 .. 10) { print "$var "; } print "\nafter: $var\n";` [download] Prints: `before: 42 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 after: 42` [download] True laziness is hard work	[reply] [d/l] [select]