in reply to System command using array and pipe

I would use a simpler solution than those presented so far: use system() with a scalar argument and simply quote the path containing a space so that the shell sees it as a single argument.

system("mysqldump --add-drop-table -uroot -ppassword mydatabase | gzip -9c > '/home/username/Ubuntu One/mydatabase.sql.gz'");

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Re^2: System command using array and pipe
by ikegami (Patriarch) on Jun 04, 2011 at 19:14 UTC
    That's basically the second one I posted except you don't handle "'" in paths, spaces and other symbols in passwords, etc.
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      Your comments are fair, but in common use cases appropriate quoting of the shell command line is sufficient, especially if one can control the contents of the password and filename. If these come from arbitrary user input, then your approach is more reasonable.

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        I'm not sure what you mean. I can guess you'd mean one of these.

        • Store the shell literal in the config. 

          my $password = '...';  # Not the password, but a shell literal of the 
+password.
system( ... "-p$password" ... );

          [download]

        • Pretend the config is a shell literal. 

          my $password = '...';
system( ... "-p$password" ... );  # Pretend $password is a shell liter
+al.

          [download]

        • Embed the config data in the command 

          system( ... "-p..." ... );

          [download]

        Every one of these are very unappealing to me.

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