Hmmm - this problem is indeed baffling, i recommend a different approach - IO::Pipe:

#!/usr/bin/perl -w

use strict;
use IO::Pipe;

my $pipe = IO::Pipe->new();
$pipe->reader('dir c:\\temp');

my $line;

while ($line = <$pipe>) {
     print "Linha.....: $line \n";
}
[download]

Anytime i need a 'portable' script, i like to use a framework that encapsulates the offending piece of code - such as opening a pipe to a system process.

Jeff

R-R-R--R-R-R--R-R-R--R-R-R--R-R-R--
L-L--L-L--L-L--L-L--L-L--L-L--L-L--