Clean up and document API for hashes
[p5sagit/p5-mst-13.2.git] / pod / perldiag.pod
CommitLineData
a0d0e21e 1=head1 NAME
2
3perldiag - various Perl diagnostics
4
5=head1 DESCRIPTION
6
7These messages are classified as follows (listed in increasing order of
8desperation):
9
10 (W) A warning (optional).
11 (D) A deprecation (optional).
12 (S) A severe warning (mandatory).
13 (F) A fatal error (trappable).
14 (P) An internal error you should never see (trappable).
15 (X) A very fatal error (non-trappable).
cb1a09d0 16 (A) An alien error message (not generated by Perl).
a0d0e21e 17
748a9306 18Optional warnings are enabled by using the B<-w> switch. Warnings may
8b1a09fc 19be captured by setting C<$SIG{__WARN__}> to a reference to a routine that will be
748a9306 20called on each warning instead of printing it. See L<perlvar>.
21Trappable errors may be trapped using the eval operator. See
22L<perlfunc/eval>.
a0d0e21e 23
24Some of these messages are generic. Spots that vary are denoted with a %s,
2ba9eb46 25just as in a printf format. Note that some messages start with a %s!
a0d0e21e 26The symbols C<"%-?@> sort before the letters, while C<[> and C<\> sort after.
27
28=over 4
29
30=item "my" variable %s can't be in a package
31
32(F) Lexically scoped variables aren't in a package, so it doesn't make sense
33to try to declare one with a package qualifier on the front. Use local()
34if you want to localize a package variable.
35
2ba9eb46 36=item "my" variable %s masks earlier declaration in same scope
37
38(S) A lexical variable has been redeclared in the same scope, effectively
39eliminating all access to the previous instance. This is almost always
8b1a09fc 40a typographical error. Note that the earlier variable will still exist
2ba9eb46 41until the end of the scope or until all closure referents to it are
42destroyed.
43
a0d0e21e 44=item "no" not allowed in expression
45
46(F) The "no" keyword is recognized and executed at compile time, and returns
47no useful value. See L<perlmod>.
48
49=item "use" not allowed in expression
50
51(F) The "use" keyword is recognized and executed at compile time, and returns
52no useful value. See L<perlmod>.
53
54=item % may only be used in unpack
55
5f05dabc 56(F) You can't pack a string by supplying a checksum, because the
a0d0e21e 57checksumming process loses information, and you can't go the other
58way. See L<perlfunc/unpack>.
59
60=item %s (...) interpreted as function
61
62(W) You've run afoul of the rule that says that any list operator followed
8b1a09fc 63by parentheses turns into a function, with all the list operators arguments
5f05dabc 64found inside the parentheses. See L<perlop/Terms and List Operators (Leftward)>.
a0d0e21e 65
66=item %s argument is not a HASH element
67
5f05dabc 68(F) The argument to exists() must be a hash element, such as
a0d0e21e 69
70 $foo{$bar}
71 $ref->[12]->{"susie"}
72
5f05dabc 73=item %s argument is not a HASH element or slice
74
75(F) The argument to delete() must be either a hash element, such as
76
77 $foo{$bar}
78 $ref->[12]->{"susie"}
79
80or a hash slice, such as
81
82 @foo{$bar, $baz, $xyzzy}
83 @{$ref->[12]}{"susie", "queue"}
84
a0d0e21e 85=item %s did not return a true value
86
87(F) A required (or used) file must return a true value to indicate that
88it compiled correctly and ran its initialization code correctly. It's
89traditional to end such a file with a "1;", though any true value would
90do. See L<perlfunc/require>.
91
92=item %s found where operator expected
93
94(S) The Perl lexer knows whether to expect a term or an operator. If it
95sees what it knows to be a term when it was expecting to see an operator,
96it gives you this warning. Usually it indicates that an operator or
97delimiter was omitted, such as a semicolon.
98
f86702cc 99=item %s had compilation errors
a0d0e21e 100
101(F) The final summary message when a C<perl -c> fails.
102
f86702cc 103=item %s has too many errors
a0d0e21e 104
105(F) The parser has given up trying to parse the program after 10 errors.
106Further error messages would likely be uninformative.
107
108=item %s matches null string many times
109
110(W) The pattern you've specified would be an infinite loop if the
111regular expression engine didn't specifically check for that. See L<perlre>.
112
113=item %s never introduced
114
115(S) The symbol in question was declared but somehow went out of scope
116before it could possibly have been used.
117
118=item %s syntax OK
119
120(F) The final summary message when a C<perl -c> succeeds.
121
f86702cc 122=item %s: Command not found
cb1a09d0 123
124(A) You've accidentally run your script through B<csh> instead
3a52c276 125of Perl. Check the #! line, or manually feed your script into
126Perl yourself.
cb1a09d0 127
f86702cc 128=item %s: Expression syntax
cb1a09d0 129
130(A) You've accidentally run your script through B<csh> instead
3a52c276 131of Perl. Check the #! line, or manually feed your script into
132Perl yourself.
cb1a09d0 133
f86702cc 134=item %s: Undefined variable
cb1a09d0 135
136(A) You've accidentally run your script through B<csh> instead
3a52c276 137of Perl. Check the #! line, or manually feed your script into
138Perl yourself.
cb1a09d0 139
140=item %s: not found
141
8b1a09fc 142(A) You've accidentally run your script through the Bourne shell
3a52c276 143instead of Perl. Check the #! line, or manually feed your script
cb1a09d0 144into Perl yourself.
145
a0d0e21e 146=item B<-P> not allowed for setuid/setgid script
147
148(F) The script would have to be opened by the C preprocessor by name,
149which provides a race condition that breaks security.
150
151=item C<-T> and C<-B> not implemented on filehandles
152
153(F) Perl can't peek at the stdio buffer of filehandles when it doesn't
154know about your kind of stdio. You'll have to use a filename instead.
155
a5f75d66 156=item 500 Server error
157
158See Server error.
159
a0d0e21e 160=item ?+* follows nothing in regexp
161
162(F) You started a regular expression with a quantifier. Backslash it
163if you meant it literally. See L<perlre>.
164
165=item @ outside of string
166
2ba9eb46 167(F) You had a pack template that specified an absolute position outside
a0d0e21e 168the string being unpacked. See L<perlfunc/pack>.
169
170=item accept() on closed fd
171
172(W) You tried to do an accept on a closed socket. Did you forget to check
173the return value of your socket() call? See L<perlfunc/accept>.
174
175=item Allocation too large: %lx
176
55497cff 177(X) You can't allocate more than 64K on an MSDOS machine.
178
179=item Allocation too large
180
181(F) You can't allocate more than 2^31+"small amount" bytes.
a0d0e21e 182
183=item Arg too short for msgsnd
184
185(F) msgsnd() requires a string at least as long as sizeof(long).
186
748a9306 187=item Ambiguous use of %s resolved as %s
188
189(W)(S) You said something that may not be interpreted the way
190you thought. Normally it's pretty easy to disambiguate it by supplying
5f05dabc 191a missing quote, operator, parenthesis pair or declaration.
748a9306 192
a0d0e21e 193=item Args must match #! line
194
195(F) The setuid emulator requires that the arguments Perl was invoked
3a52c276 196with match the arguments specified on the #! line. Since some systems
197impose a one-argument limit on the #! line, try combining switches;
198for example, turn C<-w -U> into C<-wU>.
a0d0e21e 199
f86702cc 200=item Argument "%s" isn't numeric%s
a0d0e21e 201
202(W) The indicated string was fed as an argument to an operator that
203expected a numeric value instead. If you're fortunate the message
204will identify which operator was so unfortunate.
205
206=item Array @%s missing the @ in argument %d of %s()
207
208(D) Really old Perl let you omit the @ on array names in some spots. This
209is now heavily deprecated.
210
211=item assertion botched: %s
212
213(P) The malloc package that comes with Perl had an internal failure.
214
215=item Assertion failed: file "%s"
216
217(P) A general assertion failed. The file in question must be examined.
218
219=item Assignment to both a list and a scalar
220
221(F) If you assign to a conditional operator, the 2nd and 3rd arguments
222must either both be scalars or both be lists. Otherwise Perl won't
223know which context to supply to the right side.
224
225=item Attempt to free non-arena SV: 0x%lx
226
227(P) All SV objects are supposed to be allocated from arenas that will
228be garbage collected on exit. An SV was discovered to be outside any
229of those arenas.
230
bbce6d69 231=item Attempt to free non-existent shared string
232
233(P) Perl maintains a reference counted internal table of strings to
234optimize the storage and access of hash keys and other strings. This
235indicates someone tried to decrement the reference count of a string
236that can no longer be found in the table.
237
a0d0e21e 238=item Attempt to free temp prematurely
239
240(W) Mortalized values are supposed to be freed by the free_tmps()
241routine. This indicates that something else is freeing the SV before
242the free_tmps() routine gets a chance, which means that the free_tmps()
243routine will be freeing an unreferenced scalar when it does try to free
244it.
245
246=item Attempt to free unreferenced glob pointers
247
248(P) The reference counts got screwed up on symbol aliases.
249
250=item Attempt to free unreferenced scalar
251
252(W) Perl went to decrement the reference count of a scalar to see if it
253would go to 0, and discovered that it had already gone to 0 earlier,
254and should have been freed, and in fact, probably was freed. This
255could indicate that SvREFCNT_dec() was called too many times, or that
256SvREFCNT_inc() was called too few times, or that the SV was mortalized
257when it shouldn't have been, or that memory has been corrupted.
258
b7a902f4 259=item Attempt to use reference as lvalue in substr
260
261(W) You supplied a reference as the first argument to substr() used
8b1a09fc 262as an lvalue, which is pretty strange. Perhaps you forgot to
b7a902f4 263dereference it first. See L<perlfunc/substr>.
264
a0d0e21e 265=item Bad arg length for %s, is %d, should be %d
266
267(F) You passed a buffer of the wrong size to one of msgctl(), semctl() or
2ba9eb46 268shmctl(). In C parlance, the correct sizes are, respectively,
5f05dabc 269S<sizeof(struct msqid_ds *)>, S<sizeof(struct semid_ds *)>, and
a0d0e21e 270S<sizeof(struct shmid_ds *)>.
271
a0d0e21e 272=item Bad filehandle: %s
273
274(F) A symbol was passed to something wanting a filehandle, but the symbol
275has no filehandle associated with it. Perhaps you didn't do an open(), or
276did it in another package.
277
278=item Bad free() ignored
279
280(S) An internal routine called free() on something that had never been
33c8a3fe 281malloc()ed in the first place. Mandatory, but can be disabled by
282setting environment variable C<PERL_BADFREE> to 1.
283
284This message can be quite often seen with DB_File on systems with
285"hard" dynamic linking, like C<AIX> and C<OS/2>. It is a bug of
286C<Berkeley DB> which is left unnoticed if C<DB> uses I<forgiving>
287system malloc().
a0d0e21e 288
aa689395 289=item Bad hash
290
291(P) One of the internal hash routines was passed a null HV pointer.
292
a0d0e21e 293=item Bad name after %s::
294
295(F) You started to name a symbol by using a package prefix, and then didn't
296finish the symbol. In particular, you can't interpolate outside of quotes,
297so
298
299 $var = 'myvar';
300 $sym = mypack::$var;
301
302is not the same as
303
304 $var = 'myvar';
305 $sym = "mypack::$var";
306
307=item Bad symbol for array
308
309(P) An internal request asked to add an array entry to something that
310wasn't a symbol table entry.
311
312=item Bad symbol for filehandle
313
314(P) An internal request asked to add a filehandle entry to something that
315wasn't a symbol table entry.
316
317=item Bad symbol for hash
318
319(P) An internal request asked to add a hash entry to something that
320wasn't a symbol table entry.
321
8b1a09fc 322=item Badly placed ()'s
cb1a09d0 323
324(A) You've accidentally run your script through B<csh> instead
3a52c276 325of Perl. Check the #! line, or manually feed your script into
326Perl yourself.
cb1a09d0 327
a0d0e21e 328=item BEGIN failed--compilation aborted
329
330(F) An untrapped exception was raised while executing a BEGIN subroutine.
331Compilation stops immediately and the interpreter is exited.
332
333=item bind() on closed fd
334
335(W) You tried to do a bind on a closed socket. Did you forget to check
336the return value of your socket() call? See L<perlfunc/bind>.
337
4633a7c4 338=item Bizarre copy of %s in %s
339
340(P) Perl detected an attempt to copy an internal value that is not copiable.
341
a0d0e21e 342=item Callback called exit
343
344(F) A subroutine invoked from an external package via perl_call_sv()
345exited by calling exit.
346
0a753a76 347=item Can't "goto" outside a block
348
349(F) A "goto" statement was executed to jump out of what might look
350like a block, except that it isn't a proper block. This usually
351occurs if you tried to jump out of a sort() block or subroutine, which
352is a no-no. See L<perlfunc/goto>.
353
a0d0e21e 354=item Can't "last" outside a block
355
356(F) A "last" statement was executed to break out of the current block,
357except that there's this itty bitty problem called there isn't a
358current block. Note that an "if" or "else" block doesn't count as a
0a753a76 359"loopish" block, as doesn't a block given to sort(). You can usually double
360the curlies to get the same effect though, because the inner curlies
361will be considered a block that loops once. See L<perlfunc/last>.
a0d0e21e 362
363=item Can't "next" outside a block
364
365(F) A "next" statement was executed to reiterate the current block, but
366there isn't a current block. Note that an "if" or "else" block doesn't
0a753a76 367count as a "loopish" block, as doesn't a block given to sort(). You can
368usually double the curlies to get the same effect though, because the inner
369curlies will be considered a block that loops once. See L<perlfunc/last>.
a0d0e21e 370
371=item Can't "redo" outside a block
372
373(F) A "redo" statement was executed to restart the current block, but
374there isn't a current block. Note that an "if" or "else" block doesn't
0a753a76 375count as a "loopish" block, as doesn't a block given to sort(). You can
376usually double the curlies to get the same effect though, because the inner
377curlies will be considered a block that loops once. See L<perlfunc/last>.
a0d0e21e 378
379=item Can't bless non-reference value
380
381(F) Only hard references may be blessed. This is how Perl "enforces"
382encapsulation of objects. See L<perlobj>.
383
384=item Can't break at that line
385
386(S) A warning intended for while running within the debugger, indicating
387the line number specified wasn't the location of a statement that could
388be stopped at.
389
390=item Can't call method "%s" in empty package "%s"
391
392(F) You called a method correctly, and it correctly indicated a package
393functioning as a class, but that package doesn't have ANYTHING defined
394in it, let alone methods. See L<perlobj>.
395
396=item Can't call method "%s" on unblessed reference
397
398(F) A method call must know what package it's supposed to run in. It
399ordinarily finds this out from the object reference you supply, but
400you didn't supply an object reference in this case. A reference isn't
401an object reference until it has been blessed. See L<perlobj>.
402
403=item Can't call method "%s" without a package or object reference
404
405(F) You used the syntax of a method call, but the slot filled by the
406object reference or package name contains an expression that returns
407neither an object reference nor a package name. (Perhaps it's null?)
408Something like this will reproduce the error:
409
410 $BADREF = undef;
411 process $BADREF 1,2,3;
412 $BADREF->process(1,2,3);
413
414=item Can't chdir to %s
415
416(F) You called C<perl -x/foo/bar>, but C</foo/bar> is not a directory
417that you can chdir to, possibly because it doesn't exist.
418
419=item Can't coerce %s to integer in %s
420
421(F) Certain types of SVs, in particular real symbol table entries
55497cff 422(typeglobs), can't be forced to stop being what they are. So you can't
a0d0e21e 423say things like:
424
425 *foo += 1;
426
427You CAN say
428
429 $foo = *foo;
430 $foo += 1;
431
432but then $foo no longer contains a glob.
433
434=item Can't coerce %s to number in %s
435
436(F) Certain types of SVs, in particular real symbol table entries
55497cff 437(typeglobs), can't be forced to stop being what they are.
a0d0e21e 438
439=item Can't coerce %s to string in %s
440
441(F) Certain types of SVs, in particular real symbol table entries
55497cff 442(typeglobs), can't be forced to stop being what they are.
a0d0e21e 443
444=item Can't create pipe mailbox
445
748a9306 446(P) An error peculiar to VMS. The process is suffering from exhausted quotas
447or other plumbing problems.
a0d0e21e 448
449=item Can't declare %s in my
450
5f05dabc 451(F) Only scalar, array, and hash variables may be declared as lexical variables.
a0d0e21e 452They must have ordinary identifiers as names.
453
454=item Can't do inplace edit on %s: %s
455
456(S) The creation of the new file failed for the indicated reason.
457
5f05dabc 458=item Can't do in-place edit without backup
a0d0e21e 459
460(F) You're on a system such as MSDOS that gets confused if you try reading
461from a deleted (but still opened) file. You have to say B<-i>C<.bak>, or some
462such.
463
8b1a09fc 464=item Can't do inplace edit: %s E<gt> 14 characters
a0d0e21e 465
466(S) There isn't enough room in the filename to make a backup name for the file.
467
468=item Can't do inplace edit: %s is not a regular file
469
470(S) You tried to use the B<-i> switch on a special file, such as a file in
471/dev, or a FIFO. The file was ignored.
472
473=item Can't do setegid!
474
475(P) The setegid() call failed for some reason in the setuid emulator
476of suidperl.
477
478=item Can't do seteuid!
479
480(P) The setuid emulator of suidperl failed for some reason.
481
482=item Can't do setuid
483
484(F) This typically means that ordinary perl tried to exec suidperl to
485do setuid emulation, but couldn't exec it. It looks for a name of the
486form sperl5.000 in the same directory that the perl executable resides
487under the name perl5.000, typically /usr/local/bin on Unix machines.
488If the file is there, check the execute permissions. If it isn't, ask
489your sysadmin why he and/or she removed it.
490
491=item Can't do waitpid with flags
492
493(F) This machine doesn't have either waitpid() or wait4(), so only waitpid()
494without flags is emulated.
495
8b1a09fc 496=item Can't do {n,m} with n E<gt> m
a0d0e21e 497
498(F) Minima must be less than or equal to maxima. If you really want
499your regexp to match something 0 times, just put {0}. See L<perlre>.
500
501=item Can't emulate -%s on #! line
502
503(F) The #! line specifies a switch that doesn't make sense at this point.
504For example, it'd be kind of silly to put a B<-x> on the #! line.
505
506=item Can't exec "%s": %s
507
5f05dabc 508(W) An system(), exec(), or piped open call could not execute the named
a0d0e21e 509program for the indicated reason. Typical reasons include: the permissions
510were wrong on the file, the file wasn't found in C<$ENV{PATH}>, the
511executable in question was compiled for another architecture, or the
512#! line in a script points to an interpreter that can't be run for
513similar reasons. (Or maybe your system doesn't support #! at all.)
514
515=item Can't exec %s
516
517(F) Perl was trying to execute the indicated program for you because that's
518what the #! line said. If that's not what you wanted, you may need to
519mention "perl" on the #! line somewhere.
520
521=item Can't execute %s
522
523(F) You used the B<-S> switch, but the script to execute could not be found
524in the PATH, or at least not with the correct permissions.
525
526=item Can't find label %s
527
528(F) You said to goto a label that isn't mentioned anywhere that it's possible
529for us to go to. See L<perlfunc/goto>.
530
531=item Can't find string terminator %s anywhere before EOF
532
533(F) Perl strings can stretch over multiple lines. This message means that
5f05dabc 534the closing delimiter was omitted. Because bracketed quotes count nesting
a0d0e21e 535levels, the following is missing its final parenthesis:
536
537 print q(The character '(' starts a side comment.)
538
539=item Can't fork
540
541(F) A fatal error occurred while trying to fork while opening a pipeline.
542
33c8a3fe 543=item Unsupported function fork
544
545(F) Your version of executable does not support forking.
546
547Note that under some systems, like OS/2, there may be different flavors of
548Perl executables, some of which may support fork, some not. Try changing
549the name you call Perl by to C<perl_>, C<perl__>, and so on.
550
748a9306 551=item Can't get filespec - stale stat buffer?
552
553(S) A warning peculiar to VMS. This arises because of the difference between
554access checks under VMS and under the Unix model Perl assumes. Under VMS,
555access checks are done by filename, rather than by bits in the stat buffer, so
556that ACLs and other protections can be taken into account. Unfortunately, Perl
557assumes that the stat buffer contains all the necessary information, and passes
558it, instead of the filespec, to the access checking routine. It will try to
559retrieve the filespec using the device name and FID present in the stat buffer,
560but this works only if you haven't made a subsequent call to the CRTL stat()
5f05dabc 561routine, because the device name is overwritten with each call. If this warning
748a9306 562appears, the name lookup failed, and the access checking routine gave up and
563returned FALSE, just to be conservative. (Note: The access checking routine
564knows about the Perl C<stat> operator and file tests, so you shouldn't ever
565see this warning in response to a Perl command; it arises only if some internal
566code takes stat buffers lightly.)
567
a0d0e21e 568=item Can't get pipe mailbox device name
569
748a9306 570(P) An error peculiar to VMS. After creating a mailbox to act as a pipe, Perl
571can't retrieve its name for later use.
a0d0e21e 572
573=item Can't get SYSGEN parameter value for MAXBUF
574
748a9306 575(P) An error peculiar to VMS. Perl asked $GETSYI how big you want your
576mailbox buffers to be, and didn't get an answer.
a0d0e21e 577
578=item Can't goto subroutine outside a subroutine
579
580(F) The deeply magical "goto subroutine" call can only replace one subroutine
581call for another. It can't manufacture one out of whole cloth. In general
5f05dabc 582you should be calling it out of only an AUTOLOAD routine anyway. See
a0d0e21e 583L<perlfunc/goto>.
584
4633a7c4 585=item Can't localize a reference
586
587(F) You said something like C<local $$ref>, which is not allowed because
588the compiler can't determine whether $ref will end up pointing to anything
589with a symbol table entry, and a symbol table entry is necessary to
590do a local.
591
748a9306 592=item Can't localize lexical variable %s
593
2ba9eb46 594(F) You used local on a variable name that was previously declared as a
748a9306 595lexical variable using "my". This is not allowed. If you want to
596localize a package variable of the same name, qualify it with the
597package name.
598
a0d0e21e 599=item Can't locate %s in @INC
600
601(F) You said to do (or require, or use) a file that couldn't be found
602in any of the libraries mentioned in @INC. Perhaps you need to set
603the PERL5LIB environment variable to say where the extra library is,
604or maybe the script needs to add the library name to @INC. Or maybe
605you just misspelled the name of the file. See L<perlfunc/require>.
606
607=item Can't locate object method "%s" via package "%s"
608
609(F) You called a method correctly, and it correctly indicated a package
610functioning as a class, but that package doesn't define that particular
2ba9eb46 611method, nor does any of its base classes. See L<perlobj>.
a0d0e21e 612
613=item Can't locate package %s for @%s::ISA
614
615(W) The @ISA array contained the name of another package that doesn't seem
616to exist.
617
618=item Can't mktemp()
619
620(F) The mktemp() routine failed for some reason while trying to process
621a B<-e> switch. Maybe your /tmp partition is full, or clobbered.
622
623=item Can't modify %s in %s
624
625(F) You aren't allowed to assign to the item indicated, or otherwise try to
5f05dabc 626change it, such as with an auto-increment.
a0d0e21e 627
628=item Can't modify non-existent substring
629
630(P) The internal routine that does assignment to a substr() was handed
631a NULL.
632
5f05dabc 633=item Can't msgrcv to read-only var
a0d0e21e 634
5f05dabc 635(F) The target of a msgrcv must be modifiable to be used as a receive
a0d0e21e 636buffer.
637
638=item Can't open %s: %s
639
640(S) An inplace edit couldn't open the original file for the indicated reason.
641Usually this is because you don't have read permission for the file.
642
643=item Can't open bidirectional pipe
644
645(W) You tried to say C<open(CMD, "|cmd|")>, which is not supported. You can
646try any of several modules in the Perl library to do this, such as
7e1af8bc 647IPC::Open2. Alternately, direct the pipe's output to a file using "E<gt>",
a0d0e21e 648and then read it in under a different file handle.
649
748a9306 650=item Can't open error file %s as stderr
651
652(F) An error peculiar to VMS. Perl does its own command line redirection, and
8b1a09fc 653couldn't open the file specified after '2E<gt>' or '2E<gt>E<gt>' on the
654command line for writing.
748a9306 655
656=item Can't open input file %s as stdin
657
658(F) An error peculiar to VMS. Perl does its own command line redirection, and
8b1a09fc 659couldn't open the file specified after 'E<lt>' on the command line for reading.
748a9306 660
661=item Can't open output file %s as stdout
662
663(F) An error peculiar to VMS. Perl does its own command line redirection, and
8b1a09fc 664couldn't open the file specified after 'E<gt>' or 'E<gt>E<gt>' on the command
665line for writing.
748a9306 666
667=item Can't open output pipe (name: %s)
668
669(P) An error peculiar to VMS. Perl does its own command line redirection, and
670couldn't open the pipe into which to send data destined for stdout.
671
a0d0e21e 672=item Can't open perl script "%s": %s
673
674(F) The script you specified can't be opened for the indicated reason.
675
676=item Can't rename %s to %s: %s, skipping file
677
678(S) The rename done by the B<-i> switch failed for some reason, probably because
679you don't have write permission to the directory.
680
748a9306 681=item Can't reopen input pipe (name: %s) in binary mode
682
683(P) An error peculiar to VMS. Perl thought stdin was a pipe, and tried to
684reopen it to accept binary data. Alas, it failed.
685
a0d0e21e 686=item Can't reswap uid and euid
687
688(P) The setreuid() call failed for some reason in the setuid emulator
689of suidperl.
690
691=item Can't return outside a subroutine
692
693(F) The return statement was executed in mainline code, that is, where
694there was no subroutine call to return out of. See L<perlsub>.
695
696=item Can't stat script "%s"
697
698(P) For some reason you can't fstat() the script even though you have
699it open already. Bizarre.
700
701=item Can't swap uid and euid
702
703(P) The setreuid() call failed for some reason in the setuid emulator
704of suidperl.
705
706=item Can't take log of %g
707
5f05dabc 708(F) Logarithms are defined on only positive real numbers.
a0d0e21e 709
710=item Can't take sqrt of %g
711
712(F) For ordinary real numbers, you can't take the square root of a
713negative number. There's a Complex package available for Perl, though,
714if you really want to do that.
715
716=item Can't undef active subroutine
717
718(F) You can't undefine a routine that's currently running. You can,
719however, redefine it while it's running, and you can even undef the
720redefined subroutine while the old routine is running. Go figure.
721
722=item Can't unshift
723
724(F) You tried to unshift an "unreal" array that can't be unshifted, such
725as the main Perl stack.
726
727=item Can't upgrade that kind of scalar
728
729(P) The internal sv_upgrade routine adds "members" to an SV, making
730it into a more specialized kind of SV. The top several SV types are
731so specialized, however, that they cannot be interconverted. This
732message indicates that such a conversion was attempted.
733
734=item Can't upgrade to undef
735
736(P) The undefined SV is the bottom of the totem pole, in the scheme
737of upgradability. Upgrading to undef indicates an error in the
738code calling sv_upgrade.
739
c07a80fd 740=item Can't use "my %s" in sort comparison
741
742(F) The global variables $a and $b are reserved for sort comparisons.
8b1a09fc 743You mentioned $a or $b in the same line as the E<lt>=E<gt> or cmp operator,
c07a80fd 744and the variable had earlier been declared as a lexical variable.
745Either qualify the sort variable with the package name, or rename the
746lexical variable.
747
a0d0e21e 748=item Can't use %s for loop variable
749
750(F) Only a simple scalar variable may be used as a loop variable on a foreach.
751
752=item Can't use %s ref as %s ref
753
754(F) You've mixed up your reference types. You have to dereference a
755reference of the type needed. You can use the ref() function to
756test the type of the reference, if need be.
757
748a9306 758=item Can't use \1 to mean $1 in expression
759
760(W) In an ordinary expression, backslash is a unary operator that creates
761a reference to its argument. The use of backslash to indicate a backreference
5f05dabc 762to a matched substring is valid only as part of a regular expression pattern.
748a9306 763Trying to do this in ordinary Perl code produces a value that prints
764out looking like SCALAR(0xdecaf). Use the $1 form instead.
765
44a8e56a 766=item Can't use bareword ("%s") as %s ref while \"strict refs\" in use
767
768(F) Only hard references are allowed by "strict refs". Symbolic references
769are disallowed. See L<perlref>.
770
748a9306 771=item Can't use string ("%s") as %s ref while "strict refs" in use
a0d0e21e 772
773(F) Only hard references are allowed by "strict refs". Symbolic references
774are disallowed. See L<perlref>.
775
776=item Can't use an undefined value as %s reference
777
778(F) A value used as either a hard reference or a symbolic reference must
779be a defined value. This helps to de-lurk some insidious errors.
780
a0d0e21e 781=item Can't use global %s in "my"
782
783(F) You tried to declare a magical variable as a lexical variable. This is
5f05dabc 784not allowed, because the magic can be tied to only one location (namely
a0d0e21e 785the global variable) and it would be incredibly confusing to have
786variables in your program that looked like magical variables but
787weren't.
788
748a9306 789=item Can't use subscript on %s
790
791(F) The compiler tried to interpret a bracketed expression as a
792subscript. But to the left of the brackets was an expression that
793didn't look like an array reference, or anything else subscriptable.
794
a0d0e21e 795=item Can't write to temp file for B<-e>: %s
796
797(F) The write routine failed for some reason while trying to process
798a B<-e> switch. Maybe your /tmp partition is full, or clobbered.
799
5f05dabc 800=item Can't x= to read-only value
a0d0e21e 801
802(F) You tried to repeat a constant value (often the undefined value) with
803an assignment operator, which implies modifying the value itself.
804Perhaps you need to copy the value to a temporary, and repeat that.
805
806=item Cannot open temporary file
807
8b1a09fc 808(F) The create routine failed for some reason while trying to process
a0d0e21e 809a B<-e> switch. Maybe your /tmp partition is full, or clobbered.
810
e7ea3e70 811=item Cannot resolve method `%s' overloading `%s' in package `%s'
812
813(F|P) Error resolving overloading specified by a method name (as
814opposed to a subroutine reference): no such method callable via the
815package. If method name is C<???>, this is an internal error.
816
a0d0e21e 817=item chmod: mode argument is missing initial 0
818
819(W) A novice will sometimes say
820
821 chmod 777, $filename
822
823not realizing that 777 will be interpreted as a decimal number, equivalent
824to 01411. Octal constants are introduced with a leading 0 in Perl, as in C.
825
8b1a09fc 826=item Close on unopened file E<lt>%sE<gt>
a0d0e21e 827
828(W) You tried to close a filehandle that was never opened.
829
830=item connect() on closed fd
831
832(W) You tried to do a connect on a closed socket. Did you forget to check
833the return value of your socket() call? See L<perlfunc/connect>.
834
4cee8e80 835=item Constant subroutine %s redefined
836
837(S) You redefined a subroutine which had previously been eligible for
838inlining. See L<perlsub/"Constant Functions"> for commentary and
839workarounds.
840
e7ea3e70 841=item Copy method did not return a reference
842
843(F) The method which overloads "=" is buggy. See L<overload/Copy Constructor>.
844
a0d0e21e 845=item Corrupt malloc ptr 0x%lx at 0x%lx
846
847(P) The malloc package that comes with Perl had an internal failure.
848
849=item corrupted regexp pointers
850
851(P) The regular expression engine got confused by what the regular
852expression compiler gave it.
853
854=item corrupted regexp program
855
856(P) The regular expression engine got passed a regexp program without
857a valid magic number.
858
859=item Deep recursion on subroutine "%s"
860
861(W) This subroutine has called itself (directly or indirectly) 100
862times than it has returned. This probably indicates an infinite
863recursion, unless you're writing strange benchmark programs, in which
864case it indicates something else.
865
4633a7c4 866=item Did you mean &%s instead?
867
868(W) You probably referred to an imported subroutine &FOO as $FOO or some such.
869
748a9306 870=item Did you mean $ or @ instead of %?
a0d0e21e 871
748a9306 872(W) You probably said %hash{$key} when you meant $hash{$key} or @hash{@keys}.
873On the other hand, maybe you just meant %hash and got carried away.
874
7e1af8bc 875=item Died
5f05dabc 876
877(F) You passed die() an empty string (the equivalent of C<die "">) or
878you called it with no args and both C<$@> and C<$_> were empty.
879
880=item Do you need to pre-declare %s?
748a9306 881
882(S) This is an educated guess made in conjunction with the message "%s
883found where operator expected". It often means a subroutine or module
884name is being referenced that hasn't been declared yet. This may be
885because of ordering problems in your file, or because of a missing
886"sub", "package", "require", or "use" statement. If you're
887referencing something that isn't defined yet, you don't actually have
888to define the subroutine or package before the current location. You
889can use an empty "sub foo;" or "package FOO;" to enter a "forward"
890declaration.
a0d0e21e 891
892=item Don't know how to handle magic of type '%s'
893
894(P) The internal handling of magical variables has been cursed.
895
896=item do_study: out of memory
897
898(P) This should have been caught by safemalloc() instead.
899
900=item Duplicate free() ignored
901
902(S) An internal routine called free() on something that had already
903been freed.
904
4633a7c4 905=item elseif should be elsif
906
907(S) There is no keyword "elseif" in Perl because Larry thinks it's
908ugly. Your code will be interpreted as an attempt to call a method
909named "elseif" for the class returned by the following block. This is
910unlikely to be what you want.
911
a0d0e21e 912=item END failed--cleanup aborted
913
914(F) An untrapped exception was raised while executing an END subroutine.
915The interpreter is immediately exited.
916
748a9306 917=item Error converting file specification %s
918
5f05dabc 919(F) An error peculiar to VMS. Because Perl may have to deal with file
748a9306 920specifications in either VMS or Unix syntax, it converts them to a
921single form when it must operate on them directly. Either you've
922passed an invalid file specification to Perl, or you've found a
923case the conversion routines don't handle. Drat.
924
f86702cc 925=item Execution of %s aborted due to compilation errors
a0d0e21e 926
927(F) The final summary message when a Perl compilation fails.
928
929=item Exiting eval via %s
930
8b1a09fc 931(W) You are exiting an eval by unconventional means, such as
a0d0e21e 932a goto, or a loop control statement.
933
0a753a76 934=item Exiting pseudo-block via %s
935
936(W) You are exiting a rather special block construct (like a sort block or
937subroutine) by unconventional means, such as a goto, or a loop control
938statement. See L<perlfunc/sort>.
939
a0d0e21e 940=item Exiting subroutine via %s
941
8b1a09fc 942(W) You are exiting a subroutine by unconventional means, such as
a0d0e21e 943a goto, or a loop control statement.
944
945=item Exiting substitution via %s
946
8b1a09fc 947(W) You are exiting a substitution by unconventional means, such as
a0d0e21e 948a return, a goto, or a loop control statement.
949
748a9306 950=item Fatal VMS error at %s, line %d
a0d0e21e 951
748a9306 952(P) An error peculiar to VMS. Something untoward happened in a VMS system
953service or RTL routine; Perl's exit status should provide more details. The
954filename in "at %s" and the line number in "line %d" tell you which section of
955the Perl source code is distressed.
a0d0e21e 956
957=item fcntl is not implemented
958
959(F) Your machine apparently doesn't implement fcntl(). What is this, a
960PDP-11 or something?
961
962=item Filehandle %s never opened
963
964(W) An I/O operation was attempted on a filehandle that was never initialized.
965You need to do an open() or a socket() call, or call a constructor from
966the FileHandle package.
967
5f05dabc 968=item Filehandle %s opened for only input
a0d0e21e 969
970(W) You tried to write on a read-only filehandle. If you
971intended it to be a read-write filehandle, you needed to open it with
8b1a09fc 972"+E<lt>" or "+E<gt>" or "+E<gt>E<gt>" instead of with "E<lt>" or nothing. If
5f05dabc 973you intended only to write the file, use "E<gt>" or "E<gt>E<gt>". See
8b1a09fc 974L<perlfunc/open>.
a0d0e21e 975
5f05dabc 976=item Filehandle opened for only input
a0d0e21e 977
978(W) You tried to write on a read-only filehandle. If you
979intended it to be a read-write filehandle, you needed to open it with
8b1a09fc 980"+E<lt>" or "+E<gt>" or "+E<gt>E<gt>" instead of with "E<lt>" or nothing. If
5f05dabc 981you intended only to write the file, use "E<gt>" or "E<gt>E<gt>". See
8b1a09fc 982L<perlfunc/open>.
a0d0e21e 983
984=item Final $ should be \$ or $name
985
986(F) You must now decide whether the final $ in a string was meant to be
987a literal dollar sign, or was meant to introduce a variable name
988that happens to be missing. So you have to put either the backslash or
989the name.
990
991=item Final @ should be \@ or @name
992
993(F) You must now decide whether the final @ in a string was meant to be
994a literal "at" sign, or was meant to introduce a variable name
995that happens to be missing. So you have to put either the backslash or
996the name.
997
998=item Format %s redefined
999
1000(W) You redefined a format. To suppress this warning, say
1001
1002 {
1003 local $^W = 0;
1004 eval "format NAME =...";
1005 }
1006
1007=item Format not terminated
1008
1009(F) A format must be terminated by a line with a solitary dot. Perl got
1010to the end of your file without finding such a line.
1011
1012=item Found = in conditional, should be ==
1013
1014(W) You said
1015
1016 if ($foo = 123)
1017
1018when you meant
1019
1020 if ($foo == 123)
1021
1022(or something like that).
1023
1024=item gdbm store returned %d, errno %d, key "%s"
1025
1026(S) A warning from the GDBM_File extension that a store failed.
1027
1028=item gethostent not implemented
1029
1030(F) Your C library apparently doesn't implement gethostent(), probably
1031because if it did, it'd feel morally obligated to return every hostname
1032on the Internet.
1033
1034=item get{sock,peer}name() on closed fd
1035
1036(W) You tried to get a socket or peer socket name on a closed socket.
1037Did you forget to check the return value of your socket() call?
1038
748a9306 1039=item getpwnam returned invalid UIC %#o for user "%s"
1040
1041(S) A warning peculiar to VMS. The call to C<sys$getuai> underlying the
1042C<getpwnam> operator returned an invalid UIC.
1043
1044
a0d0e21e 1045=item Glob not terminated
1046
1047(F) The lexer saw a left angle bracket in a place where it was expecting
1048a term, so it's looking for the corresponding right angle bracket, and not
1049finding it. Chances are you left some needed parentheses out earlier in
1050the line, and you really meant a "less than".
1051
1052=item Global symbol "%s" requires explicit package name
1053
1054(F) You've said "use strict vars", which indicates that all variables must
1055either be lexically scoped (using "my"), or explicitly qualified to
1056say which package the global variable is in (using "::").
1057
1058=item goto must have label
1059
1060(F) Unlike with "next" or "last", you're not allowed to goto an
1061unspecified destination. See L<perlfunc/goto>.
1062
1063=item Had to create %s unexpectedly
1064
1065(S) A routine asked for a symbol from a symbol table that ought to have
1066existed already, but for some reason it didn't, and had to be created on
1067an emergency basis to prevent a core dump.
1068
1069=item Hash %%s missing the % in argument %d of %s()
1070
1071(D) Really old Perl let you omit the % on hash names in some spots. This
1072is now heavily deprecated.
1073
8b1a09fc 1074=item Ill-formed logical name |%s| in prime_env_iter
a0d0e21e 1075
8b1a09fc 1076(W) A warning peculiar to VMS. A logical name was encountered when preparing
1077to iterate over %ENV which violates the syntactic rules governing logical
5f05dabc 1078names. Because it cannot be translated normally, it is skipped, and will not
1079appear in %ENV. This may be a benign occurrence, as some software packages
8b1a09fc 1080might directly modify logical name tables and introduce non-standard names,
1081or it may indicate that a logical name table has been corrupted.
a0d0e21e 1082
4fdae800 1083=item Illegal character %s (carriage return)
1084
1085(F) A carriage return character was found in the input. This is an
1086error, and not a warning, because carriage return characters can break
f65adc38 1087here documents (e.g. C<print E<lt>E<lt>EOF;>). Note that Perl always
4fdae800 1088opens scripts in text mode, so this error should only occur in C<eval>.
1089
a0d0e21e 1090=item Illegal division by zero
1091
1092(F) You tried to divide a number by 0. Either something was wrong in your
1093logic, or you need to put a conditional in to guard against meaningless input.
1094
1095=item Illegal modulus zero
1096
1097(F) You tried to divide a number by 0 to get the remainder. Most numbers
1098don't take to this kindly.
1099
1100=item Illegal octal digit
1101
1102(F) You used an 8 or 9 in a octal number.
1103
748a9306 1104=item Illegal octal digit ignored
1105
1106(W) You may have tried to use an 8 or 9 in a octal number. Interpretation
1107of the octal number stopped before the 8 or 9.
1108
a0d0e21e 1109=item Insecure dependency in %s
1110
8b1a09fc 1111(F) You tried to do something that the tainting mechanism didn't like.
a0d0e21e 1112The tainting mechanism is turned on when you're running setuid or setgid,
1113or when you specify B<-T> to turn it on explicitly. The tainting mechanism
1114labels all data that's derived directly or indirectly from the user,
1115who is considered to be unworthy of your trust. If any such data is
1116used in a "dangerous" operation, you get this error. See L<perlsec>
1117for more information.
1118
1119=item Insecure directory in %s
1120
1121(F) You can't use system(), exec(), or a piped open in a setuid or setgid
8b1a09fc 1122script if C<$ENV{PATH}> contains a directory that is writable by the world.
a0d0e21e 1123See L<perlsec>.
1124
1125=item Insecure PATH
1126
1127(F) You can't use system(), exec(), or a piped open in a setuid or
8b1a09fc 1128setgid script if C<$ENV{PATH}> is derived from data supplied (or
a0d0e21e 1129potentially supplied) by the user. The script must set the path to a
1130known value, using trustworthy data. See L<perlsec>.
1131
bbce6d69 1132=item Integer overflow in hex number
1133
1134(S) The literal hex number you have specified is too big for your
1135architecture. On a 32-bit architecture the largest hex literal is
11360xFFFFFFFF.
1137
1138=item Integer overflow in octal number
1139
1140(S) The literal octal number you have specified is too big for your
1141architecture. On a 32-bit architecture the largest octal literal is
1142037777777777.
1143
748a9306 1144=item Internal inconsistency in tracking vforks
1145
1146(S) A warning peculiar to VMS. Perl keeps track of the number
5f05dabc 1147of times you've called C<fork> and C<exec>, to determine
2ba9eb46 1148whether the current call to C<exec> should affect the current
748a9306 1149script or a subprocess (see L<perlvms/exec>). Somehow, this count
1150has become scrambled, so Perl is making a guess and treating
1151this C<exec> as a request to terminate the Perl script
1152and execute the specified command.
1153
a0d0e21e 1154=item internal disaster in regexp
1155
1156(P) Something went badly wrong in the regular expression parser.
1157
1158=item internal urp in regexp at /%s/
1159
1160(P) Something went badly awry in the regular expression parser.
1161
1162=item invalid [] range in regexp
1163
1164(F) The range specified in a character class had a minimum character
1165greater than the maximum character. See L<perlre>.
1166
1167=item ioctl is not implemented
1168
1169(F) Your machine apparently doesn't implement ioctl(), which is pretty
1170strange for a machine that supports C.
1171
1172=item junk on end of regexp
1173
1174(P) The regular expression parser is confused.
1175
1176=item Label not found for "last %s"
1177
1178(F) You named a loop to break out of, but you're not currently in a
1179loop of that name, not even if you count where you were called from.
1180See L<perlfunc/last>.
1181
1182=item Label not found for "next %s"
1183
1184(F) You named a loop to continue, but you're not currently in a loop of
1185that name, not even if you count where you were called from. See
1186L<perlfunc/last>.
1187
1188=item Label not found for "redo %s"
1189
1190(F) You named a loop to restart, but you're not currently in a loop of
1191that name, not even if you count where you were called from. See
1192L<perlfunc/last>.
1193
1194=item listen() on closed fd
1195
1196(W) You tried to do a listen on a closed socket. Did you forget to check
1197the return value of your socket() call? See L<perlfunc/listen>.
1198
1199=item Literal @%s now requires backslash
1200
1201(F) It used to be that Perl would try to guess whether you wanted an
1202array interpolated or a literal @. It did this when the string was
1203first used at runtime. Now strings are parsed at compile time, and
1204ambiguous instances of @ must be disambiguated, either by putting a
1205backslash to indicate a literal, or by declaring (or using) the array
1206within the program before the string (lexically). (Someday it will simply
1207assume that an unbackslashed @ interpolates an array.)
1208
1209=item Method for operation %s not found in package %s during blessing
1210
1211(F) An attempt was made to specify an entry in an overloading table that
e7ea3e70 1212doesn't resolve to a valid subroutine. See L<overload>.
a0d0e21e 1213
1214=item Might be a runaway multi-line %s string starting on line %d
1215
1216(S) An advisory indicating that the previous error may have been caused
1217by a missing delimiter on a string or pattern, because it eventually
1218ended earlier on the current line.
1219
1220=item Misplaced _ in number
1221
1222(W) An underline in a decimal constant wasn't on a 3-digit boundary.
1223
1224=item Missing $ on loop variable
1225
8b1a09fc 1226(F) Apparently you've been programming in B<csh> too much. Variables are always
1227mentioned with the $ in Perl, unlike in the shells, where it can vary from
a0d0e21e 1228one line to the next.
1229
1230=item Missing comma after first argument to %s function
1231
1232(F) While certain functions allow you to specify a filehandle or an
1233"indirect object" before the argument list, this ain't one of them.
1234
748a9306 1235=item Missing operator before %s?
1236
1237(S) This is an educated guess made in conjunction with the message "%s
1238found where operator expected". Often the missing operator is a comma.
1239
a0d0e21e 1240=item Missing right bracket
1241
1242(F) The lexer counted more opening curly brackets (braces) than closing ones.
1243As a general rule, you'll find it's missing near the place you were last
1244editing.
1245
1246=item Missing semicolon on previous line?
1247
1248(S) This is an educated guess made in conjunction with the message "%s
1249found where operator expected". Don't automatically put a semicolon on
1250the previous line just because you saw this message.
1251
1252=item Modification of a read-only value attempted
1253
1254(F) You tried, directly or indirectly, to change the value of a
5f05dabc 1255constant. You didn't, of course, try "2 = 1", because the compiler
a0d0e21e 1256catches that. But an easy way to do the same thing is:
1257
1258 sub mod { $_[0] = 1 }
1259 mod(2);
1260
1261Another way is to assign to a substr() that's off the end of the string.
1262
1263=item Modification of non-creatable array value attempted, subscript %d
1264
1265(F) You tried to make an array value spring into existence, and the
1266subscript was probably negative, even counting from end of the array
1267backwards.
1268
1269=item Modification of non-creatable hash value attempted, subscript "%s"
1270
1271(F) You tried to make a hash value spring into existence, and it couldn't
1272be created for some peculiar reason.
1273
1274=item Module name must be constant
1275
1276(F) Only a bare module name is allowed as the first argument to a "use".
1277
1278=item msg%s not implemented
1279
1280(F) You don't have System V message IPC on your system.
1281
1282=item Multidimensional syntax %s not supported
1283
8b1a09fc 1284(W) Multidimensional arrays aren't written like C<$foo[1,2,3]>. They're written
1285like C<$foo[1][2][3]>, as in C.
1286
1287=item Name "%s::%s" used only once: possible typo
1288
1289(W) Typographical errors often show up as unique variable names. If you
1290had a good reason for having a unique name, then just mention it
1291again somehow to suppress the message (the C<use vars> pragma is
1292provided for just this purpose).
a0d0e21e 1293
1294=item Negative length
1295
1296(F) You tried to do a read/write/send/recv operation with a buffer length
1297that is less than 0. This is difficult to imagine.
1298
1299=item nested *?+ in regexp
1300
5f05dabc 1301(F) You can't quantify a quantifier without intervening parentheses. So
a0d0e21e 1302things like ** or +* or ?* are illegal.
1303
5f05dabc 1304Note, however, that the minimal matching quantifiers, C<*?>, C<+?>, and C<??> appear
a0d0e21e 1305to be nested quantifiers, but aren't. See L<perlre>.
1306
1307=item No #! line
1308
1309(F) The setuid emulator requires that scripts have a well-formed #! line
1310even on machines that don't support the #! construct.
1311
1312=item No %s allowed while running setuid
1313
1314(F) Certain operations are deemed to be too insecure for a setuid or setgid
1315script to even be allowed to attempt. Generally speaking there will be
1316another way to do what you want that is, if not secure, at least securable.
1317See L<perlsec>.
1318
1319=item No B<-e> allowed in setuid scripts
1320
1321(F) A setuid script can't be specified by the user.
1322
1323=item No comma allowed after %s
1324
1325(F) A list operator that has a filehandle or "indirect object" is not
1326allowed to have a comma between that and the following arguments.
1327Otherwise it'd be just another one of the arguments.
1328
0a753a76 1329One possible cause for this is that you expected to have imported a
1330constant to your name space with B<use> or B<import> while no such
1331importing took place, it may for example be that your operating system
1332does not support that particular constant. Hopefully you did use an
1333explicit import list for the constants you expect to see, please see
1334L<perlfunc/use> and L<perlfunc/import>. While an explicit import list
1335would probably have caught this error earlier it naturally does not
1336remedy the fact that your operating system still does not support that
1337constant. Maybe you have a typo in the constants of the symbol import
1338list of B<use> or B<import> or in the constant name at the line where
1339this error was triggered?
1340
748a9306 1341=item No command into which to pipe on command line
1342
1343(F) An error peculiar to VMS. Perl handles its own command line redirection,
1344and found a '|' at the end of the command line, so it doesn't know whither you
1345want to pipe the output from this command.
1346
a0d0e21e 1347=item No DB::DB routine defined
1348
1349(F) The currently executing code was compiled with the B<-d> switch,
1350but for some reason the perl5db.pl file (or some facsimile thereof)
1351didn't define a routine to be called at the beginning of each
1352statement. Which is odd, because the file should have been required
1353automatically, and should have blown up the require if it didn't parse
1354right.
1355
1356=item No dbm on this machine
1357
1358(P) This is counted as an internal error, because every machine should
5f05dabc 1359supply dbm nowadays, because Perl comes with SDBM. See L<SDBM_File>.
a0d0e21e 1360
1361=item No DBsub routine
1362
1363(F) The currently executing code was compiled with the B<-d> switch,
1364but for some reason the perl5db.pl file (or some facsimile thereof)
1365didn't define a DB::sub routine to be called at the beginning of each
1366ordinary subroutine call.
1367
8b1a09fc 1368=item No error file after 2E<gt> or 2E<gt>E<gt> on command line
748a9306 1369
1370(F) An error peculiar to VMS. Perl handles its own command line redirection,
8b1a09fc 1371and found a '2E<gt>' or a '2E<gt>E<gt>' on the command line, but can't find
1372the name of the file to which to write data destined for stderr.
748a9306 1373
8b1a09fc 1374=item No input file after E<lt> on command line
748a9306 1375
1376(F) An error peculiar to VMS. Perl handles its own command line redirection,
8b1a09fc 1377and found a 'E<lt>' on the command line, but can't find the name of the file
1378from which to read data for stdin.
748a9306 1379
8b1a09fc 1380=item No output file after E<gt> on command line
748a9306 1381
1382(F) An error peculiar to VMS. Perl handles its own command line redirection,
8b1a09fc 1383and found a lone 'E<gt>' at the end of the command line, so it doesn't know
1384whither you wanted to redirect stdout.
748a9306 1385
8b1a09fc 1386=item No output file after E<gt> or E<gt>E<gt> on command line
748a9306 1387
1388(F) An error peculiar to VMS. Perl handles its own command line redirection,
8b1a09fc 1389and found a 'E<gt>' or a 'E<gt>E<gt>' on the command line, but can't find the
1390name of the file to which to write data destined for stdout.
748a9306 1391
a0d0e21e 1392=item No Perl script found in input
1393
1394(F) You called C<perl -x>, but no line was found in the file beginning
1395with #! and containing the word "perl".
1396
1397=item No setregid available
1398
1399(F) Configure didn't find anything resembling the setregid() call for
1400your system.
1401
1402=item No setreuid available
1403
1404(F) Configure didn't find anything resembling the setreuid() call for
1405your system.
1406
1407=item No space allowed after B<-I>
1408
1409(F) The argument to B<-I> must follow the B<-I> immediately with no
1410intervening space.
1411
748a9306 1412=item No such pipe open
1413
1414(P) An error peculiar to VMS. The internal routine my_pclose() tried to
1415close a pipe which hadn't been opened. This should have been caught earlier as
1416an attempt to close an unopened filehandle.
1417
a0d0e21e 1418=item No such signal: SIG%s
1419
1420(W) You specified a signal name as a subscript to %SIG that was not recognized.
1421Say C<kill -l> in your shell to see the valid signal names on your system.
1422
1423=item Not a CODE reference
1424
1425(F) Perl was trying to evaluate a reference to a code value (that is, a
1426subroutine), but found a reference to something else instead. You can
1427use the ref() function to find out what kind of ref it really was.
1428See also L<perlref>.
1429
1430=item Not a format reference
1431
1432(F) I'm not sure how you managed to generate a reference to an anonymous
1433format, but this indicates you did, and that it didn't exist.
1434
1435=item Not a GLOB reference
1436
55497cff 1437(F) Perl was trying to evaluate a reference to a "typeglob" (that is,
a0d0e21e 1438a symbol table entry that looks like C<*foo>), but found a reference to
1439something else instead. You can use the ref() function to find out
1440what kind of ref it really was. See L<perlref>.
1441
1442=item Not a HASH reference
1443
1444(F) Perl was trying to evaluate a reference to a hash value, but
1445found a reference to something else instead. You can use the ref()
1446function to find out what kind of ref it really was. See L<perlref>.
1447
1448=item Not a perl script
1449
1450(F) The setuid emulator requires that scripts have a well-formed #! line
1451even on machines that don't support the #! construct. The line must
1452mention perl.
1453
1454=item Not a SCALAR reference
1455
1456(F) Perl was trying to evaluate a reference to a scalar value, but
1457found a reference to something else instead. You can use the ref()
1458function to find out what kind of ref it really was. See L<perlref>.
1459
1460=item Not a subroutine reference
1461
1462(F) Perl was trying to evaluate a reference to a code value (that is, a
1463subroutine), but found a reference to something else instead. You can
1464use the ref() function to find out what kind of ref it really was.
1465See also L<perlref>.
1466
e7ea3e70 1467=item Not a subroutine reference in overload table
a0d0e21e 1468
1469(F) An attempt was made to specify an entry in an overloading table that
8b1a09fc 1470doesn't somehow point to a valid subroutine. See L<overload>.
a0d0e21e 1471
1472=item Not an ARRAY reference
1473
1474(F) Perl was trying to evaluate a reference to an array value, but
1475found a reference to something else instead. You can use the ref()
1476function to find out what kind of ref it really was. See L<perlref>.
1477
1478=item Not enough arguments for %s
1479
1480(F) The function requires more arguments than you specified.
1481
1482=item Not enough format arguments
1483
1484(W) A format specified more picture fields than the next line supplied.
1485See L<perlform>.
1486
1487=item Null filename used
1488
5f05dabc 1489(F) You can't require the null filename, especially because on many machines
a0d0e21e 1490that means the current directory! See L<perlfunc/require>.
1491
55497cff 1492=item Null picture in formline
1493
1494(F) The first argument to formline must be a valid format picture
1495specification. It was found to be empty, which probably means you
1496supplied it an uninitialized value. See L<perlform>.
1497
a0d0e21e 1498=item NULL OP IN RUN
1499
1500(P) Some internal routine called run() with a null opcode pointer.
1501
1502=item Null realloc
1503
1504(P) An attempt was made to realloc NULL.
1505
1506=item NULL regexp argument
1507
5f05dabc 1508(P) The internal pattern matching routines blew it big time.
a0d0e21e 1509
1510=item NULL regexp parameter
1511
1512(P) The internal pattern matching routines are out of their gourd.
1513
1514=item Odd number of elements in hash list
1515
1516(S) You specified an odd number of elements to a hash list, which is odd,
5f05dabc 1517because hash lists come in key/value pairs.
a0d0e21e 1518
bbce6d69 1519=item Offset outside string
1520
1521(F) You tried to do a read/write/send/recv operation with an offset
1522pointing outside the buffer. This is difficult to imagine.
1523The sole exception to this is that C<sysread()>ing past the buffer
1524will extend the buffer and zero pad the new area.
1525
a0d0e21e 1526=item oops: oopsAV
1527
1528(S) An internal warning that the grammar is screwed up.
1529
1530=item oops: oopsHV
1531
1532(S) An internal warning that the grammar is screwed up.
1533
e7ea3e70 1534=item Operation `%s': no method found,%s
44a8e56a 1535
e7ea3e70 1536(F) An attempt was made to perform an overloaded operation for which
1537no handler was defined. While some handlers can be autogenerated in
1538terms of other handlers, there is no default handler for any
1539operation, unless C<fallback> overloading key is specified to be
1540true. See L<overload>.
44a8e56a 1541
748a9306 1542=item Operator or semicolon missing before %s
1543
1544(S) You used a variable or subroutine call where the parser was
1545expecting an operator. The parser has assumed you really meant
1546to use an operator, but this is highly likely to be incorrect.
1547For example, if you say "*foo *foo" it will be interpreted as
1548if you said "*foo * 'foo'".
1549
a0d0e21e 1550=item Out of memory for yacc stack
1551
1552(F) The yacc parser wanted to grow its stack so it could continue parsing,
1553but realloc() wouldn't give it more memory, virtual or otherwise.
1554
1555=item Out of memory!
1556
55497cff 1557(X|F) The malloc() function returned 0, indicating there was insufficient
eff9c6e2 1558remaining memory (or virtual memory) to satisfy the request.
1559
1560The request was judged to be small, so the possibility to trap it
1561depends on the way perl was compiled. By default it is not trappable.
1562However, if compiled for this, Perl may use the contents of C<$^M> as
1563an emergency pool after die()ing with this message. In this case the
55497cff 1564error is trappable I<once>.
1565
1566=item Out of memory during request for %s
1567
1568(F) The malloc() function returned 0, indicating there was insufficient
1569remaining memory (or virtual memory) to satisfy the request. However,
1570the request was judged large enough (compile-time default is 64K), so
1571a possibility to shut down by trapping this error is granted.
1572
a0d0e21e 1573=item page overflow
1574
1575(W) A single call to write() produced more lines than can fit on a page.
1576See L<perlform>.
1577
1578=item panic: ck_grep
1579
1580(P) Failed an internal consistency check trying to compile a grep.
1581
1582=item panic: ck_split
1583
1584(P) Failed an internal consistency check trying to compile a split.
1585
1586=item panic: corrupt saved stack index
1587
1588(P) The savestack was requested to restore more localized values than there
1589are in the savestack.
1590
1591=item panic: die %s
1592
1593(P) We popped the context stack to an eval context, and then discovered
1594it wasn't an eval context.
1595
1596=item panic: do_match
1597
1598(P) The internal pp_match() routine was called with invalid operational data.
1599
1600=item panic: do_split
1601
1602(P) Something terrible went wrong in setting up for the split.
1603
1604=item panic: do_subst
1605
1606(P) The internal pp_subst() routine was called with invalid operational data.
1607
1608=item panic: do_trans
1609
1610(P) The internal do_trans() routine was called with invalid operational data.
1611
1612=item panic: goto
1613
1614(P) We popped the context stack to a context with the specified label,
1615and then discovered it wasn't a context we know how to do a goto in.
1616
1617=item panic: INTERPCASEMOD
1618
1619(P) The lexer got into a bad state at a case modifier.
1620
1621=item panic: INTERPCONCAT
1622
1623(P) The lexer got into a bad state parsing a string with brackets.
1624
1625=item panic: last
1626
1627(P) We popped the context stack to a block context, and then discovered
1628it wasn't a block context.
1629
1630=item panic: leave_scope clearsv
1631
5f05dabc 1632(P) A writable lexical variable became read-only somehow within the scope.
a0d0e21e 1633
1634=item panic: leave_scope inconsistency
1635
1636(P) The savestack probably got out of sync. At least, there was an
1637invalid enum on the top of it.
1638
1639=item panic: malloc
1640
1641(P) Something requested a negative number of bytes of malloc.
1642
1643=item panic: mapstart
1644
1645(P) The compiler is screwed up with respect to the map() function.
1646
1647=item panic: null array
1648
1649(P) One of the internal array routines was passed a null AV pointer.
1650
1651=item panic: pad_alloc
1652
1653(P) The compiler got confused about which scratch pad it was allocating
1654and freeing temporaries and lexicals from.
1655
1656=item panic: pad_free curpad
1657
1658(P) The compiler got confused about which scratch pad it was allocating
1659and freeing temporaries and lexicals from.
1660
1661=item panic: pad_free po
1662
1663(P) An invalid scratch pad offset was detected internally.
1664
1665=item panic: pad_reset curpad
1666
1667(P) The compiler got confused about which scratch pad it was allocating
1668and freeing temporaries and lexicals from.
1669
1670=item panic: pad_sv po
1671
1672(P) An invalid scratch pad offset was detected internally.
1673
1674=item panic: pad_swipe curpad
1675
1676(P) The compiler got confused about which scratch pad it was allocating
1677and freeing temporaries and lexicals from.
1678
1679=item panic: pad_swipe po
1680
1681(P) An invalid scratch pad offset was detected internally.
1682
1683=item panic: pp_iter
1684
1685(P) The foreach iterator got called in a non-loop context frame.
1686
1687=item panic: realloc
1688
1689(P) Something requested a negative number of bytes of realloc.
1690
1691=item panic: restartop
1692
1693(P) Some internal routine requested a goto (or something like it), and
1694didn't supply the destination.
1695
1696=item panic: return
1697
1698(P) We popped the context stack to a subroutine or eval context, and
1699then discovered it wasn't a subroutine or eval context.
1700
1701=item panic: scan_num
1702
1703(P) scan_num() got called on something that wasn't a number.
1704
1705=item panic: sv_insert
1706
1707(P) The sv_insert() routine was told to remove more string than there
1708was string.
1709
1710=item panic: top_env
1711
1712(P) The compiler attempted to do a goto, or something weird like that.
1713
1714=item panic: yylex
1715
1716(P) The lexer got into a bad state while processing a case modifier.
1717
5f05dabc 1718=item Pareneses missing around "%s" list
a0d0e21e 1719
1720(W) You said something like
1721
1722 my $foo, $bar = @_;
1723
1724when you meant
1725
1726 my ($foo, $bar) = @_;
1727
1728Remember that "my" and "local" bind closer than comma.
1729
1730=item Perl %3.3f required--this is only version %s, stopped
1731
1732(F) The module in question uses features of a version of Perl more recent
1733than the currently running version. How long has it been since you upgraded,
1734anyway? See L<perlfunc/require>.
1735
1736=item Permission denied
1737
1738(F) The setuid emulator in suidperl decided you were up to no good.
1739
748a9306 1740=item pid %d not a child
1741
1742(W) A warning peculiar to VMS. Waitpid() was asked to wait for a process which
1743isn't a subprocess of the current process. While this is fine from VMS'
1744perspective, it's probably not what you intended.
1745
a0d0e21e 1746=item POSIX getpgrp can't take an argument
1747
1748(F) Your C compiler uses POSIX getpgrp(), which takes no argument, unlike
1749the BSD version, which takes a pid.
1750
bbce6d69 1751=item Possible attempt to put comments in qw() list
1752
774d564b 1753(W) qw() lists contain items separated by whitespace; as with literal
1754strings, comment characters are not ignored, but are instead treated
1755as literal data. (You may have used different delimiters than the
1756exclamation marks parentheses shown here; braces are also frequently
1757used.)
bbce6d69 1758
774d564b 1759You probably wrote something like this:
1760
1761 @list = qw(
1762 a # a comment
bbce6d69 1763 b # another comment
774d564b 1764 );
bbce6d69 1765
1766when you should have written this:
1767
774d564b 1768 @list = qw(
1769 a
bbce6d69 1770 b
774d564b 1771 );
1772
1773If you really want comments, build your list the
1774old-fashioned way, with quotes and commas:
1775
1776 @list = (
1777 'a', # a comment
1778 'b', # another comment
1779 );
bbce6d69 1780
1781=item Possible attempt to separate words with commas
1782
774d564b 1783(W) qw() lists contain items separated by whitespace; therefore commas
1784aren't needed to separate the items. (You may have used different
1785delimiters than the parentheses shown here; braces are also frequently
1786used.)
bbce6d69 1787
774d564b 1788You probably wrote something like this:
bbce6d69 1789
774d564b 1790 qw! a, b, c !;
1791
1792which puts literal commas into some of the list items. Write it without
1793commas if you don't want them to appear in your data:
bbce6d69 1794
774d564b 1795 qw! a b c !;
bbce6d69 1796
a0d0e21e 1797=item Possible memory corruption: %s overflowed 3rd argument
1798
1799(F) An ioctl() or fcntl() returned more than Perl was bargaining for.
1800Perl guesses a reasonable buffer size, but puts a sentinel byte at the
1801end of the buffer just in case. This sentinel byte got clobbered, and
1802Perl assumes that memory is now corrupted. See L<perlfunc/ioctl>.
1803
1804=item Precedence problem: open %s should be open(%s)
1805
1806(S) The old irregular construct
cb1a09d0 1807
a0d0e21e 1808 open FOO || die;
1809
1810is now misinterpreted as
1811
1812 open(FOO || die);
1813
1814because of the strict regularization of Perl 5's grammar into unary and
1815list operators. (The old open was a little of both.) You must put
5f05dabc 1816parentheses around the filehandle, or use the new "or" operator instead of "||".
a0d0e21e 1817
1818=item print on closed filehandle %s
1819
1820(W) The filehandle you're printing on got itself closed sometime before now.
1821Check your logic flow.
1822
1823=item printf on closed filehandle %s
1824
1825(W) The filehandle you're writing to got itself closed sometime before now.
1826Check your logic flow.
1827
1828=item Probable precedence problem on %s
1829
1830(W) The compiler found a bare word where it expected a conditional,
1831which often indicates that an || or && was parsed as part of the
1832last argument of the previous construct, for example:
1833
1834 open FOO || die;
1835
4633a7c4 1836=item Prototype mismatch: (%s) vs (%s)
1837
5f05dabc 1838(S) The subroutine being defined had a pre-declared (forward) declaration
4633a7c4 1839with a different function prototype.
1840
8b1a09fc 1841=item Read on closed filehandle E<lt>%sE<gt>
a0d0e21e 1842
1843(W) The filehandle you're reading from got itself closed sometime before now.
1844Check your logic flow.
1845
1846=item Reallocation too large: %lx
1847
1848(F) You can't allocate more than 64K on an MSDOS machine.
1849
1850=item Recompile perl with B<-D>DEBUGGING to use B<-D> switch
1851
1852(F) You can't use the B<-D> option unless the code to produce the
1853desired output is compiled into Perl, which entails some overhead,
1854which is why it's currently left out of your copy.
1855
1856=item Recursive inheritance detected
1857
1858(F) More than 100 levels of inheritance were used. Probably indicates
1859an unintended loop in your inheritance hierarchy.
1860
1861=item Reference miscount in sv_replace()
1862
1863(W) The internal sv_replace() function was handed a new SV with a
1864reference count of other than 1.
1865
1866=item regexp memory corruption
1867
1868(P) The regular expression engine got confused by what the regular
1869expression compiler gave it.
1870
1871=item regexp out of space
1872
1873(P) A "can't happen" error, because safemalloc() should have caught it earlier.
1874
1875=item regexp too big
1876
2ba9eb46 1877(F) The current implementation of regular expressions uses shorts as
a0d0e21e 1878address offsets within a string. Unfortunately this means that if
1879the regular expression compiles to longer than 32767, it'll blow up.
1880Usually when you want a regular expression this big, there is a better
1881way to do it with multiple statements. See L<perlre>.
1882
1883=item Reversed %s= operator
1884
1885(W) You wrote your assignment operator backwards. The = must always
1886comes last, to avoid ambiguity with subsequent unary operators.
1887
1888=item Runaway format
1889
1890(F) Your format contained the ~~ repeat-until-blank sequence, but it
1891produced 200 lines at once, and the 200th line looked exactly like the
1892199th line. Apparently you didn't arrange for the arguments to exhaust
1893themselves, either by using ^ instead of @ (for scalar variables), or by
1894shifting or popping (for array variables). See L<perlform>.
1895
1896=item Scalar value @%s[%s] better written as $%s[%s]
1897
a6006777 1898(W) You've used an array slice (indicated by @) to select a single element of
a0d0e21e 1899an array. Generally it's better to ask for a scalar value (indicated by $).
8b1a09fc 1900The difference is that C<$foo[&bar]> always behaves like a scalar, both when
1901assigning to it and when evaluating its argument, while C<@foo[&bar]> behaves
a0d0e21e 1902like a list when you assign to it, and provides a list context to its
5f05dabc 1903subscript, which can do weird things if you're expecting only one subscript.
a0d0e21e 1904
748a9306 1905On the other hand, if you were actually hoping to treat the array
5f05dabc 1906element as a list, you need to look into how references work, because
748a9306 1907Perl will not magically convert between scalars and lists for you. See
1908L<perlref>.
1909
a6006777 1910=item Scalar value @%s{%s} better written as $%s{%s}
1911
1912(W) You've used a hash slice (indicated by @) to select a single element of
1913a hash. Generally it's better to ask for a scalar value (indicated by $).
1914The difference is that C<$foo{&bar}> always behaves like a scalar, both when
1915assigning to it and when evaluating its argument, while C<@foo{&bar}> behaves
1916like a list when you assign to it, and provides a list context to its
1917subscript, which can do weird things if you're expecting only one subscript.
1918
1919On the other hand, if you were actually hoping to treat the hash
1920element as a list, you need to look into how references work, because
1921Perl will not magically convert between scalars and lists for you. See
1922L<perlref>.
1923
a0d0e21e 1924=item Script is not setuid/setgid in suidperl
1925
1926(F) Oddly, the suidperl program was invoked on a script with its setuid
8b1a09fc 1927or setgid bit not set. This doesn't make much sense.
a0d0e21e 1928
1929=item Search pattern not terminated
1930
1931(F) The lexer couldn't find the final delimiter of a // or m{}
1932construct. Remember that bracketing delimiters count nesting level.
1933
1934=item seek() on unopened file
1935
1936(W) You tried to use the seek() function on a filehandle that was either
1937never opened or has been closed since.
1938
1939=item select not implemented
1940
1941(F) This machine doesn't implement the select() system call.
1942
1943=item sem%s not implemented
1944
1945(F) You don't have System V semaphore IPC on your system.
1946
1947=item semi-panic: attempt to dup freed string
1948
1949(S) The internal newSVsv() routine was called to duplicate a scalar
1950that had previously been marked as free.
1951
1952=item Semicolon seems to be missing
1953
1954(W) A nearby syntax error was probably caused by a missing semicolon,
1955or possibly some other missing operator, such as a comma.
1956
1957=item Send on closed socket
1958
1959(W) The filehandle you're sending to got itself closed sometime before now.
1960Check your logic flow.
1961
1962=item Sequence (?#... not terminated
1963
1964(F) A regular expression comment must be terminated by a closing
5f05dabc 1965parenthesis. Embedded parentheses aren't allowed. See L<perlre>.
a0d0e21e 1966
1967=item Sequence (?%s...) not implemented
1968
1969(F) A proposed regular expression extension has the character reserved
1970but has not yet been written. See L<perlre>.
1971
1972=item Sequence (?%s...) not recognized
1973
1974(F) You used a regular expression extension that doesn't make sense.
1975See L<perlre>.
1976
a5f75d66 1977=item Server error
1978
1979Also known as "500 Server error". This is a CGI error, not a Perl
1980error. You need to make sure your script is executable, is accessible
1981by the user CGI is running the script under (which is probably not
1982the user account you tested it under), does not rely on any environment
1983variables (like PATH) from the user it isn't running under, and isn't
1984in a location where the CGI server can't find it, basically, more or less.
1985
a0d0e21e 1986=item setegid() not implemented
1987
8b1a09fc 1988(F) You tried to assign to C<$)>, and your operating system doesn't support
a0d0e21e 1989the setegid() system call (or equivalent), or at least Configure didn't
1990think so.
1991
1992=item seteuid() not implemented
1993
8b1a09fc 1994(F) You tried to assign to C<$E<gt>>, and your operating system doesn't support
a0d0e21e 1995the seteuid() system call (or equivalent), or at least Configure didn't
1996think so.
1997
1998=item setrgid() not implemented
1999
8b1a09fc 2000(F) You tried to assign to C<$(>, and your operating system doesn't support
a0d0e21e 2001the setrgid() system call (or equivalent), or at least Configure didn't
2002think so.
2003
2004=item setruid() not implemented
2005
8b1a09fc 2006(F) You tried to assign to C<$<lt>>, and your operating system doesn't support
a0d0e21e 2007the setruid() system call (or equivalent), or at least Configure didn't
2008think so.
2009
2010=item Setuid/gid script is writable by world
2011
2012(F) The setuid emulator won't run a script that is writable by the world,
2013because the world might have written on it already.
2014
2015=item shm%s not implemented
2016
2017(F) You don't have System V shared memory IPC on your system.
2018
2019=item shutdown() on closed fd
2020
2021(W) You tried to do a shutdown on a closed socket. Seems a bit superfluous.
2022
f86702cc 2023=item SIG%s handler "%s" not defined
a0d0e21e 2024
2025(W) The signal handler named in %SIG doesn't, in fact, exist. Perhaps you
2026put it into the wrong package?
2027
2028=item sort is now a reserved word
2029
2030(F) An ancient error message that almost nobody ever runs into anymore.
2031But before sort was a keyword, people sometimes used it as a filehandle.
2032
2033=item Sort subroutine didn't return a numeric value
2034
2035(F) A sort comparison routine must return a number. You probably blew
4633a7c4 2036it by not using C<E<lt>=E<gt>> or C<cmp>, or by not using them correctly.
a0d0e21e 2037See L<perlfunc/sort>.
2038
2039=item Sort subroutine didn't return single value
2040
2041(F) A sort comparison subroutine may not return a list value with more
2042or less than one element. See L<perlfunc/sort>.
2043
2044=item Split loop
2045
2046(P) The split was looping infinitely. (Obviously, a split shouldn't iterate
2047more times than there are characters of input, which is what happened.)
2048See L<perlfunc/split>.
2049
8b1a09fc 2050=item Stat on unopened file E<lt>%sE<gt>
a0d0e21e 2051
2052(W) You tried to use the stat() function (or an equivalent file test)
2053on a filehandle that was either never opened or has been closed since.
2054
2055=item Statement unlikely to be reached
2056
2057(W) You did an exec() with some statement after it other than a die().
2058This is almost always an error, because exec() never returns unless
2059there was a failure. You probably wanted to use system() instead,
2060which does return. To suppress this warning, put the exec() in a block
2061by itself.
2062
e7ea3e70 2063=item Stub found while resolving method `%s' overloading `%s' in package `%s'
2064
2065(P) Overloading resolution over @ISA tree may be broken by importation stubs.
2066Stubs should never be implicitely created, but explicit calls to C<can>
2067may break this.
2068
a0d0e21e 2069=item Subroutine %s redefined
2070
2071(W) You redefined a subroutine. To suppress this warning, say
2072
2073 {
2074 local $^W = 0;
2075 eval "sub name { ... }";
2076 }
2077
2078=item Substitution loop
2079
2080(P) The substitution was looping infinitely. (Obviously, a
2081substitution shouldn't iterate more times than there are characters of
2082input, which is what happened.) See the discussion of substitution in
5f05dabc 2083L<perlop/"Quote and Quote-like Operators">.
a0d0e21e 2084
2085=item Substitution pattern not terminated
2086
2087(F) The lexer couldn't find the interior delimiter of a s/// or s{}{}
2088construct. Remember that bracketing delimiters count nesting level.
2089
2090=item Substitution replacement not terminated
2091
2092(F) The lexer couldn't find the final delimiter of a s/// or s{}{}
2093construct. Remember that bracketing delimiters count nesting level.
2094
2095=item substr outside of string
2096
2097(W) You tried to reference a substr() that pointed outside of a string.
2098That is, the absolute value of the offset was larger than the length of
2099the string. See L<perlfunc/substr>.
2100
f86702cc 2101=item suidperl is no longer needed since %s
a0d0e21e 2102
2103(F) Your Perl was compiled with B<-D>SETUID_SCRIPTS_ARE_SECURE_NOW, but a
2104version of the setuid emulator somehow got run anyway.
2105
2106=item syntax error
2107
2108(F) Probably means you had a syntax error. Common reasons include:
2109
2110 A keyword is misspelled.
2111 A semicolon is missing.
2112 A comma is missing.
2113 An opening or closing parenthesis is missing.
2114 An opening or closing brace is missing.
2115 A closing quote is missing.
2116
2117Often there will be another error message associated with the syntax
2118error giving more information. (Sometimes it helps to turn on B<-w>.)
2119The error message itself often tells you where it was in the line when
2120it decided to give up. Sometimes the actual error is several tokens
5f05dabc 2121before this, because Perl is good at understanding random input.
a0d0e21e 2122Occasionally the line number may be misleading, and once in a blue moon
2123the only way to figure out what's triggering the error is to call
2124C<perl -c> repeatedly, chopping away half the program each time to see
2125if the error went away. Sort of the cybernetic version of S<20 questions>.
2126
cb1a09d0 2127=item syntax error at line %d: `%s' unexpected
2128
8b1a09fc 2129(A) You've accidentally run your script through the Bourne shell
3a52c276 2130instead of Perl. Check the #! line, or manually feed your script
cb1a09d0 2131into Perl yourself.
2132
a0d0e21e 2133=item System V IPC is not implemented on this machine
2134
5f05dabc 2135(F) You tried to do something with a function beginning with "sem", "shm",
a0d0e21e 2136or "msg". See L<perlfunc/semctl>, for example.
2137
2138=item Syswrite on closed filehandle
2139
2140(W) The filehandle you're writing to got itself closed sometime before now.
2141Check your logic flow.
2142
2143=item tell() on unopened file
2144
2145(W) You tried to use the tell() function on a filehandle that was either
2146never opened or has been closed since.
2147
8b1a09fc 2148=item Test on unopened file E<lt>%sE<gt>
a0d0e21e 2149
2150(W) You tried to invoke a file test operator on a filehandle that isn't
2151open. Check your logic. See also L<perlfunc/-X>.
2152
2153=item That use of $[ is unsupported
2154
8b1a09fc 2155(F) Assignment to C<$[> is now strictly circumscribed, and interpreted as
5f05dabc 2156a compiler directive. You may say only one of
a0d0e21e 2157
2158 $[ = 0;
2159 $[ = 1;
2160 ...
2161 local $[ = 0;
2162 local $[ = 1;
2163 ...
2164
2165This is to prevent the problem of one module changing the array base
2166out from under another module inadvertently. See L<perlvar/$[>.
2167
2168=item The %s function is unimplemented
2169
2170The function indicated isn't implemented on this architecture, according
2171to the probings of Configure.
2172
f86702cc 2173=item The crypt() function is unimplemented due to excessive paranoia
a0d0e21e 2174
2175(F) Configure couldn't find the crypt() function on your machine,
2176probably because your vendor didn't supply it, probably because they
8b1a09fc 2177think the U.S. Government thinks it's a secret, or at least that they
a0d0e21e 2178will continue to pretend that it is. And if you quote me on that, I
2179will deny it.
2180
2181=item The stat preceding C<-l _> wasn't an lstat
2182
2183(F) It makes no sense to test the current stat buffer for symbolic linkhood
2184if the last stat that wrote to the stat buffer already went past
2185the symlink to get to the real file. Use an actual filename instead.
2186
2187=item times not implemented
2188
2189(F) Your version of the C library apparently doesn't do times(). I suspect
2190you're not running on Unix.
2191
2192=item Too few args to syscall
2193
2194(F) There has to be at least one argument to syscall() to specify the
2195system call to call, silly dilly.
2196
4fdae800 2197=item Too late for "B<-T>" option (try putting it first)
f86702cc 2198
f65adc38 2199(X) The #! line in a Perl script contains the B<-T> option, but Perl
2200was not invoked with B<-T> in its argument list. Due to the way Perl
2201handles tainting, by the time Perl discovers a B<-T> in a script, it's
f86702cc 2202too late to properly taint everything from the environment. So Perl
2203gives up.
2204
3a52c276 2205This error can usually be fixed by editing the #! line so that the
f65adc38 2206B<-T> option is in the Perl program's first argument. (Many operating
3a52c276 2207systems that implement the #! feature only pick up one argument from
f86702cc 2208it, so Perl has to get the rest on its own.)
2209
cb1a09d0 2210=item Too many ('s
2211
2212=item Too many )'s
2213
2214(A) You've accidentally run your script through B<csh> instead
3a52c276 2215of Perl. Check the #! line, or manually feed your script into
2216Perl yourself.
cb1a09d0 2217
a0d0e21e 2218=item Too many args to syscall
2219
5f05dabc 2220(F) Perl supports a maximum of only 14 args to syscall().
a0d0e21e 2221
2222=item Too many arguments for %s
2223
2224(F) The function requires fewer arguments than you specified.
2225
2226=item trailing \ in regexp
2227
2228(F) The regular expression ends with an unbackslashed backslash. Backslash
2229it. See L<perlre>.
2230
2231=item Translation pattern not terminated
2232
2233(F) The lexer couldn't find the interior delimiter of a tr/// or tr[][]
2234construct.
2235
2236=item Translation replacement not terminated
2237
2238(F) The lexer couldn't find the final delimiter of a tr/// or tr[][]
2239construct.
2240
2241=item truncate not implemented
2242
2243(F) Your machine doesn't implement a file truncation mechanism that
2244Configure knows about.
2245
2246=item Type of arg %d to %s must be %s (not %s)
2247
2248(F) This function requires the argument in that position to be of a
8b1a09fc 2249certain type. Arrays must be @NAME or C<@{EXPR}>. Hashes must be
2250%NAME or C<%{EXPR}>. No implicit dereferencing is allowed--use the
a0d0e21e 2251{EXPR} forms as an explicit dereference. See L<perlref>.
2252
2253=item umask: argument is missing initial 0
2254
5f05dabc 2255(W) A umask of 222 is incorrect. It should be 0222, because octal literals
a0d0e21e 2256always start with 0 in Perl, as in C.
2257
4633a7c4 2258=item Unable to create sub named "%s"
2259
2260(F) You attempted to create or access a subroutine with an illegal name.
2261
a0d0e21e 2262=item Unbalanced context: %d more PUSHes than POPs
2263
2264(W) The exit code detected an internal inconsistency in how many execution
2265contexts were entered and left.
2266
2267=item Unbalanced saves: %d more saves than restores
2268
2269(W) The exit code detected an internal inconsistency in how many
2270values were temporarily localized.
2271
2272=item Unbalanced scopes: %d more ENTERs than LEAVEs
2273
2274(W) The exit code detected an internal inconsistency in how many blocks
2275were entered and left.
2276
2277=item Unbalanced tmps: %d more allocs than frees
2278
2279(W) The exit code detected an internal inconsistency in how many mortal
2280scalars were allocated and freed.
2281
2282=item Undefined format "%s" called
2283
2284(F) The format indicated doesn't seem to exist. Perhaps it's really in
2285another package? See L<perlform>.
2286
2287=item Undefined sort subroutine "%s" called
2288
2289(F) The sort comparison routine specified doesn't seem to exist. Perhaps
2290it's in a different package? See L<perlfunc/sort>.
2291
2292=item Undefined subroutine &%s called
2293
2294(F) The subroutine indicated hasn't been defined, or if it was, it
2295has since been undefined.
2296
2297=item Undefined subroutine called
2298
2299(F) The anonymous subroutine you're trying to call hasn't been defined,
2300or if it was, it has since been undefined.
2301
2302=item Undefined subroutine in sort
2303
2304(F) The sort comparison routine specified is declared but doesn't seem to
2305have been defined yet. See L<perlfunc/sort>.
2306
4633a7c4 2307=item Undefined top format "%s" called
2308
2309(F) The format indicated doesn't seem to exist. Perhaps it's really in
2310another package? See L<perlform>.
2311
a0d0e21e 2312=item unexec of %s into %s failed!
2313
2314(F) The unexec() routine failed for some reason. See your local FSF
2315representative, who probably put it there in the first place.
2316
2317=item Unknown BYTEORDER
2318
5f05dabc 2319(F) There are no byte-swapping functions for a machine with this byte order.
a0d0e21e 2320
2321=item unmatched () in regexp
2322
2323(F) Unbackslashed parentheses must always be balanced in regular
2324expressions. If you're a vi user, the % key is valuable for finding
5f05dabc 2325the matching parenthesis. See L<perlre>.
a0d0e21e 2326
2327=item Unmatched right bracket
2328
2329(F) The lexer counted more closing curly brackets (braces) than opening
2330ones, so you're probably missing an opening bracket. As a general
2331rule, you'll find the missing one (so to speak) near the place you were
2332last editing.
2333
2334=item unmatched [] in regexp
2335
2336(F) The brackets around a character class must match. If you wish to
2337include a closing bracket in a character class, backslash it or put it first.
2338See L<perlre>.
2339
2340=item Unquoted string "%s" may clash with future reserved word
2341
2342(W) You used a bare word that might someday be claimed as a reserved word.
2343It's best to put such a word in quotes, or capitalize it somehow, or insert
2344an underbar into it. You might also declare it as a subroutine.
2345
2346=item Unrecognized character \%03o ignored
2347
2348(S) A garbage character was found in the input, and ignored, in case it's
2349a weird control character on an EBCDIC machine, or some such.
2350
2351=item Unrecognized signal name "%s"
2352
2353(F) You specified a signal name to the kill() function that was not recognized.
2354Say C<kill -l> in your shell to see the valid signal names on your system.
2355
2356=item Unrecognized switch: -%s
2357
2358(F) You specified an illegal option to Perl. Don't do that.
2359(If you think you didn't do that, check the #! line to see if it's
2360supplying the bad switch on your behalf.)
2361
2362=item Unsuccessful %s on filename containing newline
2363
2364(W) A file operation was attempted on a filename, and that operation
2365failed, PROBABLY because the filename contained a newline, PROBABLY
2366because you forgot to chop() or chomp() it off. See L<perlfunc/chop>.
2367
2368=item Unsupported directory function "%s" called
2369
2370(F) Your machine doesn't support opendir() and readdir().
2371
2372=item Unsupported function %s
2373
2374(F) This machines doesn't implement the indicated function, apparently.
2375At least, Configure doesn't think so.
2376
2377=item Unsupported socket function "%s" called
2378
2379(F) Your machine doesn't support the Berkeley socket mechanism, or at
2380least that's what Configure thought.
2381
8b1a09fc 2382=item Unterminated E<lt>E<gt> operator
a0d0e21e 2383
2384(F) The lexer saw a left angle bracket in a place where it was expecting
2385a term, so it's looking for the corresponding right angle bracket, and not
2386finding it. Chances are you left some needed parentheses out earlier in
2387the line, and you really meant a "less than".
2388
2389=item Use of $# is deprecated
2390
8b1a09fc 2391(D) This was an ill-advised attempt to emulate a poorly defined B<awk> feature.
a0d0e21e 2392Use an explicit printf() or sprintf() instead.
2393
2394=item Use of $* is deprecated
2395
5f05dabc 2396(D) This variable magically turned on multi-line pattern matching, both for
a0d0e21e 2397you and for any luckless subroutine that you happen to call. You should
2398use the new C<//m> and C<//s> modifiers now to do that without the dangerous
2399action-at-a-distance effects of C<$*>.
2400
748a9306 2401=item Use of %s in printf format not supported
2402
5f05dabc 2403(F) You attempted to use a feature of printf that is accessible from
2404only C. This usually means there's a better way to do it in Perl.
748a9306 2405
a0d0e21e 2406=item Use of %s is deprecated
2407
2408(D) The construct indicated is no longer recommended for use, generally
2409because there's a better way to do it, and also because the old way has
2410bad side effects.
2411
8b1a09fc 2412=item Use of bare E<lt>E<lt> to mean E<lt>E<lt>"" is deprecated
4633a7c4 2413
2414(D) You are now encouraged to use the explicitly quoted form if you
2415wish to use a blank line as the terminator of the here-document.
2416
a0d0e21e 2417=item Use of implicit split to @_ is deprecated
2418
2419(D) It makes a lot of work for the compiler when you clobber a
2420subroutine's argument list, so it's better if you assign the results of
2421a split() explicitly to an array (or list).
2422
2423=item Use of uninitialized value
2424
2425(W) An undefined value was used as if it were already defined. It was
2426interpreted as a "" or a 0, but maybe it was a mistake. To suppress this
2427warning assign an initial value to your variables.
2428
2429=item Useless use of %s in void context
2430
2431(W) You did something without a side effect in a context that does nothing
2432with the return value, such as a statement that doesn't return a value
2433from a block, or the left side of a scalar comma operator. Very often
2434this points not to stupidity on your part, but a failure of Perl to parse
2435your program the way you thought it would. For example, you'd get this
2436if you mixed up your C precedence with Python precedence and said
2437
2438 $one, $two = 1, 2;
2439
2440when you meant to say
2441
2442 ($one, $two) = (1, 2);
2443
748a9306 2444Another common error is to use ordinary parentheses to construct a list
2445reference when you should be using square or curly brackets, for
2446example, if you say
2447
2448 $array = (1,2);
2449
2450when you should have said
2451
2452 $array = [1,2];
2453
2454The square brackets explicitly turn a list value into a scalar value,
2455while parentheses do not. So when a parenthesized list is evaluated in
2456a scalar context, the comma is treated like C's comma operator, which
2457throws away the left argument, which is not what you want. See
2458L<perlref> for more on this.
2459
55497cff 2460=item untie attempted while %d inner references still exist
2461
2462(W) A copy of the object returned from C<tie> (or C<tied>) was still
2463valid when C<untie> was called.
2464
8ebc5c01 2465=item Value of %s construct can be "0"; test with defined()
a6006777 2466
2467(W) In a conditional expression, you used <HANDLE>, <*> (glob), or
8ebc5c01 2468C<readdir> as a boolean value. Each of these constructs can return a
a6006777 2469value of "0"; that would make the conditional expression false, which
8ebc5c01 2470is probably not what you intended. When using these constructs in
a6006777 2471conditional expressions, test their values with the C<defined> operator.
2472
4633a7c4 2473=item Variable "%s" is not exported
2474
2475(F) While "use strict" in effect, you referred to a global variable
2476that you apparently thought was imported from another module, because
2477something else of the same name (usually a subroutine) is exported
2478by that module. It usually means you put the wrong funny character
2479on the front of your variable.
2480
44a8e56a 2481=item Variable "%s" may be unavailable
2482
2483(W) An inner (nested) I<anonymous> subroutine is inside a I<named>
2484subroutine, and outside that is another subroutine; and the anonymous
2485(innermost) subroutine is referencing a lexical variable defined in
2486the outermost subroutine. For example:
2487
2488 sub outermost { my $a; sub middle { sub { $a } } }
2489
2490If the anonymous subroutine is called or referenced (directly or
2491indirectly) from the outermost subroutine, it will share the variable
2492as you would expect. But if the anonymous subroutine is called or
2493referenced when the outermost subroutine is not active, it will see
2494the value of the shared variable as it was before and during the
2495*first* call to the outermost subroutine, which is probably not what
2496you want.
2497
2498In these circumstances, it is usually best to make the middle
2499subroutine anonymous, using the C<sub {}> syntax. Perl has specific
2500support for shared variables in nested anonymous subroutines; a named
2501subroutine in between interferes with this feature.
2502
2503=item Variable "%s" will not stay shared
2504
2505(W) An inner (nested) I<named> subroutine is referencing a lexical
2506variable defined in an outer subroutine.
2507
2508When the inner subroutine is called, it will probably see the value of
2509the outer subroutine's variable as it was before and during the
2510*first* call to the outer subroutine; in this case, after the first
2511call to the outer subroutine is complete, the inner and outer
2512subroutines will no longer share a common value for the variable. In
2513other words, the variable will no longer be shared.
2514
2515Furthermore, if the outer subroutine is anonymous and references a
2516lexical variable outside itself, then the outer and inner subroutines
2517will I<never> share the given variable.
2518
2519This problem can usually be solved by making the inner subroutine
2520anonymous, using the C<sub {}> syntax. When inner anonymous subs that
2521reference variables in outer subroutines are called or referenced,
2522they are automatically re-bound to the current values of such
2523variables.
2524
f86702cc 2525=item Variable syntax
cb1a09d0 2526
2527(A) You've accidentally run your script through B<csh> instead
3a52c276 2528of Perl. Check the #! line, or manually feed your script into
2529Perl yourself.
cb1a09d0 2530
7e1af8bc 2531=item Warning: something's wrong
5f05dabc 2532
2533(W) You passed warn() an empty string (the equivalent of C<warn "">) or
2534you called it with no args and C<$_> was empty.
2535
f86702cc 2536=item Warning: unable to close filehandle %s properly
a0d0e21e 2537
8b1a09fc 2538(S) The implicit close() done by an open() got an error indication on the
5f05dabc 2539close(). This usually indicates your file system ran out of disk space.
a0d0e21e 2540
5f05dabc 2541=item Warning: Use of "%s" without parentheses is ambiguous
a0d0e21e 2542
2543(S) You wrote a unary operator followed by something that looks like a
2544binary operator that could also have been interpreted as a term or
2545unary operator. For instance, if you know that the rand function
2546has a default argument of 1.0, and you write
2547
2548 rand + 5;
2549
2550you may THINK you wrote the same thing as
2551
2552 rand() + 5;
2553
2554but in actual fact, you got
2555
2556 rand(+5);
2557
5f05dabc 2558So put in parentheses to say what you really mean.
a0d0e21e 2559
2560=item Write on closed filehandle
2561
2562(W) The filehandle you're writing to got itself closed sometime before now.
2563Check your logic flow.
2564
2565=item X outside of string
2566
2567(F) You had a pack template that specified a relative position before
2568the beginning of the string being unpacked. See L<perlfunc/pack>.
2569
2570=item x outside of string
2571
2572(F) You had a pack template that specified a relative position after
2573the end of the string being unpacked. See L<perlfunc/pack>.
2574
2575=item Xsub "%s" called in sort
2576
2577(F) The use of an external subroutine as a sort comparison is not yet supported.
2578
2579=item Xsub called in sort
2580
2581(F) The use of an external subroutine as a sort comparison is not yet supported.
2582
2583=item You can't use C<-l> on a filehandle
2584
2585(F) A filehandle represents an opened file, and when you opened the file it
2586already went past any symlink you are presumably trying to look for.
2587Use a filename instead.
2588
2589=item YOU HAVEN'T DISABLED SET-ID SCRIPTS IN THE KERNEL YET!
2590
5f05dabc 2591(F) And you probably never will, because you probably don't have the
a0d0e21e 2592sources to your kernel, and your vendor probably doesn't give a rip
2593about what you want. Your best bet is to use the wrapsuid script in
2594the eg directory to put a setuid C wrapper around your script.
2595
2596=item You need to quote "%s"
2597
2598(W) You assigned a bareword as a signal handler name. Unfortunately, you
2599already have a subroutine of that name declared, which means that Perl 5
2600will try to call the subroutine when the assignment is executed, which is
2601probably not what you want. (If it IS what you want, put an & in front.)
2602
2603=item [gs]etsockopt() on closed fd
2604
2605(W) You tried to get or set a socket option on a closed socket.
2606Did you forget to check the return value of your socket() call?
2607See L<perlfunc/getsockopt>.
2608
2609=item \1 better written as $1
2610
2611(W) Outside of patterns, backreferences live on as variables. The use
5f05dabc 2612of backslashes is grandfathered on the right-hand side of a
a0d0e21e 2613substitution, but stylistically it's better to use the variable form
2614because other Perl programmers will expect it, and it works better
2615if there are more than 9 backreferences.
2616
8b1a09fc 2617=item '|' and 'E<lt>' may not both be specified on command line
748a9306 2618
2619(F) An error peculiar to VMS. Perl does its own command line redirection, and
2620found that STDIN was a pipe, and that you also tried to redirect STDIN using
8b1a09fc 2621'E<lt>'. Only one STDIN stream to a customer, please.
748a9306 2622
8b1a09fc 2623=item '|' and 'E<gt>' may not both be specified on command line
748a9306 2624
2625(F) An error peculiar to VMS. Perl does its own command line redirection, and
2626thinks you tried to redirect stdout both to a file and into a pipe to another
2627command. You need to choose one or the other, though nothing's stopping you
2628from piping into a program or Perl script which 'splits' output into two
2629streams, such as
2630
2631 open(OUT,">$ARGV[0]") or die "Can't write to $ARGV[0]: $!";
2632 while (<STDIN>) {
2633 print;
2634 print OUT;
2635 }
2636 close OUT;
2637
774d564b 2638=item Got an error from DosAllocMem
33c8a3fe 2639
774d564b 2640(P) An error peculiar to OS/2. Most probably you're using an obsolete
2641version of Perl, and this should not happen anyway.
33c8a3fe 2642
2643=item Malformed PERLLIB_PREFIX
2644
2645(F) An error peculiar to OS/2. PERLLIB_PREFIX should be of the form
2646
2647 prefix1;prefix2
2648
2649or
2650
2651 prefix1 prefix2
2652
2653with non-empty prefix1 and prefix2. If C<prefix1> is indeed a prefix of
2654a builtin library search path, prefix2 is substituted. The error may appear
2655if components are not found, or are too long. See L<perlos2/"PERLLIB_PREFIX">.
2656
2657=item PERL_SH_DIR too long
2658
2659(F) An error peculiar to OS/2. PERL_SH_DIR is the directory to find the
2660C<sh>-shell in. See L<perlos2/"PERL_SH_DIR">.
2661
2662=item Process terminated by SIG%s
2663
2664(W) This is a standard message issued by OS/2 applications, while *nix
2665applications die in silence. It is considered a feature of the OS/2
2666port. One can easily disable this by appropriate sighandlers, see
2667L<perlipc/"Signals">. See L<perlos2/"Process terminated by SIGTERM/SIGINT">.
2668
a0d0e21e 2669=back
2670