sv_vcatpvfn hogs memory [Patch included]
[p5sagit/p5-mst-13.2.git] / pod / perldiag.pod
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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).
54310121 15 (X) A very fatal error (nontrappable).
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
68dc0745 19be captured by setting C<$SIG{__WARN__}> to a reference to a routine that
20will be called on each warning instead of printing it. See L<perlvar>.
748a9306 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
54310121 177(X) You can't allocate more than 64K on an MS-DOS machine.
55497cff 178
179=item Allocation too large
180
181(F) You can't allocate more than 2^31+"small amount" bytes.
a0d0e21e 182
2ae324a7 183=item Applying %s to %s will act on scalar(%s)
184
185(W) The pattern match (//), substitution (s///), and translation (tr///)
186operators work on scalar values. If you apply one of them to an array
187or a hash, it will convert the array or hash to a scalar value -- the
188length of an array, or the population info of a hash -- and then work on
189that scalar value. This is probably not what you meant to do. See
190L<perlfunc/grep> and L<perlfunc/map> for alternatives.
191
a0d0e21e 192=item Arg too short for msgsnd
193
194(F) msgsnd() requires a string at least as long as sizeof(long).
195
748a9306 196=item Ambiguous use of %s resolved as %s
197
198(W)(S) You said something that may not be interpreted the way
199you thought. Normally it's pretty easy to disambiguate it by supplying
5f05dabc 200a missing quote, operator, parenthesis pair or declaration.
748a9306 201
a0d0e21e 202=item Args must match #! line
203
204(F) The setuid emulator requires that the arguments Perl was invoked
3a52c276 205with match the arguments specified on the #! line. Since some systems
206impose a one-argument limit on the #! line, try combining switches;
207for example, turn C<-w -U> into C<-wU>.
a0d0e21e 208
f86702cc 209=item Argument "%s" isn't numeric%s
a0d0e21e 210
211(W) The indicated string was fed as an argument to an operator that
212expected a numeric value instead. If you're fortunate the message
213will identify which operator was so unfortunate.
214
215=item Array @%s missing the @ in argument %d of %s()
216
217(D) Really old Perl let you omit the @ on array names in some spots. This
218is now heavily deprecated.
219
220=item assertion botched: %s
221
222(P) The malloc package that comes with Perl had an internal failure.
223
224=item Assertion failed: file "%s"
225
226(P) A general assertion failed. The file in question must be examined.
227
228=item Assignment to both a list and a scalar
229
230(F) If you assign to a conditional operator, the 2nd and 3rd arguments
231must either both be scalars or both be lists. Otherwise Perl won't
232know which context to supply to the right side.
233
234=item Attempt to free non-arena SV: 0x%lx
235
236(P) All SV objects are supposed to be allocated from arenas that will
237be garbage collected on exit. An SV was discovered to be outside any
238of those arenas.
239
54310121 240=item Attempt to free nonexistent shared string
bbce6d69 241
242(P) Perl maintains a reference counted internal table of strings to
243optimize the storage and access of hash keys and other strings. This
244indicates someone tried to decrement the reference count of a string
245that can no longer be found in the table.
246
a0d0e21e 247=item Attempt to free temp prematurely
248
249(W) Mortalized values are supposed to be freed by the free_tmps()
250routine. This indicates that something else is freeing the SV before
251the free_tmps() routine gets a chance, which means that the free_tmps()
252routine will be freeing an unreferenced scalar when it does try to free
253it.
254
255=item Attempt to free unreferenced glob pointers
256
257(P) The reference counts got screwed up on symbol aliases.
258
259=item Attempt to free unreferenced scalar
260
261(W) Perl went to decrement the reference count of a scalar to see if it
262would go to 0, and discovered that it had already gone to 0 earlier,
263and should have been freed, and in fact, probably was freed. This
264could indicate that SvREFCNT_dec() was called too many times, or that
265SvREFCNT_inc() was called too few times, or that the SV was mortalized
266when it shouldn't have been, or that memory has been corrupted.
267
b7a902f4 268=item Attempt to use reference as lvalue in substr
269
270(W) You supplied a reference as the first argument to substr() used
8b1a09fc 271as an lvalue, which is pretty strange. Perhaps you forgot to
b7a902f4 272dereference it first. See L<perlfunc/substr>.
273
a0d0e21e 274=item Bad arg length for %s, is %d, should be %d
275
276(F) You passed a buffer of the wrong size to one of msgctl(), semctl() or
2ba9eb46 277shmctl(). In C parlance, the correct sizes are, respectively,
5f05dabc 278S<sizeof(struct msqid_ds *)>, S<sizeof(struct semid_ds *)>, and
a0d0e21e 279S<sizeof(struct shmid_ds *)>.
280
a0d0e21e 281=item Bad filehandle: %s
282
283(F) A symbol was passed to something wanting a filehandle, but the symbol
284has no filehandle associated with it. Perhaps you didn't do an open(), or
285did it in another package.
286
287=item Bad free() ignored
288
289(S) An internal routine called free() on something that had never been
33c8a3fe 290malloc()ed in the first place. Mandatory, but can be disabled by
291setting environment variable C<PERL_BADFREE> to 1.
292
293This message can be quite often seen with DB_File on systems with
294"hard" dynamic linking, like C<AIX> and C<OS/2>. It is a bug of
295C<Berkeley DB> which is left unnoticed if C<DB> uses I<forgiving>
296system malloc().
a0d0e21e 297
aa689395 298=item Bad hash
299
300(P) One of the internal hash routines was passed a null HV pointer.
301
a0d0e21e 302=item Bad name after %s::
303
304(F) You started to name a symbol by using a package prefix, and then didn't
305finish the symbol. In particular, you can't interpolate outside of quotes,
306so
307
308 $var = 'myvar';
309 $sym = mypack::$var;
310
311is not the same as
312
313 $var = 'myvar';
314 $sym = "mypack::$var";
315
316=item Bad symbol for array
317
318(P) An internal request asked to add an array entry to something that
319wasn't a symbol table entry.
320
321=item Bad symbol for filehandle
322
323(P) An internal request asked to add a filehandle entry to something that
324wasn't a symbol table entry.
325
326=item Bad symbol for hash
327
328(P) An internal request asked to add a hash entry to something that
329wasn't a symbol table entry.
330
8b1a09fc 331=item Badly placed ()'s
cb1a09d0 332
333(A) You've accidentally run your script through B<csh> instead
3a52c276 334of Perl. Check the #! line, or manually feed your script into
335Perl yourself.
cb1a09d0 336
3fe9a6f1 337=item Bareword "%s" not allowed while "strict subs" in use
338
339(F) With "strict subs" in use, a bareword is only allowed as a
340subroutine identifier, in curly braces or to the left of the "=>" symbol.
54310121 341Perhaps you need to predeclare a subroutine?
3fe9a6f1 342
a0d0e21e 343=item BEGIN failed--compilation aborted
344
345(F) An untrapped exception was raised while executing a BEGIN subroutine.
346Compilation stops immediately and the interpreter is exited.
347
68dc0745 348=item BEGIN not safe after errors--compilation aborted
349
350(F) Perl found a C<BEGIN {}> subroutine (or a C<use> directive, which
351implies a C<BEGIN {}>) after one or more compilation errors had
352already occurred. Since the intended environment for the C<BEGIN {}>
353could not be guaranteed (due to the errors), and since subsequent code
354likely depends on its correct operation, Perl just gave up.
355
a0d0e21e 356=item bind() on closed fd
357
358(W) You tried to do a bind on a closed socket. Did you forget to check
359the return value of your socket() call? See L<perlfunc/bind>.
360
4633a7c4 361=item Bizarre copy of %s in %s
362
363(P) Perl detected an attempt to copy an internal value that is not copiable.
364
a0d0e21e 365=item Callback called exit
366
367(F) A subroutine invoked from an external package via perl_call_sv()
368exited by calling exit.
369
0a753a76 370=item Can't "goto" outside a block
371
372(F) A "goto" statement was executed to jump out of what might look
373like a block, except that it isn't a proper block. This usually
374occurs if you tried to jump out of a sort() block or subroutine, which
375is a no-no. See L<perlfunc/goto>.
376
a0d0e21e 377=item Can't "last" outside a block
378
379(F) A "last" statement was executed to break out of the current block,
380except that there's this itty bitty problem called there isn't a
381current block. Note that an "if" or "else" block doesn't count as a
0a753a76 382"loopish" block, as doesn't a block given to sort(). You can usually double
383the curlies to get the same effect though, because the inner curlies
384will be considered a block that loops once. See L<perlfunc/last>.
a0d0e21e 385
386=item Can't "next" outside a block
387
388(F) A "next" statement was executed to reiterate the current block, but
389there isn't a current block. Note that an "if" or "else" block doesn't
0a753a76 390count as a "loopish" block, as doesn't a block given to sort(). You can
391usually double the curlies to get the same effect though, because the inner
54310121 392curlies will be considered a block that loops once. See L<perlfunc/next>.
a0d0e21e 393
394=item Can't "redo" outside a block
395
396(F) A "redo" statement was executed to restart the current block, but
397there isn't a current block. Note that an "if" or "else" block doesn't
0a753a76 398count as a "loopish" block, as doesn't a block given to sort(). You can
399usually double the curlies to get the same effect though, because the inner
54310121 400curlies will be considered a block that loops once. See L<perlfunc/redo>.
a0d0e21e 401
402=item Can't bless non-reference value
403
404(F) Only hard references may be blessed. This is how Perl "enforces"
405encapsulation of objects. See L<perlobj>.
406
407=item Can't break at that line
408
54310121 409(S) A warning intended to only be printed while running within the debugger, indicating
a0d0e21e 410the line number specified wasn't the location of a statement that could
411be stopped at.
412
413=item Can't call method "%s" in empty package "%s"
414
415(F) You called a method correctly, and it correctly indicated a package
416functioning as a class, but that package doesn't have ANYTHING defined
417in it, let alone methods. See L<perlobj>.
418
419=item Can't call method "%s" on unblessed reference
420
54310121 421(F) A method call must know in what package it's supposed to run. It
a0d0e21e 422ordinarily finds this out from the object reference you supply, but
423you didn't supply an object reference in this case. A reference isn't
424an object reference until it has been blessed. See L<perlobj>.
425
426=item Can't call method "%s" without a package or object reference
427
428(F) You used the syntax of a method call, but the slot filled by the
429object reference or package name contains an expression that returns
430neither an object reference nor a package name. (Perhaps it's null?)
431Something like this will reproduce the error:
432
433 $BADREF = undef;
434 process $BADREF 1,2,3;
435 $BADREF->process(1,2,3);
436
437=item Can't chdir to %s
438
439(F) You called C<perl -x/foo/bar>, but C</foo/bar> is not a directory
440that you can chdir to, possibly because it doesn't exist.
441
442=item Can't coerce %s to integer in %s
443
444(F) Certain types of SVs, in particular real symbol table entries
55497cff 445(typeglobs), can't be forced to stop being what they are. So you can't
a0d0e21e 446say things like:
447
448 *foo += 1;
449
450You CAN say
451
452 $foo = *foo;
453 $foo += 1;
454
455but then $foo no longer contains a glob.
456
457=item Can't coerce %s to number in %s
458
459(F) Certain types of SVs, in particular real symbol table entries
55497cff 460(typeglobs), can't be forced to stop being what they are.
a0d0e21e 461
462=item Can't coerce %s to string in %s
463
464(F) Certain types of SVs, in particular real symbol table entries
55497cff 465(typeglobs), can't be forced to stop being what they are.
a0d0e21e 466
467=item Can't create pipe mailbox
468
748a9306 469(P) An error peculiar to VMS. The process is suffering from exhausted quotas
470or other plumbing problems.
a0d0e21e 471
472=item Can't declare %s in my
473
5f05dabc 474(F) Only scalar, array, and hash variables may be declared as lexical variables.
a0d0e21e 475They must have ordinary identifiers as names.
476
477=item Can't do inplace edit on %s: %s
478
479(S) The creation of the new file failed for the indicated reason.
480
54310121 481=item Can't do inplace edit without backup
a0d0e21e 482
54310121 483(F) You're on a system such as MS-DOS that gets confused if you try reading
3fe9a6f1 484from a deleted (but still opened) file. You have to say C<-i.bak>, or some
a0d0e21e 485such.
486
8b1a09fc 487=item Can't do inplace edit: %s E<gt> 14 characters
a0d0e21e 488
489(S) There isn't enough room in the filename to make a backup name for the file.
490
491=item Can't do inplace edit: %s is not a regular file
492
493(S) You tried to use the B<-i> switch on a special file, such as a file in
494/dev, or a FIFO. The file was ignored.
495
496=item Can't do setegid!
497
498(P) The setegid() call failed for some reason in the setuid emulator
499of suidperl.
500
501=item Can't do seteuid!
502
503(P) The setuid emulator of suidperl failed for some reason.
504
505=item Can't do setuid
506
507(F) This typically means that ordinary perl tried to exec suidperl to
508do setuid emulation, but couldn't exec it. It looks for a name of the
509form sperl5.000 in the same directory that the perl executable resides
510under the name perl5.000, typically /usr/local/bin on Unix machines.
511If the file is there, check the execute permissions. If it isn't, ask
512your sysadmin why he and/or she removed it.
513
514=item Can't do waitpid with flags
515
516(F) This machine doesn't have either waitpid() or wait4(), so only waitpid()
517without flags is emulated.
518
8b1a09fc 519=item Can't do {n,m} with n E<gt> m
a0d0e21e 520
521(F) Minima must be less than or equal to maxima. If you really want
522your regexp to match something 0 times, just put {0}. See L<perlre>.
523
524=item Can't emulate -%s on #! line
525
526(F) The #! line specifies a switch that doesn't make sense at this point.
527For example, it'd be kind of silly to put a B<-x> on the #! line.
528
529=item Can't exec "%s": %s
530
5f05dabc 531(W) An system(), exec(), or piped open call could not execute the named
a0d0e21e 532program for the indicated reason. Typical reasons include: the permissions
533were wrong on the file, the file wasn't found in C<$ENV{PATH}>, the
534executable in question was compiled for another architecture, or the
535#! line in a script points to an interpreter that can't be run for
536similar reasons. (Or maybe your system doesn't support #! at all.)
537
538=item Can't exec %s
539
540(F) Perl was trying to execute the indicated program for you because that's
541what the #! line said. If that's not what you wanted, you may need to
542mention "perl" on the #! line somewhere.
543
544=item Can't execute %s
545
546(F) You used the B<-S> switch, but the script to execute could not be found
547in the PATH, or at least not with the correct permissions.
548
549=item Can't find label %s
550
551(F) You said to goto a label that isn't mentioned anywhere that it's possible
552for us to go to. See L<perlfunc/goto>.
553
554=item Can't find string terminator %s anywhere before EOF
555
556(F) Perl strings can stretch over multiple lines. This message means that
5f05dabc 557the closing delimiter was omitted. Because bracketed quotes count nesting
a0d0e21e 558levels, the following is missing its final parenthesis:
559
560 print q(The character '(' starts a side comment.)
561
562=item Can't fork
563
564(F) A fatal error occurred while trying to fork while opening a pipeline.
565
748a9306 566=item Can't get filespec - stale stat buffer?
567
568(S) A warning peculiar to VMS. This arises because of the difference between
569access checks under VMS and under the Unix model Perl assumes. Under VMS,
570access checks are done by filename, rather than by bits in the stat buffer, so
571that ACLs and other protections can be taken into account. Unfortunately, Perl
572assumes that the stat buffer contains all the necessary information, and passes
573it, instead of the filespec, to the access checking routine. It will try to
574retrieve the filespec using the device name and FID present in the stat buffer,
575but this works only if you haven't made a subsequent call to the CRTL stat()
5f05dabc 576routine, because the device name is overwritten with each call. If this warning
748a9306 577appears, the name lookup failed, and the access checking routine gave up and
578returned FALSE, just to be conservative. (Note: The access checking routine
579knows about the Perl C<stat> operator and file tests, so you shouldn't ever
580see this warning in response to a Perl command; it arises only if some internal
581code takes stat buffers lightly.)
582
a0d0e21e 583=item Can't get pipe mailbox device name
584
748a9306 585(P) An error peculiar to VMS. After creating a mailbox to act as a pipe, Perl
586can't retrieve its name for later use.
a0d0e21e 587
588=item Can't get SYSGEN parameter value for MAXBUF
589
748a9306 590(P) An error peculiar to VMS. Perl asked $GETSYI how big you want your
591mailbox buffers to be, and didn't get an answer.
a0d0e21e 592
593=item Can't goto subroutine outside a subroutine
594
595(F) The deeply magical "goto subroutine" call can only replace one subroutine
596call for another. It can't manufacture one out of whole cloth. In general
5f05dabc 597you should be calling it out of only an AUTOLOAD routine anyway. See
a0d0e21e 598L<perlfunc/goto>.
599
706a304b 600=item Can't localize through a reference
4633a7c4 601
706a304b 602(F) You said something like C<local $$ref>, which Perl can't currently
603handle, because when it goes to restore the old value of whatever $ref
604pointed to after the scope of the local() is finished, it can't be
605sure that $ref will still be a reference.
4633a7c4 606
748a9306 607=item Can't localize lexical variable %s
608
2ba9eb46 609(F) You used local on a variable name that was previously declared as a
748a9306 610lexical variable using "my". This is not allowed. If you want to
611localize a package variable of the same name, qualify it with the
612package name.
613
a0d0e21e 614=item Can't locate %s in @INC
615
7a2e2cd6 616(F) You said to do (or require, or use) a file that couldn't be found
54310121 617in any of the libraries mentioned in @INC. Perhaps you need to set the
618PERL5LIB or PERL5OPT environment variable to say where the extra library
619is, or maybe the script needs to add the library name to @INC. Or maybe
a0d0e21e 620you just misspelled the name of the file. See L<perlfunc/require>.
621
622=item Can't locate object method "%s" via package "%s"
623
624(F) You called a method correctly, and it correctly indicated a package
625functioning as a class, but that package doesn't define that particular
2ba9eb46 626method, nor does any of its base classes. See L<perlobj>.
a0d0e21e 627
628=item Can't locate package %s for @%s::ISA
629
630(W) The @ISA array contained the name of another package that doesn't seem
631to exist.
632
3e3baf6d 633=item Can't make list assignment to \%ENV on this system
634
635(F) List assignment to %ENV is not supported on some systems, notably VMS.
636
a0d0e21e 637=item Can't mktemp()
638
639(F) The mktemp() routine failed for some reason while trying to process
640a B<-e> switch. Maybe your /tmp partition is full, or clobbered.
641
642=item Can't modify %s in %s
643
644(F) You aren't allowed to assign to the item indicated, or otherwise try to
5f05dabc 645change it, such as with an auto-increment.
a0d0e21e 646
54310121 647=item Can't modify nonexistent substring
a0d0e21e 648
649(P) The internal routine that does assignment to a substr() was handed
650a NULL.
651
5f05dabc 652=item Can't msgrcv to read-only var
a0d0e21e 653
5f05dabc 654(F) The target of a msgrcv must be modifiable to be used as a receive
a0d0e21e 655buffer.
656
657=item Can't open %s: %s
658
54310121 659(S) An inplace edit couldn't open the original file for the indicated reason.
a0d0e21e 660Usually this is because you don't have read permission for the file.
661
662=item Can't open bidirectional pipe
663
664(W) You tried to say C<open(CMD, "|cmd|")>, which is not supported. You can
665try any of several modules in the Perl library to do this, such as
7e1af8bc 666IPC::Open2. Alternately, direct the pipe's output to a file using "E<gt>",
a0d0e21e 667and then read it in under a different file handle.
668
748a9306 669=item Can't open error file %s as stderr
670
671(F) An error peculiar to VMS. Perl does its own command line redirection, and
8b1a09fc 672couldn't open the file specified after '2E<gt>' or '2E<gt>E<gt>' on the
673command line for writing.
748a9306 674
675=item Can't open input file %s as stdin
676
677(F) An error peculiar to VMS. Perl does its own command line redirection, and
8b1a09fc 678couldn't open the file specified after 'E<lt>' on the command line for reading.
748a9306 679
680=item Can't open output file %s as stdout
681
682(F) An error peculiar to VMS. Perl does its own command line redirection, and
8b1a09fc 683couldn't open the file specified after 'E<gt>' or 'E<gt>E<gt>' on the command
684line for writing.
748a9306 685
686=item Can't open output pipe (name: %s)
687
688(P) An error peculiar to VMS. Perl does its own command line redirection, and
689couldn't open the pipe into which to send data destined for stdout.
690
a0d0e21e 691=item Can't open perl script "%s": %s
692
693(F) The script you specified can't be opened for the indicated reason.
694
7bac28a0 695=item Can't redefine active sort subroutine %s
696
697(F) Perl optimizes the internal handling of sort subroutines and keeps
698pointers into them. You tried to redefine one such sort subroutine when it
699was currently active, which is not allowed. If you really want to do
700this, you should write C<sort { &func } @x> instead of C<sort func @x>.
701
a0d0e21e 702=item Can't rename %s to %s: %s, skipping file
703
704(S) The rename done by the B<-i> switch failed for some reason, probably because
705you don't have write permission to the directory.
706
748a9306 707=item Can't reopen input pipe (name: %s) in binary mode
708
709(P) An error peculiar to VMS. Perl thought stdin was a pipe, and tried to
710reopen it to accept binary data. Alas, it failed.
711
a0d0e21e 712=item Can't reswap uid and euid
713
714(P) The setreuid() call failed for some reason in the setuid emulator
715of suidperl.
716
717=item Can't return outside a subroutine
718
719(F) The return statement was executed in mainline code, that is, where
720there was no subroutine call to return out of. See L<perlsub>.
721
722=item Can't stat script "%s"
723
724(P) For some reason you can't fstat() the script even though you have
725it open already. Bizarre.
726
727=item Can't swap uid and euid
728
729(P) The setreuid() call failed for some reason in the setuid emulator
730of suidperl.
731
732=item Can't take log of %g
733
5f05dabc 734(F) Logarithms are defined on only positive real numbers.
a0d0e21e 735
736=item Can't take sqrt of %g
737
738(F) For ordinary real numbers, you can't take the square root of a
739negative number. There's a Complex package available for Perl, though,
740if you really want to do that.
741
742=item Can't undef active subroutine
743
744(F) You can't undefine a routine that's currently running. You can,
745however, redefine it while it's running, and you can even undef the
746redefined subroutine while the old routine is running. Go figure.
747
748=item Can't unshift
749
750(F) You tried to unshift an "unreal" array that can't be unshifted, such
751as the main Perl stack.
752
753=item Can't upgrade that kind of scalar
754
755(P) The internal sv_upgrade routine adds "members" to an SV, making
756it into a more specialized kind of SV. The top several SV types are
757so specialized, however, that they cannot be interconverted. This
758message indicates that such a conversion was attempted.
759
760=item Can't upgrade to undef
761
762(P) The undefined SV is the bottom of the totem pole, in the scheme
763of upgradability. Upgrading to undef indicates an error in the
764code calling sv_upgrade.
765
c07a80fd 766=item Can't use "my %s" in sort comparison
767
768(F) The global variables $a and $b are reserved for sort comparisons.
8b1a09fc 769You mentioned $a or $b in the same line as the E<lt>=E<gt> or cmp operator,
c07a80fd 770and the variable had earlier been declared as a lexical variable.
771Either qualify the sort variable with the package name, or rename the
772lexical variable.
773
a0d0e21e 774=item Can't use %s for loop variable
775
776(F) Only a simple scalar variable may be used as a loop variable on a foreach.
777
778=item Can't use %s ref as %s ref
779
780(F) You've mixed up your reference types. You have to dereference a
781reference of the type needed. You can use the ref() function to
782test the type of the reference, if need be.
783
748a9306 784=item Can't use \1 to mean $1 in expression
785
786(W) In an ordinary expression, backslash is a unary operator that creates
787a reference to its argument. The use of backslash to indicate a backreference
5f05dabc 788to a matched substring is valid only as part of a regular expression pattern.
748a9306 789Trying to do this in ordinary Perl code produces a value that prints
790out looking like SCALAR(0xdecaf). Use the $1 form instead.
791
44a8e56a 792=item Can't use bareword ("%s") as %s ref while \"strict refs\" in use
793
794(F) Only hard references are allowed by "strict refs". Symbolic references
795are disallowed. See L<perlref>.
796
748a9306 797=item Can't use string ("%s") as %s ref while "strict refs" in use
a0d0e21e 798
799(F) Only hard references are allowed by "strict refs". Symbolic references
800are disallowed. See L<perlref>.
801
802=item Can't use an undefined value as %s reference
803
804(F) A value used as either a hard reference or a symbolic reference must
54310121 805be a defined value. This helps to delurk some insidious errors.
a0d0e21e 806
a0d0e21e 807=item Can't use global %s in "my"
808
809(F) You tried to declare a magical variable as a lexical variable. This is
5f05dabc 810not allowed, because the magic can be tied to only one location (namely
a0d0e21e 811the global variable) and it would be incredibly confusing to have
812variables in your program that looked like magical variables but
813weren't.
814
748a9306 815=item Can't use subscript on %s
816
817(F) The compiler tried to interpret a bracketed expression as a
818subscript. But to the left of the brackets was an expression that
819didn't look like an array reference, or anything else subscriptable.
820
a0d0e21e 821=item Can't write to temp file for B<-e>: %s
822
823(F) The write routine failed for some reason while trying to process
824a B<-e> switch. Maybe your /tmp partition is full, or clobbered.
825
5f05dabc 826=item Can't x= to read-only value
a0d0e21e 827
828(F) You tried to repeat a constant value (often the undefined value) with
829an assignment operator, which implies modifying the value itself.
830Perhaps you need to copy the value to a temporary, and repeat that.
831
832=item Cannot open temporary file
833
8b1a09fc 834(F) The create routine failed for some reason while trying to process
a0d0e21e 835a B<-e> switch. Maybe your /tmp partition is full, or clobbered.
836
e7ea3e70 837=item Cannot resolve method `%s' overloading `%s' in package `%s'
838
839(F|P) Error resolving overloading specified by a method name (as
840opposed to a subroutine reference): no such method callable via the
841package. If method name is C<???>, this is an internal error.
842
a0d0e21e 843=item chmod: mode argument is missing initial 0
844
845(W) A novice will sometimes say
846
847 chmod 777, $filename
848
849not realizing that 777 will be interpreted as a decimal number, equivalent
850to 01411. Octal constants are introduced with a leading 0 in Perl, as in C.
851
8b1a09fc 852=item Close on unopened file E<lt>%sE<gt>
a0d0e21e 853
854(W) You tried to close a filehandle that was never opened.
855
7a2e2cd6 856=item Compilation failed in require
857
858(F) Perl could not compile a file specified in a C<require> statement.
859Perl uses this generic message when none of the errors that it encountered
860were severe enough to halt compilation immediately.
861
a0d0e21e 862=item connect() on closed fd
863
864(W) You tried to do a connect on a closed socket. Did you forget to check
865the return value of your socket() call? See L<perlfunc/connect>.
866
4cee8e80 867=item Constant subroutine %s redefined
868
869(S) You redefined a subroutine which had previously been eligible for
870inlining. See L<perlsub/"Constant Functions"> for commentary and
871workarounds.
872
9607fc9c 873=item Constant subroutine %s undefined
874
875(S) You undefined a subroutine which had previously been eligible for
876inlining. See L<perlsub/"Constant Functions"> for commentary and
877workarounds.
878
e7ea3e70 879=item Copy method did not return a reference
880
881(F) The method which overloads "=" is buggy. See L<overload/Copy Constructor>.
882
a0d0e21e 883=item Corrupt malloc ptr 0x%lx at 0x%lx
884
885(P) The malloc package that comes with Perl had an internal failure.
886
887=item corrupted regexp pointers
888
889(P) The regular expression engine got confused by what the regular
890expression compiler gave it.
891
892=item corrupted regexp program
893
894(P) The regular expression engine got passed a regexp program without
895a valid magic number.
896
897=item Deep recursion on subroutine "%s"
898
899(W) This subroutine has called itself (directly or indirectly) 100
3e3baf6d 900times more than it has returned. This probably indicates an infinite
a0d0e21e 901recursion, unless you're writing strange benchmark programs, in which
902case it indicates something else.
903
fc36a67e 904=item Delimiter for here document is too long
905
906(F) In a here document construct like C<E<lt>E<lt>FOO>, the label
907C<FOO> is too long for Perl to handle. You have to be seriously
908twisted to write code that triggers this error.
909
4633a7c4 910=item Did you mean &%s instead?
911
912(W) You probably referred to an imported subroutine &FOO as $FOO or some such.
913
748a9306 914=item Did you mean $ or @ instead of %?
a0d0e21e 915
748a9306 916(W) You probably said %hash{$key} when you meant $hash{$key} or @hash{@keys}.
917On the other hand, maybe you just meant %hash and got carried away.
918
7e1af8bc 919=item Died
5f05dabc 920
921(F) You passed die() an empty string (the equivalent of C<die "">) or
922you called it with no args and both C<$@> and C<$_> were empty.
923
54310121 924=item Do you need to predeclare %s?
748a9306 925
926(S) This is an educated guess made in conjunction with the message "%s
927found where operator expected". It often means a subroutine or module
928name is being referenced that hasn't been declared yet. This may be
929because of ordering problems in your file, or because of a missing
930"sub", "package", "require", or "use" statement. If you're
931referencing something that isn't defined yet, you don't actually have
932to define the subroutine or package before the current location. You
933can use an empty "sub foo;" or "package FOO;" to enter a "forward"
934declaration.
a0d0e21e 935
936=item Don't know how to handle magic of type '%s'
937
938(P) The internal handling of magical variables has been cursed.
939
940=item do_study: out of memory
941
942(P) This should have been caught by safemalloc() instead.
943
944=item Duplicate free() ignored
945
946(S) An internal routine called free() on something that had already
947been freed.
948
4633a7c4 949=item elseif should be elsif
950
951(S) There is no keyword "elseif" in Perl because Larry thinks it's
952ugly. Your code will be interpreted as an attempt to call a method
953named "elseif" for the class returned by the following block. This is
954unlikely to be what you want.
955
a0d0e21e 956=item END failed--cleanup aborted
957
958(F) An untrapped exception was raised while executing an END subroutine.
959The interpreter is immediately exited.
960
748a9306 961=item Error converting file specification %s
962
5f05dabc 963(F) An error peculiar to VMS. Because Perl may have to deal with file
748a9306 964specifications in either VMS or Unix syntax, it converts them to a
965single form when it must operate on them directly. Either you've
966passed an invalid file specification to Perl, or you've found a
967case the conversion routines don't handle. Drat.
968
fc36a67e 969=item Excessively long <> operator
970
971(F) The contents of a <> operator may not exceed the maximum size of a
972Perl identifier. If you're just trying to glob a long list of
973filenames, try using the glob() operator, or put the filenames into a
974variable and glob that.
975
f86702cc 976=item Execution of %s aborted due to compilation errors
a0d0e21e 977
978(F) The final summary message when a Perl compilation fails.
979
980=item Exiting eval via %s
981
8b1a09fc 982(W) You are exiting an eval by unconventional means, such as
a0d0e21e 983a goto, or a loop control statement.
984
0a753a76 985=item Exiting pseudo-block via %s
986
987(W) You are exiting a rather special block construct (like a sort block or
988subroutine) by unconventional means, such as a goto, or a loop control
989statement. See L<perlfunc/sort>.
990
a0d0e21e 991=item Exiting subroutine via %s
992
8b1a09fc 993(W) You are exiting a subroutine by unconventional means, such as
a0d0e21e 994a goto, or a loop control statement.
995
996=item Exiting substitution via %s
997
8b1a09fc 998(W) You are exiting a substitution by unconventional means, such as
a0d0e21e 999a return, a goto, or a loop control statement.
1000
748a9306 1001=item Fatal VMS error at %s, line %d
a0d0e21e 1002
748a9306 1003(P) An error peculiar to VMS. Something untoward happened in a VMS system
1004service or RTL routine; Perl's exit status should provide more details. The
1005filename in "at %s" and the line number in "line %d" tell you which section of
1006the Perl source code is distressed.
a0d0e21e 1007
1008=item fcntl is not implemented
1009
1010(F) Your machine apparently doesn't implement fcntl(). What is this, a
1011PDP-11 or something?
1012
1013=item Filehandle %s never opened
1014
1015(W) An I/O operation was attempted on a filehandle that was never initialized.
1016You need to do an open() or a socket() call, or call a constructor from
1017the FileHandle package.
1018
5f05dabc 1019=item Filehandle %s opened for only input
a0d0e21e 1020
1021(W) You tried to write on a read-only filehandle. If you
1022intended it to be a read-write filehandle, you needed to open it with
8b1a09fc 1023"+E<lt>" or "+E<gt>" or "+E<gt>E<gt>" instead of with "E<lt>" or nothing. If
5f05dabc 1024you intended only to write the file, use "E<gt>" or "E<gt>E<gt>". See
8b1a09fc 1025L<perlfunc/open>.
a0d0e21e 1026
5f05dabc 1027=item Filehandle opened for only input
a0d0e21e 1028
1029(W) You tried to write on a read-only filehandle. If you
1030intended it to be a read-write filehandle, you needed to open it with
8b1a09fc 1031"+E<lt>" or "+E<gt>" or "+E<gt>E<gt>" instead of with "E<lt>" or nothing. If
5f05dabc 1032you intended only to write the file, use "E<gt>" or "E<gt>E<gt>". See
8b1a09fc 1033L<perlfunc/open>.
a0d0e21e 1034
1035=item Final $ should be \$ or $name
1036
1037(F) You must now decide whether the final $ in a string was meant to be
1038a literal dollar sign, or was meant to introduce a variable name
1039that happens to be missing. So you have to put either the backslash or
1040the name.
1041
1042=item Final @ should be \@ or @name
1043
1044(F) You must now decide whether the final @ in a string was meant to be
1045a literal "at" sign, or was meant to introduce a variable name
1046that happens to be missing. So you have to put either the backslash or
1047the name.
1048
1049=item Format %s redefined
1050
1051(W) You redefined a format. To suppress this warning, say
1052
1053 {
1054 local $^W = 0;
1055 eval "format NAME =...";
1056 }
1057
1058=item Format not terminated
1059
1060(F) A format must be terminated by a line with a solitary dot. Perl got
1061to the end of your file without finding such a line.
1062
1063=item Found = in conditional, should be ==
1064
1065(W) You said
1066
1067 if ($foo = 123)
1068
1069when you meant
1070
1071 if ($foo == 123)
1072
1073(or something like that).
1074
1075=item gdbm store returned %d, errno %d, key "%s"
1076
1077(S) A warning from the GDBM_File extension that a store failed.
1078
1079=item gethostent not implemented
1080
1081(F) Your C library apparently doesn't implement gethostent(), probably
1082because if it did, it'd feel morally obligated to return every hostname
1083on the Internet.
1084
1085=item get{sock,peer}name() on closed fd
1086
1087(W) You tried to get a socket or peer socket name on a closed socket.
1088Did you forget to check the return value of your socket() call?
1089
748a9306 1090=item getpwnam returned invalid UIC %#o for user "%s"
1091
1092(S) A warning peculiar to VMS. The call to C<sys$getuai> underlying the
1093C<getpwnam> operator returned an invalid UIC.
1094
1095
a0d0e21e 1096=item Glob not terminated
1097
1098(F) The lexer saw a left angle bracket in a place where it was expecting
1099a term, so it's looking for the corresponding right angle bracket, and not
1100finding it. Chances are you left some needed parentheses out earlier in
1101the line, and you really meant a "less than".
1102
1103=item Global symbol "%s" requires explicit package name
1104
68dc0745 1105(F) You've said "use strict vars", which indicates that all variables
1106must either be lexically scoped (using "my"), or explicitly qualified to
a0d0e21e 1107say which package the global variable is in (using "::").
1108
1109=item goto must have label
1110
1111(F) Unlike with "next" or "last", you're not allowed to goto an
1112unspecified destination. See L<perlfunc/goto>.
1113
1114=item Had to create %s unexpectedly
1115
1116(S) A routine asked for a symbol from a symbol table that ought to have
1117existed already, but for some reason it didn't, and had to be created on
1118an emergency basis to prevent a core dump.
1119
1120=item Hash %%s missing the % in argument %d of %s()
1121
1122(D) Really old Perl let you omit the % on hash names in some spots. This
1123is now heavily deprecated.
1124
8903cb82 1125=item Identifier too long
1126
1127(F) Perl limits identifiers (names for variables, functions, etc.) to
fc36a67e 1128about 250 characters for simple names, and somewhat more for compound
1129names (like C<$A::B>). You've exceeded Perl's limits. Future
1130versions of Perl are likely to eliminate these arbitrary limitations.
8903cb82 1131
8b1a09fc 1132=item Ill-formed logical name |%s| in prime_env_iter
a0d0e21e 1133
8b1a09fc 1134(W) A warning peculiar to VMS. A logical name was encountered when preparing
1135to iterate over %ENV which violates the syntactic rules governing logical
5f05dabc 1136names. Because it cannot be translated normally, it is skipped, and will not
1137appear in %ENV. This may be a benign occurrence, as some software packages
54310121 1138might directly modify logical name tables and introduce nonstandard names,
8b1a09fc 1139or it may indicate that a logical name table has been corrupted.
a0d0e21e 1140
4fdae800 1141=item Illegal character %s (carriage return)
1142
1143(F) A carriage return character was found in the input. This is an
1144error, and not a warning, because carriage return characters can break
54310121 1145multi-line strings, including here documents (e.g., C<print E<lt>E<lt>EOF;>).
1146
1147Under Unix, this error is usually caused by executing Perl code --
68dc0745 1148either the main program, a module, or an eval'd string -- that was
54310121 1149transferred over a network connection from a non-Unix system without
68dc0745 1150properly converting the text file format.
1151
1152Under systems that use something other than '\n' to delimit lines of
1153text, this error can also be caused by reading Perl code from a file
1154handle that is in binary mode (as set by the C<binmode> operator).
1155
1156In either case, the Perl code in question will probably need to be
1157converted with something like C<s/\x0D\x0A?/\n/g> before it can be
1158executed.
4fdae800 1159
a0d0e21e 1160=item Illegal division by zero
1161
1162(F) You tried to divide a number by 0. Either something was wrong in your
1163logic, or you need to put a conditional in to guard against meaningless input.
1164
1165=item Illegal modulus zero
1166
1167(F) You tried to divide a number by 0 to get the remainder. Most numbers
1168don't take to this kindly.
1169
1170=item Illegal octal digit
1171
1172(F) You used an 8 or 9 in a octal number.
1173
748a9306 1174=item Illegal octal digit ignored
1175
1176(W) You may have tried to use an 8 or 9 in a octal number. Interpretation
1177of the octal number stopped before the 8 or 9.
1178
54310121 1179=item Illegal switch in PERL5OPT: %s
1180
1181(X) The PERL5OPT environment variable may only be used to set the
1182following switches: B<-[DIMUdmw]>.
1183
9607fc9c 1184=item In string, @%s now must be written as \@%s
1185
1186(F) It used to be that Perl would try to guess whether you wanted an
1187array interpolated or a literal @. It did this when the string was first
1188used at runtime. Now strings are parsed at compile time, and ambiguous
1189instances of @ must be disambiguated, either by prepending a backslash to
1190indicate a literal, or by declaring (or using) the array within the
1191program before the string (lexically). (Someday it will simply assume
1192that an unbackslashed @ interpolates an array.)
1193
a0d0e21e 1194=item Insecure dependency in %s
1195
8b1a09fc 1196(F) You tried to do something that the tainting mechanism didn't like.
a0d0e21e 1197The tainting mechanism is turned on when you're running setuid or setgid,
1198or when you specify B<-T> to turn it on explicitly. The tainting mechanism
1199labels all data that's derived directly or indirectly from the user,
1200who is considered to be unworthy of your trust. If any such data is
1201used in a "dangerous" operation, you get this error. See L<perlsec>
1202for more information.
1203
1204=item Insecure directory in %s
1205
1206(F) You can't use system(), exec(), or a piped open in a setuid or setgid
8b1a09fc 1207script if C<$ENV{PATH}> contains a directory that is writable by the world.
a0d0e21e 1208See L<perlsec>.
1209
1210=item Insecure PATH
1211
1212(F) You can't use system(), exec(), or a piped open in a setuid or
8b1a09fc 1213setgid script if C<$ENV{PATH}> is derived from data supplied (or
a0d0e21e 1214potentially supplied) by the user. The script must set the path to a
1215known value, using trustworthy data. See L<perlsec>.
1216
bbce6d69 1217=item Integer overflow in hex number
1218
1219(S) The literal hex number you have specified is too big for your
1220architecture. On a 32-bit architecture the largest hex literal is
12210xFFFFFFFF.
1222
1223=item Integer overflow in octal number
1224
1225(S) The literal octal number you have specified is too big for your
1226architecture. On a 32-bit architecture the largest octal literal is
1227037777777777.
1228
748a9306 1229=item Internal inconsistency in tracking vforks
1230
1231(S) A warning peculiar to VMS. Perl keeps track of the number
5f05dabc 1232of times you've called C<fork> and C<exec>, to determine
2ba9eb46 1233whether the current call to C<exec> should affect the current
748a9306 1234script or a subprocess (see L<perlvms/exec>). Somehow, this count
1235has become scrambled, so Perl is making a guess and treating
1236this C<exec> as a request to terminate the Perl script
1237and execute the specified command.
1238
a0d0e21e 1239=item internal disaster in regexp
1240
1241(P) Something went badly wrong in the regular expression parser.
1242
5cd24f17 1243=item internal error: glob failed
1244
1245(P) Something went wrong with the external program(s) used for C<glob>
1246and C<E<lt>*.cE<gt>>. This may mean that your csh (C shell) is
1247broken. If so, you should change all of the csh-related variables in
1248config.sh: If you have tcsh, make the variables refer to it as if it
1249were csh (e.g. C<full_csh='/usr/bin/tcsh'>); otherwise, make them all
1250empty (except that C<d_csh> should be C<'undef'>) so that Perl will
1251think csh is missing. In either case, after editing config.sh, run
1252C<./Configure -S> and rebuild Perl.
1253
a0d0e21e 1254=item internal urp in regexp at /%s/
1255
1256(P) Something went badly awry in the regular expression parser.
1257
1258=item invalid [] range in regexp
1259
1260(F) The range specified in a character class had a minimum character
1261greater than the maximum character. See L<perlre>.
1262
c635e13b 1263=item Invalid conversion in %s: "%s"
1264
878e08df 1265(W) Perl does not understand the given format conversion.
c635e13b 1266See L<perlfunc/sprintf>.
1267
96e4d5b1 1268=item Invalid type in pack: '%s'
1269
8903cb82 1270(F) The given character is not a valid pack type. See L<perlfunc/pack>.
96e4d5b1 1271
1272=item Invalid type in unpack: '%s'
1273
8903cb82 1274(F) The given character is not a valid unpack type. See L<perlfunc/unpack>.
96e4d5b1 1275
a0d0e21e 1276=item ioctl is not implemented
1277
1278(F) Your machine apparently doesn't implement ioctl(), which is pretty
1279strange for a machine that supports C.
1280
1281=item junk on end of regexp
1282
1283(P) The regular expression parser is confused.
1284
1285=item Label not found for "last %s"
1286
1287(F) You named a loop to break out of, but you're not currently in a
1288loop of that name, not even if you count where you were called from.
1289See L<perlfunc/last>.
1290
1291=item Label not found for "next %s"
1292
1293(F) You named a loop to continue, but you're not currently in a loop of
1294that name, not even if you count where you were called from. See
1295L<perlfunc/last>.
1296
1297=item Label not found for "redo %s"
1298
1299(F) You named a loop to restart, but you're not currently in a loop of
1300that name, not even if you count where you were called from. See
1301L<perlfunc/last>.
1302
1303=item listen() on closed fd
1304
1305(W) You tried to do a listen on a closed socket. Did you forget to check
1306the return value of your socket() call? See L<perlfunc/listen>.
1307
a0d0e21e 1308=item Method for operation %s not found in package %s during blessing
1309
1310(F) An attempt was made to specify an entry in an overloading table that
e7ea3e70 1311doesn't resolve to a valid subroutine. See L<overload>.
a0d0e21e 1312
1313=item Might be a runaway multi-line %s string starting on line %d
1314
1315(S) An advisory indicating that the previous error may have been caused
1316by a missing delimiter on a string or pattern, because it eventually
1317ended earlier on the current line.
1318
1319=item Misplaced _ in number
1320
1321(W) An underline in a decimal constant wasn't on a 3-digit boundary.
1322
1323=item Missing $ on loop variable
1324
8b1a09fc 1325(F) Apparently you've been programming in B<csh> too much. Variables are always
1326mentioned with the $ in Perl, unlike in the shells, where it can vary from
a0d0e21e 1327one line to the next.
1328
1329=item Missing comma after first argument to %s function
1330
1331(F) While certain functions allow you to specify a filehandle or an
1332"indirect object" before the argument list, this ain't one of them.
1333
748a9306 1334=item Missing operator before %s?
1335
1336(S) This is an educated guess made in conjunction with the message "%s
1337found where operator expected". Often the missing operator is a comma.
1338
a0d0e21e 1339=item Missing right bracket
1340
1341(F) The lexer counted more opening curly brackets (braces) than closing ones.
1342As a general rule, you'll find it's missing near the place you were last
1343editing.
1344
1345=item Missing semicolon on previous line?
1346
1347(S) This is an educated guess made in conjunction with the message "%s
1348found where operator expected". Don't automatically put a semicolon on
1349the previous line just because you saw this message.
1350
1351=item Modification of a read-only value attempted
1352
1353(F) You tried, directly or indirectly, to change the value of a
5f05dabc 1354constant. You didn't, of course, try "2 = 1", because the compiler
a0d0e21e 1355catches that. But an easy way to do the same thing is:
1356
1357 sub mod { $_[0] = 1 }
1358 mod(2);
1359
1360Another way is to assign to a substr() that's off the end of the string.
1361
54310121 1362=item Modification of noncreatable array value attempted, subscript %d
a0d0e21e 1363
1364(F) You tried to make an array value spring into existence, and the
1365subscript was probably negative, even counting from end of the array
1366backwards.
1367
54310121 1368=item Modification of noncreatable hash value attempted, subscript "%s"
a0d0e21e 1369
1370(F) You tried to make a hash value spring into existence, and it couldn't
1371be created for some peculiar reason.
1372
1373=item Module name must be constant
1374
1375(F) Only a bare module name is allowed as the first argument to a "use".
1376
1377=item msg%s not implemented
1378
1379(F) You don't have System V message IPC on your system.
1380
1381=item Multidimensional syntax %s not supported
1382
8b1a09fc 1383(W) Multidimensional arrays aren't written like C<$foo[1,2,3]>. They're written
1384like C<$foo[1][2][3]>, as in C.
1385
1386=item Name "%s::%s" used only once: possible typo
1387
68dc0745 1388(W) Typographical errors often show up as unique variable names.
1389If you had a good reason for having a unique name, then just mention
1390it again somehow to suppress the message. The C<use vars> pragma is
1391provided for just this purpose.
a0d0e21e 1392
1393=item Negative length
1394
1395(F) You tried to do a read/write/send/recv operation with a buffer length
1396that is less than 0. This is difficult to imagine.
1397
1398=item nested *?+ in regexp
1399
5f05dabc 1400(F) You can't quantify a quantifier without intervening parentheses. So
a0d0e21e 1401things like ** or +* or ?* are illegal.
1402
5f05dabc 1403Note, however, that the minimal matching quantifiers, C<*?>, C<+?>, and C<??> appear
a0d0e21e 1404to be nested quantifiers, but aren't. See L<perlre>.
1405
1406=item No #! line
1407
1408(F) The setuid emulator requires that scripts have a well-formed #! line
1409even on machines that don't support the #! construct.
1410
1411=item No %s allowed while running setuid
1412
1413(F) Certain operations are deemed to be too insecure for a setuid or setgid
1414script to even be allowed to attempt. Generally speaking there will be
1415another way to do what you want that is, if not secure, at least securable.
1416See L<perlsec>.
1417
1418=item No B<-e> allowed in setuid scripts
1419
1420(F) A setuid script can't be specified by the user.
1421
1422=item No comma allowed after %s
1423
1424(F) A list operator that has a filehandle or "indirect object" is not
1425allowed to have a comma between that and the following arguments.
1426Otherwise it'd be just another one of the arguments.
1427
0a753a76 1428One possible cause for this is that you expected to have imported a
1429constant to your name space with B<use> or B<import> while no such
1430importing took place, it may for example be that your operating system
1431does not support that particular constant. Hopefully you did use an
1432explicit import list for the constants you expect to see, please see
1433L<perlfunc/use> and L<perlfunc/import>. While an explicit import list
1434would probably have caught this error earlier it naturally does not
1435remedy the fact that your operating system still does not support that
1436constant. Maybe you have a typo in the constants of the symbol import
1437list of B<use> or B<import> or in the constant name at the line where
1438this error was triggered?
1439
748a9306 1440=item No command into which to pipe on command line
1441
1442(F) An error peculiar to VMS. Perl handles its own command line redirection,
54310121 1443and found a '|' at the end of the command line, so it doesn't know where you
748a9306 1444want to pipe the output from this command.
1445
a0d0e21e 1446=item No DB::DB routine defined
1447
1448(F) The currently executing code was compiled with the B<-d> switch,
1449but for some reason the perl5db.pl file (or some facsimile thereof)
1450didn't define a routine to be called at the beginning of each
1451statement. Which is odd, because the file should have been required
1452automatically, and should have blown up the require if it didn't parse
1453right.
1454
1455=item No dbm on this machine
1456
1457(P) This is counted as an internal error, because every machine should
5f05dabc 1458supply dbm nowadays, because Perl comes with SDBM. See L<SDBM_File>.
a0d0e21e 1459
1460=item No DBsub routine
1461
1462(F) The currently executing code was compiled with the B<-d> switch,
1463but for some reason the perl5db.pl file (or some facsimile thereof)
1464didn't define a DB::sub routine to be called at the beginning of each
1465ordinary subroutine call.
1466
8b1a09fc 1467=item No error file after 2E<gt> or 2E<gt>E<gt> on command line
748a9306 1468
1469(F) An error peculiar to VMS. Perl handles its own command line redirection,
8b1a09fc 1470and found a '2E<gt>' or a '2E<gt>E<gt>' on the command line, but can't find
1471the name of the file to which to write data destined for stderr.
748a9306 1472
8b1a09fc 1473=item No input file after E<lt> on command line
748a9306 1474
1475(F) An error peculiar to VMS. Perl handles its own command line redirection,
8b1a09fc 1476and found a 'E<lt>' on the command line, but can't find the name of the file
1477from which to read data for stdin.
748a9306 1478
8b1a09fc 1479=item No output file after E<gt> on command line
748a9306 1480
1481(F) An error peculiar to VMS. Perl handles its own command line redirection,
8b1a09fc 1482and found a lone 'E<gt>' at the end of the command line, so it doesn't know
54310121 1483where you wanted to redirect stdout.
748a9306 1484
8b1a09fc 1485=item No output file after E<gt> or E<gt>E<gt> on command line
748a9306 1486
1487(F) An error peculiar to VMS. Perl handles its own command line redirection,
8b1a09fc 1488and found a 'E<gt>' or a 'E<gt>E<gt>' on the command line, but can't find the
1489name of the file to which to write data destined for stdout.
748a9306 1490
a0d0e21e 1491=item No Perl script found in input
1492
1493(F) You called C<perl -x>, but no line was found in the file beginning
1494with #! and containing the word "perl".
1495
1496=item No setregid available
1497
1498(F) Configure didn't find anything resembling the setregid() call for
1499your system.
1500
1501=item No setreuid available
1502
1503(F) Configure didn't find anything resembling the setreuid() call for
1504your system.
1505
1506=item No space allowed after B<-I>
1507
1508(F) The argument to B<-I> must follow the B<-I> immediately with no
1509intervening space.
1510
748a9306 1511=item No such pipe open
1512
1513(P) An error peculiar to VMS. The internal routine my_pclose() tried to
1514close a pipe which hadn't been opened. This should have been caught earlier as
1515an attempt to close an unopened filehandle.
1516
a0d0e21e 1517=item No such signal: SIG%s
1518
1519(W) You specified a signal name as a subscript to %SIG that was not recognized.
1520Say C<kill -l> in your shell to see the valid signal names on your system.
1521
1522=item Not a CODE reference
1523
1524(F) Perl was trying to evaluate a reference to a code value (that is, a
1525subroutine), but found a reference to something else instead. You can
1526use the ref() function to find out what kind of ref it really was.
1527See also L<perlref>.
1528
1529=item Not a format reference
1530
1531(F) I'm not sure how you managed to generate a reference to an anonymous
1532format, but this indicates you did, and that it didn't exist.
1533
1534=item Not a GLOB reference
1535
55497cff 1536(F) Perl was trying to evaluate a reference to a "typeglob" (that is,
a0d0e21e 1537a symbol table entry that looks like C<*foo>), but found a reference to
1538something else instead. You can use the ref() function to find out
1539what kind of ref it really was. See L<perlref>.
1540
1541=item Not a HASH reference
1542
1543(F) Perl was trying to evaluate a reference to a hash value, but
1544found a reference to something else instead. You can use the ref()
1545function to find out what kind of ref it really was. See L<perlref>.
1546
1547=item Not a perl script
1548
1549(F) The setuid emulator requires that scripts have a well-formed #! line
1550even on machines that don't support the #! construct. The line must
1551mention perl.
1552
1553=item Not a SCALAR reference
1554
1555(F) Perl was trying to evaluate a reference to a scalar value, but
1556found a reference to something else instead. You can use the ref()
1557function to find out what kind of ref it really was. See L<perlref>.
1558
1559=item Not a subroutine reference
1560
1561(F) Perl was trying to evaluate a reference to a code value (that is, a
1562subroutine), but found a reference to something else instead. You can
1563use the ref() function to find out what kind of ref it really was.
1564See also L<perlref>.
1565
e7ea3e70 1566=item Not a subroutine reference in overload table
a0d0e21e 1567
1568(F) An attempt was made to specify an entry in an overloading table that
8b1a09fc 1569doesn't somehow point to a valid subroutine. See L<overload>.
a0d0e21e 1570
1571=item Not an ARRAY reference
1572
1573(F) Perl was trying to evaluate a reference to an array value, but
1574found a reference to something else instead. You can use the ref()
1575function to find out what kind of ref it really was. See L<perlref>.
1576
1577=item Not enough arguments for %s
1578
1579(F) The function requires more arguments than you specified.
1580
1581=item Not enough format arguments
1582
1583(W) A format specified more picture fields than the next line supplied.
1584See L<perlform>.
1585
1586=item Null filename used
1587
5f05dabc 1588(F) You can't require the null filename, especially because on many machines
a0d0e21e 1589that means the current directory! See L<perlfunc/require>.
1590
55497cff 1591=item Null picture in formline
1592
1593(F) The first argument to formline must be a valid format picture
1594specification. It was found to be empty, which probably means you
1595supplied it an uninitialized value. See L<perlform>.
1596
a0d0e21e 1597=item NULL OP IN RUN
1598
1599(P) Some internal routine called run() with a null opcode pointer.
1600
1601=item Null realloc
1602
1603(P) An attempt was made to realloc NULL.
1604
1605=item NULL regexp argument
1606
5f05dabc 1607(P) The internal pattern matching routines blew it big time.
a0d0e21e 1608
1609=item NULL regexp parameter
1610
1611(P) The internal pattern matching routines are out of their gourd.
1612
fc36a67e 1613=item Number too long
1614
1615(F) Perl limits the representation of decimal numbers in programs to about
1616about 250 characters. You've exceeded that length. Future versions of
1617Perl are likely to eliminate this arbitrary limitation. In the meantime,
1618try using scientific notation (e.g. "1e6" instead of "1_000_000").
1619
a0d0e21e 1620=item Odd number of elements in hash list
1621
1622(S) You specified an odd number of elements to a hash list, which is odd,
5f05dabc 1623because hash lists come in key/value pairs.
a0d0e21e 1624
bbce6d69 1625=item Offset outside string
1626
1627(F) You tried to do a read/write/send/recv operation with an offset
1628pointing outside the buffer. This is difficult to imagine.
1629The sole exception to this is that C<sysread()>ing past the buffer
1630will extend the buffer and zero pad the new area.
1631
a0d0e21e 1632=item oops: oopsAV
1633
1634(S) An internal warning that the grammar is screwed up.
1635
1636=item oops: oopsHV
1637
1638(S) An internal warning that the grammar is screwed up.
1639
e7ea3e70 1640=item Operation `%s': no method found,%s
44a8e56a 1641
e7ea3e70 1642(F) An attempt was made to perform an overloaded operation for which
1643no handler was defined. While some handlers can be autogenerated in
1644terms of other handlers, there is no default handler for any
1645operation, unless C<fallback> overloading key is specified to be
1646true. See L<overload>.
44a8e56a 1647
748a9306 1648=item Operator or semicolon missing before %s
1649
1650(S) You used a variable or subroutine call where the parser was
1651expecting an operator. The parser has assumed you really meant
1652to use an operator, but this is highly likely to be incorrect.
1653For example, if you say "*foo *foo" it will be interpreted as
1654if you said "*foo * 'foo'".
1655
a0d0e21e 1656=item Out of memory for yacc stack
1657
1658(F) The yacc parser wanted to grow its stack so it could continue parsing,
1659but realloc() wouldn't give it more memory, virtual or otherwise.
1660
1661=item Out of memory!
1662
55497cff 1663(X|F) The malloc() function returned 0, indicating there was insufficient
54310121 1664remaining memory (or virtual memory) to satisfy the request.
eff9c6e2 1665
1666The request was judged to be small, so the possibility to trap it
1667depends on the way perl was compiled. By default it is not trappable.
1668However, if compiled for this, Perl may use the contents of C<$^M> as
1669an emergency pool after die()ing with this message. In this case the
55497cff 1670error is trappable I<once>.
1671
1672=item Out of memory during request for %s
1673
1674(F) The malloc() function returned 0, indicating there was insufficient
1675remaining memory (or virtual memory) to satisfy the request. However,
1676the request was judged large enough (compile-time default is 64K), so
1677a possibility to shut down by trapping this error is granted.
1678
a0d0e21e 1679=item page overflow
1680
1681(W) A single call to write() produced more lines than can fit on a page.
1682See L<perlform>.
1683
1684=item panic: ck_grep
1685
1686(P) Failed an internal consistency check trying to compile a grep.
1687
1688=item panic: ck_split
1689
1690(P) Failed an internal consistency check trying to compile a split.
1691
1692=item panic: corrupt saved stack index
1693
1694(P) The savestack was requested to restore more localized values than there
1695are in the savestack.
1696
1697=item panic: die %s
1698
1699(P) We popped the context stack to an eval context, and then discovered
1700it wasn't an eval context.
1701
1702=item panic: do_match
1703
1704(P) The internal pp_match() routine was called with invalid operational data.
1705
1706=item panic: do_split
1707
1708(P) Something terrible went wrong in setting up for the split.
1709
1710=item panic: do_subst
1711
1712(P) The internal pp_subst() routine was called with invalid operational data.
1713
1714=item panic: do_trans
1715
1716(P) The internal do_trans() routine was called with invalid operational data.
1717
c635e13b 1718=item panic: frexp
1719
1720(P) The library function frexp() failed, making printf("%f") impossible.
1721
a0d0e21e 1722=item panic: goto
1723
1724(P) We popped the context stack to a context with the specified label,
1725and then discovered it wasn't a context we know how to do a goto in.
1726
1727=item panic: INTERPCASEMOD
1728
1729(P) The lexer got into a bad state at a case modifier.
1730
1731=item panic: INTERPCONCAT
1732
1733(P) The lexer got into a bad state parsing a string with brackets.
1734
1735=item panic: last
1736
1737(P) We popped the context stack to a block context, and then discovered
1738it wasn't a block context.
1739
1740=item panic: leave_scope clearsv
1741
5f05dabc 1742(P) A writable lexical variable became read-only somehow within the scope.
a0d0e21e 1743
1744=item panic: leave_scope inconsistency
1745
1746(P) The savestack probably got out of sync. At least, there was an
1747invalid enum on the top of it.
1748
1749=item panic: malloc
1750
1751(P) Something requested a negative number of bytes of malloc.
1752
1753=item panic: mapstart
1754
1755(P) The compiler is screwed up with respect to the map() function.
1756
1757=item panic: null array
1758
1759(P) One of the internal array routines was passed a null AV pointer.
1760
1761=item panic: pad_alloc
1762
1763(P) The compiler got confused about which scratch pad it was allocating
1764and freeing temporaries and lexicals from.
1765
1766=item panic: pad_free curpad
1767
1768(P) The compiler got confused about which scratch pad it was allocating
1769and freeing temporaries and lexicals from.
1770
1771=item panic: pad_free po
1772
1773(P) An invalid scratch pad offset was detected internally.
1774
1775=item panic: pad_reset curpad
1776
1777(P) The compiler got confused about which scratch pad it was allocating
1778and freeing temporaries and lexicals from.
1779
1780=item panic: pad_sv po
1781
1782(P) An invalid scratch pad offset was detected internally.
1783
1784=item panic: pad_swipe curpad
1785
1786(P) The compiler got confused about which scratch pad it was allocating
1787and freeing temporaries and lexicals from.
1788
1789=item panic: pad_swipe po
1790
1791(P) An invalid scratch pad offset was detected internally.
1792
1793=item panic: pp_iter
1794
1795(P) The foreach iterator got called in a non-loop context frame.
1796
1797=item panic: realloc
1798
1799(P) Something requested a negative number of bytes of realloc.
1800
1801=item panic: restartop
1802
1803(P) Some internal routine requested a goto (or something like it), and
1804didn't supply the destination.
1805
1806=item panic: return
1807
1808(P) We popped the context stack to a subroutine or eval context, and
1809then discovered it wasn't a subroutine or eval context.
1810
1811=item panic: scan_num
1812
1813(P) scan_num() got called on something that wasn't a number.
1814
1815=item panic: sv_insert
1816
1817(P) The sv_insert() routine was told to remove more string than there
1818was string.
1819
1820=item panic: top_env
1821
1822(P) The compiler attempted to do a goto, or something weird like that.
1823
1824=item panic: yylex
1825
1826(P) The lexer got into a bad state while processing a case modifier.
1827
5f05dabc 1828=item Pareneses missing around "%s" list
a0d0e21e 1829
1830(W) You said something like
1831
1832 my $foo, $bar = @_;
1833
1834when you meant
1835
1836 my ($foo, $bar) = @_;
1837
1838Remember that "my" and "local" bind closer than comma.
1839
1840=item Perl %3.3f required--this is only version %s, stopped
1841
1842(F) The module in question uses features of a version of Perl more recent
1843than the currently running version. How long has it been since you upgraded,
1844anyway? See L<perlfunc/require>.
1845
1846=item Permission denied
1847
1848(F) The setuid emulator in suidperl decided you were up to no good.
1849
748a9306 1850=item pid %d not a child
1851
1852(W) A warning peculiar to VMS. Waitpid() was asked to wait for a process which
1853isn't a subprocess of the current process. While this is fine from VMS'
1854perspective, it's probably not what you intended.
1855
a0d0e21e 1856=item POSIX getpgrp can't take an argument
1857
1858(F) Your C compiler uses POSIX getpgrp(), which takes no argument, unlike
1859the BSD version, which takes a pid.
1860
bbce6d69 1861=item Possible attempt to put comments in qw() list
1862
774d564b 1863(W) qw() lists contain items separated by whitespace; as with literal
1864strings, comment characters are not ignored, but are instead treated
1865as literal data. (You may have used different delimiters than the
1866exclamation marks parentheses shown here; braces are also frequently
1867used.)
bbce6d69 1868
774d564b 1869You probably wrote something like this:
1870
54310121 1871 @list = qw(
774d564b 1872 a # a comment
bbce6d69 1873 b # another comment
774d564b 1874 );
bbce6d69 1875
1876when you should have written this:
1877
774d564b 1878 @list = qw(
54310121 1879 a
1880 b
774d564b 1881 );
1882
1883If you really want comments, build your list the
1884old-fashioned way, with quotes and commas:
1885
1886 @list = (
1887 'a', # a comment
1888 'b', # another comment
1889 );
bbce6d69 1890
1891=item Possible attempt to separate words with commas
1892
774d564b 1893(W) qw() lists contain items separated by whitespace; therefore commas
68dc0745 1894aren't needed to separate the items. (You may have used different
774d564b 1895delimiters than the parentheses shown here; braces are also frequently
1896used.)
bbce6d69 1897
54310121 1898You probably wrote something like this:
bbce6d69 1899
774d564b 1900 qw! a, b, c !;
1901
1902which puts literal commas into some of the list items. Write it without
1903commas if you don't want them to appear in your data:
bbce6d69 1904
774d564b 1905 qw! a b c !;
bbce6d69 1906
a0d0e21e 1907=item Possible memory corruption: %s overflowed 3rd argument
1908
1909(F) An ioctl() or fcntl() returned more than Perl was bargaining for.
1910Perl guesses a reasonable buffer size, but puts a sentinel byte at the
1911end of the buffer just in case. This sentinel byte got clobbered, and
1912Perl assumes that memory is now corrupted. See L<perlfunc/ioctl>.
1913
1914=item Precedence problem: open %s should be open(%s)
1915
1916(S) The old irregular construct
cb1a09d0 1917
a0d0e21e 1918 open FOO || die;
1919
1920is now misinterpreted as
1921
1922 open(FOO || die);
1923
68dc0745 1924because of the strict regularization of Perl 5's grammar into unary
1925and list operators. (The old open was a little of both.) You must
1926put parentheses around the filehandle, or use the new "or" operator
1927instead of "||".
a0d0e21e 1928
1929=item print on closed filehandle %s
1930
1931(W) The filehandle you're printing on got itself closed sometime before now.
1932Check your logic flow.
1933
1934=item printf on closed filehandle %s
1935
1936(W) The filehandle you're writing to got itself closed sometime before now.
1937Check your logic flow.
1938
1939=item Probable precedence problem on %s
1940
54310121 1941(W) The compiler found a bareword where it expected a conditional,
a0d0e21e 1942which often indicates that an || or && was parsed as part of the
1943last argument of the previous construct, for example:
1944
1945 open FOO || die;
1946
3fe9a6f1 1947=item Prototype mismatch: %s vs %s
4633a7c4 1948
3fe9a6f1 1949(S) The subroutine being declared or defined had previously been declared
1950or defined with a different function prototype.
4633a7c4 1951
8b1a09fc 1952=item Read on closed filehandle E<lt>%sE<gt>
a0d0e21e 1953
1954(W) The filehandle you're reading from got itself closed sometime before now.
1955Check your logic flow.
1956
1957=item Reallocation too large: %lx
1958
54310121 1959(F) You can't allocate more than 64K on an MS-DOS machine.
a0d0e21e 1960
1961=item Recompile perl with B<-D>DEBUGGING to use B<-D> switch
1962
1963(F) You can't use the B<-D> option unless the code to produce the
1964desired output is compiled into Perl, which entails some overhead,
1965which is why it's currently left out of your copy.
1966
1967=item Recursive inheritance detected
1968
1969(F) More than 100 levels of inheritance were used. Probably indicates
1970an unintended loop in your inheritance hierarchy.
1971
1972=item Reference miscount in sv_replace()
1973
1974(W) The internal sv_replace() function was handed a new SV with a
1975reference count of other than 1.
1976
1977=item regexp memory corruption
1978
1979(P) The regular expression engine got confused by what the regular
1980expression compiler gave it.
1981
1982=item regexp out of space
1983
1984(P) A "can't happen" error, because safemalloc() should have caught it earlier.
1985
1986=item regexp too big
1987
2ba9eb46 1988(F) The current implementation of regular expressions uses shorts as
a0d0e21e 1989address offsets within a string. Unfortunately this means that if
1990the regular expression compiles to longer than 32767, it'll blow up.
1991Usually when you want a regular expression this big, there is a better
1992way to do it with multiple statements. See L<perlre>.
1993
1994=item Reversed %s= operator
1995
1996(W) You wrote your assignment operator backwards. The = must always
1997comes last, to avoid ambiguity with subsequent unary operators.
1998
1999=item Runaway format
2000
2001(F) Your format contained the ~~ repeat-until-blank sequence, but it
2002produced 200 lines at once, and the 200th line looked exactly like the
2003199th line. Apparently you didn't arrange for the arguments to exhaust
2004themselves, either by using ^ instead of @ (for scalar variables), or by
2005shifting or popping (for array variables). See L<perlform>.
2006
2007=item Scalar value @%s[%s] better written as $%s[%s]
2008
a6006777 2009(W) You've used an array slice (indicated by @) to select a single element of
a0d0e21e 2010an array. Generally it's better to ask for a scalar value (indicated by $).
8b1a09fc 2011The difference is that C<$foo[&bar]> always behaves like a scalar, both when
2012assigning to it and when evaluating its argument, while C<@foo[&bar]> behaves
a0d0e21e 2013like a list when you assign to it, and provides a list context to its
5f05dabc 2014subscript, which can do weird things if you're expecting only one subscript.
a0d0e21e 2015
748a9306 2016On the other hand, if you were actually hoping to treat the array
5f05dabc 2017element as a list, you need to look into how references work, because
748a9306 2018Perl will not magically convert between scalars and lists for you. See
2019L<perlref>.
2020
a6006777 2021=item Scalar value @%s{%s} better written as $%s{%s}
2022
2023(W) You've used a hash slice (indicated by @) to select a single element of
2024a hash. Generally it's better to ask for a scalar value (indicated by $).
2025The difference is that C<$foo{&bar}> always behaves like a scalar, both when
2026assigning to it and when evaluating its argument, while C<@foo{&bar}> behaves
2027like a list when you assign to it, and provides a list context to its
2028subscript, which can do weird things if you're expecting only one subscript.
2029
2030On the other hand, if you were actually hoping to treat the hash
2031element as a list, you need to look into how references work, because
2032Perl will not magically convert between scalars and lists for you. See
2033L<perlref>.
2034
a0d0e21e 2035=item Script is not setuid/setgid in suidperl
2036
54310121 2037(F) Oddly, the suidperl program was invoked on a script without a setuid
2038or setgid bit set. This doesn't make much sense.
a0d0e21e 2039
2040=item Search pattern not terminated
2041
2042(F) The lexer couldn't find the final delimiter of a // or m{}
2043construct. Remember that bracketing delimiters count nesting level.
2044
96e4d5b1 2045=item %sseek() on unopened file
a0d0e21e 2046
96e4d5b1 2047(W) You tried to use the seek() or sysseek() function on a filehandle that
2048was either never opened or has since been closed.
a0d0e21e 2049
2050=item select not implemented
2051
2052(F) This machine doesn't implement the select() system call.
2053
2054=item sem%s not implemented
2055
2056(F) You don't have System V semaphore IPC on your system.
2057
2058=item semi-panic: attempt to dup freed string
2059
2060(S) The internal newSVsv() routine was called to duplicate a scalar
2061that had previously been marked as free.
2062
2063=item Semicolon seems to be missing
2064
2065(W) A nearby syntax error was probably caused by a missing semicolon,
2066or possibly some other missing operator, such as a comma.
2067
2068=item Send on closed socket
2069
2070(W) The filehandle you're sending to got itself closed sometime before now.
2071Check your logic flow.
2072
1b1626e4 2073=item Sequence (? incomplete
2074(F) A regular expression ended with an incomplete extension (?.
2075See L<perlre>.
2076
a0d0e21e 2077=item Sequence (?#... not terminated
2078
2079(F) A regular expression comment must be terminated by a closing
5f05dabc 2080parenthesis. Embedded parentheses aren't allowed. See L<perlre>.
a0d0e21e 2081
2082=item Sequence (?%s...) not implemented
2083
2084(F) A proposed regular expression extension has the character reserved
2085but has not yet been written. See L<perlre>.
2086
2087=item Sequence (?%s...) not recognized
2088
2089(F) You used a regular expression extension that doesn't make sense.
2090See L<perlre>.
2091
a5f75d66 2092=item Server error
2093
9607fc9c 2094Also known as "500 Server error".
2095
2096B<This is a CGI error, not a Perl error>.
2097
2098You need to make sure your script is executable, is accessible by the user
2099CGI is running the script under (which is probably not the user account you
2100tested it under), does not rely on any environment variables (like PATH)
2101from the user it isn't running under, and isn't in a location where the CGI
2102server can't find it, basically, more or less. Please see the following
2103for more information:
2104
2105 http://www.perl.com/perl/faq/idiots-guide.html
2106 http://www.perl.com/perl/faq/perl-cgi-faq.html
2107 ftp://rtfm.mit.edu/pub/usenet/news.answers/www/cgi-faq
2108 http://hoohoo.ncsa.uiuc.edu/cgi/interface.html
2109 http://www-genome.wi.mit.edu/WWW/faqs/www-security-faq.html
a5f75d66 2110
a0d0e21e 2111=item setegid() not implemented
2112
8b1a09fc 2113(F) You tried to assign to C<$)>, and your operating system doesn't support
a0d0e21e 2114the setegid() system call (or equivalent), or at least Configure didn't
2115think so.
2116
2117=item seteuid() not implemented
2118
8b1a09fc 2119(F) You tried to assign to C<$E<gt>>, and your operating system doesn't support
a0d0e21e 2120the seteuid() system call (or equivalent), or at least Configure didn't
2121think so.
2122
2123=item setrgid() not implemented
2124
8b1a09fc 2125(F) You tried to assign to C<$(>, and your operating system doesn't support
a0d0e21e 2126the setrgid() system call (or equivalent), or at least Configure didn't
2127think so.
2128
2129=item setruid() not implemented
2130
1f8d2005 2131(F) You tried to assign to C<$E<lt>>, and your operating system doesn't support
a0d0e21e 2132the setruid() system call (or equivalent), or at least Configure didn't
2133think so.
2134
2135=item Setuid/gid script is writable by world
2136
2137(F) The setuid emulator won't run a script that is writable by the world,
2138because the world might have written on it already.
2139
2140=item shm%s not implemented
2141
2142(F) You don't have System V shared memory IPC on your system.
2143
2144=item shutdown() on closed fd
2145
2146(W) You tried to do a shutdown on a closed socket. Seems a bit superfluous.
2147
f86702cc 2148=item SIG%s handler "%s" not defined
a0d0e21e 2149
2150(W) The signal handler named in %SIG doesn't, in fact, exist. Perhaps you
2151put it into the wrong package?
2152
2153=item sort is now a reserved word
2154
2155(F) An ancient error message that almost nobody ever runs into anymore.
2156But before sort was a keyword, people sometimes used it as a filehandle.
2157
2158=item Sort subroutine didn't return a numeric value
2159
2160(F) A sort comparison routine must return a number. You probably blew
4633a7c4 2161it by not using C<E<lt>=E<gt>> or C<cmp>, or by not using them correctly.
a0d0e21e 2162See L<perlfunc/sort>.
2163
2164=item Sort subroutine didn't return single value
2165
2166(F) A sort comparison subroutine may not return a list value with more
2167or less than one element. See L<perlfunc/sort>.
2168
2169=item Split loop
2170
2171(P) The split was looping infinitely. (Obviously, a split shouldn't iterate
2172more times than there are characters of input, which is what happened.)
2173See L<perlfunc/split>.
2174
8b1a09fc 2175=item Stat on unopened file E<lt>%sE<gt>
a0d0e21e 2176
2177(W) You tried to use the stat() function (or an equivalent file test)
54310121 2178on a filehandle that was either never opened or has since been closed.
a0d0e21e 2179
2180=item Statement unlikely to be reached
2181
2182(W) You did an exec() with some statement after it other than a die().
2183This is almost always an error, because exec() never returns unless
2184there was a failure. You probably wanted to use system() instead,
2185which does return. To suppress this warning, put the exec() in a block
2186by itself.
2187
e7ea3e70 2188=item Stub found while resolving method `%s' overloading `%s' in package `%s'
2189
2190(P) Overloading resolution over @ISA tree may be broken by importation stubs.
2191Stubs should never be implicitely created, but explicit calls to C<can>
2192may break this.
2193
a0d0e21e 2194=item Subroutine %s redefined
2195
2196(W) You redefined a subroutine. To suppress this warning, say
2197
2198 {
2199 local $^W = 0;
2200 eval "sub name { ... }";
2201 }
2202
2203=item Substitution loop
2204
2205(P) The substitution was looping infinitely. (Obviously, a
2206substitution shouldn't iterate more times than there are characters of
68dc0745 2207input, which is what happened.) See the discussion of substitution in
5f05dabc 2208L<perlop/"Quote and Quote-like Operators">.
a0d0e21e 2209
2210=item Substitution pattern not terminated
2211
2212(F) The lexer couldn't find the interior delimiter of a s/// or s{}{}
2213construct. Remember that bracketing delimiters count nesting level.
2214
2215=item Substitution replacement not terminated
2216
2217(F) The lexer couldn't find the final delimiter of a s/// or s{}{}
2218construct. Remember that bracketing delimiters count nesting level.
2219
2220=item substr outside of string
2221
3e3baf6d 2222(S),(W) You tried to reference a substr() that pointed outside of a
2223string. That is, the absolute value of the offset was larger than the
2224length of the string. See L<perlfunc/substr>. This warning is
2225mandatory if substr is used in an lvalue context (as the left hand side
2226of an assignment or as a subroutine argument for example).
a0d0e21e 2227
f86702cc 2228=item suidperl is no longer needed since %s
a0d0e21e 2229
2230(F) Your Perl was compiled with B<-D>SETUID_SCRIPTS_ARE_SECURE_NOW, but a
2231version of the setuid emulator somehow got run anyway.
2232
2233=item syntax error
2234
2235(F) Probably means you had a syntax error. Common reasons include:
2236
2237 A keyword is misspelled.
2238 A semicolon is missing.
2239 A comma is missing.
2240 An opening or closing parenthesis is missing.
2241 An opening or closing brace is missing.
2242 A closing quote is missing.
2243
2244Often there will be another error message associated with the syntax
2245error giving more information. (Sometimes it helps to turn on B<-w>.)
2246The error message itself often tells you where it was in the line when
2247it decided to give up. Sometimes the actual error is several tokens
5f05dabc 2248before this, because Perl is good at understanding random input.
a0d0e21e 2249Occasionally the line number may be misleading, and once in a blue moon
2250the only way to figure out what's triggering the error is to call
2251C<perl -c> repeatedly, chopping away half the program each time to see
2252if the error went away. Sort of the cybernetic version of S<20 questions>.
2253
cb1a09d0 2254=item syntax error at line %d: `%s' unexpected
2255
8b1a09fc 2256(A) You've accidentally run your script through the Bourne shell
3a52c276 2257instead of Perl. Check the #! line, or manually feed your script
cb1a09d0 2258into Perl yourself.
2259
a0d0e21e 2260=item System V IPC is not implemented on this machine
2261
5f05dabc 2262(F) You tried to do something with a function beginning with "sem", "shm",
a0d0e21e 2263or "msg". See L<perlfunc/semctl>, for example.
2264
2265=item Syswrite on closed filehandle
2266
2267(W) The filehandle you're writing to got itself closed sometime before now.
2268Check your logic flow.
2269
fc36a67e 2270=item Target of goto is too deeply nested
2271
2272(F) You tried to use C<goto> to reach a label that was too deeply
2273nested for Perl to reach. Perl is doing you a favor by refusing.
2274
8903cb82 2275=item tell() on unopened file
a0d0e21e 2276
8903cb82 2277(W) You tried to use the tell() function on a filehandle that was either
2278never opened or has since been closed.
a0d0e21e 2279
8b1a09fc 2280=item Test on unopened file E<lt>%sE<gt>
a0d0e21e 2281
2282(W) You tried to invoke a file test operator on a filehandle that isn't
2283open. Check your logic. See also L<perlfunc/-X>.
2284
2285=item That use of $[ is unsupported
2286
8b1a09fc 2287(F) Assignment to C<$[> is now strictly circumscribed, and interpreted as
5f05dabc 2288a compiler directive. You may say only one of
a0d0e21e 2289
2290 $[ = 0;
2291 $[ = 1;
2292 ...
2293 local $[ = 0;
2294 local $[ = 1;
2295 ...
2296
2297This is to prevent the problem of one module changing the array base
2298out from under another module inadvertently. See L<perlvar/$[>.
2299
2300=item The %s function is unimplemented
2301
2302The function indicated isn't implemented on this architecture, according
2303to the probings of Configure.
2304
f86702cc 2305=item The crypt() function is unimplemented due to excessive paranoia
a0d0e21e 2306
2307(F) Configure couldn't find the crypt() function on your machine,
2308probably because your vendor didn't supply it, probably because they
8b1a09fc 2309think the U.S. Government thinks it's a secret, or at least that they
a0d0e21e 2310will continue to pretend that it is. And if you quote me on that, I
2311will deny it.
2312
2313=item The stat preceding C<-l _> wasn't an lstat
2314
2315(F) It makes no sense to test the current stat buffer for symbolic linkhood
2316if the last stat that wrote to the stat buffer already went past
2317the symlink to get to the real file. Use an actual filename instead.
2318
2319=item times not implemented
2320
2321(F) Your version of the C library apparently doesn't do times(). I suspect
2322you're not running on Unix.
2323
2324=item Too few args to syscall
2325
2326(F) There has to be at least one argument to syscall() to specify the
2327system call to call, silly dilly.
2328
9607fc9c 2329=item Too late for "B<-T>" option
2330
2331(X) The #! line (or local equivalent) in a Perl script contains the
8cc95fdb 2332B<-T> option, but Perl was not invoked with B<-T> in its command line.
2333This is an error because, by the time Perl discovers a B<-T> in a
2334script, it's too late to properly taint everything from the environment.
2335So Perl gives up.
f86702cc 2336
9607fc9c 2337If the Perl script is being executed as a command using the #!
2338mechanism (or its local equivalent), this error can usually be fixed
2339by editing the #! line so that the B<-T> option is a part of Perl's
2340first argument: e.g. change C<perl -n -T> to C<perl -T -n>.
f86702cc 2341
9607fc9c 2342If the Perl script is being executed as C<perl scriptname>, then the
2343B<-T> option must appear on the command line: C<perl -T scriptname>.
f86702cc 2344
8cc95fdb 2345=item Too late for "-%s" option
2346
2347(X) The #! line (or local equivalent) in a Perl script contains the
2348B<-M> or B<-m> option. This is an error because B<-M> and B<-m> options
2349are not intended for use inside scripts. Use the C<use> pragma instead.
2350
cb1a09d0 2351=item Too many ('s
2352
2353=item Too many )'s
2354
2355(A) You've accidentally run your script through B<csh> instead
3a52c276 2356of Perl. Check the #! line, or manually feed your script into
2357Perl yourself.
cb1a09d0 2358
a0d0e21e 2359=item Too many args to syscall
2360
5f05dabc 2361(F) Perl supports a maximum of only 14 args to syscall().
a0d0e21e 2362
2363=item Too many arguments for %s
2364
2365(F) The function requires fewer arguments than you specified.
2366
2367=item trailing \ in regexp
2368
2369(F) The regular expression ends with an unbackslashed backslash. Backslash
2370it. See L<perlre>.
2371
2372=item Translation pattern not terminated
2373
2374(F) The lexer couldn't find the interior delimiter of a tr/// or tr[][]
2375construct.
2376
2377=item Translation replacement not terminated
2378
2379(F) The lexer couldn't find the final delimiter of a tr/// or tr[][]
2380construct.
2381
2382=item truncate not implemented
2383
2384(F) Your machine doesn't implement a file truncation mechanism that
2385Configure knows about.
2386
2387=item Type of arg %d to %s must be %s (not %s)
2388
2389(F) This function requires the argument in that position to be of a
8b1a09fc 2390certain type. Arrays must be @NAME or C<@{EXPR}>. Hashes must be
2391%NAME or C<%{EXPR}>. No implicit dereferencing is allowed--use the
a0d0e21e 2392{EXPR} forms as an explicit dereference. See L<perlref>.
2393
2394=item umask: argument is missing initial 0
2395
5f05dabc 2396(W) A umask of 222 is incorrect. It should be 0222, because octal literals
a0d0e21e 2397always start with 0 in Perl, as in C.
2398
4633a7c4 2399=item Unable to create sub named "%s"
2400
2401(F) You attempted to create or access a subroutine with an illegal name.
2402
a0d0e21e 2403=item Unbalanced context: %d more PUSHes than POPs
2404
2405(W) The exit code detected an internal inconsistency in how many execution
2406contexts were entered and left.
2407
2408=item Unbalanced saves: %d more saves than restores
2409
2410(W) The exit code detected an internal inconsistency in how many
2411values were temporarily localized.
2412
2413=item Unbalanced scopes: %d more ENTERs than LEAVEs
2414
2415(W) The exit code detected an internal inconsistency in how many blocks
2416were entered and left.
2417
2418=item Unbalanced tmps: %d more allocs than frees
2419
2420(W) The exit code detected an internal inconsistency in how many mortal
2421scalars were allocated and freed.
2422
2423=item Undefined format "%s" called
2424
2425(F) The format indicated doesn't seem to exist. Perhaps it's really in
2426another package? See L<perlform>.
2427
2428=item Undefined sort subroutine "%s" called
2429
2430(F) The sort comparison routine specified doesn't seem to exist. Perhaps
2431it's in a different package? See L<perlfunc/sort>.
2432
2433=item Undefined subroutine &%s called
2434
2435(F) The subroutine indicated hasn't been defined, or if it was, it
2436has since been undefined.
2437
2438=item Undefined subroutine called
2439
2440(F) The anonymous subroutine you're trying to call hasn't been defined,
2441or if it was, it has since been undefined.
2442
2443=item Undefined subroutine in sort
2444
2445(F) The sort comparison routine specified is declared but doesn't seem to
2446have been defined yet. See L<perlfunc/sort>.
2447
4633a7c4 2448=item Undefined top format "%s" called
2449
2450(F) The format indicated doesn't seem to exist. Perhaps it's really in
2451another package? See L<perlform>.
2452
a0d0e21e 2453=item unexec of %s into %s failed!
2454
2455(F) The unexec() routine failed for some reason. See your local FSF
2456representative, who probably put it there in the first place.
2457
2458=item Unknown BYTEORDER
2459
5f05dabc 2460(F) There are no byte-swapping functions for a machine with this byte order.
a0d0e21e 2461
2462=item unmatched () in regexp
2463
2464(F) Unbackslashed parentheses must always be balanced in regular
2465expressions. If you're a vi user, the % key is valuable for finding
5f05dabc 2466the matching parenthesis. See L<perlre>.
a0d0e21e 2467
2468=item Unmatched right bracket
2469
2470(F) The lexer counted more closing curly brackets (braces) than opening
2471ones, so you're probably missing an opening bracket. As a general
2472rule, you'll find the missing one (so to speak) near the place you were
2473last editing.
2474
2475=item unmatched [] in regexp
2476
2477(F) The brackets around a character class must match. If you wish to
2478include a closing bracket in a character class, backslash it or put it first.
2479See L<perlre>.
2480
2481=item Unquoted string "%s" may clash with future reserved word
2482
54310121 2483(W) You used a bareword that might someday be claimed as a reserved word.
a0d0e21e 2484It's best to put such a word in quotes, or capitalize it somehow, or insert
2485an underbar into it. You might also declare it as a subroutine.
2486
54310121 2487=item Unrecognized character %s
a0d0e21e 2488
54310121 2489(F) The Perl parser has no idea what to do with the specified character
2490in your Perl script (or eval). Perhaps you tried to run a compressed
2491script, a binary program, or a directory as a Perl program.
a0d0e21e 2492
2493=item Unrecognized signal name "%s"
2494
2495(F) You specified a signal name to the kill() function that was not recognized.
2496Say C<kill -l> in your shell to see the valid signal names on your system.
2497
2498=item Unrecognized switch: -%s
2499
2500(F) You specified an illegal option to Perl. Don't do that.
2501(If you think you didn't do that, check the #! line to see if it's
2502supplying the bad switch on your behalf.)
2503
2504=item Unsuccessful %s on filename containing newline
2505
2506(W) A file operation was attempted on a filename, and that operation
2507failed, PROBABLY because the filename contained a newline, PROBABLY
54310121 2508because you forgot to chop() or chomp() it off. See L<perlfunc/chomp>.
a0d0e21e 2509
2510=item Unsupported directory function "%s" called
2511
2512(F) Your machine doesn't support opendir() and readdir().
2513
54310121 2514=item Unsupported function fork
2515
2516(F) Your version of executable does not support forking.
2517
2518Note that under some systems, like OS/2, there may be different flavors of
2519Perl executables, some of which may support fork, some not. Try changing
2520the name you call Perl by to C<perl_>, C<perl__>, and so on.
2521
a0d0e21e 2522=item Unsupported function %s
2523
2524(F) This machines doesn't implement the indicated function, apparently.
2525At least, Configure doesn't think so.
2526
2527=item Unsupported socket function "%s" called
2528
2529(F) Your machine doesn't support the Berkeley socket mechanism, or at
2530least that's what Configure thought.
2531
8b1a09fc 2532=item Unterminated E<lt>E<gt> operator
a0d0e21e 2533
2534(F) The lexer saw a left angle bracket in a place where it was expecting
2535a term, so it's looking for the corresponding right angle bracket, and not
2536finding it. Chances are you left some needed parentheses out earlier in
2537the line, and you really meant a "less than".
2538
5cd24f17 2539=item Use of "$$<digit>" to mean "${$}<digit>" is deprecated
2540
2541(D) Perl versions before 5.004 misinterpreted any type marker followed
2542by "$" and a digit. For example, "$$0" was incorrectly taken to mean
2543"${$}0" instead of "${$0}". This bug is (mostly) fixed in Perl 5.004.
2544
2545However, the developers of Perl 5.004 could not fix this bug completely,
2546because at least two widely-used modules depend on the old meaning of
2547"$$0" in a string. So Perl 5.004 still interprets "$$<digit>" in the
2548old (broken) way inside strings; but it generates this message as a
2549warning. And in Perl 5.005, this special treatment will cease.
2550
a0d0e21e 2551=item Use of $# is deprecated
2552
8b1a09fc 2553(D) This was an ill-advised attempt to emulate a poorly defined B<awk> feature.
a0d0e21e 2554Use an explicit printf() or sprintf() instead.
2555
2556=item Use of $* is deprecated
2557
4a6725af 2558(D) This variable magically turned on multi-line pattern matching, both for
a0d0e21e 2559you and for any luckless subroutine that you happen to call. You should
2560use the new C<//m> and C<//s> modifiers now to do that without the dangerous
2561action-at-a-distance effects of C<$*>.
2562
748a9306 2563=item Use of %s in printf format not supported
2564
5f05dabc 2565(F) You attempted to use a feature of printf that is accessible from
2566only C. This usually means there's a better way to do it in Perl.
748a9306 2567
8b1a09fc 2568=item Use of bare E<lt>E<lt> to mean E<lt>E<lt>"" is deprecated
4633a7c4 2569
2570(D) You are now encouraged to use the explicitly quoted form if you
3fe9a6f1 2571wish to use an empty line as the terminator of the here-document.
4633a7c4 2572
a0d0e21e 2573=item Use of implicit split to @_ is deprecated
2574
2575(D) It makes a lot of work for the compiler when you clobber a
2576subroutine's argument list, so it's better if you assign the results of
2577a split() explicitly to an array (or list).
2578
dc848c6f 2579=item Use of inherited AUTOLOAD for non-method %s() is deprecated
2580
5cd24f17 2581(D) As an (ahem) accidental feature, C<AUTOLOAD> subroutines are looked
2582up as methods (using the C<@ISA> hierarchy) even when the subroutines to
2583be autoloaded were called as plain functions (e.g. C<Foo::bar()>), not
2584as methods (e.g. C<Foo->bar()> or C<$obj->bar()>).
dc848c6f 2585
2586This bug will be rectified in Perl 5.005, which will use method lookup
2587only for methods' C<AUTOLOAD>s. However, there is a significant base
2588of existing code that may be using the old behavior. So, as an
2589interim step, Perl 5.004 issues an optional warning when non-methods
2590use inherited C<AUTOLOAD>s.
2591
2592The simple rule is: Inheritance will not work when autoloading
2593non-methods. The simple fix for old code is: In any module that used to
2594depend on inheriting C<AUTOLOAD> for non-methods from a base class named
2595C<BaseClass>, execute C<*AUTOLOAD = \&BaseClass::AUTOLOAD> during startup.
2596
2597=item Use of %s is deprecated
2598
2599(D) The construct indicated is no longer recommended for use, generally
2600because there's a better way to do it, and also because the old way has
2601bad side effects.
2602
a0d0e21e 2603=item Use of uninitialized value
2604
2605(W) An undefined value was used as if it were already defined. It was
2606interpreted as a "" or a 0, but maybe it was a mistake. To suppress this
2607warning assign an initial value to your variables.
2608
2609=item Useless use of %s in void context
2610
2611(W) You did something without a side effect in a context that does nothing
2612with the return value, such as a statement that doesn't return a value
2613from a block, or the left side of a scalar comma operator. Very often
2614this points not to stupidity on your part, but a failure of Perl to parse
2615your program the way you thought it would. For example, you'd get this
2616if you mixed up your C precedence with Python precedence and said
2617
2618 $one, $two = 1, 2;
2619
2620when you meant to say
2621
2622 ($one, $two) = (1, 2);
2623
748a9306 2624Another common error is to use ordinary parentheses to construct a list
2625reference when you should be using square or curly brackets, for
2626example, if you say
2627
2628 $array = (1,2);
2629
2630when you should have said
2631
2632 $array = [1,2];
2633
2634The square brackets explicitly turn a list value into a scalar value,
2635while parentheses do not. So when a parenthesized list is evaluated in
2636a scalar context, the comma is treated like C's comma operator, which
2637throws away the left argument, which is not what you want. See
2638L<perlref> for more on this.
2639
55497cff 2640=item untie attempted while %d inner references still exist
2641
2642(W) A copy of the object returned from C<tie> (or C<tied>) was still
2643valid when C<untie> was called.
2644
68dc0745 2645=item Value of %s can be "0"; test with defined()
a6006777 2646
68dc0745 2647(W) In a conditional expression, you used <HANDLE>, <*> (glob), C<each()>,
2648or C<readdir()> as a boolean value. Each of these constructs can return a
2649value of "0"; that would make the conditional expression false, which is
2650probably not what you intended. When using these constructs in conditional
2651expressions, test their values with the C<defined> operator.
a6006777 2652
9607fc9c 2653=item Variable "%s" is not imported%s
4633a7c4 2654
2655(F) While "use strict" in effect, you referred to a global variable
2656that you apparently thought was imported from another module, because
2657something else of the same name (usually a subroutine) is exported
2658by that module. It usually means you put the wrong funny character
2659on the front of your variable.
2660
44a8e56a 2661=item Variable "%s" may be unavailable
2662
2663(W) An inner (nested) I<anonymous> subroutine is inside a I<named>
2664subroutine, and outside that is another subroutine; and the anonymous
2665(innermost) subroutine is referencing a lexical variable defined in
2666the outermost subroutine. For example:
2667
2668 sub outermost { my $a; sub middle { sub { $a } } }
2669
2670If the anonymous subroutine is called or referenced (directly or
2671indirectly) from the outermost subroutine, it will share the variable
2672as you would expect. But if the anonymous subroutine is called or
2673referenced when the outermost subroutine is not active, it will see
2674the value of the shared variable as it was before and during the
2675*first* call to the outermost subroutine, which is probably not what
2676you want.
2677
2678In these circumstances, it is usually best to make the middle
2679subroutine anonymous, using the C<sub {}> syntax. Perl has specific
2680support for shared variables in nested anonymous subroutines; a named
2681subroutine in between interferes with this feature.
2682
2683=item Variable "%s" will not stay shared
2684
2685(W) An inner (nested) I<named> subroutine is referencing a lexical
2686variable defined in an outer subroutine.
2687
2688When the inner subroutine is called, it will probably see the value of
2689the outer subroutine's variable as it was before and during the
2690*first* call to the outer subroutine; in this case, after the first
2691call to the outer subroutine is complete, the inner and outer
2692subroutines will no longer share a common value for the variable. In
2693other words, the variable will no longer be shared.
2694
2695Furthermore, if the outer subroutine is anonymous and references a
2696lexical variable outside itself, then the outer and inner subroutines
2697will I<never> share the given variable.
2698
2699This problem can usually be solved by making the inner subroutine
2700anonymous, using the C<sub {}> syntax. When inner anonymous subs that
2701reference variables in outer subroutines are called or referenced,
54310121 2702they are automatically rebound to the current values of such
44a8e56a 2703variables.
2704
f86702cc 2705=item Variable syntax
cb1a09d0 2706
2707(A) You've accidentally run your script through B<csh> instead
3a52c276 2708of Perl. Check the #! line, or manually feed your script into
2709Perl yourself.
cb1a09d0 2710
7e1af8bc 2711=item Warning: something's wrong
5f05dabc 2712
2713(W) You passed warn() an empty string (the equivalent of C<warn "">) or
2714you called it with no args and C<$_> was empty.
2715
f86702cc 2716=item Warning: unable to close filehandle %s properly
a0d0e21e 2717
8b1a09fc 2718(S) The implicit close() done by an open() got an error indication on the
5f05dabc 2719close(). This usually indicates your file system ran out of disk space.
a0d0e21e 2720
5f05dabc 2721=item Warning: Use of "%s" without parentheses is ambiguous
a0d0e21e 2722
2723(S) You wrote a unary operator followed by something that looks like a
2724binary operator that could also have been interpreted as a term or
2725unary operator. For instance, if you know that the rand function
2726has a default argument of 1.0, and you write
2727
2728 rand + 5;
2729
2730you may THINK you wrote the same thing as
2731
2732 rand() + 5;
2733
2734but in actual fact, you got
2735
2736 rand(+5);
2737
5f05dabc 2738So put in parentheses to say what you really mean.
a0d0e21e 2739
2740=item Write on closed filehandle
2741
2742(W) The filehandle you're writing to got itself closed sometime before now.
2743Check your logic flow.
2744
2745=item X outside of string
2746
2747(F) You had a pack template that specified a relative position before
2748the beginning of the string being unpacked. See L<perlfunc/pack>.
2749
2750=item x outside of string
2751
2752(F) You had a pack template that specified a relative position after
2753the end of the string being unpacked. See L<perlfunc/pack>.
2754
2755=item Xsub "%s" called in sort
2756
2757(F) The use of an external subroutine as a sort comparison is not yet supported.
2758
2759=item Xsub called in sort
2760
2761(F) The use of an external subroutine as a sort comparison is not yet supported.
2762
2763=item You can't use C<-l> on a filehandle
2764
2765(F) A filehandle represents an opened file, and when you opened the file it
2766already went past any symlink you are presumably trying to look for.
2767Use a filename instead.
2768
2769=item YOU HAVEN'T DISABLED SET-ID SCRIPTS IN THE KERNEL YET!
2770
5f05dabc 2771(F) And you probably never will, because you probably don't have the
a0d0e21e 2772sources to your kernel, and your vendor probably doesn't give a rip
2773about what you want. Your best bet is to use the wrapsuid script in
2774the eg directory to put a setuid C wrapper around your script.
2775
2776=item You need to quote "%s"
2777
2778(W) You assigned a bareword as a signal handler name. Unfortunately, you
2779already have a subroutine of that name declared, which means that Perl 5
2780will try to call the subroutine when the assignment is executed, which is
2781probably not what you want. (If it IS what you want, put an & in front.)
2782
2783=item [gs]etsockopt() on closed fd
2784
2785(W) You tried to get or set a socket option on a closed socket.
2786Did you forget to check the return value of your socket() call?
2787See L<perlfunc/getsockopt>.
2788
2789=item \1 better written as $1
2790
2791(W) Outside of patterns, backreferences live on as variables. The use
5f05dabc 2792of backslashes is grandfathered on the right-hand side of a
a0d0e21e 2793substitution, but stylistically it's better to use the variable form
2794because other Perl programmers will expect it, and it works better
2795if there are more than 9 backreferences.
2796
8b1a09fc 2797=item '|' and 'E<lt>' may not both be specified on command line
748a9306 2798
2799(F) An error peculiar to VMS. Perl does its own command line redirection, and
2800found that STDIN was a pipe, and that you also tried to redirect STDIN using
8b1a09fc 2801'E<lt>'. Only one STDIN stream to a customer, please.
748a9306 2802
8b1a09fc 2803=item '|' and 'E<gt>' may not both be specified on command line
748a9306 2804
2805(F) An error peculiar to VMS. Perl does its own command line redirection, and
2806thinks you tried to redirect stdout both to a file and into a pipe to another
2807command. You need to choose one or the other, though nothing's stopping you
2808from piping into a program or Perl script which 'splits' output into two
2809streams, such as
2810
2811 open(OUT,">$ARGV[0]") or die "Can't write to $ARGV[0]: $!";
2812 while (<STDIN>) {
2813 print;
2814 print OUT;
2815 }
2816 close OUT;
2817
774d564b 2818=item Got an error from DosAllocMem
33c8a3fe 2819
774d564b 2820(P) An error peculiar to OS/2. Most probably you're using an obsolete
2821version of Perl, and this should not happen anyway.
33c8a3fe 2822
2823=item Malformed PERLLIB_PREFIX
2824
dc848c6f 2825(F) An error peculiar to OS/2. PERLLIB_PREFIX should be of the form
33c8a3fe 2826
2827 prefix1;prefix2
2828
2829or
2830
2831 prefix1 prefix2
2832
dc848c6f 2833with nonempty prefix1 and prefix2. If C<prefix1> is indeed a prefix
2834of a builtin library search path, prefix2 is substituted. The error
2835may appear if components are not found, or are too long. See
2836"PERLLIB_PREFIX" in F<README.os2>.
33c8a3fe 2837
2838=item PERL_SH_DIR too long
2839
54310121 2840(F) An error peculiar to OS/2. PERL_SH_DIR is the directory to find the
dc848c6f 2841C<sh>-shell in. See "PERL_SH_DIR" in F<README.os2>.
33c8a3fe 2842
2843=item Process terminated by SIG%s
2844
2845(W) This is a standard message issued by OS/2 applications, while *nix
dc848c6f 2846applications die in silence. It is considered a feature of the OS/2
2847port. One can easily disable this by appropriate sighandlers, see
2848L<perlipc/"Signals">. See also "Process terminated by SIGTERM/SIGINT"
2849in F<README.os2>.
33c8a3fe 2850
a0d0e21e 2851=back
2852