3 perldiag - various Perl diagnostics
7 These messages are classified as follows (listed in increasing order of
10 (W) A warning (optional).
11 (D) A deprecation (optional).
12 (S) A severe warning (mandatory).
13 (F) A fatal error (trappable).
14 (P) An internal error you should never see (trappable).
15 (X) A very fatal error (nontrappable).
16 (A) An alien error message (not generated by Perl).
18 Optional warnings are enabled by using the B<-w> switch. Warnings may
19 be captured by setting C<$SIG{__WARN__}> to a reference to a routine that
20 will be called on each warning instead of printing it. See L<perlvar>.
22 Trappable errors may be trapped using the eval operator. See
23 L<perlfunc/eval>. In almost all cases, warnings may be selectively
24 disabled or promoted to fatal errors using the C<warnings> pragma.
27 Some of these messages are generic. Spots that vary are denoted with a %s,
28 just as in a printf format. Note that some messages start with a %s!
29 Since the messages are listed in alphabetical order, the symbols
30 C<"%(-?@> sort before the letters, while C<[> and C<\> sort after.
34 =item "my sub" not yet implemented
36 (F) Lexically scoped subroutines are not yet implemented. Don't try that
39 =item "my" variable %s can't be in a package
41 (F) Lexically scoped variables aren't in a package, so it doesn't make sense
42 to try to declare one with a package qualifier on the front. Use local()
43 if you want to localize a package variable.
45 =item "my" variable %s masks earlier declaration in same %s
47 (W) A lexical variable has been redeclared in the current scope or statement,
48 effectively eliminating all access to the previous instance. This is almost
49 always a typographical error. Note that the earlier variable will still exist
50 until the end of the scope or until all closure referents to it are
53 =item "no" not allowed in expression
55 (F) The "no" keyword is recognized and executed at compile time, and returns
56 no useful value. See L<perlmod>.
58 =item "use" not allowed in expression
60 (F) The "use" keyword is recognized and executed at compile time, and returns
61 no useful value. See L<perlmod>.
63 =item '!' allowed only after types %s
65 (F) The '!' is allowed in pack() and unpack() only after certain types.
68 =item / cannot take a count
70 (F) You had an unpack template indicating a counted-length string,
71 but you have also specified an explicit size for the string.
74 =item / must be followed by a, A or Z
76 (F) You had an unpack template indicating a counted-length string,
77 which must be followed by one of the letters a, A or Z
78 to indicate what sort of string is to be unpacked.
81 =item / must be followed by a*, A* or Z*
83 (F) You had an pack template indicating a counted-length string,
84 Currently the only things that can have their length counted are a*, A* or Z*.
87 =item / must follow a numeric type
89 (F) You had an unpack template that contained a '#',
90 but this did not follow some numeric unpack specification.
93 =item % may only be used in unpack
95 (F) You can't pack a string by supplying a checksum, because the
96 checksumming process loses information, and you can't go the other
97 way. See L<perlfunc/unpack>.
99 =item Repeat count in pack overflows
101 (F) You can't specify a repeat count so large that it overflows
102 your signed integers. See L<perlfunc/pack>.
104 =item Repeat count in unpack overflows
106 (F) You can't specify a repeat count so large that it overflows
107 your signed integers. See L<perlfunc/unpack>.
109 =item /%s/: Unrecognized escape \\%c passed through
111 (W) You used a backslash-character combination which is not recognized
112 by Perl. This combination appears in an interpolated variable or a
113 C<'>-delimited regular expression.
115 =item /%s/ should probably be written as "%s"
117 (W) You have used a pattern where Perl expected to find a string,
118 like in the first argument to C<join>. Perl will treat the true
119 or false result of matching the pattern against $_ as the string,
120 which is probably not what you had in mind.
122 =item %s (...) interpreted as function
124 (W) You've run afoul of the rule that says that any list operator followed
125 by parentheses turns into a function, with all the list operators arguments
126 found inside the parentheses. See L<perlop/Terms and List Operators (Leftward)>.
128 =item %s() called too early to check prototype
130 (W) You've called a function that has a prototype before the parser saw a
131 definition or declaration for it, and Perl could not check that the call
132 conforms to the prototype. You need to either add an early prototype
133 declaration for the subroutine in question, or move the subroutine
134 definition ahead of the call to get proper prototype checking. Alternatively,
135 if you are certain that you're calling the function correctly, you may put
136 an ampersand before the name to avoid the warning. See L<perlsub>.
138 =item %s argument is not a HASH element
140 (F) The argument to exists() must be a hash element, such as
143 $ref->[12]->{"susie"}
145 =item %s argument is not a HASH element or slice
147 (F) The argument to delete() must be either a hash element, such as
150 $ref->[12]->{"susie"}
152 or a hash slice, such as
154 @foo{$bar, $baz, $xyzzy}
155 @{$ref->[12]}{"susie", "queue"}
157 =item %s did not return a true value
159 (F) A required (or used) file must return a true value to indicate that
160 it compiled correctly and ran its initialization code correctly. It's
161 traditional to end such a file with a "1;", though any true value would
162 do. See L<perlfunc/require>.
164 =item %s found where operator expected
166 (S) The Perl lexer knows whether to expect a term or an operator. If it
167 sees what it knows to be a term when it was expecting to see an operator,
168 it gives you this warning. Usually it indicates that an operator or
169 delimiter was omitted, such as a semicolon.
171 =item %s had compilation errors
173 (F) The final summary message when a C<perl -c> fails.
175 =item %s has too many errors
177 (F) The parser has given up trying to parse the program after 10 errors.
178 Further error messages would likely be uninformative.
180 =item %s matches null string many times
182 (W) The pattern you've specified would be an infinite loop if the
183 regular expression engine didn't specifically check for that. See L<perlre>.
185 =item %s never introduced
187 (S) The symbol in question was declared but somehow went out of scope
188 before it could possibly have been used.
190 =item %s package attribute may clash with future reserved word: %s
192 (W) A lowercase attribute name was used that had a package-specific handler.
193 That name might have a meaning to Perl itself some day, even though it
194 doesn't yet. Perhaps you should use a mixed-case attribute name, instead.
199 (F) The final summary message when a C<perl -c> succeeds.
201 =item %s: Command not found
203 (A) You've accidentally run your script through B<csh> instead
204 of Perl. Check the #! line, or manually feed your script into
207 =item %s: Expression syntax
209 (A) You've accidentally run your script through B<csh> instead
210 of Perl. Check the #! line, or manually feed your script into
213 =item %s: Undefined variable
215 (A) You've accidentally run your script through B<csh> instead
216 of Perl. Check the #! line, or manually feed your script into
221 (A) You've accidentally run your script through the Bourne shell
222 instead of Perl. Check the #! line, or manually feed your script
225 =item (in cleanup) %s
227 (W) This prefix usually indicates that a DESTROY() method raised
228 the indicated exception. Since destructors are usually called by
229 the system at arbitrary points during execution, and often a vast
230 number of times, the warning is issued only once for any number
231 of failures that would otherwise result in the same message being
234 Failure of user callbacks dispatched using the C<G_KEEPERR> flag
235 could also result in this warning. See L<perlcall/G_KEEPERR>.
237 =item (Missing semicolon on previous line?)
239 (S) This is an educated guess made in conjunction with the message "%s
240 found where operator expected". Don't automatically put a semicolon on
241 the previous line just because you saw this message.
243 =item B<-P> not allowed for setuid/setgid script
245 (F) The script would have to be opened by the C preprocessor by name,
246 which provides a race condition that breaks security.
248 =item C<-T> and C<-B> not implemented on filehandles
250 (F) Perl can't peek at the stdio buffer of filehandles when it doesn't
251 know about your kind of stdio. You'll have to use a filename instead.
253 =item C<-p> destination: %s
255 (F) An error occurred during the implicit output invoked by the C<-p>
256 command-line switch. (This output goes to STDOUT unless you've
257 redirected it with select().)
259 =item 500 Server error
263 =item ?+* follows nothing in regexp
265 (F) You started a regular expression with a quantifier. Backslash it
266 if you meant it literally. See L<perlre>.
268 =item @ outside of string
270 (F) You had a pack template that specified an absolute position outside
271 the string being unpacked. See L<perlfunc/pack>.
273 =item <> should be quotes
275 (F) You wrote C<require E<lt>fileE<gt>> when you should have written
278 =item accept() on closed fd
280 (W) You tried to do an accept on a closed socket. Did you forget to check
281 the return value of your socket() call? See L<perlfunc/accept>.
283 =item Allocation too large: %lx
285 (X) You can't allocate more than 64K on an MS-DOS machine.
287 =item Applying %s to %s will act on scalar(%s)
289 (W) The pattern match (//), substitution (s///), and transliteration (tr///)
290 operators work on scalar values. If you apply one of them to an array
291 or a hash, it will convert the array or hash to a scalar value -- the
292 length of an array, or the population info of a hash -- and then work on
293 that scalar value. This is probably not what you meant to do. See
294 L<perlfunc/grep> and L<perlfunc/map> for alternatives.
296 =item Arg too short for msgsnd
298 (F) msgsnd() requires a string at least as long as sizeof(long).
300 =item Ambiguous use of %s resolved as %s
302 (W)(S) You said something that may not be interpreted the way
303 you thought. Normally it's pretty easy to disambiguate it by supplying
304 a missing quote, operator, parenthesis pair or declaration.
306 =item Ambiguous call resolved as CORE::%s(), qualify as such or use &
308 (W) A subroutine you have declared has the same name as a Perl keyword,
309 and you have used the name without qualification for calling one or the
310 other. Perl decided to call the builtin because the subroutine is
313 To force interpretation as a subroutine call, either put an ampersand
314 before the subroutine name, or qualify the name with its package.
315 Alternatively, you can import the subroutine (or pretend that it's
316 imported with the C<use subs> pragma).
318 To silently interpret it as the Perl operator, use the C<CORE::> prefix
319 on the operator (e.g. C<CORE::log($x)>) or by declaring the subroutine
320 to be an object method (see L<perlsub/"Subroutine Attributes">
323 =item Args must match #! line
325 (F) The setuid emulator requires that the arguments Perl was invoked
326 with match the arguments specified on the #! line. Since some systems
327 impose a one-argument limit on the #! line, try combining switches;
328 for example, turn C<-w -U> into C<-wU>.
330 =item Argument "%s" isn't numeric%s
332 (W) The indicated string was fed as an argument to an operator that
333 expected a numeric value instead. If you're fortunate the message
334 will identify which operator was so unfortunate.
336 =item Array @%s missing the @ in argument %d of %s()
338 (D) Really old Perl let you omit the @ on array names in some spots. This
339 is now heavily deprecated.
341 =item assertion botched: %s
343 (P) The malloc package that comes with Perl had an internal failure.
345 =item Assertion failed: file "%s"
347 (P) A general assertion failed. The file in question must be examined.
349 =item Assignment to both a list and a scalar
351 (F) If you assign to a conditional operator, the 2nd and 3rd arguments
352 must either both be scalars or both be lists. Otherwise Perl won't
353 know which context to supply to the right side.
355 =item Attempt to free non-arena SV: 0x%lx
357 (P) All SV objects are supposed to be allocated from arenas that will
358 be garbage collected on exit. An SV was discovered to be outside any
361 =item Attempt to free nonexistent shared string
363 (P) Perl maintains a reference counted internal table of strings to
364 optimize the storage and access of hash keys and other strings. This
365 indicates someone tried to decrement the reference count of a string
366 that can no longer be found in the table.
368 =item Attempt to free temp prematurely
370 (W) Mortalized values are supposed to be freed by the free_tmps()
371 routine. This indicates that something else is freeing the SV before
372 the free_tmps() routine gets a chance, which means that the free_tmps()
373 routine will be freeing an unreferenced scalar when it does try to free
376 =item Attempt to free unreferenced glob pointers
378 (P) The reference counts got screwed up on symbol aliases.
380 =item Attempt to free unreferenced scalar
382 (W) Perl went to decrement the reference count of a scalar to see if it
383 would go to 0, and discovered that it had already gone to 0 earlier,
384 and should have been freed, and in fact, probably was freed. This
385 could indicate that SvREFCNT_dec() was called too many times, or that
386 SvREFCNT_inc() was called too few times, or that the SV was mortalized
387 when it shouldn't have been, or that memory has been corrupted.
389 =item Attempt to join self
391 (F) You tried to join a thread from within itself, which is an
392 impossible task. You may be joining the wrong thread, or you may
393 need to move the join() to some other thread.
395 =item Attempt to pack pointer to temporary value
397 (W) You tried to pass a temporary value (like the result of a
398 function, or a computed expression) to the "p" pack() template. This
399 means the result contains a pointer to a location that could become
400 invalid anytime, even before the end of the current statement. Use
401 literals or global values as arguments to the "p" pack() template to
404 =item Attempt to use reference as lvalue in substr
406 (W) You supplied a reference as the first argument to substr() used
407 as an lvalue, which is pretty strange. Perhaps you forgot to
408 dereference it first. See L<perlfunc/substr>.
410 =item Bad arg length for %s, is %d, should be %d
412 (F) You passed a buffer of the wrong size to one of msgctl(), semctl() or
413 shmctl(). In C parlance, the correct sizes are, respectively,
414 S<sizeof(struct msqid_ds *)>, S<sizeof(struct semid_ds *)>, and
415 S<sizeof(struct shmid_ds *)>.
417 =item Bad filehandle: %s
419 (F) A symbol was passed to something wanting a filehandle, but the symbol
420 has no filehandle associated with it. Perhaps you didn't do an open(), or
421 did it in another package.
423 =item Bad free() ignored
425 (S) An internal routine called free() on something that had never been
426 malloc()ed in the first place. Mandatory, but can be disabled by
427 setting environment variable C<PERL_BADFREE> to 1.
429 This message can be quite often seen with DB_File on systems with
430 "hard" dynamic linking, like C<AIX> and C<OS/2>. It is a bug of
431 C<Berkeley DB> which is left unnoticed if C<DB> uses I<forgiving>
436 (P) One of the internal hash routines was passed a null HV pointer.
438 =item Bad index while coercing array into hash
440 (F) The index looked up in the hash found as the 0'th element of a
441 pseudo-hash is not legal. Index values must be at 1 or greater.
444 =item Bad name after %s::
446 (F) You started to name a symbol by using a package prefix, and then didn't
447 finish the symbol. In particular, you can't interpolate outside of quotes,
456 $sym = "mypack::$var";
458 =item Bad realloc() ignored
460 (S) An internal routine called realloc() on something that had never been
461 malloc()ed in the first place. Mandatory, but can be disabled by
462 setting environment variable C<PERL_BADFREE> to 1.
464 =item Bad symbol for array
466 (P) An internal request asked to add an array entry to something that
467 wasn't a symbol table entry.
469 =item Bad symbol for filehandle
471 (P) An internal request asked to add a filehandle entry to something that
472 wasn't a symbol table entry.
474 =item Bad symbol for hash
476 (P) An internal request asked to add a hash entry to something that
477 wasn't a symbol table entry.
479 =item Badly placed ()'s
481 (A) You've accidentally run your script through B<csh> instead
482 of Perl. Check the #! line, or manually feed your script into
485 =item Bareword "%s" not allowed while "strict subs" in use
487 (F) With "strict subs" in use, a bareword is only allowed as a
488 subroutine identifier, in curly brackets or to the left of the "=>" symbol.
489 Perhaps you need to predeclare a subroutine?
491 =item Bareword "%s" refers to nonexistent package
493 (W) You used a qualified bareword of the form C<Foo::>, but
494 the compiler saw no other uses of that namespace before that point.
495 Perhaps you need to predeclare a package?
497 =item BEGIN failed--compilation aborted
499 (F) An untrapped exception was raised while executing a BEGIN subroutine.
500 Compilation stops immediately and the interpreter is exited.
502 =item BEGIN not safe after errors--compilation aborted
504 (F) Perl found a C<BEGIN {}> subroutine (or a C<use> directive, which
505 implies a C<BEGIN {}>) after one or more compilation errors had
506 already occurred. Since the intended environment for the C<BEGIN {}>
507 could not be guaranteed (due to the errors), and since subsequent code
508 likely depends on its correct operation, Perl just gave up.
510 =item Binary number > 0b11111111111111111111111111111111 non-portable
512 (W) The binary number you specified is larger than 2**32-1
513 (4294967295) and therefore non-portable between systems. See
514 L<perlport> for more on portability concerns.
516 =item bind() on closed fd
518 (W) You tried to do a bind on a closed socket. Did you forget to check
519 the return value of your socket() call? See L<perlfunc/bind>.
521 =item Bit vector size > 32 non-portable
523 (W) Using bit vector sizes larger than 32 is non-portable.
525 =item Bizarre copy of %s in %s
527 (P) Perl detected an attempt to copy an internal value that is not copiable.
529 =item Buffer overflow in prime_env_iter: %s
531 (W) A warning peculiar to VMS. While Perl was preparing to iterate over
532 %ENV, it encountered a logical name or symbol definition which was too long,
533 so it was truncated to the string shown.
535 =item Callback called exit
537 (F) A subroutine invoked from an external package via perl_call_sv()
538 exited by calling exit.
540 =item Can't "goto" outside a block
542 (F) A "goto" statement was executed to jump out of what might look
543 like a block, except that it isn't a proper block. This usually
544 occurs if you tried to jump out of a sort() block or subroutine, which
545 is a no-no. See L<perlfunc/goto>.
547 =item Can't "goto" into the middle of a foreach loop
549 (F) A "goto" statement was executed to jump into the middle of a
550 foreach loop. You can't get there from here. See L<perlfunc/goto>.
552 =item Can't "last" outside a block
554 (F) A "last" statement was executed to break out of the current block,
555 except that there's this itty bitty problem called there isn't a
556 current block. Note that an "if" or "else" block doesn't count as a
557 "loopish" block, as doesn't a block given to sort(). You can usually double
558 the curlies to get the same effect though, because the inner curlies
559 will be considered a block that loops once. See L<perlfunc/last>.
561 =item Can't "next" outside a block
563 (F) A "next" statement was executed to reiterate the current block, but
564 there isn't a current block. Note that an "if" or "else" block doesn't
565 count as a "loopish" block, as doesn't a block given to sort(). You can
566 usually double the curlies to get the same effect though, because the inner
567 curlies will be considered a block that loops once. See L<perlfunc/next>.
569 =item Can't read CRTL environ
571 (S) A warning peculiar to VMS. Perl tried to read an element of %ENV
572 from the CRTL's internal environment array and discovered the array was
573 missing. You need to figure out where your CRTL misplaced its environ
574 or define F<PERL_ENV_TABLES> (see L<perlvms>) so that environ is not searched.
576 =item Can't "redo" outside a block
578 (F) A "redo" statement was executed to restart the current block, but
579 there isn't a current block. Note that an "if" or "else" block doesn't
580 count as a "loopish" block, as doesn't a block given to sort(). You can
581 usually double the curlies to get the same effect though, because the inner
582 curlies will be considered a block that loops once. See L<perlfunc/redo>.
584 =item Can't bless non-reference value
586 (F) Only hard references may be blessed. This is how Perl "enforces"
587 encapsulation of objects. See L<perlobj>.
589 =item Can't break at that line
591 (S) A warning intended to only be printed while running within the debugger, indicating
592 the line number specified wasn't the location of a statement that could
595 =item Can't call method "%s" in empty package "%s"
597 (F) You called a method correctly, and it correctly indicated a package
598 functioning as a class, but that package doesn't have ANYTHING defined
599 in it, let alone methods. See L<perlobj>.
601 =item Can't call method "%s" on unblessed reference
603 (F) A method call must know in what package it's supposed to run. It
604 ordinarily finds this out from the object reference you supply, but
605 you didn't supply an object reference in this case. A reference isn't
606 an object reference until it has been blessed. See L<perlobj>.
608 =item Can't call method "%s" without a package or object reference
610 (F) You used the syntax of a method call, but the slot filled by the
611 object reference or package name contains an expression that returns
612 a defined value which is neither an object reference nor a package name.
613 Something like this will reproduce the error:
616 process $BADREF 1,2,3;
617 $BADREF->process(1,2,3);
619 =item Can't call method "%s" on an undefined value
621 (F) You used the syntax of a method call, but the slot filled by the
622 object reference or package name contains an undefined value.
623 Something like this will reproduce the error:
626 process $BADREF 1,2,3;
627 $BADREF->process(1,2,3);
629 =item Can't chdir to %s
631 (F) You called C<perl -x/foo/bar>, but C</foo/bar> is not a directory
632 that you can chdir to, possibly because it doesn't exist.
634 =item Can't check filesystem of script "%s"
636 (P) For some reason you can't check the filesystem of the script for nosuid.
638 =item Can't coerce %s to integer in %s
640 (F) Certain types of SVs, in particular real symbol table entries
641 (typeglobs), can't be forced to stop being what they are. So you can't
651 but then $foo no longer contains a glob.
653 =item Can't coerce %s to number in %s
655 (F) Certain types of SVs, in particular real symbol table entries
656 (typeglobs), can't be forced to stop being what they are.
658 =item Can't coerce %s to string in %s
660 (F) Certain types of SVs, in particular real symbol table entries
661 (typeglobs), can't be forced to stop being what they are.
663 =item Can't coerce array into hash
665 (F) You used an array where a hash was expected, but the array has no
666 information on how to map from keys to array indices. You can do that
667 only with arrays that have a hash reference at index 0.
669 =item Can't create pipe mailbox
671 (P) An error peculiar to VMS. The process is suffering from exhausted quotas
672 or other plumbing problems.
674 =item Can't declare %s in my
676 (F) Only scalar, array, and hash variables may be declared as lexical variables.
677 They must have ordinary identifiers as names.
679 =item Can't do inplace edit on %s: %s
681 (S) The creation of the new file failed for the indicated reason.
683 =item Can't do inplace edit without backup
685 (F) You're on a system such as MS-DOS that gets confused if you try reading
686 from a deleted (but still opened) file. You have to say C<-i.bak>, or some
689 =item Can't do inplace edit: %s would not be unique
691 (S) Your filesystem does not support filenames longer than 14
692 characters and Perl was unable to create a unique filename during
693 inplace editing with the B<-i> switch. The file was ignored.
695 =item Can't do inplace edit: %s is not a regular file
697 (S) You tried to use the B<-i> switch on a special file, such as a file in
698 /dev, or a FIFO. The file was ignored.
700 =item Can't do setegid!
702 (P) The setegid() call failed for some reason in the setuid emulator
705 =item Can't do seteuid!
707 (P) The setuid emulator of suidperl failed for some reason.
709 =item Can't do setuid
711 (F) This typically means that ordinary perl tried to exec suidperl to
712 do setuid emulation, but couldn't exec it. It looks for a name of the
713 form sperl5.000 in the same directory that the perl executable resides
714 under the name perl5.000, typically /usr/local/bin on Unix machines.
715 If the file is there, check the execute permissions. If it isn't, ask
716 your sysadmin why he and/or she removed it.
718 =item Can't do waitpid with flags
720 (F) This machine doesn't have either waitpid() or wait4(), so only waitpid()
721 without flags is emulated.
723 =item Can't do {n,m} with n E<gt> m
725 (F) Minima must be less than or equal to maxima. If you really want
726 your regexp to match something 0 times, just put {0}. See L<perlre>.
728 =item Can't emulate -%s on #! line
730 (F) The #! line specifies a switch that doesn't make sense at this point.
731 For example, it'd be kind of silly to put a B<-x> on the #! line.
733 =item Can't exec "%s": %s
735 (W) An system(), exec(), or piped open call could not execute the named
736 program for the indicated reason. Typical reasons include: the permissions
737 were wrong on the file, the file wasn't found in C<$ENV{PATH}>, the
738 executable in question was compiled for another architecture, or the
739 #! line in a script points to an interpreter that can't be run for
740 similar reasons. (Or maybe your system doesn't support #! at all.)
744 (F) Perl was trying to execute the indicated program for you because that's
745 what the #! line said. If that's not what you wanted, you may need to
746 mention "perl" on the #! line somewhere.
748 =item Can't execute %s
750 (F) You used the B<-S> switch, but the copies of the script to execute found
751 in the PATH did not have correct permissions.
753 =item Can't find %s on PATH, '.' not in PATH
755 (F) You used the B<-S> switch, but the script to execute could not be found
756 in the PATH, or at least not with the correct permissions. The script
757 exists in the current directory, but PATH prohibits running it.
759 =item Can't find %s on PATH
761 (F) You used the B<-S> switch, but the script to execute could not be found
764 =item Can't find label %s
766 (F) You said to goto a label that isn't mentioned anywhere that it's possible
767 for us to go to. See L<perlfunc/goto>.
769 =item Can't find string terminator %s anywhere before EOF
771 (F) Perl strings can stretch over multiple lines. This message means that
772 the closing delimiter was omitted. Because bracketed quotes count nesting
773 levels, the following is missing its final parenthesis:
775 print q(The character '(' starts a side comment.);
777 If you're getting this error from a here-document, you may have
778 included unseen whitespace before or after your closing tag. A good
779 programmer's editor will have a way to help you find these characters.
783 (F) A fatal error occurred while trying to fork while opening a pipeline.
785 =item Can't get filespec - stale stat buffer?
787 (S) A warning peculiar to VMS. This arises because of the difference between
788 access checks under VMS and under the Unix model Perl assumes. Under VMS,
789 access checks are done by filename, rather than by bits in the stat buffer, so
790 that ACLs and other protections can be taken into account. Unfortunately, Perl
791 assumes that the stat buffer contains all the necessary information, and passes
792 it, instead of the filespec, to the access checking routine. It will try to
793 retrieve the filespec using the device name and FID present in the stat buffer,
794 but this works only if you haven't made a subsequent call to the CRTL stat()
795 routine, because the device name is overwritten with each call. If this warning
796 appears, the name lookup failed, and the access checking routine gave up and
797 returned FALSE, just to be conservative. (Note: The access checking routine
798 knows about the Perl C<stat> operator and file tests, so you shouldn't ever
799 see this warning in response to a Perl command; it arises only if some internal
800 code takes stat buffers lightly.)
802 =item Can't get pipe mailbox device name
804 (P) An error peculiar to VMS. After creating a mailbox to act as a pipe, Perl
805 can't retrieve its name for later use.
807 =item Can't get SYSGEN parameter value for MAXBUF
809 (P) An error peculiar to VMS. Perl asked $GETSYI how big you want your
810 mailbox buffers to be, and didn't get an answer.
812 =item Can't goto subroutine outside a subroutine
814 (F) The deeply magical "goto subroutine" call can only replace one subroutine
815 call for another. It can't manufacture one out of whole cloth. In general
816 you should be calling it out of only an AUTOLOAD routine anyway. See
819 =item Can't goto subroutine from an eval-string
821 (F) The "goto subroutine" call can't be used to jump out of an eval "string".
822 (You can use it to jump out of an eval {BLOCK}, but you probably don't want to.)
824 =item Can't localize through a reference
826 (F) You said something like C<local $$ref>, which Perl can't currently
827 handle, because when it goes to restore the old value of whatever $ref
828 pointed to after the scope of the local() is finished, it can't be
829 sure that $ref will still be a reference.
831 =item Can't localize lexical variable %s
833 (F) You used local on a variable name that was previously declared as a
834 lexical variable using "my". This is not allowed. If you want to
835 localize a package variable of the same name, qualify it with the
838 =item Can't localize pseudo-hash element
840 (F) You said something like C<local $ar-E<gt>{'key'}>, where $ar is
841 a reference to a pseudo-hash. That hasn't been implemented yet, but
842 you can get a similar effect by localizing the corresponding array
843 element directly -- C<local $ar-E<gt>[$ar-E<gt>[0]{'key'}]>.
845 =item Can't locate auto/%s.al in @INC
847 (F) A function (or method) was called in a package which allows autoload,
848 but there is no function to autoload. Most probable causes are a misprint
849 in a function/method name or a failure to C<AutoSplit> the file, say, by
850 doing C<make install>.
852 =item Can't locate %s
854 (F) You said to C<do> (or C<require>, or C<use>) a file that couldn't be
855 found. Perl looks for the file in all the locations mentioned in @INC,
856 unless the file name included the full path to the file. Perhaps you need
857 to set the PERL5LIB or PERL5OPT environment variable to say where the extra
858 library is, or maybe the script needs to add the library name to @INC. Or
859 maybe you just misspelled the name of the file. See L<perlfunc/require>
862 =item Can't locate object method "%s" via package "%s"
864 (F) You called a method correctly, and it correctly indicated a package
865 functioning as a class, but that package doesn't define that particular
866 method, nor does any of its base classes. See L<perlobj>.
868 =item Can't locate package %s for @%s::ISA
870 (W) The @ISA array contained the name of another package that doesn't seem
873 =item Can't make list assignment to \%ENV on this system
875 (F) List assignment to %ENV is not supported on some systems, notably VMS.
877 =item Can't modify %s in %s
879 (F) You aren't allowed to assign to the item indicated, or otherwise try to
880 change it, such as with an auto-increment.
882 =item Can't modify non-lvalue subroutine call
884 (F) Subroutines used in lvalue context should be marked as such, see
885 L<perlsub/"Lvalue subroutines">.
887 =item Can't modify nonexistent substring
889 (P) The internal routine that does assignment to a substr() was handed
892 =item Can't msgrcv to read-only var
894 (F) The target of a msgrcv must be modifiable to be used as a receive
897 =item Can't open %s: %s
899 (S) The implicit opening of a file through use of the C<E<lt>E<gt>>
900 filehandle, either implicitly under the C<-n> or C<-p> command-line
901 switches, or explicitly, failed for the indicated reason. Usually this
902 is because you don't have read permission for a file which you named
905 =item Can't open bidirectional pipe
907 (W) You tried to say C<open(CMD, "|cmd|")>, which is not supported. You can
908 try any of several modules in the Perl library to do this, such as
909 IPC::Open2. Alternately, direct the pipe's output to a file using "E<gt>",
910 and then read it in under a different file handle.
912 =item Can't open error file %s as stderr
914 (F) An error peculiar to VMS. Perl does its own command line redirection, and
915 couldn't open the file specified after '2E<gt>' or '2E<gt>E<gt>' on the
916 command line for writing.
918 =item Can't open input file %s as stdin
920 (F) An error peculiar to VMS. Perl does its own command line redirection, and
921 couldn't open the file specified after 'E<lt>' on the command line for reading.
923 =item Can't open output file %s as stdout
925 (F) An error peculiar to VMS. Perl does its own command line redirection, and
926 couldn't open the file specified after 'E<gt>' or 'E<gt>E<gt>' on the command
929 =item Can't open output pipe (name: %s)
931 (P) An error peculiar to VMS. Perl does its own command line redirection, and
932 couldn't open the pipe into which to send data destined for stdout.
934 =item Can't open perl script "%s": %s
936 (F) The script you specified can't be opened for the indicated reason.
938 =item Can't redefine active sort subroutine %s
940 (F) Perl optimizes the internal handling of sort subroutines and keeps
941 pointers into them. You tried to redefine one such sort subroutine when it
942 was currently active, which is not allowed. If you really want to do
943 this, you should write C<sort { &func } @x> instead of C<sort func @x>.
945 =item Can't remove %s: %s, skipping file
947 (S) You requested an inplace edit without creating a backup file. Perl
948 was unable to remove the original file to replace it with the modified
949 file. The file was left unmodified.
951 =item Can't rename %s to %s: %s, skipping file
953 (S) The rename done by the B<-i> switch failed for some reason,
954 probably because you don't have write permission to the directory.
956 =item Can't reopen input pipe (name: %s) in binary mode
958 (P) An error peculiar to VMS. Perl thought stdin was a pipe, and tried to
959 reopen it to accept binary data. Alas, it failed.
961 =item Can't reswap uid and euid
963 (P) The setreuid() call failed for some reason in the setuid emulator
966 =item Can't return outside a subroutine
968 (F) The return statement was executed in mainline code, that is, where
969 there was no subroutine call to return out of. See L<perlsub>.
971 =item Can't return %s from lvalue subroutine
973 (F) Perl detected an attempt to return illegal lvalues (such
974 as temporary or readonly values) from a subroutine used as an lvalue.
977 =item Can't stat script "%s"
979 (P) For some reason you can't fstat() the script even though you have
980 it open already. Bizarre.
982 =item Can't swap uid and euid
984 (P) The setreuid() call failed for some reason in the setuid emulator
987 =item Can't take log of %g
989 (F) For ordinary real numbers, you can't take the logarithm of a
990 negative number or zero. There's a Math::Complex package that comes
991 standard with Perl, though, if you really want to do that for
992 the negative numbers.
994 =item Can't take sqrt of %g
996 (F) For ordinary real numbers, you can't take the square root of a
997 negative number. There's a Math::Complex package that comes standard
998 with Perl, though, if you really want to do that.
1000 =item Can't undef active subroutine
1002 (F) You can't undefine a routine that's currently running. You can,
1003 however, redefine it while it's running, and you can even undef the
1004 redefined subroutine while the old routine is running. Go figure.
1008 (F) You tried to unshift an "unreal" array that can't be unshifted, such
1009 as the main Perl stack.
1011 =item Can't upgrade that kind of scalar
1013 (P) The internal sv_upgrade routine adds "members" to an SV, making
1014 it into a more specialized kind of SV. The top several SV types are
1015 so specialized, however, that they cannot be interconverted. This
1016 message indicates that such a conversion was attempted.
1018 =item Can't upgrade to undef
1020 (P) The undefined SV is the bottom of the totem pole, in the scheme
1021 of upgradability. Upgrading to undef indicates an error in the
1022 code calling sv_upgrade.
1024 =item Can't use %%! because Errno.pm is not available
1026 (F) The first time the %! hash is used, perl automatically loads the
1027 Errno.pm module. The Errno module is expected to tie the %! hash to
1028 provide symbolic names for C<$!> errno values.
1030 =item Can't use "my %s" in sort comparison
1032 (F) The global variables $a and $b are reserved for sort comparisons.
1033 You mentioned $a or $b in the same line as the E<lt>=E<gt> or cmp operator,
1034 and the variable had earlier been declared as a lexical variable.
1035 Either qualify the sort variable with the package name, or rename the
1038 =item Bad evalled substitution pattern
1040 (F) You've used the /e switch to evaluate the replacement for a
1041 substitution, but perl found a syntax error in the code to evaluate,
1042 most likely an unexpected right brace '}'.
1044 =item Can't use %s for loop variable
1046 (F) Only a simple scalar variable may be used as a loop variable on a foreach.
1048 =item Can't use %s ref as %s ref
1050 (F) You've mixed up your reference types. You have to dereference a
1051 reference of the type needed. You can use the ref() function to
1052 test the type of the reference, if need be.
1054 =item Can't use \1 to mean $1 in expression
1056 (W) In an ordinary expression, backslash is a unary operator that creates
1057 a reference to its argument. The use of backslash to indicate a backreference
1058 to a matched substring is valid only as part of a regular expression pattern.
1059 Trying to do this in ordinary Perl code produces a value that prints
1060 out looking like SCALAR(0xdecaf). Use the $1 form instead.
1062 =item Can't use bareword ("%s") as %s ref while \"strict refs\" in use
1064 (F) Only hard references are allowed by "strict refs". Symbolic references
1065 are disallowed. See L<perlref>.
1067 =item Can't use string ("%s") as %s ref while "strict refs" in use
1069 (F) Only hard references are allowed by "strict refs". Symbolic references
1070 are disallowed. See L<perlref>.
1072 =item Can't use an undefined value as %s reference
1074 (F) A value used as either a hard reference or a symbolic reference must
1075 be a defined value. This helps to delurk some insidious errors.
1077 =item Can't use global %s in "my"
1079 (F) You tried to declare a magical variable as a lexical variable. This is
1080 not allowed, because the magic can be tied to only one location (namely
1081 the global variable) and it would be incredibly confusing to have
1082 variables in your program that looked like magical variables but
1085 =item Can't use subscript on %s
1087 (F) The compiler tried to interpret a bracketed expression as a
1088 subscript. But to the left of the brackets was an expression that
1089 didn't look like an array reference, or anything else subscriptable.
1091 =item Can't weaken a nonreference
1093 (F) You attempted to weaken something that was not a reference. Only
1094 references can be weakened.
1096 =item Can't x= to read-only value
1098 (F) You tried to repeat a constant value (often the undefined value) with
1099 an assignment operator, which implies modifying the value itself.
1100 Perhaps you need to copy the value to a temporary, and repeat that.
1102 =item Can't find an opnumber for "%s"
1104 (F) A string of a form C<CORE::word> was given to prototype(), but
1105 there is no builtin with the name C<word>.
1107 =item Can't resolve method `%s' overloading `%s' in package `%s'
1109 (F|P) Error resolving overloading specified by a method name (as
1110 opposed to a subroutine reference): no such method callable via the
1111 package. If method name is C<???>, this is an internal error.
1113 =item Character class [:%s:] unknown
1115 (F) The class in the character class [: :] syntax is unknown.
1117 =item Character class syntax [%s] belongs inside character classes
1119 (W) The character class constructs [: :], [= =], and [. .] go
1120 I<inside> character classes, the [] are part of the construct,
1121 for example: /[012[:alpha:]345]/. Note that the last two constructs
1122 are not currently implemented, they are placeholders for future extensions.
1124 =item Character class syntax [. .] is reserved for future extensions
1126 (W) Within regular expression character classes ([]) the syntax beginning
1127 with "[." and ending with ".]" is reserved for future extensions.
1128 If you need to represent those character sequences inside a regular
1129 expression character class, just quote the square brackets with the
1130 backslash: "\[." and ".\]".
1132 =item Character class syntax [= =] is reserved for future extensions
1134 (W) Within regular expression character classes ([]) the syntax
1135 beginning with "[=" and ending with "=]" is reserved for future extensions.
1136 If you need to represent those character sequences inside a regular
1137 expression character class, just quote the square brackets with the
1138 backslash: "\[=" and "=\]".
1140 =item chmod: mode argument is missing initial 0
1142 (W) A novice will sometimes say
1144 chmod 777, $filename
1146 not realizing that 777 will be interpreted as a decimal number, equivalent
1147 to 01411. Octal constants are introduced with a leading 0 in Perl, as in C.
1149 =item Close on unopened file E<lt>%sE<gt>
1151 (W) You tried to close a filehandle that was never opened.
1153 =item Compilation failed in require
1155 (F) Perl could not compile a file specified in a C<require> statement.
1156 Perl uses this generic message when none of the errors that it encountered
1157 were severe enough to halt compilation immediately.
1159 =item Complex regular subexpression recursion limit (%d) exceeded
1161 (W) The regular expression engine uses recursion in complex situations
1162 where back-tracking is required. Recursion depth is limited to 32766,
1163 or perhaps less in architectures where the stack cannot grow
1164 arbitrarily. ("Simple" and "medium" situations are handled without
1165 recursion and are not subject to a limit.) Try shortening the string
1166 under examination; looping in Perl code (e.g. with C<while>) rather
1167 than in the regular expression engine; or rewriting the regular
1168 expression so that it is simpler or backtracks less. (See L<perlbook>
1169 for information on I<Mastering Regular Expressions>.)
1171 =item connect() on closed fd
1173 (W) You tried to do a connect on a closed socket. Did you forget to check
1174 the return value of your socket() call? See L<perlfunc/connect>.
1176 =item Constant is not %s reference
1178 (F) A constant value (perhaps declared using the C<use constant> pragma)
1179 is being dereferenced, but it amounts to the wrong type of reference. The
1180 message indicates the type of reference that was expected. This usually
1181 indicates a syntax error in dereferencing the constant value.
1182 See L<perlsub/"Constant Functions"> and L<constant>.
1184 =item Constant subroutine %s redefined
1186 (S) You redefined a subroutine which had previously been eligible for
1187 inlining. See L<perlsub/"Constant Functions"> for commentary and
1190 =item Constant subroutine %s undefined
1192 (S) You undefined a subroutine which had previously been eligible for
1193 inlining. See L<perlsub/"Constant Functions"> for commentary and
1196 =item constant(%s): %%^H is not localized
1198 (F) When setting compile-time-lexicalized hash %^H one should set the
1199 corresponding bit of $^H as well.
1201 =item constant(%s): %s
1203 (F) Compile-time-substitutions (such as overloaded constants and
1204 character names) were not correctly set up.
1206 =item Copy method did not return a reference
1208 (F) The method which overloads "=" is buggy. See L<overload/Copy Constructor>.
1210 =item Corrupt malloc ptr 0x%lx at 0x%lx
1212 (P) The malloc package that comes with Perl had an internal failure.
1214 =item corrupted regexp pointers
1216 (P) The regular expression engine got confused by what the regular
1217 expression compiler gave it.
1219 =item corrupted regexp program
1221 (P) The regular expression engine got passed a regexp program without
1222 a valid magic number.
1224 =item Deep recursion on subroutine "%s"
1226 (W) This subroutine has called itself (directly or indirectly) 100
1227 times more than it has returned. This probably indicates an infinite
1228 recursion, unless you're writing strange benchmark programs, in which
1229 case it indicates something else.
1231 =item defined(@array) is deprecated
1233 (D) defined() is not usually useful on arrays because it checks for an
1234 undefined I<scalar> value. If you want to see if the array is empty,
1235 just use C<if (@array) { # not empty }> for example.
1237 =item defined(%hash) is deprecated
1239 (D) defined() is not usually useful on hashes because it checks for an
1240 undefined I<scalar> value. If you want to see if the hash is empty,
1241 just use C<if (%hash) { # not empty }> for example.
1243 =item Delimiter for here document is too long
1245 (F) In a here document construct like C<E<lt>E<lt>FOO>, the label
1246 C<FOO> is too long for Perl to handle. You have to be seriously
1247 twisted to write code that triggers this error.
1249 =item Did not produce a valid header
1253 =item Did you mean &%s instead?
1255 (W) You probably referred to an imported subroutine &FOO as $FOO or some such.
1257 =item Did you mean $ or @ instead of %?
1259 (W) You probably said %hash{$key} when you meant $hash{$key} or @hash{@keys}.
1260 On the other hand, maybe you just meant %hash and got carried away.
1264 (F) You passed die() an empty string (the equivalent of C<die "">) or
1265 you called it with no args and both C<$@> and C<$_> were empty.
1267 =item Do you need to predeclare %s?
1269 (S) This is an educated guess made in conjunction with the message "%s
1270 found where operator expected". It often means a subroutine or module
1271 name is being referenced that hasn't been declared yet. This may be
1272 because of ordering problems in your file, or because of a missing
1273 "sub", "package", "require", or "use" statement. If you're
1274 referencing something that isn't defined yet, you don't actually have
1275 to define the subroutine or package before the current location. You
1276 can use an empty "sub foo;" or "package FOO;" to enter a "forward"
1279 =item Document contains no data
1283 =item Don't know how to handle magic of type '%s'
1285 (P) The internal handling of magical variables has been cursed.
1287 =item do_study: out of memory
1289 (P) This should have been caught by safemalloc() instead.
1291 =item Duplicate free() ignored
1293 (S) An internal routine called free() on something that had already
1296 =item elseif should be elsif
1298 (S) There is no keyword "elseif" in Perl because Larry thinks it's
1299 ugly. Your code will be interpreted as an attempt to call a method
1300 named "elseif" for the class returned by the following block. This is
1301 unlikely to be what you want.
1303 =item END failed--cleanup aborted
1305 (F) An untrapped exception was raised while executing an END subroutine.
1306 The interpreter is immediately exited.
1308 =item entering effective %s failed
1310 (F) While under the C<use filetest> pragma, switching the real and
1311 effective uids or gids failed.
1313 =item Error converting file specification %s
1315 (F) An error peculiar to VMS. Because Perl may have to deal with file
1316 specifications in either VMS or Unix syntax, it converts them to a
1317 single form when it must operate on them directly. Either you've
1318 passed an invalid file specification to Perl, or you've found a
1319 case the conversion routines don't handle. Drat.
1321 =item %s: Eval-group in insecure regular expression
1323 (F) Perl detected tainted data when trying to compile a regular expression
1324 that contains the C<(?{ ... })> zero-width assertion, which is unsafe.
1325 See L<perlre/(?{ code })>, and L<perlsec>.
1327 =item %s: Eval-group not allowed, use re 'eval'
1329 (F) A regular expression contained the C<(?{ ... })> zero-width assertion,
1330 but that construct is only allowed when the C<use re 'eval'> pragma is
1331 in effect. See L<perlre/(?{ code })>.
1333 =item %s: Eval-group not allowed at run time
1335 (F) Perl tried to compile a regular expression containing the C<(?{ ... })>
1336 zero-width assertion at run time, as it would when the pattern contains
1337 interpolated values. Since that is a security risk, it is not allowed.
1338 If you insist, you may still do this by explicitly building the pattern
1339 from an interpolated string at run time and using that in an eval().
1340 See L<perlre/(?{ code })>.
1342 =item Excessively long <> operator
1344 (F) The contents of a <> operator may not exceed the maximum size of a
1345 Perl identifier. If you're just trying to glob a long list of
1346 filenames, try using the glob() operator, or put the filenames into a
1347 variable and glob that.
1349 =item Execution of %s aborted due to compilation errors
1351 (F) The final summary message when a Perl compilation fails.
1353 =item Exiting eval via %s
1355 (W) You are exiting an eval by unconventional means, such as
1356 a goto, or a loop control statement.
1358 =item Exiting pseudo-block via %s
1360 (W) You are exiting a rather special block construct (like a sort block or
1361 subroutine) by unconventional means, such as a goto, or a loop control
1362 statement. See L<perlfunc/sort>.
1364 =item Exiting subroutine via %s
1366 (W) You are exiting a subroutine by unconventional means, such as
1367 a goto, or a loop control statement.
1369 =item Exiting substitution via %s
1371 (W) You are exiting a substitution by unconventional means, such as
1372 a return, a goto, or a loop control statement.
1374 =item Explicit blessing to '' (assuming package main)
1376 (W) You are blessing a reference to a zero length string. This has
1377 the effect of blessing the reference into the package main. This is
1378 usually not what you want. Consider providing a default target
1379 package, e.g. bless($ref, $p || 'MyPackage');
1381 =item Fatal VMS error at %s, line %d
1383 (P) An error peculiar to VMS. Something untoward happened in a VMS system
1384 service or RTL routine; Perl's exit status should provide more details. The
1385 filename in "at %s" and the line number in "line %d" tell you which section of
1386 the Perl source code is distressed.
1388 =item fcntl is not implemented
1390 (F) Your machine apparently doesn't implement fcntl(). What is this, a
1391 PDP-11 or something?
1393 =item Filehandle %s never opened
1395 (W) An I/O operation was attempted on a filehandle that was never initialized.
1396 You need to do an open() or a socket() call, or call a constructor from
1397 the FileHandle package.
1399 =item Filehandle %s opened only for input
1401 (W) You tried to write on a read-only filehandle. If you
1402 intended it to be a read-write filehandle, you needed to open it with
1403 "+E<lt>" or "+E<gt>" or "+E<gt>E<gt>" instead of with "E<lt>" or nothing. If
1404 you intended only to write the file, use "E<gt>" or "E<gt>E<gt>". See
1407 =item Filehandle %s opened only for output
1409 (W) You tried to read from a filehandle opened only for writing. If you
1410 intended it to be a read-write filehandle, you needed to open it with
1411 "+E<lt>" or "+E<gt>" or "+E<gt>E<gt>" instead of with "E<lt>" or nothing. If
1412 you intended only to read from the file, use "E<lt>". See
1415 =item Final $ should be \$ or $name
1417 (F) You must now decide whether the final $ in a string was meant to be
1418 a literal dollar sign, or was meant to introduce a variable name
1419 that happens to be missing. So you have to put either the backslash or
1422 =item Final @ should be \@ or @name
1424 (F) You must now decide whether the final @ in a string was meant to be
1425 a literal "at" sign, or was meant to introduce a variable name
1426 that happens to be missing. So you have to put either the backslash or
1429 =item Format %s redefined
1431 (W) You redefined a format. To suppress this warning, say
1435 eval "format NAME =...";
1438 =item Format not terminated
1440 (F) A format must be terminated by a line with a solitary dot. Perl got
1441 to the end of your file without finding such a line.
1443 =item Found = in conditional, should be ==
1453 (or something like that).
1455 =item gdbm store returned %d, errno %d, key "%s"
1457 (S) A warning from the GDBM_File extension that a store failed.
1459 =item gethostent not implemented
1461 (F) Your C library apparently doesn't implement gethostent(), probably
1462 because if it did, it'd feel morally obligated to return every hostname
1465 =item get{sock,peer}name() on closed fd
1467 (W) You tried to get a socket or peer socket name on a closed socket.
1468 Did you forget to check the return value of your socket() call?
1470 =item getpwnam returned invalid UIC %#o for user "%s"
1472 (S) A warning peculiar to VMS. The call to C<sys$getuai> underlying the
1473 C<getpwnam> operator returned an invalid UIC.
1475 =item Glob not terminated
1477 (F) The lexer saw a left angle bracket in a place where it was expecting
1478 a term, so it's looking for the corresponding right angle bracket, and not
1479 finding it. Chances are you left some needed parentheses out earlier in
1480 the line, and you really meant a "less than".
1482 =item Global symbol "%s" requires explicit package name
1484 (F) You've said "use strict vars", which indicates that all variables
1485 must either be lexically scoped (using "my"), or explicitly qualified to
1486 say which package the global variable is in (using "::").
1488 =item goto must have label
1490 (F) Unlike with "next" or "last", you're not allowed to goto an
1491 unspecified destination. See L<perlfunc/goto>.
1493 =item Had to create %s unexpectedly
1495 (S) A routine asked for a symbol from a symbol table that ought to have
1496 existed already, but for some reason it didn't, and had to be created on
1497 an emergency basis to prevent a core dump.
1499 =item Hash %%s missing the % in argument %d of %s()
1501 (D) Really old Perl let you omit the % on hash names in some spots. This
1502 is now heavily deprecated.
1504 =item Hexadecimal number > 0xffffffff non-portable
1506 (W) The hexadecimal number you specified is larger than 2**32-1
1507 (4294967295) and therefore non-portable between systems. See
1508 L<perlport> for more on portability concerns.
1510 =item Identifier too long
1512 (F) Perl limits identifiers (names for variables, functions, etc.) to
1513 about 250 characters for simple names, and somewhat more for compound
1514 names (like C<$A::B>). You've exceeded Perl's limits. Future
1515 versions of Perl are likely to eliminate these arbitrary limitations.
1517 =item Ill-formed CRTL environ value "%s"
1519 (W) A warning peculiar to VMS. Perl tried to read the CRTL's internal
1520 environ array, and encountered an element without the C<=> delimiter
1521 used to spearate keys from values. The element is ignored.
1523 =item Ill-formed message in prime_env_iter: |%s|
1525 (W) A warning peculiar to VMS. Perl tried to read a logical name
1526 or CLI symbol definition when preparing to iterate over %ENV, and
1527 didn't see the expected delimiter between key and value, so the
1530 =item Illegal character %s (carriage return)
1532 (F) A carriage return character was found in the input. This is an
1533 error, and not a warning, because carriage return characters can break
1534 multi-line strings, including here documents (e.g., C<print E<lt>E<lt>EOF;>).
1536 Under Unix, this error is usually caused by executing Perl code --
1537 either the main program, a module, or an eval'd string -- that was
1538 transferred over a network connection from a non-Unix system without
1539 properly converting the text file format.
1541 Under systems that use something other than '\n' to delimit lines of
1542 text, this error can also be caused by reading Perl code from a file
1543 handle that is in binary mode (as set by the C<binmode> operator).
1545 In either case, the Perl code in question will probably need to be
1546 converted with something like C<s/\x0D\x0A?/\n/g> before it can be
1549 =item Illegal division by zero
1551 (F) You tried to divide a number by 0. Either something was wrong in your
1552 logic, or you need to put a conditional in to guard against meaningless input.
1554 =item Illegal modulus zero
1556 (F) You tried to divide a number by 0 to get the remainder. Most numbers
1557 don't take to this kindly.
1559 =item Illegal binary digit %s
1561 (F) You used a digit other than 0 and 1 in a binary number.
1563 =item Illegal octal digit %s
1565 (F) You used an 8 or 9 in a octal number.
1567 =item Illegal binary digit %s ignored
1569 (W) You may have tried to use a digit other than 0 or 1 in a binary number.
1570 Interpretation of the binary number stopped before the offending digit.
1572 =item Illegal octal digit %s ignored
1574 (W) You may have tried to use an 8 or 9 in a octal number. Interpretation
1575 of the octal number stopped before the 8 or 9.
1577 =item Illegal hexadecimal digit %s ignored
1579 (W) You may have tried to use a character other than 0 - 9 or A - F, a - f
1580 in a hexadecimal number. Interpretation of the hexadecimal number stopped
1581 before the illegal character.
1583 =item Illegal number of bits in vec
1585 (F) The number of bits in vec() (the third argument) must be a power of
1586 two from 1 to 32 (or 64, if your platform supports that).
1588 =item Illegal switch in PERL5OPT: %s
1590 (X) The PERL5OPT environment variable may only be used to set the
1591 following switches: B<-[DIMUdmw]>.
1593 =item In string, @%s now must be written as \@%s
1595 (F) It used to be that Perl would try to guess whether you wanted an
1596 array interpolated or a literal @. It did this when the string was first
1597 used at runtime. Now strings are parsed at compile time, and ambiguous
1598 instances of @ must be disambiguated, either by prepending a backslash to
1599 indicate a literal, or by declaring (or using) the array within the
1600 program before the string (lexically). (Someday it will simply assume
1601 that an unbackslashed @ interpolates an array.)
1603 =item Insecure dependency in %s
1605 (F) You tried to do something that the tainting mechanism didn't like.
1606 The tainting mechanism is turned on when you're running setuid or setgid,
1607 or when you specify B<-T> to turn it on explicitly. The tainting mechanism
1608 labels all data that's derived directly or indirectly from the user,
1609 who is considered to be unworthy of your trust. If any such data is
1610 used in a "dangerous" operation, you get this error. See L<perlsec>
1611 for more information.
1613 =item Insecure directory in %s
1615 (F) You can't use system(), exec(), or a piped open in a setuid or setgid
1616 script if C<$ENV{PATH}> contains a directory that is writable by the world.
1619 =item Insecure $ENV{%s} while running %s
1621 (F) You can't use system(), exec(), or a piped open in a setuid or
1622 setgid script if any of C<$ENV{PATH}>, C<$ENV{IFS}>, C<$ENV{CDPATH}>,
1623 C<$ENV{ENV}> or C<$ENV{BASH_ENV}> are derived from data supplied (or
1624 potentially supplied) by the user. The script must set the path to a
1625 known value, using trustworthy data. See L<perlsec>.
1627 =item Integer overflow in %s number
1629 (W) The hexadecimal, octal or binary number you have specified either
1630 as a literal in your code or as a scalar is too big for your
1631 architecture, and has been converted to a floating point number. On a
1632 32-bit architecture the largest hexadecimal, octal or binary number
1633 representable without overflow is 0xFFFFFFFF, 037777777777, or
1634 0b11111111111111111111111111111111 respectively. Note that Perl
1635 transparently promotes all numbers to a floating point representation
1636 internally--subject to loss of precision errors in subsequent
1639 =item Internal inconsistency in tracking vforks
1641 (S) A warning peculiar to VMS. Perl keeps track of the number
1642 of times you've called C<fork> and C<exec>, to determine
1643 whether the current call to C<exec> should affect the current
1644 script or a subprocess (see L<perlvms/"exec LIST">). Somehow, this count
1645 has become scrambled, so Perl is making a guess and treating
1646 this C<exec> as a request to terminate the Perl script
1647 and execute the specified command.
1649 =item internal disaster in regexp
1651 (P) Something went badly wrong in the regular expression parser.
1653 =item glob failed (%s)
1655 (W) Something went wrong with the external program(s) used for C<glob>
1656 and C<E<lt>*.cE<gt>>. Usually, this means that you supplied a C<glob>
1657 pattern that caused the external program to fail and exit with a nonzero
1658 status. If the message indicates that the abnormal exit resulted in a
1659 coredump, this may also mean that your csh (C shell) is broken. If so,
1660 you should change all of the csh-related variables in config.sh: If you
1661 have tcsh, make the variables refer to it as if it were csh (e.g.
1662 C<full_csh='/usr/bin/tcsh'>); otherwise, make them all empty (except that
1663 C<d_csh> should be C<'undef'>) so that Perl will think csh is missing.
1664 In either case, after editing config.sh, run C<./Configure -S> and
1667 =item internal urp in regexp at /%s/
1669 (P) Something went badly awry in the regular expression parser.
1671 =item Invalid %s attribute: %s
1673 The indicated attribute for a subroutine or variable was not recognized
1674 by Perl or by a user-supplied handler. See L<attributes>.
1676 =item Invalid %s attributes: %s
1678 The indicated attributes for a subroutine or variable were not recognized
1679 by Perl or by a user-supplied handler. See L<attributes>.
1681 =item invalid [] range in regexp
1683 (F) The range specified in a character class had a minimum character
1684 greater than the maximum character, or the range didn't start/end with
1685 a literal character. See L<perlre>.
1687 =item Invalid conversion in %s: "%s"
1689 (W) Perl does not understand the given format conversion.
1690 See L<perlfunc/sprintf>.
1692 =item Invalid separator character %s in attribute list
1694 (F) Something other than a comma or whitespace was seen between the
1695 elements of an attribute list. If the previous attribute
1696 had a parenthesised parameter list, perhaps that list was terminated
1697 too soon. See L<attributes>.
1699 =item Invalid type in pack: '%s'
1701 (F) The given character is not a valid pack type. See L<perlfunc/pack>.
1702 (W) The given character is not a valid pack type but used to be silently
1705 =item Invalid type in unpack: '%s'
1707 (F) The given character is not a valid unpack type. See L<perlfunc/unpack>.
1708 (W) The given character is not a valid unpack type but used to be silently
1711 =item ioctl is not implemented
1713 (F) Your machine apparently doesn't implement ioctl(), which is pretty
1714 strange for a machine that supports C.
1716 =item junk on end of regexp
1718 (P) The regular expression parser is confused.
1720 =item Label not found for "last %s"
1722 (F) You named a loop to break out of, but you're not currently in a
1723 loop of that name, not even if you count where you were called from.
1724 See L<perlfunc/last>.
1726 =item Label not found for "next %s"
1728 (F) You named a loop to continue, but you're not currently in a loop of
1729 that name, not even if you count where you were called from. See
1732 =item Label not found for "redo %s"
1734 (F) You named a loop to restart, but you're not currently in a loop of
1735 that name, not even if you count where you were called from. See
1738 =item leaving effective %s failed
1740 (F) While under the C<use filetest> pragma, switching the real and
1741 effective uids or gids failed.
1743 =item listen() on closed fd
1745 (W) You tried to do a listen on a closed socket. Did you forget to check
1746 the return value of your socket() call? See L<perlfunc/listen>.
1748 =item Lvalue subs returning %s not implemented yet
1750 (F) Due to limitations in the current implementation, array and hash
1751 values cannot be returned in subroutines used in lvalue context.
1752 See L<perlsub/"Lvalue subroutines">.
1754 =item Method for operation %s not found in package %s during blessing
1756 (F) An attempt was made to specify an entry in an overloading table that
1757 doesn't resolve to a valid subroutine. See L<overload>.
1759 =item Method %s not permitted
1763 =item Might be a runaway multi-line %s string starting on line %d
1765 (S) An advisory indicating that the previous error may have been caused
1766 by a missing delimiter on a string or pattern, because it eventually
1767 ended earlier on the current line.
1769 =item Misplaced _ in number
1771 (W) An underline in a decimal constant wasn't on a 3-digit boundary.
1773 =item Missing $ on loop variable
1775 (F) Apparently you've been programming in B<csh> too much. Variables are always
1776 mentioned with the $ in Perl, unlike in the shells, where it can vary from
1777 one line to the next.
1779 =item Missing %sbrace%s on \N{}
1781 (F) Wrong syntax of character name literal C<\N{charname}> within
1782 double-quotish context.
1784 =item Missing comma after first argument to %s function
1786 (F) While certain functions allow you to specify a filehandle or an
1787 "indirect object" before the argument list, this ain't one of them.
1789 =item Missing command in piped open
1791 (W) You used the C<open(FH, "| command")> or C<open(FH, "command |")>
1792 construction, but the command was missing or blank.
1794 =item Missing operator before %s?
1796 (S) This is an educated guess made in conjunction with the message "%s
1797 found where operator expected". Often the missing operator is a comma.
1799 =item Missing right curly or square bracket
1801 (F) The lexer counted more opening curly or square brackets than
1802 closing ones. As a general rule, you'll find it's missing near the place
1803 you were last editing.
1805 =item Modification of a read-only value attempted
1807 (F) You tried, directly or indirectly, to change the value of a
1808 constant. You didn't, of course, try "2 = 1", because the compiler
1809 catches that. But an easy way to do the same thing is:
1811 sub mod { $_[0] = 1 }
1814 Another way is to assign to a substr() that's off the end of the string.
1816 =item Modification of non-creatable array value attempted, subscript %d
1818 (F) You tried to make an array value spring into existence, and the
1819 subscript was probably negative, even counting from end of the array
1822 =item Modification of non-creatable hash value attempted, subscript "%s"
1824 (P) You tried to make a hash value spring into existence, and it couldn't
1825 be created for some peculiar reason.
1827 =item Module name must be constant
1829 (F) Only a bare module name is allowed as the first argument to a "use".
1831 =item msg%s not implemented
1833 (F) You don't have System V message IPC on your system.
1835 =item Multidimensional syntax %s not supported
1837 (W) Multidimensional arrays aren't written like C<$foo[1,2,3]>. They're written
1838 like C<$foo[1][2][3]>, as in C.
1840 =item Missing name in "my sub"
1842 (F) The reserved syntax for lexically scoped subroutines requires that they
1843 have a name with which they can be found.
1845 =item Name "%s::%s" used only once: possible typo
1847 (W) Typographical errors often show up as unique variable names.
1848 If you had a good reason for having a unique name, then just mention
1849 it again somehow to suppress the message. The C<our> declaration is
1850 provided for this purpose.
1852 =item Negative length
1854 (F) You tried to do a read/write/send/recv operation with a buffer length
1855 that is less than 0. This is difficult to imagine.
1857 =item nested *?+ in regexp
1859 (F) You can't quantify a quantifier without intervening parentheses. So
1860 things like ** or +* or ?* are illegal.
1862 Note, however, that the minimal matching quantifiers, C<*?>, C<+?>, and C<??> appear
1863 to be nested quantifiers, but aren't. See L<perlre>.
1867 (F) The setuid emulator requires that scripts have a well-formed #! line
1868 even on machines that don't support the #! construct.
1870 =item No %s allowed while running setuid
1872 (F) Certain operations are deemed to be too insecure for a setuid or setgid
1873 script to even be allowed to attempt. Generally speaking there will be
1874 another way to do what you want that is, if not secure, at least securable.
1877 =item No B<-e> allowed in setuid scripts
1879 (F) A setuid script can't be specified by the user.
1881 =item No comma allowed after %s
1883 (F) A list operator that has a filehandle or "indirect object" is not
1884 allowed to have a comma between that and the following arguments.
1885 Otherwise it'd be just another one of the arguments.
1887 One possible cause for this is that you expected to have imported a
1888 constant to your name space with B<use> or B<import> while no such
1889 importing took place, it may for example be that your operating system
1890 does not support that particular constant. Hopefully you did use an
1891 explicit import list for the constants you expect to see, please see
1892 L<perlfunc/use> and L<perlfunc/import>. While an explicit import list
1893 would probably have caught this error earlier it naturally does not
1894 remedy the fact that your operating system still does not support that
1895 constant. Maybe you have a typo in the constants of the symbol import
1896 list of B<use> or B<import> or in the constant name at the line where
1897 this error was triggered?
1899 =item No command into which to pipe on command line
1901 (F) An error peculiar to VMS. Perl handles its own command line redirection,
1902 and found a '|' at the end of the command line, so it doesn't know where you
1903 want to pipe the output from this command.
1905 =item No DB::DB routine defined
1907 (F) The currently executing code was compiled with the B<-d> switch,
1908 but for some reason the perl5db.pl file (or some facsimile thereof)
1909 didn't define a routine to be called at the beginning of each
1910 statement. Which is odd, because the file should have been required
1911 automatically, and should have blown up the require if it didn't parse
1914 =item No dbm on this machine
1916 (P) This is counted as an internal error, because every machine should
1917 supply dbm nowadays, because Perl comes with SDBM. See L<SDBM_File>.
1919 =item No DBsub routine
1921 (F) The currently executing code was compiled with the B<-d> switch,
1922 but for some reason the perl5db.pl file (or some facsimile thereof)
1923 didn't define a DB::sub routine to be called at the beginning of each
1924 ordinary subroutine call.
1926 =item No error file after 2E<gt> or 2E<gt>E<gt> on command line
1928 (F) An error peculiar to VMS. Perl handles its own command line redirection,
1929 and found a '2E<gt>' or a '2E<gt>E<gt>' on the command line, but can't find
1930 the name of the file to which to write data destined for stderr.
1932 =item No input file after E<lt> on command line
1934 (F) An error peculiar to VMS. Perl handles its own command line redirection,
1935 and found a 'E<lt>' on the command line, but can't find the name of the file
1936 from which to read data for stdin.
1938 =item No output file after E<gt> on command line
1940 (F) An error peculiar to VMS. Perl handles its own command line redirection,
1941 and found a lone 'E<gt>' at the end of the command line, so it doesn't know
1942 where you wanted to redirect stdout.
1944 =item No output file after E<gt> or E<gt>E<gt> on command line
1946 (F) An error peculiar to VMS. Perl handles its own command line redirection,
1947 and found a 'E<gt>' or a 'E<gt>E<gt>' on the command line, but can't find the
1948 name of the file to which to write data destined for stdout.
1950 =item No Perl script found in input
1952 (F) You called C<perl -x>, but no line was found in the file beginning
1953 with #! and containing the word "perl".
1955 =item No setregid available
1957 (F) Configure didn't find anything resembling the setregid() call for
1960 =item No setreuid available
1962 (F) Configure didn't find anything resembling the setreuid() call for
1965 =item No space allowed after B<-I>
1967 (F) The argument to B<-I> must follow the B<-I> immediately with no
1970 =item No such pseudo-hash field "%s"
1972 (F) You tried to access an array as a hash, but the field name used is
1973 not defined. The hash at index 0 should map all valid field names to
1974 array indices for that to work.
1976 =item No such pseudo-hash field "%s" in variable %s of type %s
1978 (F) You tried to access a field of a typed variable where the type
1979 does not know about the field name. The field names are looked up in
1980 the %FIELDS hash in the type package at compile time. The %FIELDS hash
1981 is usually set up with the 'fields' pragma.
1983 =item No such pipe open
1985 (P) An error peculiar to VMS. The internal routine my_pclose() tried to
1986 close a pipe which hadn't been opened. This should have been caught earlier as
1987 an attempt to close an unopened filehandle.
1989 =item No such signal: SIG%s
1991 (W) You specified a signal name as a subscript to %SIG that was not recognized.
1992 Say C<kill -l> in your shell to see the valid signal names on your system.
1994 =item no UTC offset information; assuming local time is UTC
1996 (S) A warning peculiar to VMS. Perl was unable to find the local
1997 timezone offset, so it's assuming that local system time is equivalent
1998 to UTC. If it's not, define the logical name F<SYS$TIMEZONE_DIFFERENTIAL>
1999 to translate to the number of seconds which need to be added to UTC to
2002 =item Not a CODE reference
2004 (F) Perl was trying to evaluate a reference to a code value (that is, a
2005 subroutine), but found a reference to something else instead. You can
2006 use the ref() function to find out what kind of ref it really was.
2007 See also L<perlref>.
2009 =item Not a format reference
2011 (F) I'm not sure how you managed to generate a reference to an anonymous
2012 format, but this indicates you did, and that it didn't exist.
2014 =item Not a GLOB reference
2016 (F) Perl was trying to evaluate a reference to a "typeglob" (that is,
2017 a symbol table entry that looks like C<*foo>), but found a reference to
2018 something else instead. You can use the ref() function to find out
2019 what kind of ref it really was. See L<perlref>.
2021 =item Not a HASH reference
2023 (F) Perl was trying to evaluate a reference to a hash value, but
2024 found a reference to something else instead. You can use the ref()
2025 function to find out what kind of ref it really was. See L<perlref>.
2027 =item Not a perl script
2029 (F) The setuid emulator requires that scripts have a well-formed #! line
2030 even on machines that don't support the #! construct. The line must
2033 =item Not a SCALAR reference
2035 (F) Perl was trying to evaluate a reference to a scalar value, but
2036 found a reference to something else instead. You can use the ref()
2037 function to find out what kind of ref it really was. See L<perlref>.
2039 =item Not a subroutine reference
2041 (F) Perl was trying to evaluate a reference to a code value (that is, a
2042 subroutine), but found a reference to something else instead. You can
2043 use the ref() function to find out what kind of ref it really was.
2044 See also L<perlref>.
2046 =item Not a subroutine reference in overload table
2048 (F) An attempt was made to specify an entry in an overloading table that
2049 doesn't somehow point to a valid subroutine. See L<overload>.
2051 =item Not an ARRAY reference
2053 (F) Perl was trying to evaluate a reference to an array value, but
2054 found a reference to something else instead. You can use the ref()
2055 function to find out what kind of ref it really was. See L<perlref>.
2057 =item Not enough arguments for %s
2059 (F) The function requires more arguments than you specified.
2061 =item Not enough format arguments
2063 (W) A format specified more picture fields than the next line supplied.
2066 =item Null filename used
2068 (F) You can't require the null filename, especially because on many machines
2069 that means the current directory! See L<perlfunc/require>.
2071 =item Null picture in formline
2073 (F) The first argument to formline must be a valid format picture
2074 specification. It was found to be empty, which probably means you
2075 supplied it an uninitialized value. See L<perlform>.
2077 =item NULL OP IN RUN
2079 (P) Some internal routine called run() with a null opcode pointer.
2083 (P) An attempt was made to realloc NULL.
2085 =item NULL regexp argument
2087 (P) The internal pattern matching routines blew it big time.
2089 =item NULL regexp parameter
2091 (P) The internal pattern matching routines are out of their gourd.
2093 =item Number too long
2095 (F) Perl limits the representation of decimal numbers in programs to about
2096 about 250 characters. You've exceeded that length. Future versions of
2097 Perl are likely to eliminate this arbitrary limitation. In the meantime,
2098 try using scientific notation (e.g. "1e6" instead of "1_000_000").
2100 =item Octal number > 037777777777 non-portable
2102 (W) The octal number you specified is larger than 2**32-1 (4294967295)
2103 and therefore non-portable between systems. See L<perlport> for more
2104 on portability concerns.
2106 See also L<perlport> for writing portable code.
2108 =item Odd number of elements in hash assignment
2110 (S) You specified an odd number of elements to initialize a hash, which
2111 is odd, because hashes come in key/value pairs.
2113 =item Offset outside string
2115 (F) You tried to do a read/write/send/recv operation with an offset
2116 pointing outside the buffer. This is difficult to imagine.
2117 The sole exception to this is that C<sysread()>ing past the buffer
2118 will extend the buffer and zero pad the new area.
2122 (S) An internal warning that the grammar is screwed up.
2126 (S) An internal warning that the grammar is screwed up.
2128 =item Operation `%s': no method found, %s
2130 (F) An attempt was made to perform an overloaded operation for which
2131 no handler was defined. While some handlers can be autogenerated in
2132 terms of other handlers, there is no default handler for any
2133 operation, unless C<fallback> overloading key is specified to be
2134 true. See L<overload>.
2136 =item Operator or semicolon missing before %s
2138 (S) You used a variable or subroutine call where the parser was
2139 expecting an operator. The parser has assumed you really meant
2140 to use an operator, but this is highly likely to be incorrect.
2141 For example, if you say "*foo *foo" it will be interpreted as
2142 if you said "*foo * 'foo'".
2144 =item Out of memory!
2146 (X) The malloc() function returned 0, indicating there was insufficient
2147 remaining memory (or virtual memory) to satisfy the request. Perl
2148 has no option but to exit immediately.
2150 =item Out of memory for yacc stack
2152 (F) The yacc parser wanted to grow its stack so it could continue parsing,
2153 but realloc() wouldn't give it more memory, virtual or otherwise.
2155 =item Out of memory during request for %s
2157 (X|F) The malloc() function returned 0, indicating there was insufficient
2158 remaining memory (or virtual memory) to satisfy the request.
2160 The request was judged to be small, so the possibility to trap it
2161 depends on the way perl was compiled. By default it is not trappable.
2162 However, if compiled for this, Perl may use the contents of C<$^M> as
2163 an emergency pool after die()ing with this message. In this case the
2164 error is trappable I<once>.
2166 =item Out of memory during "large" request for %s
2168 (F) The malloc() function returned 0, indicating there was insufficient
2169 remaining memory (or virtual memory) to satisfy the request. However,
2170 the request was judged large enough (compile-time default is 64K), so
2171 a possibility to shut down by trapping this error is granted.
2173 =item Out of memory during ridiculously large request
2175 (F) You can't allocate more than 2^31+"small amount" bytes. This error
2176 is most likely to be caused by a typo in the Perl program. e.g., C<$arr[time]>
2177 instead of C<$arr[$time]>.
2181 (W) A single call to write() produced more lines than can fit on a page.
2184 =item panic: ck_grep
2186 (P) Failed an internal consistency check trying to compile a grep.
2188 =item panic: ck_split
2190 (P) Failed an internal consistency check trying to compile a split.
2192 =item panic: corrupt saved stack index
2194 (P) The savestack was requested to restore more localized values than there
2195 are in the savestack.
2197 =item panic: del_backref
2199 (P) Failed an internal consistency check while trying to reset a weak
2204 (P) We popped the context stack to an eval context, and then discovered
2205 it wasn't an eval context.
2207 =item panic: do_match
2209 (P) The internal pp_match() routine was called with invalid operational data.
2211 =item panic: do_split
2213 (P) Something terrible went wrong in setting up for the split.
2215 =item panic: do_subst
2217 (P) The internal pp_subst() routine was called with invalid operational data.
2219 =item panic: do_trans
2221 (P) The internal do_trans() routine was called with invalid operational data.
2225 (P) The library function frexp() failed, making printf("%f") impossible.
2229 (P) We popped the context stack to a context with the specified label,
2230 and then discovered it wasn't a context we know how to do a goto in.
2232 =item panic: INTERPCASEMOD
2234 (P) The lexer got into a bad state at a case modifier.
2236 =item panic: INTERPCONCAT
2238 (P) The lexer got into a bad state parsing a string with brackets.
2240 =item panic: kid popen errno read
2242 (F) forked child returned an incomprehensible message about its errno.
2246 (P) We popped the context stack to a block context, and then discovered
2247 it wasn't a block context.
2249 =item panic: leave_scope clearsv
2251 (P) A writable lexical variable became read-only somehow within the scope.
2253 =item panic: leave_scope inconsistency
2255 (P) The savestack probably got out of sync. At least, there was an
2256 invalid enum on the top of it.
2260 (P) Something requested a negative number of bytes of malloc.
2262 =item panic: magic_killbackrefs
2264 (P) Failed an internal consistency check while trying to reset all weak
2265 references to an object.
2267 =item panic: mapstart
2269 (P) The compiler is screwed up with respect to the map() function.
2271 =item panic: null array
2273 (P) One of the internal array routines was passed a null AV pointer.
2275 =item panic: pad_alloc
2277 (P) The compiler got confused about which scratch pad it was allocating
2278 and freeing temporaries and lexicals from.
2280 =item panic: pad_free curpad
2282 (P) The compiler got confused about which scratch pad it was allocating
2283 and freeing temporaries and lexicals from.
2285 =item panic: pad_free po
2287 (P) An invalid scratch pad offset was detected internally.
2289 =item panic: pad_reset curpad
2291 (P) The compiler got confused about which scratch pad it was allocating
2292 and freeing temporaries and lexicals from.
2294 =item panic: pad_sv po
2296 (P) An invalid scratch pad offset was detected internally.
2298 =item panic: pad_swipe curpad
2300 (P) The compiler got confused about which scratch pad it was allocating
2301 and freeing temporaries and lexicals from.
2303 =item panic: pad_swipe po
2305 (P) An invalid scratch pad offset was detected internally.
2307 =item panic: pp_iter
2309 (P) The foreach iterator got called in a non-loop context frame.
2311 =item panic: realloc
2313 (P) Something requested a negative number of bytes of realloc.
2315 =item panic: restartop
2317 (P) Some internal routine requested a goto (or something like it), and
2318 didn't supply the destination.
2322 (P) We popped the context stack to a subroutine or eval context, and
2323 then discovered it wasn't a subroutine or eval context.
2325 =item panic: scan_num
2327 (P) scan_num() got called on something that wasn't a number.
2329 =item panic: sv_insert
2331 (P) The sv_insert() routine was told to remove more string than there
2334 =item panic: top_env
2336 (P) The compiler attempted to do a goto, or something weird like that.
2340 (P) The lexer got into a bad state while processing a case modifier.
2342 =item Parentheses missing around "%s" list
2344 (W) You said something like
2350 my ($foo, $bar) = @_;
2352 Remember that "my" and "local" bind closer than comma.
2354 =item Perl %3.3f required--this is only version %s, stopped
2356 (F) The module in question uses features of a version of Perl more recent
2357 than the currently running version. How long has it been since you upgraded,
2358 anyway? See L<perlfunc/require>.
2360 =item Permission denied
2362 (F) The setuid emulator in suidperl decided you were up to no good.
2364 =item pid %x not a child
2366 (W) A warning peculiar to VMS. Waitpid() was asked to wait for a process which
2367 isn't a subprocess of the current process. While this is fine from VMS'
2368 perspective, it's probably not what you intended.
2370 =item POSIX getpgrp can't take an argument
2372 (F) Your C compiler uses POSIX getpgrp(), which takes no argument, unlike
2373 the BSD version, which takes a pid.
2375 =item Possible Y2K bug: %s
2377 (W) You are concatenating the number 19 with another number, which
2378 could be a potential Year 2000 problem.
2380 =item Possible attempt to put comments in qw() list
2382 (W) qw() lists contain items separated by whitespace; as with literal
2383 strings, comment characters are not ignored, but are instead treated
2384 as literal data. (You may have used different delimiters than the
2385 parentheses shown here; braces are also frequently used.)
2387 You probably wrote something like this:
2394 when you should have written this:
2401 If you really want comments, build your list the
2402 old-fashioned way, with quotes and commas:
2406 'b', # another comment
2409 =item Possible attempt to separate words with commas
2411 (W) qw() lists contain items separated by whitespace; therefore commas
2412 aren't needed to separate the items. (You may have used different
2413 delimiters than the parentheses shown here; braces are also frequently
2416 You probably wrote something like this:
2420 which puts literal commas into some of the list items. Write it without
2421 commas if you don't want them to appear in your data:
2425 =item Possible memory corruption: %s overflowed 3rd argument
2427 (F) An ioctl() or fcntl() returned more than Perl was bargaining for.
2428 Perl guesses a reasonable buffer size, but puts a sentinel byte at the
2429 end of the buffer just in case. This sentinel byte got clobbered, and
2430 Perl assumes that memory is now corrupted. See L<perlfunc/ioctl>.
2432 =item Precedence problem: open %s should be open(%s)
2434 (S) The old irregular construct
2438 is now misinterpreted as
2442 because of the strict regularization of Perl 5's grammar into unary
2443 and list operators. (The old open was a little of both.) You must
2444 put parentheses around the filehandle, or use the new "or" operator
2447 =item Premature end of script headers
2451 =item print on closed filehandle %s
2453 (W) The filehandle you're printing on got itself closed sometime before now.
2454 Check your logic flow.
2456 =item printf on closed filehandle %s
2458 (W) The filehandle you're writing to got itself closed sometime before now.
2459 Check your logic flow.
2461 =item Probable precedence problem on %s
2463 (W) The compiler found a bareword where it expected a conditional,
2464 which often indicates that an || or && was parsed as part of the
2465 last argument of the previous construct, for example:
2469 =item Prototype mismatch: %s vs %s
2471 (S) The subroutine being declared or defined had previously been declared
2472 or defined with a different function prototype.
2474 =item Range iterator outside integer range
2476 (F) One (or both) of the numeric arguments to the range operator ".."
2477 are outside the range which can be represented by integers internally.
2478 One possible workaround is to force Perl to use magical string
2479 increment by prepending "0" to your numbers.
2481 =item Read on closed filehandle %s
2483 (W) The filehandle you're reading from got itself closed sometime before now.
2484 Check your logic flow.
2486 =item realloc() of freed memory ignored
2488 (S) An internal routine called realloc() on something that had already
2491 =item Reallocation too large: %lx
2493 (F) You can't allocate more than 64K on an MS-DOS machine.
2495 =item Recompile perl with B<-D>DEBUGGING to use B<-D> switch
2497 (F) You can't use the B<-D> option unless the code to produce the
2498 desired output is compiled into Perl, which entails some overhead,
2499 which is why it's currently left out of your copy.
2501 =item Recursive inheritance detected in package '%s'
2503 (F) More than 100 levels of inheritance were used. Probably indicates
2504 an unintended loop in your inheritance hierarchy.
2506 =item Recursive inheritance detected while looking for method '%s' in package '%s'
2508 (F) More than 100 levels of inheritance were encountered while invoking a
2509 method. Probably indicates an unintended loop in your inheritance hierarchy.
2511 =item Reference found where even-sized list expected
2513 (W) You gave a single reference where Perl was expecting a list with
2514 an even number of elements (for assignment to a hash). This
2515 usually means that you used the anon hash constructor when you meant
2516 to use parens. In any case, a hash requires key/value B<pairs>.
2518 %hash = { one => 1, two => 2, }; # WRONG
2519 %hash = [ qw/ an anon array / ]; # WRONG
2520 %hash = ( one => 1, two => 2, ); # right
2521 %hash = qw( one 1 two 2 ); # also fine
2523 =item Reference is already weak
2525 (W) You have attempted to weaken a reference that is already weak.
2526 Doing so has no effect.
2528 =item Reference miscount in sv_replace()
2530 (W) The internal sv_replace() function was handed a new SV with a
2531 reference count of other than 1.
2533 =item regexp *+ operand could be empty
2535 (F) The part of the regexp subject to either the * or + quantifier
2536 could match an empty string.
2538 =item regexp memory corruption
2540 (P) The regular expression engine got confused by what the regular
2541 expression compiler gave it.
2543 =item regexp out of space
2545 (P) A "can't happen" error, because safemalloc() should have caught it earlier.
2547 =item Reversed %s= operator
2549 (W) You wrote your assignment operator backwards. The = must always
2550 comes last, to avoid ambiguity with subsequent unary operators.
2552 =item Runaway format
2554 (F) Your format contained the ~~ repeat-until-blank sequence, but it
2555 produced 200 lines at once, and the 200th line looked exactly like the
2556 199th line. Apparently you didn't arrange for the arguments to exhaust
2557 themselves, either by using ^ instead of @ (for scalar variables), or by
2558 shifting or popping (for array variables). See L<perlform>.
2560 =item Scalar value @%s[%s] better written as $%s[%s]
2562 (W) You've used an array slice (indicated by @) to select a single element of
2563 an array. Generally it's better to ask for a scalar value (indicated by $).
2564 The difference is that C<$foo[&bar]> always behaves like a scalar, both when
2565 assigning to it and when evaluating its argument, while C<@foo[&bar]> behaves
2566 like a list when you assign to it, and provides a list context to its
2567 subscript, which can do weird things if you're expecting only one subscript.
2569 On the other hand, if you were actually hoping to treat the array
2570 element as a list, you need to look into how references work, because
2571 Perl will not magically convert between scalars and lists for you. See
2574 =item Scalar value @%s{%s} better written as $%s{%s}
2576 (W) You've used a hash slice (indicated by @) to select a single element of
2577 a hash. Generally it's better to ask for a scalar value (indicated by $).
2578 The difference is that C<$foo{&bar}> always behaves like a scalar, both when
2579 assigning to it and when evaluating its argument, while C<@foo{&bar}> behaves
2580 like a list when you assign to it, and provides a list context to its
2581 subscript, which can do weird things if you're expecting only one subscript.
2583 On the other hand, if you were actually hoping to treat the hash
2584 element as a list, you need to look into how references work, because
2585 Perl will not magically convert between scalars and lists for you. See
2588 =item Script is not setuid/setgid in suidperl
2590 (F) Oddly, the suidperl program was invoked on a script without a setuid
2591 or setgid bit set. This doesn't make much sense.
2593 =item Search pattern not terminated
2595 (F) The lexer couldn't find the final delimiter of a // or m{}
2596 construct. Remember that bracketing delimiters count nesting level.
2597 Missing the leading C<$> from a variable C<$m> may cause this error.
2599 =item %sseek() on unopened file
2601 (W) You tried to use the seek() or sysseek() function on a filehandle that
2602 was either never opened or has since been closed.
2604 =item select not implemented
2606 (F) This machine doesn't implement the select() system call.
2608 =item sem%s not implemented
2610 (F) You don't have System V semaphore IPC on your system.
2612 =item semi-panic: attempt to dup freed string
2614 (S) The internal newSVsv() routine was called to duplicate a scalar
2615 that had previously been marked as free.
2617 =item Semicolon seems to be missing
2619 (W) A nearby syntax error was probably caused by a missing semicolon,
2620 or possibly some other missing operator, such as a comma.
2622 =item Send on closed socket
2624 (W) The filehandle you're sending to got itself closed sometime before now.
2625 Check your logic flow.
2627 =item Sequence (? incomplete
2629 (F) A regular expression ended with an incomplete extension (?.
2632 =item Sequence (?#... not terminated
2634 (F) A regular expression comment must be terminated by a closing
2635 parenthesis. Embedded parentheses aren't allowed. See L<perlre>.
2637 =item Sequence (?%s...) not implemented
2639 (F) A proposed regular expression extension has the character reserved
2640 but has not yet been written. See L<perlre>.
2642 =item Sequence (?%s...) not recognized
2644 (F) You used a regular expression extension that doesn't make sense.
2649 This is the error message generally seen in a browser window when trying
2650 to run a CGI program (including SSI) over the web. The actual error
2651 text varies widely from server to server. The most frequently-seen
2652 variants are "500 Server error", "Method (something) not permitted",
2653 "Document contains no data", "Premature end of script headers", and
2654 "Did not produce a valid header".
2656 B<This is a CGI error, not a Perl error>.
2658 You need to make sure your script is executable, is accessible by the user
2659 CGI is running the script under (which is probably not the user account you
2660 tested it under), does not rely on any environment variables (like PATH)
2661 from the user it isn't running under, and isn't in a location where the CGI
2662 server can't find it, basically, more or less. Please see the following
2663 for more information:
2665 http://www.perl.com/CPAN/doc/FAQs/cgi/idiots-guide.html
2666 http://www.perl.com/CPAN/doc/FAQs/cgi/perl-cgi-faq.html
2667 ftp://rtfm.mit.edu/pub/usenet/news.answers/www/cgi-faq
2668 http://hoohoo.ncsa.uiuc.edu/cgi/interface.html
2669 http://www-genome.wi.mit.edu/WWW/faqs/www-security-faq.html
2671 You should also look at L<perlfaq9>.
2673 =item setegid() not implemented
2675 (F) You tried to assign to C<$)>, and your operating system doesn't support
2676 the setegid() system call (or equivalent), or at least Configure didn't
2679 =item seteuid() not implemented
2681 (F) You tried to assign to C<$E<gt>>, and your operating system doesn't support
2682 the seteuid() system call (or equivalent), or at least Configure didn't
2685 =item setrgid() not implemented
2687 (F) You tried to assign to C<$(>, and your operating system doesn't support
2688 the setrgid() system call (or equivalent), or at least Configure didn't
2691 =item setruid() not implemented
2693 (F) You tried to assign to C<$E<lt>>, and your operating system doesn't support
2694 the setruid() system call (or equivalent), or at least Configure didn't
2697 =item Setuid/gid script is writable by world
2699 (F) The setuid emulator won't run a script that is writable by the world,
2700 because the world might have written on it already.
2702 =item shm%s not implemented
2704 (F) You don't have System V shared memory IPC on your system.
2706 =item shutdown() on closed fd
2708 (W) You tried to do a shutdown on a closed socket. Seems a bit superfluous.
2710 =item SIG%s handler "%s" not defined
2712 (W) The signal handler named in %SIG doesn't, in fact, exist. Perhaps you
2713 put it into the wrong package?
2715 =item sort is now a reserved word
2717 (F) An ancient error message that almost nobody ever runs into anymore.
2718 But before sort was a keyword, people sometimes used it as a filehandle.
2720 =item Sort subroutine didn't return a numeric value
2722 (F) A sort comparison routine must return a number. You probably blew
2723 it by not using C<E<lt>=E<gt>> or C<cmp>, or by not using them correctly.
2724 See L<perlfunc/sort>.
2726 =item Sort subroutine didn't return single value
2728 (F) A sort comparison subroutine may not return a list value with more
2729 or less than one element. See L<perlfunc/sort>.
2733 (P) The split was looping infinitely. (Obviously, a split shouldn't iterate
2734 more times than there are characters of input, which is what happened.)
2735 See L<perlfunc/split>.
2737 =item Stat on unopened file E<lt>%sE<gt>
2739 (W) You tried to use the stat() function (or an equivalent file test)
2740 on a filehandle that was either never opened or has since been closed.
2742 =item Statement unlikely to be reached
2744 (W) You did an exec() with some statement after it other than a die().
2745 This is almost always an error, because exec() never returns unless
2746 there was a failure. You probably wanted to use system() instead,
2747 which does return. To suppress this warning, put the exec() in a block
2750 =item Strange *+?{} on zero-length expression
2752 (W) You applied a regular expression quantifier in a place where it
2753 makes no sense, such as on a zero-width assertion.
2754 Try putting the quantifier inside the assertion instead. For example,
2755 the way to match "abc" provided that it is followed by three
2756 repetitions of "xyz" is C</abc(?=(?:xyz){3})/>, not C</abc(?=xyz){3}/>.
2758 =item Stub found while resolving method `%s' overloading `%s' in package `%s'
2760 (P) Overloading resolution over @ISA tree may be broken by importation stubs.
2761 Stubs should never be implicitely created, but explicit calls to C<can>
2764 =item Subroutine %s redefined
2766 (W) You redefined a subroutine. To suppress this warning, say
2770 eval "sub name { ... }";
2773 =item Substitution loop
2775 (P) The substitution was looping infinitely. (Obviously, a
2776 substitution shouldn't iterate more times than there are characters of
2777 input, which is what happened.) See the discussion of substitution in
2778 L<perlop/"Quote and Quote-like Operators">.
2780 =item Substitution pattern not terminated
2782 (F) The lexer couldn't find the interior delimiter of a s/// or s{}{}
2783 construct. Remember that bracketing delimiters count nesting level.
2784 Missing the leading C<$> from variable C<$s> may cause this error.
2786 =item Substitution replacement not terminated
2788 (F) The lexer couldn't find the final delimiter of a s/// or s{}{}
2789 construct. Remember that bracketing delimiters count nesting level.
2790 Missing the leading C<$> from variable C<$s> may cause this error.
2792 =item substr outside of string
2794 (S),(W) You tried to reference a substr() that pointed outside of a
2795 string. That is, the absolute value of the offset was larger than the
2796 length of the string. See L<perlfunc/substr>. This warning is
2797 mandatory if substr is used in an lvalue context (as the left hand side
2798 of an assignment or as a subroutine argument for example).
2800 =item suidperl is no longer needed since %s
2802 (F) Your Perl was compiled with B<-D>SETUID_SCRIPTS_ARE_SECURE_NOW, but a
2803 version of the setuid emulator somehow got run anyway.
2805 =item switching effective %s is not implemented
2807 (F) While under the C<use filetest> pragma, we cannot switch the
2808 real and effective uids or gids.
2812 (F) Probably means you had a syntax error. Common reasons include:
2814 A keyword is misspelled.
2815 A semicolon is missing.
2817 An opening or closing parenthesis is missing.
2818 An opening or closing brace is missing.
2819 A closing quote is missing.
2821 Often there will be another error message associated with the syntax
2822 error giving more information. (Sometimes it helps to turn on B<-w>.)
2823 The error message itself often tells you where it was in the line when
2824 it decided to give up. Sometimes the actual error is several tokens
2825 before this, because Perl is good at understanding random input.
2826 Occasionally the line number may be misleading, and once in a blue moon
2827 the only way to figure out what's triggering the error is to call
2828 C<perl -c> repeatedly, chopping away half the program each time to see
2829 if the error went away. Sort of the cybernetic version of S<20 questions>.
2831 =item syntax error at line %d: `%s' unexpected
2833 (A) You've accidentally run your script through the Bourne shell
2834 instead of Perl. Check the #! line, or manually feed your script
2837 =item System V %s is not implemented on this machine
2839 (F) You tried to do something with a function beginning with "sem",
2840 "shm", or "msg" but that System V IPC is not implemented in your
2841 machine. In some machines the functionality can exist but be
2842 unconfigured. Consult your system support.
2844 =item Syswrite on closed filehandle
2846 (W) The filehandle you're writing to got itself closed sometime before now.
2847 Check your logic flow.
2849 =item Target of goto is too deeply nested
2851 (F) You tried to use C<goto> to reach a label that was too deeply
2852 nested for Perl to reach. Perl is doing you a favor by refusing.
2854 =item tell() on unopened file
2856 (W) You tried to use the tell() function on a filehandle that was either
2857 never opened or has since been closed.
2859 =item Test on unopened file E<lt>%sE<gt>
2861 (W) You tried to invoke a file test operator on a filehandle that isn't
2862 open. Check your logic. See also L<perlfunc/-X>.
2864 =item That use of $[ is unsupported
2866 (F) Assignment to C<$[> is now strictly circumscribed, and interpreted as
2867 a compiler directive. You may say only one of
2876 This is to prevent the problem of one module changing the array base
2877 out from under another module inadvertently. See L<perlvar/$[>.
2879 =item The %s function is unimplemented
2881 The function indicated isn't implemented on this architecture, according
2882 to the probings of Configure.
2884 =item The crypt() function is unimplemented due to excessive paranoia
2886 (F) Configure couldn't find the crypt() function on your machine,
2887 probably because your vendor didn't supply it, probably because they
2888 think the U.S. Government thinks it's a secret, or at least that they
2889 will continue to pretend that it is. And if you quote me on that, I
2892 =item The stat preceding C<-l _> wasn't an lstat
2894 (F) It makes no sense to test the current stat buffer for symbolic linkhood
2895 if the last stat that wrote to the stat buffer already went past
2896 the symlink to get to the real file. Use an actual filename instead.
2898 =item This Perl can't reset CRTL eviron elements (%s)
2900 =item This Perl can't set CRTL environ elements (%s=%s)
2902 (W) Warnings peculiar to VMS. You tried to change or delete an element
2903 of the CRTL's internal environ array, but your copy of Perl wasn't
2904 built with a CRTL that contained the setenv() function. You'll need to
2905 rebuild Perl with a CRTL that does, or redefine F<PERL_ENV_TABLES> (see
2906 L<perlvms>) so that the environ array isn't the target of the change to
2907 %ENV which produced the warning.
2909 =item times not implemented
2911 (F) Your version of the C library apparently doesn't do times(). I suspect
2912 you're not running on Unix.
2914 =item Too few args to syscall
2916 (F) There has to be at least one argument to syscall() to specify the
2917 system call to call, silly dilly.
2919 =item Too late for "B<-T>" option
2921 (X) The #! line (or local equivalent) in a Perl script contains the
2922 B<-T> option, but Perl was not invoked with B<-T> in its command line.
2923 This is an error because, by the time Perl discovers a B<-T> in a
2924 script, it's too late to properly taint everything from the environment.
2927 If the Perl script is being executed as a command using the #!
2928 mechanism (or its local equivalent), this error can usually be fixed
2929 by editing the #! line so that the B<-T> option is a part of Perl's
2930 first argument: e.g. change C<perl -n -T> to C<perl -T -n>.
2932 If the Perl script is being executed as C<perl scriptname>, then the
2933 B<-T> option must appear on the command line: C<perl -T scriptname>.
2935 =item Too late for "-%s" option
2937 (X) The #! line (or local equivalent) in a Perl script contains the
2938 B<-M> or B<-m> option. This is an error because B<-M> and B<-m> options
2939 are not intended for use inside scripts. Use the C<use> pragma instead.
2945 (A) You've accidentally run your script through B<csh> instead
2946 of Perl. Check the #! line, or manually feed your script into
2949 =item Too many args to syscall
2951 (F) Perl supports a maximum of only 14 args to syscall().
2953 =item Too many arguments for %s
2955 (F) The function requires fewer arguments than you specified.
2957 =item trailing \ in regexp
2959 (F) The regular expression ends with an unbackslashed backslash. Backslash
2962 =item Transliteration pattern not terminated
2964 (F) The lexer couldn't find the interior delimiter of a tr/// or tr[][]
2965 or y/// or y[][] construct. Missing the leading C<$> from variables
2966 C<$tr> or C<$y> may cause this error.
2968 =item Transliteration replacement not terminated
2970 (F) The lexer couldn't find the final delimiter of a tr/// or tr[][]
2973 =item truncate not implemented
2975 (F) Your machine doesn't implement a file truncation mechanism that
2976 Configure knows about.
2978 =item Type of arg %d to %s must be %s (not %s)
2980 (F) This function requires the argument in that position to be of a
2981 certain type. Arrays must be @NAME or C<@{EXPR}>. Hashes must be
2982 %NAME or C<%{EXPR}>. No implicit dereferencing is allowed--use the
2983 {EXPR} forms as an explicit dereference. See L<perlref>.
2985 =item umask: argument is missing initial 0
2987 (W) A umask of 222 is incorrect. It should be 0222, because octal
2988 literals always start with 0 in Perl, as in C.
2990 =item umask not implemented
2992 (F) Your machine doesn't implement the umask function and you tried
2993 to use it to restrict permissions for yourself (EXPR & 0700).
2995 =item Unable to create sub named "%s"
2997 (F) You attempted to create or access a subroutine with an illegal name.
2999 =item Unbalanced context: %d more PUSHes than POPs
3001 (W) The exit code detected an internal inconsistency in how many execution
3002 contexts were entered and left.
3004 =item Unbalanced saves: %d more saves than restores
3006 (W) The exit code detected an internal inconsistency in how many
3007 values were temporarily localized.
3009 =item Unbalanced scopes: %d more ENTERs than LEAVEs
3011 (W) The exit code detected an internal inconsistency in how many blocks
3012 were entered and left.
3014 =item Unbalanced tmps: %d more allocs than frees
3016 (W) The exit code detected an internal inconsistency in how many mortal
3017 scalars were allocated and freed.
3019 =item Undefined format "%s" called
3021 (F) The format indicated doesn't seem to exist. Perhaps it's really in
3022 another package? See L<perlform>.
3024 =item Undefined sort subroutine "%s" called
3026 (F) The sort comparison routine specified doesn't seem to exist. Perhaps
3027 it's in a different package? See L<perlfunc/sort>.
3029 =item Undefined subroutine &%s called
3031 (F) The subroutine indicated hasn't been defined, or if it was, it
3032 has since been undefined.
3034 =item Undefined subroutine called
3036 (F) The anonymous subroutine you're trying to call hasn't been defined,
3037 or if it was, it has since been undefined.
3039 =item Undefined subroutine in sort
3041 (F) The sort comparison routine specified is declared but doesn't seem to
3042 have been defined yet. See L<perlfunc/sort>.
3044 =item Undefined top format "%s" called
3046 (F) The format indicated doesn't seem to exist. Perhaps it's really in
3047 another package? See L<perlform>.
3049 =item Undefined value assigned to typeglob
3051 (W) An undefined value was assigned to a typeglob, a la C<*foo = undef>.
3052 This does nothing. It's possible that you really mean C<undef *foo>.
3054 =item unexec of %s into %s failed!
3056 (F) The unexec() routine failed for some reason. See your local FSF
3057 representative, who probably put it there in the first place.
3059 =item Unknown BYTEORDER
3061 (F) There are no byte-swapping functions for a machine with this byte order.
3063 =item Unknown open() mode '%s'
3065 (F) The second argument of 3-arguments open is not one from the list
3066 of C<L<lt>>, C<L<gt>>, C<E<gt>E<gt>>, C<+L<lt>>, C<+L<gt>>,
3067 C<+E<gt>E<gt>>, C<-|>, C<|-> of possible open() modes.
3069 =item Unknown process %x sent message to prime_env_iter: %s
3071 (P) An error peculiar to VMS. Perl was reading values for %ENV before
3072 iterating over it, and someone else stuck a message in the stream of
3073 data Perl expected. Someone's very confused, or perhaps trying to
3074 subvert Perl's population of %ENV for nefarious purposes.
3076 =item unmatched () in regexp
3078 (F) Unbackslashed parentheses must always be balanced in regular
3079 expressions. If you're a vi user, the % key is valuable for finding
3080 the matching parenthesis. See L<perlre>.
3082 =item Unmatched right %s bracket
3084 (F) The lexer counted more closing curly or square brackets than
3085 opening ones, so you're probably missing a matching opening bracket.
3086 As a general rule, you'll find the missing one (so to speak) near the
3087 place you were last editing.
3089 =item unmatched [] in regexp
3091 (F) The brackets around a character class must match. If you wish to
3092 include a closing bracket in a character class, backslash it or put it first.
3095 =item Unquoted string "%s" may clash with future reserved word
3097 (W) You used a bareword that might someday be claimed as a reserved word.
3098 It's best to put such a word in quotes, or capitalize it somehow, or insert
3099 an underbar into it. You might also declare it as a subroutine.
3101 =item Unrecognized character %s
3103 (F) The Perl parser has no idea what to do with the specified character
3104 in your Perl script (or eval). Perhaps you tried to run a compressed
3105 script, a binary program, or a directory as a Perl program.
3107 =item Unrecognized escape \\%c passed through
3109 (W) You used a backslash-character combination which is not recognized
3112 =item Unrecognized signal name "%s"
3114 (F) You specified a signal name to the kill() function that was not recognized.
3115 Say C<kill -l> in your shell to see the valid signal names on your system.
3117 =item Unrecognized switch: -%s (-h will show valid options)
3119 (F) You specified an illegal option to Perl. Don't do that.
3120 (If you think you didn't do that, check the #! line to see if it's
3121 supplying the bad switch on your behalf.)
3123 =item Unsuccessful %s on filename containing newline
3125 (W) A file operation was attempted on a filename, and that operation
3126 failed, PROBABLY because the filename contained a newline, PROBABLY
3127 because you forgot to chop() or chomp() it off. See L<perlfunc/chomp>.
3129 =item Unsupported directory function "%s" called
3131 (F) Your machine doesn't support opendir() and readdir().
3133 =item Unsupported function fork
3135 (F) Your version of executable does not support forking.
3137 Note that under some systems, like OS/2, there may be different flavors of
3138 Perl executables, some of which may support fork, some not. Try changing
3139 the name you call Perl by to C<perl_>, C<perl__>, and so on.
3141 =item Unsupported function %s
3143 (F) This machine doesn't implement the indicated function, apparently.
3144 At least, Configure doesn't think so.
3146 =item Unsupported socket function "%s" called
3148 (F) Your machine doesn't support the Berkeley socket mechanism, or at
3149 least that's what Configure thought.
3151 =item Unterminated E<lt>E<gt> operator
3153 (F) The lexer saw a left angle bracket in a place where it was expecting
3154 a term, so it's looking for the corresponding right angle bracket, and not
3155 finding it. Chances are you left some needed parentheses out earlier in
3156 the line, and you really meant a "less than".
3158 =item Unterminated attribute parameter in attribute list
3160 (F) The lexer saw an opening (left) parenthesis character while parsing an
3161 attribute list, but the matching closing (right) parenthesis
3162 character was not found. You may need to add (or remove) a backslash
3163 character to get your parentheses to balance. See L<attributes>.
3165 =item Unterminated attribute list
3167 (F) The lexer found something other than a simple identifier at the start
3168 of an attribute, and it wasn't a semicolon or the start of a
3169 block. Perhaps you terminated the parameter list of the previous attribute
3170 too soon. See L<attributes>.
3172 =item Use of $# is deprecated
3174 (D) This was an ill-advised attempt to emulate a poorly defined B<awk> feature.
3175 Use an explicit printf() or sprintf() instead.
3177 =item Use of $* is deprecated
3179 (D) This variable magically turned on multi-line pattern matching, both for
3180 you and for any luckless subroutine that you happen to call. You should
3181 use the new C<//m> and C<//s> modifiers now to do that without the dangerous
3182 action-at-a-distance effects of C<$*>.
3184 =item Use of %s in printf format not supported
3186 (F) You attempted to use a feature of printf that is accessible from
3187 only C. This usually means there's a better way to do it in Perl.
3189 =item Use of bare E<lt>E<lt> to mean E<lt>E<lt>"" is deprecated
3191 (D) You are now encouraged to use the explicitly quoted form if you
3192 wish to use an empty line as the terminator of the here-document.
3194 =item Use of implicit split to @_ is deprecated
3196 (D) It makes a lot of work for the compiler when you clobber a
3197 subroutine's argument list, so it's better if you assign the results of
3198 a split() explicitly to an array (or list).
3200 =item Use of inherited AUTOLOAD for non-method %s() is deprecated
3202 (D) As an (ahem) accidental feature, C<AUTOLOAD> subroutines are looked
3203 up as methods (using the C<@ISA> hierarchy) even when the subroutines to
3204 be autoloaded were called as plain functions (e.g. C<Foo::bar()>), not
3205 as methods (e.g. C<Foo-E<gt>bar()> or C<$obj-E<gt>bar()>).
3207 This bug will be rectified in Perl 5.005, which will use method lookup
3208 only for methods' C<AUTOLOAD>s. However, there is a significant base
3209 of existing code that may be using the old behavior. So, as an
3210 interim step, Perl 5.004 issues an optional warning when non-methods
3211 use inherited C<AUTOLOAD>s.
3213 The simple rule is: Inheritance will not work when autoloading
3214 non-methods. The simple fix for old code is: In any module that used to
3215 depend on inheriting C<AUTOLOAD> for non-methods from a base class named
3216 C<BaseClass>, execute C<*AUTOLOAD = \&BaseClass::AUTOLOAD> during startup.
3218 In code that currently says C<use AutoLoader; @ISA = qw(AutoLoader);> you
3219 should remove AutoLoader from @ISA and change C<use AutoLoader;> to
3220 C<use AutoLoader 'AUTOLOAD';>.
3222 =item Use of reserved word "%s" is deprecated
3224 (D) The indicated bareword is a reserved word. Future versions of perl
3225 may use it as a keyword, so you're better off either explicitly quoting
3226 the word in a manner appropriate for its context of use, or using a
3227 different name altogether. The warning can be suppressed for subroutine
3228 names by either adding a C<&> prefix, or using a package qualifier,
3229 e.g. C<&our()>, or C<Foo::our()>.
3231 =item Use of %s is deprecated
3233 (D) The construct indicated is no longer recommended for use, generally
3234 because there's a better way to do it, and also because the old way has
3237 =item Use of uninitialized value
3239 (W) An undefined value was used as if it were already defined. It was
3240 interpreted as a "" or a 0, but maybe it was a mistake. To suppress this
3241 warning assign a defined value to your variables.
3243 =item Useless use of "re" pragma
3245 (W) You did C<use re;> without any arguments. That isn't very useful.
3247 =item Useless use of %s in void context
3249 (W) You did something without a side effect in a context that does nothing
3250 with the return value, such as a statement that doesn't return a value
3251 from a block, or the left side of a scalar comma operator. Very often
3252 this points not to stupidity on your part, but a failure of Perl to parse
3253 your program the way you thought it would. For example, you'd get this
3254 if you mixed up your C precedence with Python precedence and said
3258 when you meant to say
3260 ($one, $two) = (1, 2);
3262 Another common error is to use ordinary parentheses to construct a list
3263 reference when you should be using square or curly brackets, for
3268 when you should have said
3272 The square brackets explicitly turn a list value into a scalar value,
3273 while parentheses do not. So when a parenthesized list is evaluated in
3274 a scalar context, the comma is treated like C's comma operator, which
3275 throws away the left argument, which is not what you want. See
3276 L<perlref> for more on this.
3278 =item untie attempted while %d inner references still exist
3280 (W) A copy of the object returned from C<tie> (or C<tied>) was still
3281 valid when C<untie> was called.
3283 =item Value of %s can be "0"; test with defined()
3285 (W) In a conditional expression, you used <HANDLE>, <*> (glob), C<each()>,
3286 or C<readdir()> as a boolean value. Each of these constructs can return a
3287 value of "0"; that would make the conditional expression false, which is
3288 probably not what you intended. When using these constructs in conditional
3289 expressions, test their values with the C<defined> operator.
3291 =item Value of CLI symbol "%s" too long
3293 (W) A warning peculiar to VMS. Perl tried to read the value of an %ENV
3294 element from a CLI symbol table, and found a resultant string longer
3295 than 1024 characters. The return value has been truncated to 1024
3298 =item Variable "%s" is not imported%s
3300 (F) While "use strict" in effect, you referred to a global variable
3301 that you apparently thought was imported from another module, because
3302 something else of the same name (usually a subroutine) is exported
3303 by that module. It usually means you put the wrong funny character
3304 on the front of your variable.
3306 =item Variable "%s" may be unavailable
3308 (W) An inner (nested) I<anonymous> subroutine is inside a I<named>
3309 subroutine, and outside that is another subroutine; and the anonymous
3310 (innermost) subroutine is referencing a lexical variable defined in
3311 the outermost subroutine. For example:
3313 sub outermost { my $a; sub middle { sub { $a } } }
3315 If the anonymous subroutine is called or referenced (directly or
3316 indirectly) from the outermost subroutine, it will share the variable
3317 as you would expect. But if the anonymous subroutine is called or
3318 referenced when the outermost subroutine is not active, it will see
3319 the value of the shared variable as it was before and during the
3320 *first* call to the outermost subroutine, which is probably not what
3323 In these circumstances, it is usually best to make the middle
3324 subroutine anonymous, using the C<sub {}> syntax. Perl has specific
3325 support for shared variables in nested anonymous subroutines; a named
3326 subroutine in between interferes with this feature.
3328 =item Variable "%s" will not stay shared
3330 (W) An inner (nested) I<named> subroutine is referencing a lexical
3331 variable defined in an outer subroutine.
3333 When the inner subroutine is called, it will probably see the value of
3334 the outer subroutine's variable as it was before and during the
3335 *first* call to the outer subroutine; in this case, after the first
3336 call to the outer subroutine is complete, the inner and outer
3337 subroutines will no longer share a common value for the variable. In
3338 other words, the variable will no longer be shared.
3340 Furthermore, if the outer subroutine is anonymous and references a
3341 lexical variable outside itself, then the outer and inner subroutines
3342 will I<never> share the given variable.
3344 This problem can usually be solved by making the inner subroutine
3345 anonymous, using the C<sub {}> syntax. When inner anonymous subs that
3346 reference variables in outer subroutines are called or referenced,
3347 they are automatically rebound to the current values of such
3350 =item Variable syntax
3352 (A) You've accidentally run your script through B<csh> instead
3353 of Perl. Check the #! line, or manually feed your script into
3356 =item Version number must be a constant number
3358 (P) The attempt to translate a C<use Module n.n LIST> statement into
3359 its equivalent C<BEGIN> block found an internal inconsistency with
3362 =item perl: warning: Setting locale failed.
3364 (S) The whole warning message will look something like:
3366 perl: warning: Setting locale failed.
3367 perl: warning: Please check that your locale settings:
3370 are supported and installed on your system.
3371 perl: warning: Falling back to the standard locale ("C").
3373 Exactly what were the failed locale settings varies. In the above the
3374 settings were that the LC_ALL was "En_US" and the LANG had no value.
3375 This error means that Perl detected that you and/or your system
3376 administrator have set up the so-called variable system but Perl could
3377 not use those settings. This was not dead serious, fortunately: there
3378 is a "default locale" called "C" that Perl can and will use, the
3379 script will be run. Before you really fix the problem, however, you
3380 will get the same error message each time you run Perl. How to really
3381 fix the problem can be found in L<perllocale> section B<LOCALE PROBLEMS>.
3383 =item Warning: something's wrong
3385 (W) You passed warn() an empty string (the equivalent of C<warn "">) or
3386 you called it with no args and C<$_> was empty.
3388 =item Warning: unable to close filehandle %s properly
3390 (S) The implicit close() done by an open() got an error indication on the
3391 close(). This usually indicates your file system ran out of disk space.
3393 =item Warning: Use of "%s" without parentheses is ambiguous
3395 (S) You wrote a unary operator followed by something that looks like a
3396 binary operator that could also have been interpreted as a term or
3397 unary operator. For instance, if you know that the rand function
3398 has a default argument of 1.0, and you write
3402 you may THINK you wrote the same thing as
3406 but in actual fact, you got
3410 So put in parentheses to say what you really mean.
3412 =item Write on closed filehandle %s
3414 (W) The filehandle you're writing to got itself closed sometime before now.
3415 Check your logic flow.
3417 =item X outside of string
3419 (F) You had a pack template that specified a relative position before
3420 the beginning of the string being unpacked. See L<perlfunc/pack>.
3422 =item x outside of string
3424 (F) You had a pack template that specified a relative position after
3425 the end of the string being unpacked. See L<perlfunc/pack>.
3427 =item Xsub "%s" called in sort
3429 (F) The use of an external subroutine as a sort comparison is not yet supported.
3431 =item Xsub called in sort
3433 (F) The use of an external subroutine as a sort comparison is not yet supported.
3435 =item You can't use C<-l> on a filehandle
3437 (F) A filehandle represents an opened file, and when you opened the file it
3438 already went past any symlink you are presumably trying to look for.
3439 Use a filename instead.
3441 =item YOU HAVEN'T DISABLED SET-ID SCRIPTS IN THE KERNEL YET!
3443 (F) And you probably never will, because you probably don't have the
3444 sources to your kernel, and your vendor probably doesn't give a rip
3445 about what you want. Your best bet is to use the wrapsuid script in
3446 the eg directory to put a setuid C wrapper around your script.
3448 =item You need to quote "%s"
3450 (W) You assigned a bareword as a signal handler name. Unfortunately, you
3451 already have a subroutine of that name declared, which means that Perl 5
3452 will try to call the subroutine when the assignment is executed, which is
3453 probably not what you want. (If it IS what you want, put an & in front.)
3455 =item [gs]etsockopt() on closed fd
3457 (W) You tried to get or set a socket option on a closed socket.
3458 Did you forget to check the return value of your socket() call?
3459 See L<perlfunc/getsockopt>.
3461 =item \1 better written as $1
3463 (W) Outside of patterns, backreferences live on as variables. The use
3464 of backslashes is grandfathered on the right-hand side of a
3465 substitution, but stylistically it's better to use the variable form
3466 because other Perl programmers will expect it, and it works better
3467 if there are more than 9 backreferences.
3469 =item '|' and 'E<lt>' may not both be specified on command line
3471 (F) An error peculiar to VMS. Perl does its own command line redirection, and
3472 found that STDIN was a pipe, and that you also tried to redirect STDIN using
3473 'E<lt>'. Only one STDIN stream to a customer, please.
3475 =item '|' and 'E<gt>' may not both be specified on command line
3477 (F) An error peculiar to VMS. Perl does its own command line redirection, and
3478 thinks you tried to redirect stdout both to a file and into a pipe to another
3479 command. You need to choose one or the other, though nothing's stopping you
3480 from piping into a program or Perl script which 'splits' output into two
3483 open(OUT,">$ARGV[0]") or die "Can't write to $ARGV[0]: $!";
3490 =item Got an error from DosAllocMem
3492 (P) An error peculiar to OS/2. Most probably you're using an obsolete
3493 version of Perl, and this should not happen anyway.
3495 =item Malformed PERLLIB_PREFIX
3497 (F) An error peculiar to OS/2. PERLLIB_PREFIX should be of the form
3505 with nonempty prefix1 and prefix2. If C<prefix1> is indeed a prefix
3506 of a builtin library search path, prefix2 is substituted. The error
3507 may appear if components are not found, or are too long. See
3508 "PERLLIB_PREFIX" in F<README.os2>.
3510 =item PERL_SH_DIR too long
3512 (F) An error peculiar to OS/2. PERL_SH_DIR is the directory to find the
3513 C<sh>-shell in. See "PERL_SH_DIR" in F<README.os2>.
3515 =item Process terminated by SIG%s
3517 (W) This is a standard message issued by OS/2 applications, while *nix
3518 applications die in silence. It is considered a feature of the OS/2
3519 port. One can easily disable this by appropriate sighandlers, see
3520 L<perlipc/"Signals">. See also "Process terminated by SIGTERM/SIGINT"