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 (default).
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 The majority of messages from the first three classifications above
19 (W, D & S) can be controlled using the C<warnings> pragma.
21 If a message can be controlled by the C<warnings> pragma, its warning
22 category is included with the classification letter in the description
25 Optional warnings are enabled by using the C<warnings> pragma or the B<-w>
26 and B<-W> switches. Warnings may be captured by setting C<$SIG{__WARN__}>
27 to a reference to a routine that will be called on each warning instead
28 of printing it. See L<perlvar>.
30 Default warnings are always enabled unless they are explicitly disabled
31 with the C<warnings> pragma or the B<-X> switch.
33 Trappable errors may be trapped using the eval operator. See
34 L<perlfunc/eval>. In almost all cases, warnings may be selectively
35 disabled or promoted to fatal errors using the C<warnings> pragma.
38 The messages are in alphabetical order, without regard to upper or
39 lower-case. Some of these messages are generic. Spots that vary are
40 denoted with a %s or other printf-style escape. These escapes are
41 ignored by the alphabetical order, as are all characters other than
42 letters. To look up your message, just ignore anything that is not a
47 =item accept() on closed socket %s
49 (W closed) You tried to do an accept on a closed socket. Did you forget
50 to check the return value of your socket() call? See
53 =item Allocation too large: %lx
55 (X) You can't allocate more than 64K on an MS-DOS machine.
57 =item '%c' allowed only after types %s
59 (F) The modifiers '!', '<' and '>' are allowed in pack() or unpack() only
60 after certain types. See L<perlfunc/pack>.
62 =item Ambiguous call resolved as CORE::%s(), qualify as such or use &
64 (W ambiguous) A subroutine you have declared has the same name as a Perl
65 keyword, and you have used the name without qualification for calling
66 one or the other. Perl decided to call the builtin because the
67 subroutine is not imported.
69 To force interpretation as a subroutine call, either put an ampersand
70 before the subroutine name, or qualify the name with its package.
71 Alternatively, you can import the subroutine (or pretend that it's
72 imported with the C<use subs> pragma).
74 To silently interpret it as the Perl operator, use the C<CORE::> prefix
75 on the operator (e.g. C<CORE::log($x)>) or declare the subroutine
76 to be an object method (see L<perlsub/"Subroutine Attributes"> or
79 =item Ambiguous range in transliteration operator
81 (F) You wrote something like C<tr/a-z-0//> which doesn't mean anything at
82 all. To include a C<-> character in a transliteration, put it either
83 first or last. (In the past, C<tr/a-z-0//> was synonymous with
84 C<tr/a-y//>, which was probably not what you would have expected.)
86 =item Ambiguous use of %s resolved as %s
88 (W ambiguous)(S) You said something that may not be interpreted the way
89 you thought. Normally it's pretty easy to disambiguate it by supplying
90 a missing quote, operator, parenthesis pair or declaration.
92 =item '|' and '<' may not both be specified on command line
94 (F) An error peculiar to VMS. Perl does its own command line
95 redirection, and found that STDIN was a pipe, and that you also tried to
96 redirect STDIN using '<'. Only one STDIN stream to a customer, please.
98 =item '|' and '>' may not both be specified on command line
100 (F) An error peculiar to VMS. Perl does its own command line
101 redirection, and thinks you tried to redirect stdout both to a file and
102 into a pipe to another command. You need to choose one or the other,
103 though nothing's stopping you from piping into a program or Perl script
104 which 'splits' output into two streams, such as
106 open(OUT,">$ARGV[0]") or die "Can't write to $ARGV[0]: $!";
113 =item Applying %s to %s will act on scalar(%s)
115 (W misc) The pattern match (C<//>), substitution (C<s///>), and
116 transliteration (C<tr///>) operators work on scalar values. If you apply
117 one of them to an array or a hash, it will convert the array or hash to
118 a scalar value -- the length of an array, or the population info of a
119 hash -- and then work on that scalar value. This is probably not what
120 you meant to do. See L<perlfunc/grep> and L<perlfunc/map> for
123 =item Args must match #! line
125 (F) The setuid emulator requires that the arguments Perl was invoked
126 with match the arguments specified on the #! line. Since some systems
127 impose a one-argument limit on the #! line, try combining switches;
128 for example, turn C<-w -U> into C<-wU>.
130 =item Arg too short for msgsnd
132 (F) msgsnd() requires a string at least as long as sizeof(long).
134 =item %s argument is not a HASH or ARRAY element
136 (F) The argument to exists() must be a hash or array element, such as:
141 =item %s argument is not a HASH or ARRAY element or slice
143 (F) The argument to delete() must be either a hash or array element,
149 or a hash or array slice, such as:
151 @foo[$bar, $baz, $xyzzy]
152 @{$ref->[12]}{"susie", "queue"}
154 =item %s argument is not a subroutine name
156 (F) The argument to exists() for C<exists &sub> must be a subroutine
157 name, and not a subroutine call. C<exists &sub()> will generate this
160 =item Argument "%s" isn't numeric%s
162 (W numeric) The indicated string was fed as an argument to an operator
163 that expected a numeric value instead. If you're fortunate the message
164 will identify which operator was so unfortunate.
166 =item Argument list not closed for PerlIO layer "%s"
168 (W layer) When pushing a layer with arguments onto the Perl I/O system you
169 forgot the ) that closes the argument list. (Layers take care of transforming
170 data between external and internal representations.) Perl stopped parsing
171 the layer list at this point and did not attempt to push this layer.
172 If your program didn't explicitly request the failing operation, it may be
173 the result of the value of the environment variable PERLIO.
175 =item Array @%s missing the @ in argument %d of %s()
177 (D deprecated) Really old Perl let you omit the @ on array names in some
178 spots. This is now heavily deprecated.
180 =item assertion botched: %s
182 (P) The malloc package that comes with Perl had an internal failure.
184 =item Assertion failed: file "%s"
186 (P) A general assertion failed. The file in question must be examined.
188 =item Assignment to both a list and a scalar
190 (F) If you assign to a conditional operator, the 2nd and 3rd arguments
191 must either both be scalars or both be lists. Otherwise Perl won't
192 know which context to supply to the right side.
194 =item A thread exited while %d threads were running
196 (W threads)(S) When using threaded Perl, a thread (not necessarily the main
197 thread) exited while there were still other threads running.
198 Usually it's a good idea to first collect the return values of the
199 created threads by joining them, and only then exit from the main
200 thread. See L<threads>.
202 =item Attempt to access disallowed key '%s' in a restricted hash
204 (F) The failing code has attempted to get or set a key which is not in
205 the current set of allowed keys of a restricted hash.
207 =item Attempt to bless into a reference
209 (F) The CLASSNAME argument to the bless() operator is expected to be
210 the name of the package to bless the resulting object into. You've
211 supplied instead a reference to something: perhaps you wrote
217 bless $self, ref($proto) || $proto;
219 If you actually want to bless into the stringified version
220 of the reference supplied, you need to stringify it yourself, for
223 bless $self, "$proto";
225 =item Attempt to delete disallowed key '%s' from a restricted hash
227 (F) The failing code attempted to delete from a restricted hash a key
228 which is not in its key set.
230 =item Attempt to delete readonly key '%s' from a restricted hash
232 (F) The failing code attempted to delete a key whose value has been
233 declared readonly from a restricted hash.
235 =item Attempt to free non-arena SV: 0x%lx
237 (P internal) All SV objects are supposed to be allocated from arenas
238 that will be garbage collected on exit. An SV was discovered to be
239 outside any of those arenas.
241 =item Attempt to free nonexistent shared string
243 (P internal) Perl maintains a reference counted internal table of
244 strings to optimize the storage and access of hash keys and other
245 strings. This indicates someone tried to decrement the reference count
246 of a string that can no longer be found in the table.
248 =item Attempt to free temp prematurely
250 (W debugging) Mortalized values are supposed to be freed by the
251 free_tmps() routine. This indicates that something else is freeing the
252 SV before the free_tmps() routine gets a chance, which means that the
253 free_tmps() routine will be freeing an unreferenced scalar when it does
256 =item Attempt to free unreferenced glob pointers
258 (P internal) The reference counts got screwed up on symbol aliases.
260 =item Attempt to free unreferenced scalar
262 (W internal) Perl went to decrement the reference count of a scalar to
263 see if it would go to 0, and discovered that it had already gone to 0
264 earlier, and should have been freed, and in fact, probably was freed.
265 This could indicate that SvREFCNT_dec() was called too many times, or
266 that SvREFCNT_inc() was called too few times, or that the SV was
267 mortalized when it shouldn't have been, or that memory has been
270 =item Attempt to join self
272 (F) You tried to join a thread from within itself, which is an
273 impossible task. You may be joining the wrong thread, or you may need
274 to move the join() to some other thread.
276 =item Attempt to pack pointer to temporary value
278 (W pack) You tried to pass a temporary value (like the result of a
279 function, or a computed expression) to the "p" pack() template. This
280 means the result contains a pointer to a location that could become
281 invalid anytime, even before the end of the current statement. Use
282 literals or global values as arguments to the "p" pack() template to
285 =item Attempt to set length of freed array
287 (W) You tried to set the length of an array which has been freed. You
288 can do this by storing a reference to the scalar representing the last index
289 of an array and later assigning through that reference. For example
291 $r = do {my @a; \$#a};
294 =item Attempt to use reference as lvalue in substr
296 (W substr) You supplied a reference as the first argument to substr()
297 used as an lvalue, which is pretty strange. Perhaps you forgot to
298 dereference it first. See L<perlfunc/substr>.
300 =item Bad arg length for %s, is %d, should be %s
302 (F) You passed a buffer of the wrong size to one of msgctl(), semctl()
303 or shmctl(). In C parlance, the correct sizes are, respectively,
304 S<sizeof(struct msqid_ds *)>, S<sizeof(struct semid_ds *)>, and
305 S<sizeof(struct shmid_ds *)>.
307 =item Bad evalled substitution pattern
309 (F) You've used the C</e> switch to evaluate the replacement for a
310 substitution, but perl found a syntax error in the code to evaluate,
311 most likely an unexpected right brace '}'.
313 =item Bad filehandle: %s
315 (F) A symbol was passed to something wanting a filehandle, but the
316 symbol has no filehandle associated with it. Perhaps you didn't do an
317 open(), or did it in another package.
319 =item Bad free() ignored
321 (S malloc) An internal routine called free() on something that had never
322 been malloc()ed in the first place. Mandatory, but can be disabled by
323 setting environment variable C<PERL_BADFREE> to 0.
325 This message can be seen quite often with DB_File on systems with "hard"
326 dynamic linking, like C<AIX> and C<OS/2>. It is a bug of C<Berkeley DB>
327 which is left unnoticed if C<DB> uses I<forgiving> system malloc().
331 (P) One of the internal hash routines was passed a null HV pointer.
333 =item Badly placed ()'s
335 (A) You've accidentally run your script through B<csh> instead
336 of Perl. Check the #! line, or manually feed your script into
339 =item Bad name after %s::
341 (F) You started to name a symbol by using a package prefix, and then
342 didn't finish the symbol. In particular, you can't interpolate outside
351 $sym = "mypack::$var";
353 =item Bad realloc() ignored
355 (S malloc) An internal routine called realloc() on something that had
356 never been malloc()ed in the first place. Mandatory, but can be disabled
357 by setting environment variable C<PERL_BADFREE> to 1.
359 =item Bad symbol for array
361 (P) An internal request asked to add an array entry to something that
362 wasn't a symbol table entry.
364 =item Bad symbol for dirhandle
366 (P) An internal request asked to add a dirhandle entry to something
367 that wasn't a symbol table entry.
370 =item Bad symbol for filehandle
372 (P) An internal request asked to add a filehandle entry to something
373 that wasn't a symbol table entry.
375 =item Bad symbol for hash
377 (P) An internal request asked to add a hash entry to something that
378 wasn't a symbol table entry.
380 =item Bareword found in conditional
382 (W bareword) The compiler found a bareword where it expected a
383 conditional, which often indicates that an || or && was parsed as part
384 of the last argument of the previous construct, for example:
388 It may also indicate a misspelled constant that has been interpreted as
391 use constant TYPO => 1;
392 if (TYOP) { print "foo" }
394 The C<strict> pragma is useful in avoiding such errors.
396 =item Bareword "%s" not allowed while "strict subs" in use
398 (F) With "strict subs" in use, a bareword is only allowed as a
399 subroutine identifier, in curly brackets or to the left of the "=>"
400 symbol. Perhaps you need to predeclare a subroutine?
402 =item Bareword "%s" refers to nonexistent package
404 (W bareword) You used a qualified bareword of the form C<Foo::>, but the
405 compiler saw no other uses of that namespace before that point. Perhaps
406 you need to predeclare a package?
408 =item BEGIN failed--compilation aborted
410 (F) An untrapped exception was raised while executing a BEGIN
411 subroutine. Compilation stops immediately and the interpreter is
414 =item BEGIN not safe after errors--compilation aborted
416 (F) Perl found a C<BEGIN {}> subroutine (or a C<use> directive, which
417 implies a C<BEGIN {}>) after one or more compilation errors had already
418 occurred. Since the intended environment for the C<BEGIN {}> could not
419 be guaranteed (due to the errors), and since subsequent code likely
420 depends on its correct operation, Perl just gave up.
422 =item \1 better written as $1
424 (W syntax) Outside of patterns, backreferences live on as variables.
425 The use of backslashes is grandfathered on the right-hand side of a
426 substitution, but stylistically it's better to use the variable form
427 because other Perl programmers will expect it, and it works better if
428 there are more than 9 backreferences.
430 =item Binary number > 0b11111111111111111111111111111111 non-portable
432 (W portable) The binary number you specified is larger than 2**32-1
433 (4294967295) and therefore non-portable between systems. See
434 L<perlport> for more on portability concerns.
436 =item bind() on closed socket %s
438 (W closed) You tried to do a bind on a closed socket. Did you forget to
439 check the return value of your socket() call? See L<perlfunc/bind>.
441 =item binmode() on closed filehandle %s
443 (W unopened) You tried binmode() on a filehandle that was never opened.
444 Check you control flow and number of arguments.
446 =item Bit vector size > 32 non-portable
448 (W portable) Using bit vector sizes larger than 32 is non-portable.
450 =item Bizarre copy of %s in %s
452 (P) Perl detected an attempt to copy an internal value that is not
455 =item Buffer overflow in prime_env_iter: %s
457 (W internal) A warning peculiar to VMS. While Perl was preparing to
458 iterate over %ENV, it encountered a logical name or symbol definition
459 which was too long, so it was truncated to the string shown.
461 =item Callback called exit
463 (F) A subroutine invoked from an external package via call_sv()
464 exited by calling exit.
466 =item %s() called too early to check prototype
468 (W prototype) You've called a function that has a prototype before the
469 parser saw a definition or declaration for it, and Perl could not check
470 that the call conforms to the prototype. You need to either add an
471 early prototype declaration for the subroutine in question, or move the
472 subroutine definition ahead of the call to get proper prototype
473 checking. Alternatively, if you are certain that you're calling the
474 function correctly, you may put an ampersand before the name to avoid
475 the warning. See L<perlsub>.
477 =item Cannot compress integer in pack
479 (F) An argument to pack("w",...) was too large to compress. The BER
480 compressed integer format can only be used with positive integers, and you
481 attempted to compress Infinity or a very large number (> 1e308).
482 See L<perlfunc/pack>.
484 =item Cannot compress negative numbers in pack
486 (F) An argument to pack("w",...) was negative. The BER compressed integer
487 format can only be used with positive integers. See L<perlfunc/pack>.
489 =item Cannot convert a reference to %s to typeglob
491 (F) You manipulated Perl's symbol table directly, stored a reference in it,
492 then tried to access that symbol via conventional Perl syntax. The access
493 triggers Perl to autovivify that typeglob, but it there is no legal conversion
494 from that type of reference to a typeglob.
496 =item Cannot copy to %s in %s
498 (P) Perl detected an attempt to copy a value to an internal type that cannot
499 be directly assigned not.
501 =item Can only compress unsigned integers in pack
503 (F) An argument to pack("w",...) was not an integer. The BER compressed
504 integer format can only be used with positive integers, and you attempted
505 to compress something else. See L<perlfunc/pack>.
507 =item Can't bless non-reference value
509 (F) Only hard references may be blessed. This is how Perl "enforces"
510 encapsulation of objects. See L<perlobj>.
512 =item Can't "break" in a loop topicalizer
514 (F) You called C<break>, but you're in a C<foreach> block rather than
515 a C<given> block. You probably meant to use C<next> or C<last>.
517 =item Can't "break" outside a given block
519 (F) You called C<break>, but you're not inside a C<given> block.
521 =item Can't call method "%s" in empty package "%s"
523 (F) You called a method correctly, and it correctly indicated a package
524 functioning as a class, but that package doesn't have ANYTHING defined
525 in it, let alone methods. See L<perlobj>.
527 =item Can't call method "%s" on an undefined value
529 (F) You used the syntax of a method call, but the slot filled by the
530 object reference or package name contains an undefined value. Something
531 like this will reproduce the error:
534 process $BADREF 1,2,3;
535 $BADREF->process(1,2,3);
537 =item Can't call method "%s" on unblessed reference
539 (F) A method call must know in what package it's supposed to run. It
540 ordinarily finds this out from the object reference you supply, but you
541 didn't supply an object reference in this case. A reference isn't an
542 object reference until it has been blessed. See L<perlobj>.
544 =item Can't call method "%s" without a package or object reference
546 (F) You used the syntax of a method call, but the slot filled by the
547 object reference or package name contains an expression that returns a
548 defined value which is neither an object reference nor a package name.
549 Something like this will reproduce the error:
552 process $BADREF 1,2,3;
553 $BADREF->process(1,2,3);
555 =item Can't chdir to %s
557 (F) You called C<perl -x/foo/bar>, but C</foo/bar> is not a directory
558 that you can chdir to, possibly because it doesn't exist.
560 =item Can't check filesystem of script "%s" for nosuid
562 (P) For some reason you can't check the filesystem of the script for
565 =item Can't coerce array into hash
567 (F) You used an array where a hash was expected, but the array has no
568 information on how to map from keys to array indices. You can do that
569 only with arrays that have a hash reference at index 0.
571 =item Can't coerce %s to integer in %s
573 (F) Certain types of SVs, in particular real symbol table entries
574 (typeglobs), can't be forced to stop being what they are. So you can't
584 but then $foo no longer contains a glob.
586 =item Can't coerce %s to number in %s
588 (F) Certain types of SVs, in particular real symbol table entries
589 (typeglobs), can't be forced to stop being what they are.
591 =item Can't coerce %s to string in %s
593 (F) Certain types of SVs, in particular real symbol table entries
594 (typeglobs), can't be forced to stop being what they are.
596 =item Can't "continue" outside a when block
598 (F) You called C<continue>, but you're not inside a C<when>
601 =item Can't create pipe mailbox
603 (P) An error peculiar to VMS. The process is suffering from exhausted
604 quotas or other plumbing problems.
606 =item Can't declare class for non-scalar %s in "%s"
608 (F) Currently, only scalar variables can be declared with a specific
609 class qualifier in a "my" or "our" declaration. The semantics may be
610 extended for other types of variables in future.
612 =item Can't declare %s in "%s"
614 (F) Only scalar, array, and hash variables may be declared as "my" or
615 "our" variables. They must have ordinary identifiers as names.
617 =item Can't do inplace edit: %s is not a regular file
619 (S inplace) You tried to use the B<-i> switch on a special file, such as
620 a file in /dev, or a FIFO. The file was ignored.
622 =item Can't do inplace edit on %s: %s
624 (S inplace) The creation of the new file failed for the indicated
627 =item Can't do inplace edit without backup
629 (F) You're on a system such as MS-DOS that gets confused if you try
630 reading from a deleted (but still opened) file. You have to say
631 C<-i.bak>, or some such.
633 =item Can't do inplace edit: %s would not be unique
635 (S inplace) Your filesystem does not support filenames longer than 14
636 characters and Perl was unable to create a unique filename during
637 inplace editing with the B<-i> switch. The file was ignored.
639 =item Can't do {n,m} with n > m in regex; marked by <-- HERE in m/%s/
641 (F) Minima must be less than or equal to maxima. If you really want your
642 regexp to match something 0 times, just put {0}. The <-- HERE shows in the
643 regular expression about where the problem was discovered. See L<perlre>.
645 =item Can't do setegid!
647 (P) The setegid() call failed for some reason in the setuid emulator of
650 =item Can't do seteuid!
652 (P) The setuid emulator of suidperl failed for some reason.
654 =item Can't do setuid
656 (F) This typically means that ordinary perl tried to exec suidperl to do
657 setuid emulation, but couldn't exec it. It looks for a name of the form
658 sperl5.000 in the same directory that the perl executable resides under
659 the name perl5.000, typically /usr/local/bin on Unix machines. If the
660 file is there, check the execute permissions. If it isn't, ask your
661 sysadmin why he and/or she removed it.
663 =item Can't do waitpid with flags
665 (F) This machine doesn't have either waitpid() or wait4(), so only
666 waitpid() without flags is emulated.
668 =item Can't emulate -%s on #! line
670 (F) The #! line specifies a switch that doesn't make sense at this
671 point. For example, it'd be kind of silly to put a B<-x> on the #!
674 =item Can't %s %s-endian %ss on this platform
676 (F) Your platform's byte-order is neither big-endian nor little-endian,
677 or it has a very strange pointer size. Packing and unpacking big- or
678 little-endian floating point values and pointers may not be possible.
679 See L<perlfunc/pack>.
681 =item Can't exec "%s": %s
683 (W exec) A system(), exec(), or piped open call could not execute the
684 named program for the indicated reason. Typical reasons include: the
685 permissions were wrong on the file, the file wasn't found in
686 C<$ENV{PATH}>, the executable in question was compiled for another
687 architecture, or the #! line in a script points to an interpreter that
688 can't be run for similar reasons. (Or maybe your system doesn't support
693 (F) Perl was trying to execute the indicated program for you because
694 that's what the #! line said. If that's not what you wanted, you may
695 need to mention "perl" on the #! line somewhere.
697 =item Can't execute %s
699 (F) You used the B<-S> switch, but the copies of the script to execute
700 found in the PATH did not have correct permissions.
702 =item Can't find an opnumber for "%s"
704 (F) A string of a form C<CORE::word> was given to prototype(), but there
705 is no builtin with the name C<word>.
707 =item Can't find %s character property "%s"
709 (F) You used C<\p{}> or C<\P{}> but the character property by that name
710 could not be found. Maybe you misspelled the name of the property
711 (remember that the names of character properties consist only of
712 alphanumeric characters), or maybe you forgot the C<Is> or C<In> prefix?
714 =item Can't find label %s
716 (F) You said to goto a label that isn't mentioned anywhere that it's
717 possible for us to go to. See L<perlfunc/goto>.
719 =item Can't find %s on PATH
721 (F) You used the B<-S> switch, but the script to execute could not be
724 =item Can't find %s on PATH, '.' not in PATH
726 (F) You used the B<-S> switch, but the script to execute could not be
727 found in the PATH, or at least not with the correct permissions. The
728 script exists in the current directory, but PATH prohibits running it.
730 =item Can't find string terminator %s anywhere before EOF
732 (F) Perl strings can stretch over multiple lines. This message means
733 that the closing delimiter was omitted. Because bracketed quotes count
734 nesting levels, the following is missing its final parenthesis:
736 print q(The character '(' starts a side comment.);
738 If you're getting this error from a here-document, you may have included
739 unseen whitespace before or after your closing tag. A good programmer's
740 editor will have a way to help you find these characters.
742 =item Can't find Unicode property definition "%s"
744 (F) You may have tried to use C<\p> which means a Unicode property (for
745 example C<\p{Lu}> is all uppercase letters). If you did mean to use a
746 Unicode property, see L<perlunicode> for the list of known properties.
747 If you didn't mean to use a Unicode property, escape the C<\p>, either
748 by C<\\p> (just the C<\p>) or by C<\Q\p> (the rest of the string, until
753 (F) A fatal error occurred while trying to fork while opening a
756 =item Can't get filespec - stale stat buffer?
758 (S) A warning peculiar to VMS. This arises because of the difference
759 between access checks under VMS and under the Unix model Perl assumes.
760 Under VMS, access checks are done by filename, rather than by bits in
761 the stat buffer, so that ACLs and other protections can be taken into
762 account. Unfortunately, Perl assumes that the stat buffer contains all
763 the necessary information, and passes it, instead of the filespec, to
764 the access checking routine. It will try to retrieve the filespec using
765 the device name and FID present in the stat buffer, but this works only
766 if you haven't made a subsequent call to the CRTL stat() routine,
767 because the device name is overwritten with each call. If this warning
768 appears, the name lookup failed, and the access checking routine gave up
769 and returned FALSE, just to be conservative. (Note: The access checking
770 routine knows about the Perl C<stat> operator and file tests, so you
771 shouldn't ever see this warning in response to a Perl command; it arises
772 only if some internal code takes stat buffers lightly.)
774 =item Can't get pipe mailbox device name
776 (P) An error peculiar to VMS. After creating a mailbox to act as a
777 pipe, Perl can't retrieve its name for later use.
779 =item Can't get SYSGEN parameter value for MAXBUF
781 (P) An error peculiar to VMS. Perl asked $GETSYI how big you want your
782 mailbox buffers to be, and didn't get an answer.
784 =item Can't "goto" into the middle of a foreach loop
786 (F) A "goto" statement was executed to jump into the middle of a foreach
787 loop. You can't get there from here. See L<perlfunc/goto>.
789 =item Can't "goto" out of a pseudo block
791 (F) A "goto" statement was executed to jump out of what might look like
792 a block, except that it isn't a proper block. This usually occurs if
793 you tried to jump out of a sort() block or subroutine, which is a no-no.
794 See L<perlfunc/goto>.
796 =item Can't goto subroutine from a sort sub (or similar callback)
798 (F) The "goto subroutine" call can't be used to jump out of the
799 comparison sub for a sort(), or from a similar callback (such
800 as the reduce() function in List::Util).
802 =item Can't goto subroutine from an eval-%s
804 (F) The "goto subroutine" call can't be used to jump out of an eval
807 =item Can't goto subroutine outside a subroutine
809 (F) The deeply magical "goto subroutine" call can only replace one
810 subroutine call for another. It can't manufacture one out of whole
811 cloth. In general you should be calling it out of only an AUTOLOAD
812 routine anyway. See L<perlfunc/goto>.
814 =item Can't ignore signal CHLD, forcing to default
816 (W signal) Perl has detected that it is being run with the SIGCHLD
817 signal (sometimes known as SIGCLD) disabled. Since disabling this
818 signal will interfere with proper determination of exit status of child
819 processes, Perl has reset the signal to its default value. This
820 situation typically indicates that the parent program under which Perl
821 may be running (e.g. cron) is being very careless.
823 =item Can't "last" outside a loop block
825 (F) A "last" statement was executed to break out of the current block,
826 except that there's this itty bitty problem called there isn't a current
827 block. Note that an "if" or "else" block doesn't count as a "loopish"
828 block, as doesn't a block given to sort(), map() or grep(). You can
829 usually double the curlies to get the same effect though, because the
830 inner curlies will be considered a block that loops once. See
833 =item Can't load '%s' for module %s
835 (F) The module you tried to load failed to load a dynamic extension. This
836 may either mean that you upgraded your version of perl to one that is
837 incompatible with your old dynamic extensions (which is known to happen
838 between major versions of perl), or (more likely) that your dynamic
839 extension was built against an older version of the library that is
840 installed on your system. You may need to rebuild your old dynamic
843 =item Can't localize lexical variable %s
845 (F) You used local on a variable name that was previously declared as a
846 lexical variable using "my". This is not allowed. If you want to
847 localize a package variable of the same name, qualify it with the
850 =item Can't localize through a reference
852 (F) You said something like C<local $$ref>, which Perl can't currently
853 handle, because when it goes to restore the old value of whatever $ref
854 pointed to after the scope of the local() is finished, it can't be sure
855 that $ref will still be a reference.
857 =item Can't locate %s
859 (F) You said to C<do> (or C<require>, or C<use>) a file that couldn't be
860 found. Perl looks for the file in all the locations mentioned in @INC,
861 unless the file name included the full path to the file. Perhaps you
862 need to set the PERL5LIB or PERL5OPT environment variable to say where
863 the extra library is, or maybe the script needs to add the library name
864 to @INC. Or maybe you just misspelled the name of the file. See
865 L<perlfunc/require> and L<lib>.
867 =item Can't locate auto/%s.al in @INC
869 (F) A function (or method) was called in a package which allows
870 autoload, but there is no function to autoload. Most probable causes
871 are a misprint in a function/method name or a failure to C<AutoSplit>
872 the file, say, by doing C<make install>.
874 =item Can't locate loadable object for module %s in @INC
876 (F) The module you loaded is trying to load an external library, like
877 for example, C<foo.so> or C<bar.dll>, but the L<DynaLoader> module was
878 unable to locate this library. See L<DynaLoader>.
880 =item Can't locate object method "%s" via package "%s"
882 (F) You called a method correctly, and it correctly indicated a package
883 functioning as a class, but that package doesn't define that particular
884 method, nor does any of its base classes. See L<perlobj>.
886 =item Can't locate package %s for @%s::ISA
888 (W syntax) The @ISA array contained the name of another package that
889 doesn't seem to exist.
891 =item Can't locate PerlIO%s
893 (F) You tried to use in open() a PerlIO layer that does not exist,
894 e.g. open(FH, ">:nosuchlayer", "somefile").
896 =item Can't make list assignment to \%ENV on this system
898 (F) List assignment to %ENV is not supported on some systems, notably
901 =item Can't modify %s in %s
903 (F) You aren't allowed to assign to the item indicated, or otherwise try
904 to change it, such as with an auto-increment.
906 =item Can't modify nonexistent substring
908 (P) The internal routine that does assignment to a substr() was handed
911 =item Can't modify non-lvalue subroutine call
913 (F) Subroutines meant to be used in lvalue context should be declared as
914 such, see L<perlsub/"Lvalue subroutines">.
916 =item Can't msgrcv to read-only var
918 (F) The target of a msgrcv must be modifiable to be used as a receive
921 =item Can't "next" outside a loop block
923 (F) A "next" statement was executed to reiterate the current block, but
924 there isn't a current block. Note that an "if" or "else" block doesn't
925 count as a "loopish" block, as doesn't a block given to sort(), map() or
926 grep(). You can usually double the curlies to get the same effect
927 though, because the inner curlies will be considered a block that loops
928 once. See L<perlfunc/next>.
930 =item Can't open %s: %s
932 (S inplace) The implicit opening of a file through use of the C<< <> >>
933 filehandle, either implicitly under the C<-n> or C<-p> command-line
934 switches, or explicitly, failed for the indicated reason. Usually this
935 is because you don't have read permission for a file which you named on
938 =item Can't open a reference
940 (W io) You tried to open a scalar reference for reading or writing,
941 using the 3-arg open() syntax :
945 but your version of perl is compiled without perlio, and this form of
946 open is not supported.
948 =item Can't open bidirectional pipe
950 (W pipe) You tried to say C<open(CMD, "|cmd|")>, which is not supported.
951 You can try any of several modules in the Perl library to do this, such
952 as IPC::Open2. Alternately, direct the pipe's output to a file using
953 ">", and then read it in under a different file handle.
955 =item Can't open error file %s as stderr
957 (F) An error peculiar to VMS. Perl does its own command line
958 redirection, and couldn't open the file specified after '2>' or '2>>' on
959 the command line for writing.
961 =item Can't open input file %s as stdin
963 (F) An error peculiar to VMS. Perl does its own command line
964 redirection, and couldn't open the file specified after '<' on the
965 command line for reading.
967 =item Can't open output file %s as stdout
969 (F) An error peculiar to VMS. Perl does its own command line
970 redirection, and couldn't open the file specified after '>' or '>>' on
971 the command line for writing.
973 =item Can't open output pipe (name: %s)
975 (P) An error peculiar to VMS. Perl does its own command line
976 redirection, and couldn't open the pipe into which to send data destined
979 =item Can't open perl script%s
981 (F) The script you specified can't be opened for the indicated reason.
983 If you're debugging a script that uses #!, and normally relies on the
984 shell's $PATH search, the -S option causes perl to do that search, so
985 you don't have to type the path or C<`which $scriptname`>.
987 =item Can't read CRTL environ
989 (S) A warning peculiar to VMS. Perl tried to read an element of %ENV
990 from the CRTL's internal environment array and discovered the array was
991 missing. You need to figure out where your CRTL misplaced its environ
992 or define F<PERL_ENV_TABLES> (see L<perlvms>) so that environ is not
995 =item Can't "redo" outside a loop block
997 (F) A "redo" statement was executed to restart the current block, but
998 there isn't a current block. Note that an "if" or "else" block doesn't
999 count as a "loopish" block, as doesn't a block given to sort(), map()
1000 or grep(). You can usually double the curlies to get the same effect
1001 though, because the inner curlies will be considered a block that
1002 loops once. See L<perlfunc/redo>.
1004 =item Can't remove %s: %s, skipping file
1006 (S inplace) You requested an inplace edit without creating a backup
1007 file. Perl was unable to remove the original file to replace it with
1008 the modified file. The file was left unmodified.
1010 =item Can't rename %s to %s: %s, skipping file
1012 (S inplace) The rename done by the B<-i> switch failed for some reason,
1013 probably because you don't have write permission to the directory.
1015 =item Can't reopen input pipe (name: %s) in binary mode
1017 (P) An error peculiar to VMS. Perl thought stdin was a pipe, and tried
1018 to reopen it to accept binary data. Alas, it failed.
1020 =item Can't resolve method `%s' overloading `%s' in package `%s'
1022 (F|P) Error resolving overloading specified by a method name (as opposed
1023 to a subroutine reference): no such method callable via the package. If
1024 method name is C<???>, this is an internal error.
1026 =item Can't reswap uid and euid
1028 (P) The setreuid() call failed for some reason in the setuid emulator of
1031 =item Can't return %s from lvalue subroutine
1033 (F) Perl detected an attempt to return illegal lvalues (such as
1034 temporary or readonly values) from a subroutine used as an lvalue. This
1037 =item Can't return outside a subroutine
1039 (F) The return statement was executed in mainline code, that is, where
1040 there was no subroutine call to return out of. See L<perlsub>.
1042 =item Can't return %s to lvalue scalar context
1044 (F) You tried to return a complete array or hash from an lvalue subroutine,
1045 but you called the subroutine in a way that made Perl think you meant
1046 to return only one value. You probably meant to write parentheses around
1047 the call to the subroutine, which tell Perl that the call should be in
1050 =item Can't stat script "%s"
1052 (P) For some reason you can't fstat() the script even though you have it
1053 open already. Bizarre.
1055 =item Can't swap uid and euid
1057 (P) The setreuid() call failed for some reason in the setuid emulator of
1060 =item Can't take log of %g
1062 (F) For ordinary real numbers, you can't take the logarithm of a
1063 negative number or zero. There's a Math::Complex package that comes
1064 standard with Perl, though, if you really want to do that for the
1067 =item Can't take sqrt of %g
1069 (F) For ordinary real numbers, you can't take the square root of a
1070 negative number. There's a Math::Complex package that comes standard
1071 with Perl, though, if you really want to do that.
1073 =item Can't undef active subroutine
1075 (F) You can't undefine a routine that's currently running. You can,
1076 however, redefine it while it's running, and you can even undef the
1077 redefined subroutine while the old routine is running. Go figure.
1081 (F) You tried to unshift an "unreal" array that can't be unshifted, such
1082 as the main Perl stack.
1084 =item Can't upgrade %s (%d) to %d
1086 (P) The internal sv_upgrade routine adds "members" to an SV, making it
1087 into a more specialized kind of SV. The top several SV types are so
1088 specialized, however, that they cannot be interconverted. This message
1089 indicates that such a conversion was attempted.
1091 =item Can't use anonymous symbol table for method lookup
1093 (F) The internal routine that does method lookup was handed a symbol
1094 table that doesn't have a name. Symbol tables can become anonymous
1095 for example by undefining stashes: C<undef %Some::Package::>.
1097 =item Can't use an undefined value as %s reference
1099 (F) A value used as either a hard reference or a symbolic reference must
1100 be a defined value. This helps to delurk some insidious errors.
1102 =item Can't use bareword ("%s") as %s ref while "strict refs" in use
1104 (F) Only hard references are allowed by "strict refs". Symbolic
1105 references are disallowed. See L<perlref>.
1107 =item Can't use %! because Errno.pm is not available
1109 (F) The first time the %! hash is used, perl automatically loads the
1110 Errno.pm module. The Errno module is expected to tie the %! hash to
1111 provide symbolic names for C<$!> errno values.
1113 =item Can't use both '<' and '>' after type '%c' in %s
1115 (F) A type cannot be forced to have both big-endian and little-endian
1116 byte-order at the same time, so this combination of modifiers is not
1117 allowed. See L<perlfunc/pack>.
1119 =item Can't use %s for loop variable
1121 (F) Only a simple scalar variable may be used as a loop variable on a
1124 =item Can't use global %s in "my"
1126 (F) You tried to declare a magical variable as a lexical variable. This
1127 is not allowed, because the magic can be tied to only one location
1128 (namely the global variable) and it would be incredibly confusing to
1129 have variables in your program that looked like magical variables but
1132 =item Can't use '%c' in a group with different byte-order in %s
1134 (F) You attempted to force a different byte-order on a type
1135 that is already inside a group with a byte-order modifier.
1136 For example you cannot force little-endianness on a type that
1137 is inside a big-endian group.
1139 =item Can't use "my %s" in sort comparison
1141 (F) The global variables $a and $b are reserved for sort comparisons.
1142 You mentioned $a or $b in the same line as the <=> or cmp operator,
1143 and the variable had earlier been declared as a lexical variable.
1144 Either qualify the sort variable with the package name, or rename the
1147 =item Can't use %s ref as %s ref
1149 (F) You've mixed up your reference types. You have to dereference a
1150 reference of the type needed. You can use the ref() function to
1151 test the type of the reference, if need be.
1153 =item Can't use string ("%s") as %s ref while "strict refs" in use
1155 (F) Only hard references are allowed by "strict refs". Symbolic
1156 references are disallowed. See L<perlref>.
1158 =item Can't use subscript on %s
1160 (F) The compiler tried to interpret a bracketed expression as a
1161 subscript. But to the left of the brackets was an expression that
1162 didn't look like a hash or array reference, or anything else subscriptable.
1164 =item Can't use \%c to mean $%c in expression
1166 (W syntax) In an ordinary expression, backslash is a unary operator that
1167 creates a reference to its argument. The use of backslash to indicate a
1168 backreference to a matched substring is valid only as part of a regular
1169 expression pattern. Trying to do this in ordinary Perl code produces a
1170 value that prints out looking like SCALAR(0xdecaf). Use the $1 form
1173 =item Can't use "when" outside a topicalizer
1175 (F) You have used a when() block that is neither inside a C<foreach>
1176 loop nor a C<given> block. (Note that this error is issued on exit
1177 from the C<when> block, so you won't get the error if the match fails,
1178 or if you use an explicit C<continue>.)
1180 =item Can't weaken a nonreference
1182 (F) You attempted to weaken something that was not a reference. Only
1183 references can be weakened.
1185 =item Can't x= to read-only value
1187 (F) You tried to repeat a constant value (often the undefined value)
1188 with an assignment operator, which implies modifying the value itself.
1189 Perhaps you need to copy the value to a temporary, and repeat that.
1191 =item Character in 'C' format wrapped in pack
1197 where $x is either less than 0 or more than 255; the C<"C"> format is
1198 only for encoding native operating system characters (ASCII, EBCDIC,
1199 and so on) and not for Unicode characters, so Perl behaved as if you meant
1203 If you actually want to pack Unicode codepoints, use the C<"U"> format
1206 =item Character in 'W' format wrapped in pack
1212 where $x is either less than 0 or more than 255. However, C<U0>-mode expects
1213 all values to fall in the interval [0, 255], so Perl behaved as if you
1216 pack("U0W", $x & 255)
1218 =item Character in 'c' format wrapped in pack
1224 where $x is either less than -128 or more than 127; the C<"c"> format
1225 is only for encoding native operating system characters (ASCII, EBCDIC,
1226 and so on) and not for Unicode characters, so Perl behaved as if you meant
1228 pack("c", $x & 255);
1230 If you actually want to pack Unicode codepoints, use the C<"U"> format
1233 =item Character in '%c' format wrapped in unpack
1235 (W unpack) You tried something like
1237 unpack("H", "\x{2a1}")
1239 where the format expects to process a byte (a character with a value
1240 below 256), but a higher value was provided instead. Perl uses the value
1241 modulus 256 instead, as if you had provided:
1243 unpack("H", "\x{a1}")
1245 =item Character(s) in '%c' format wrapped in pack
1247 (W pack) You tried something like
1249 pack("u", "\x{1f3}b")
1251 where the format expects to process a sequence of bytes (character with a
1252 value below 256), but some of the characters had a higher value. Perl
1253 uses the character values modulus 256 instead, as if you had provided:
1255 pack("u", "\x{f3}b")
1257 =item Character(s) in '%c' format wrapped in unpack
1259 (W unpack) You tried something like
1261 unpack("s", "\x{1f3}b")
1263 where the format expects to process a sequence of bytes (character with a
1264 value below 256), but some of the characters had a higher value. Perl
1265 uses the character values modulus 256 instead, as if you had provided:
1267 unpack("s", "\x{f3}b")
1269 =item close() on unopened filehandle %s
1271 (W unopened) You tried to close a filehandle that was never opened.
1273 =item closedir() attempted on invalid dirhandle %s
1275 (W io) The dirhandle you tried to close is either closed or not really
1276 a dirhandle. Check your control flow.
1278 =item Code missing after '/'
1280 (F) You had a (sub-)template that ends with a '/'. There must be another
1281 template code following the slash. See L<perlfunc/pack>.
1283 =item %s: Command not found
1285 (A) You've accidentally run your script through B<csh> instead of Perl.
1286 Check the #! line, or manually feed your script into Perl yourself.
1288 =item Compilation failed in require
1290 (F) Perl could not compile a file specified in a C<require> statement.
1291 Perl uses this generic message when none of the errors that it
1292 encountered were severe enough to halt compilation immediately.
1294 =item Complex regular subexpression recursion limit (%d) exceeded
1296 (W regexp) The regular expression engine uses recursion in complex
1297 situations where back-tracking is required. Recursion depth is limited
1298 to 32766, or perhaps less in architectures where the stack cannot grow
1299 arbitrarily. ("Simple" and "medium" situations are handled without
1300 recursion and are not subject to a limit.) Try shortening the string
1301 under examination; looping in Perl code (e.g. with C<while>) rather than
1302 in the regular expression engine; or rewriting the regular expression so
1303 that it is simpler or backtracks less. (See L<perlfaq2> for information
1304 on I<Mastering Regular Expressions>.)
1306 =item cond_broadcast() called on unlocked variable
1308 (W threads) Within a thread-enabled program, you tried to call
1309 cond_broadcast() on a variable which wasn't locked. The cond_broadcast()
1310 function is used to wake up another thread that is waiting in a
1311 cond_wait(). To ensure that the signal isn't sent before the other thread
1312 has a chance to enter the wait, it is usual for the signaling thread to
1313 first wait for a lock on variable. This lock attempt will only succeed
1314 after the other thread has entered cond_wait() and thus relinquished the
1317 =item cond_signal() called on unlocked variable
1319 (W threads) Within a thread-enabled program, you tried to call
1320 cond_signal() on a variable which wasn't locked. The cond_signal()
1321 function is used to wake up another thread that is waiting in a
1322 cond_wait(). To ensure that the signal isn't sent before the other thread
1323 has a chance to enter the wait, it is usual for the signaling thread to
1324 first wait for a lock on variable. This lock attempt will only succeed
1325 after the other thread has entered cond_wait() and thus relinquished the
1328 =item connect() on closed socket %s
1330 (W closed) You tried to do a connect on a closed socket. Did you forget
1331 to check the return value of your socket() call? See
1332 L<perlfunc/connect>.
1334 =item Constant(%s)%s: %s
1336 (F) The parser found inconsistencies either while attempting to define
1337 an overloaded constant, or when trying to find the character name
1338 specified in the C<\N{...}> escape. Perhaps you forgot to load the
1339 corresponding C<overload> or C<charnames> pragma? See L<charnames> and
1342 =item Constant(%s)%s: %s in regex; marked by <-- HERE in m/%s/
1344 (F) The parser found inconsistencies while attempting to find
1345 the character name specified in the C<\N{...}> escape. Perhaps you
1346 forgot to load the corresponding C<charnames> pragma?
1350 =item Constant is not %s reference
1352 (F) A constant value (perhaps declared using the C<use constant> pragma)
1353 is being dereferenced, but it amounts to the wrong type of reference.
1354 The message indicates the type of reference that was expected. This
1355 usually indicates a syntax error in dereferencing the constant value.
1356 See L<perlsub/"Constant Functions"> and L<constant>.
1358 =item Constant subroutine %s redefined
1360 (S) You redefined a subroutine which had previously been
1361 eligible for inlining. See L<perlsub/"Constant Functions"> for
1362 commentary and workarounds.
1364 =item Constant subroutine %s undefined
1366 (W misc) You undefined a subroutine which had previously been eligible
1367 for inlining. See L<perlsub/"Constant Functions"> for commentary and
1370 =item Copy method did not return a reference
1372 (F) The method which overloads "=" is buggy. See
1373 L<overload/Copy Constructor>.
1375 =item CORE::%s is not a keyword
1377 (F) The CORE:: namespace is reserved for Perl keywords.
1379 =item corrupted regexp pointers
1381 (P) The regular expression engine got confused by what the regular
1382 expression compiler gave it.
1384 =item corrupted regexp program
1386 (P) The regular expression engine got passed a regexp program without a
1389 =item Corrupt malloc ptr 0x%lx at 0x%lx
1391 (P) The malloc package that comes with Perl had an internal failure.
1393 =item Count after length/code in unpack
1395 (F) You had an unpack template indicating a counted-length string, but
1396 you have also specified an explicit size for the string. See
1399 =item Deep recursion on subroutine "%s"
1401 (W recursion) This subroutine has called itself (directly or indirectly)
1402 100 times more than it has returned. This probably indicates an
1403 infinite recursion, unless you're writing strange benchmark programs, in
1404 which case it indicates something else.
1406 =item defined(@array) is deprecated
1408 (D deprecated) defined() is not usually useful on arrays because it
1409 checks for an undefined I<scalar> value. If you want to see if the
1410 array is empty, just use C<if (@array) { # not empty }> for example.
1412 =item defined(%hash) is deprecated
1414 (D deprecated) defined() is not usually useful on hashes because it
1415 checks for an undefined I<scalar> value. If you want to see if the hash
1416 is empty, just use C<if (%hash) { # not empty }> for example.
1418 =item %s defines neither package nor VERSION--version check failed
1420 (F) You said something like "use Module 42" but in the Module file
1421 there are neither package declarations nor a C<$VERSION>.
1423 =item Delimiter for here document is too long
1425 (F) In a here document construct like C<<<FOO>, the label C<FOO> is too
1426 long for Perl to handle. You have to be seriously twisted to write code
1427 that triggers this error.
1429 =item Deprecated use of my() in false conditional
1431 (D deprecated) You used a declaration similar to C<my $x if 0>.
1432 There has been a long-standing bug in Perl that causes a lexical variable
1433 not to be cleared at scope exit when its declaration includes a false
1434 conditional. Some people have exploited this bug to achieve a kind of
1435 static variable. Since we intend to fix this bug, we don't want people
1436 relying on this behavior. You can achieve a similar static effect by
1437 declaring the variable in a separate block outside the function, eg
1439 sub f { my $x if 0; return $x++ }
1443 { my $x; sub f { return $x++ } }
1445 Beginning with perl 5.9.4, you can also use C<state> variables to
1446 have lexicals that are initialized only once (see L<feature>):
1448 sub f { state $x; return $x++ }
1450 =item DESTROY created new reference to dead object '%s'
1452 (F) A DESTROY() method created a new reference to the object which is
1453 just being DESTROYed. Perl is confused, and prefers to abort rather than
1454 to create a dangling reference.
1456 =item Did not produce a valid header
1460 =item %s did not return a true value
1462 (F) A required (or used) file must return a true value to indicate that
1463 it compiled correctly and ran its initialization code correctly. It's
1464 traditional to end such a file with a "1;", though any true value would
1465 do. See L<perlfunc/require>.
1467 =item (Did you mean &%s instead?)
1469 (W) You probably referred to an imported subroutine &FOO as $FOO or some
1472 =item (Did you mean "local" instead of "our"?)
1474 (W misc) Remember that "our" does not localize the declared global
1475 variable. You have declared it again in the same lexical scope, which
1478 =item (Did you mean $ or @ instead of %?)
1480 (W) You probably said %hash{$key} when you meant $hash{$key} or
1481 @hash{@keys}. On the other hand, maybe you just meant %hash and got
1486 (F) You passed die() an empty string (the equivalent of C<die "">) or
1487 you called it with no args and both C<$@> and C<$_> were empty.
1489 =item Document contains no data
1493 =item %s does not define %s::VERSION--version check failed
1495 (F) You said something like "use Module 42" but the Module did not
1496 define a C<$VERSION.>
1498 =item '/' does not take a repeat count
1500 (F) You cannot put a repeat count of any kind right after the '/' code.
1501 See L<perlfunc/pack>.
1503 =item Don't know how to handle magic of type '%s'
1505 (P) The internal handling of magical variables has been cursed.
1507 =item do_study: out of memory
1509 (P) This should have been caught by safemalloc() instead.
1511 =item (Do you need to predeclare %s?)
1513 (S syntax) This is an educated guess made in conjunction with the message
1514 "%s found where operator expected". It often means a subroutine or module
1515 name is being referenced that hasn't been declared yet. This may be
1516 because of ordering problems in your file, or because of a missing
1517 "sub", "package", "require", or "use" statement. If you're referencing
1518 something that isn't defined yet, you don't actually have to define the
1519 subroutine or package before the current location. You can use an empty
1520 "sub foo;" or "package FOO;" to enter a "forward" declaration.
1522 =item dump() better written as CORE::dump()
1524 (W misc) You used the obsolescent C<dump()> built-in function, without fully
1525 qualifying it as C<CORE::dump()>. Maybe it's a typo. See L<perlfunc/dump>.
1527 =item dump is not supported
1529 (F) Your machine doesn't support dump/undump.
1531 =item Duplicate free() ignored
1533 (S malloc) An internal routine called free() on something that had
1536 =item Duplicate modifier '%c' after '%c' in %s
1538 (W) You have applied the same modifier more than once after a type
1539 in a pack template. See L<perlfunc/pack>.
1541 =item elseif should be elsif
1543 (S syntax) There is no keyword "elseif" in Perl because Larry thinks it's
1544 ugly. Your code will be interpreted as an attempt to call a method named
1545 "elseif" for the class returned by the following block. This is
1546 unlikely to be what you want.
1550 (F) C<\p> and C<\P> are used to introduce a named Unicode property, as
1551 described in L<perlunicode> and L<perlre>. You used C<\p> or C<\P> in
1552 a regular expression without specifying the property name.
1554 =item entering effective %s failed
1556 (F) While under the C<use filetest> pragma, switching the real and
1557 effective uids or gids failed.
1559 =item %ENV is aliased to %s
1561 (F) You're running under taint mode, and the C<%ENV> variable has been
1562 aliased to another hash, so it doesn't reflect anymore the state of the
1563 program's environment. This is potentially insecure.
1565 =item Error converting file specification %s
1567 (F) An error peculiar to VMS. Because Perl may have to deal with file
1568 specifications in either VMS or Unix syntax, it converts them to a
1569 single form when it must operate on them directly. Either you've passed
1570 an invalid file specification to Perl, or you've found a case the
1571 conversion routines don't handle. Drat.
1573 =item %s: Eval-group in insecure regular expression
1575 (F) Perl detected tainted data when trying to compile a regular
1576 expression that contains the C<(?{ ... })> zero-width assertion, which
1577 is unsafe. See L<perlre/(?{ code })>, and L<perlsec>.
1579 =item %s: Eval-group not allowed at run time
1581 (F) Perl tried to compile a regular expression containing the
1582 C<(?{ ... })> zero-width assertion at run time, as it would when the
1583 pattern contains interpolated values. Since that is a security risk, it
1584 is not allowed. If you insist, you may still do this by explicitly
1585 building the pattern from an interpolated string at run time and using
1586 that in an eval(). See L<perlre/(?{ code })>.
1588 =item %s: Eval-group not allowed, use re 'eval'
1590 (F) A regular expression contained the C<(?{ ... })> zero-width
1591 assertion, but that construct is only allowed when the C<use re 'eval'>
1592 pragma is in effect. See L<perlre/(?{ code })>.
1594 =item EVAL without pos change exceeded limit in regex; marked by <-- HERE in m/%s/
1596 (F) You used a pattern that nested too many EVAL calls without consuming
1597 any text. Restructure the pattern so that text is consumed.
1599 The <-- HERE shows in the regular expression about where the problem was
1602 =item Excessively long <> operator
1604 (F) The contents of a <> operator may not exceed the maximum size of a
1605 Perl identifier. If you're just trying to glob a long list of
1606 filenames, try using the glob() operator, or put the filenames into a
1607 variable and glob that.
1609 =item exec? I'm not *that* kind of operating system
1611 (F) The C<exec> function is not implemented in MacPerl. See L<perlport>.
1613 =item Execution of %s aborted due to compilation errors
1615 (F) The final summary message when a Perl compilation fails.
1617 =item Exiting eval via %s
1619 (W exiting) You are exiting an eval by unconventional means, such as a
1620 goto, or a loop control statement.
1622 =item Exiting format via %s
1624 (W exiting) You are exiting a format by unconventional means, such as a
1625 goto, or a loop control statement.
1627 =item Exiting pseudo-block via %s
1629 (W exiting) You are exiting a rather special block construct (like a
1630 sort block or subroutine) by unconventional means, such as a goto, or a
1631 loop control statement. See L<perlfunc/sort>.
1633 =item Exiting subroutine via %s
1635 (W exiting) You are exiting a subroutine by unconventional means, such
1636 as a goto, or a loop control statement.
1638 =item Exiting substitution via %s
1640 (W exiting) You are exiting a substitution by unconventional means, such
1641 as a return, a goto, or a loop control statement.
1643 =item Explicit blessing to '' (assuming package main)
1645 (W misc) You are blessing a reference to a zero length string. This has
1646 the effect of blessing the reference into the package main. This is
1647 usually not what you want. Consider providing a default target package,
1648 e.g. bless($ref, $p || 'MyPackage');
1650 =item %s: Expression syntax
1652 (A) You've accidentally run your script through B<csh> instead of Perl.
1653 Check the #! line, or manually feed your script into Perl yourself.
1655 =item %s failed--call queue aborted
1657 (F) An untrapped exception was raised while executing a UNITCHECK,
1658 CHECK, INIT, or END subroutine. Processing of the remainder of the
1659 queue of such routines has been prematurely ended.
1661 =item False [] range "%s" in regex; marked by <-- HERE in m/%s/
1663 (W regexp) A character class range must start and end at a literal
1664 character, not another character class like C<\d> or C<[:alpha:]>. The "-"
1665 in your false range is interpreted as a literal "-". Consider quoting the
1666 "-", "\-". The <-- HERE shows in the regular expression about where the
1667 problem was discovered. See L<perlre>.
1669 =item Fatal VMS error at %s, line %d
1671 (P) An error peculiar to VMS. Something untoward happened in a VMS
1672 system service or RTL routine; Perl's exit status should provide more
1673 details. The filename in "at %s" and the line number in "line %d" tell
1674 you which section of the Perl source code is distressed.
1676 =item fcntl is not implemented
1678 (F) Your machine apparently doesn't implement fcntl(). What is this, a
1679 PDP-11 or something?
1681 =item Field too wide in 'u' format in pack
1683 (W pack) Each line in an uuencoded string start with a length indicator
1684 which can't encode values above 63. So there is no point in asking for
1685 a line length bigger than that. Perl will behave as if you specified
1688 =item Filehandle %s opened only for input
1690 (W io) You tried to write on a read-only filehandle. If you intended
1691 it to be a read-write filehandle, you needed to open it with "+<" or
1692 "+>" or "+>>" instead of with "<" or nothing. If you intended only to
1693 write the file, use ">" or ">>". See L<perlfunc/open>.
1695 =item Filehandle %s opened only for output
1697 (W io) You tried to read from a filehandle opened only for writing, If
1698 you intended it to be a read/write filehandle, you needed to open it
1699 with "+<" or "+>" or "+>>" instead of with "<" or nothing. If you
1700 intended only to read from the file, use "<". See L<perlfunc/open>.
1701 Another possibility is that you attempted to open filedescriptor 0
1702 (also known as STDIN) for output (maybe you closed STDIN earlier?).
1704 =item Filehandle %s reopened as %s only for input
1706 (W io) You opened for reading a filehandle that got the same filehandle id
1707 as STDOUT or STDERR. This occurred because you closed STDOUT or STDERR
1710 =item Filehandle STDIN reopened as %s only for output
1712 (W io) You opened for writing a filehandle that got the same filehandle id
1713 as STDIN. This occurred because you closed STDIN previously.
1715 =item Final $ should be \$ or $name
1717 (F) You must now decide whether the final $ in a string was meant to be
1718 a literal dollar sign, or was meant to introduce a variable name that
1719 happens to be missing. So you have to put either the backslash or the
1722 =item flock() on closed filehandle %s
1724 (W closed) The filehandle you're attempting to flock() got itself closed
1725 some time before now. Check your control flow. flock() operates on
1726 filehandles. Are you attempting to call flock() on a dirhandle by the
1729 =item Format not terminated
1731 (F) A format must be terminated by a line with a solitary dot. Perl got
1732 to the end of your file without finding such a line.
1734 =item Format %s redefined
1736 (W redefine) You redefined a format. To suppress this warning, say
1739 no warnings 'redefine';
1740 eval "format NAME =...";
1743 =item Found = in conditional, should be ==
1753 (or something like that).
1755 =item %s found where operator expected
1757 (S syntax) The Perl lexer knows whether to expect a term or an operator.
1758 If it sees what it knows to be a term when it was expecting to see an
1759 operator, it gives you this warning. Usually it indicates that an
1760 operator or delimiter was omitted, such as a semicolon.
1762 =item gdbm store returned %d, errno %d, key "%s"
1764 (S) A warning from the GDBM_File extension that a store failed.
1766 =item gethostent not implemented
1768 (F) Your C library apparently doesn't implement gethostent(), probably
1769 because if it did, it'd feel morally obligated to return every hostname
1772 =item get%sname() on closed socket %s
1774 (W closed) You tried to get a socket or peer socket name on a closed
1775 socket. Did you forget to check the return value of your socket() call?
1777 =item getpwnam returned invalid UIC %#o for user "%s"
1779 (S) A warning peculiar to VMS. The call to C<sys$getuai> underlying the
1780 C<getpwnam> operator returned an invalid UIC.
1782 =item getsockopt() on closed socket %s
1784 (W closed) You tried to get a socket option on a closed socket. Did you
1785 forget to check the return value of your socket() call? See
1786 L<perlfunc/getsockopt>.
1788 =item Global symbol "%s" requires explicit package name
1790 (F) You've said "use strict vars", which indicates that all variables
1791 must either be lexically scoped (using "my"), declared beforehand using
1792 "our", or explicitly qualified to say which package the global variable
1795 =item glob failed (%s)
1797 (W glob) Something went wrong with the external program(s) used for
1798 C<glob> and C<< <*.c> >>. Usually, this means that you supplied a
1799 C<glob> pattern that caused the external program to fail and exit with a
1800 nonzero status. If the message indicates that the abnormal exit
1801 resulted in a coredump, this may also mean that your csh (C shell) is
1802 broken. If so, you should change all of the csh-related variables in
1803 config.sh: If you have tcsh, make the variables refer to it as if it
1804 were csh (e.g. C<full_csh='/usr/bin/tcsh'>); otherwise, make them all
1805 empty (except that C<d_csh> should be C<'undef'>) so that Perl will
1806 think csh is missing. In either case, after editing config.sh, run
1807 C<./Configure -S> and rebuild Perl.
1809 =item Glob not terminated
1811 (F) The lexer saw a left angle bracket in a place where it was expecting
1812 a term, so it's looking for the corresponding right angle bracket, and
1813 not finding it. Chances are you left some needed parentheses out
1814 earlier in the line, and you really meant a "less than".
1816 =item Got an error from DosAllocMem
1818 (P) An error peculiar to OS/2. Most probably you're using an obsolete
1819 version of Perl, and this should not happen anyway.
1821 =item goto must have label
1823 (F) Unlike with "next" or "last", you're not allowed to goto an
1824 unspecified destination. See L<perlfunc/goto>.
1826 =item ()-group starts with a count
1828 (F) A ()-group started with a count. A count is
1829 supposed to follow something: a template character or a ()-group.
1830 See L<perlfunc/pack>.
1832 =item %s had compilation errors
1834 (F) The final summary message when a C<perl -c> fails.
1836 =item Had to create %s unexpectedly
1838 (S internal) A routine asked for a symbol from a symbol table that ought
1839 to have existed already, but for some reason it didn't, and had to be
1840 created on an emergency basis to prevent a core dump.
1842 =item Hash %%s missing the % in argument %d of %s()
1844 (D deprecated) Really old Perl let you omit the % on hash names in some
1845 spots. This is now heavily deprecated.
1847 =item %s has too many errors
1849 (F) The parser has given up trying to parse the program after 10 errors.
1850 Further error messages would likely be uninformative.
1852 =item Hexadecimal number > 0xffffffff non-portable
1854 (W portable) The hexadecimal number you specified is larger than 2**32-1
1855 (4294967295) and therefore non-portable between systems. See
1856 L<perlport> for more on portability concerns.
1858 =item Identifier too long
1860 (F) Perl limits identifiers (names for variables, functions, etc.) to
1861 about 250 characters for simple names, and somewhat more for compound
1862 names (like C<$A::B>). You've exceeded Perl's limits. Future versions
1863 of Perl are likely to eliminate these arbitrary limitations.
1865 =item Ignoring %s in character class in regex; marked by <-- HERE in m/%s/
1867 (W) Named unicode character escapes (\N{...}) may return multi-char
1868 or zero length sequences. When such an escape is used in a character class
1869 its behaviour is not well defined. Check that the correct escape has
1870 been used, and the correct charname handler is in scope.
1872 =item Illegal binary digit %s
1874 (F) You used a digit other than 0 or 1 in a binary number.
1876 =item Illegal binary digit %s ignored
1878 (W digit) You may have tried to use a digit other than 0 or 1 in a
1879 binary number. Interpretation of the binary number stopped before the
1882 =item Illegal character %s (carriage return)
1884 (F) Perl normally treats carriage returns in the program text as it
1885 would any other whitespace, which means you should never see this error
1886 when Perl was built using standard options. For some reason, your
1887 version of Perl appears to have been built without this support. Talk
1888 to your Perl administrator.
1890 =item Illegal character in prototype for %s : %s
1892 (W syntax) An illegal character was found in a prototype declaration. Legal
1893 characters in prototypes are $, @, %, *, ;, [, ], &, and \.
1895 =item Illegal declaration of anonymous subroutine
1897 (F) When using the C<sub> keyword to construct an anonymous subroutine,
1898 you must always specify a block of code. See L<perlsub>.
1900 =item Illegal declaration of subroutine %s
1902 (F) A subroutine was not declared correctly. See L<perlsub>.
1904 =item Illegal division by zero
1906 (F) You tried to divide a number by 0. Either something was wrong in
1907 your logic, or you need to put a conditional in to guard against
1910 =item Illegal hexadecimal digit %s ignored
1912 (W digit) You may have tried to use a character other than 0 - 9 or
1913 A - F, a - f in a hexadecimal number. Interpretation of the hexadecimal
1914 number stopped before the illegal character.
1916 =item Illegal modulus zero
1918 (F) You tried to divide a number by 0 to get the remainder. Most
1919 numbers don't take to this kindly.
1921 =item Illegal number of bits in vec
1923 (F) The number of bits in vec() (the third argument) must be a power of
1924 two from 1 to 32 (or 64, if your platform supports that).
1926 =item Illegal octal digit %s
1928 (F) You used an 8 or 9 in an octal number.
1930 =item Illegal octal digit %s ignored
1932 (W digit) You may have tried to use an 8 or 9 in an octal number.
1933 Interpretation of the octal number stopped before the 8 or 9.
1935 =item Illegal switch in PERL5OPT: %s
1937 (X) The PERL5OPT environment variable may only be used to set the
1938 following switches: B<-[CDIMUdmtwA]>.
1940 =item Ill-formed CRTL environ value "%s"
1942 (W internal) A warning peculiar to VMS. Perl tried to read the CRTL's
1943 internal environ array, and encountered an element without the C<=>
1944 delimiter used to separate keys from values. The element is ignored.
1946 =item Ill-formed message in prime_env_iter: |%s|
1948 (W internal) A warning peculiar to VMS. Perl tried to read a logical
1949 name or CLI symbol definition when preparing to iterate over %ENV, and
1950 didn't see the expected delimiter between key and value, so the line was
1953 =item Impossible to activate assertion call
1955 (W assertions) You're calling an assertion function in a block that is
1956 not under the control of the C<assertions> pragma.
1958 =item (in cleanup) %s
1960 (W misc) This prefix usually indicates that a DESTROY() method raised
1961 the indicated exception. Since destructors are usually called by the
1962 system at arbitrary points during execution, and often a vast number of
1963 times, the warning is issued only once for any number of failures that
1964 would otherwise result in the same message being repeated.
1966 Failure of user callbacks dispatched using the C<G_KEEPERR> flag could
1967 also result in this warning. See L<perlcall/G_KEEPERR>.
1969 =item In EBCDIC the v-string components cannot exceed 2147483647
1971 (F) An error peculiar to EBCDIC. Internally, v-strings are stored as
1972 Unicode code points, and encoded in EBCDIC as UTF-EBCDIC. The UTF-EBCDIC
1973 encoding is limited to code points no larger than 2147483647 (0x7FFFFFFF).
1975 =item Infinite recursion in regex; marked by <-- HERE in m/%s/
1977 (F) You used a pattern that references itself without consuming any input
1978 text. You should check the pattern to ensure that recursive patterns
1979 either consume text or fail.
1981 The <-- HERE shows in the regular expression about where the problem was
1984 =item Insecure dependency in %s
1986 (F) You tried to do something that the tainting mechanism didn't like.
1987 The tainting mechanism is turned on when you're running setuid or
1988 setgid, or when you specify B<-T> to turn it on explicitly. The
1989 tainting mechanism labels all data that's derived directly or indirectly
1990 from the user, who is considered to be unworthy of your trust. If any
1991 such data is used in a "dangerous" operation, you get this error. See
1992 L<perlsec> for more information.
1994 =item Insecure directory in %s
1996 (F) You can't use system(), exec(), or a piped open in a setuid or
1997 setgid script if C<$ENV{PATH}> contains a directory that is writable by
1998 the world. Also, the PATH must not contain any relative directory.
2001 =item Insecure $ENV{%s} while running %s
2003 (F) You can't use system(), exec(), or a piped open in a setuid or
2004 setgid script if any of C<$ENV{PATH}>, C<$ENV{IFS}>, C<$ENV{CDPATH}>,
2005 C<$ENV{ENV}>, C<$ENV{BASH_ENV}> or C<$ENV{TERM}> are derived from data
2006 supplied (or potentially supplied) by the user. The script must set
2007 the path to a known value, using trustworthy data. See L<perlsec>.
2009 =item Integer overflow in %s number
2011 (W overflow) The hexadecimal, octal or binary number you have specified
2012 either as a literal or as an argument to hex() or oct() is too big for
2013 your architecture, and has been converted to a floating point number.
2014 On a 32-bit architecture the largest hexadecimal, octal or binary number
2015 representable without overflow is 0xFFFFFFFF, 037777777777, or
2016 0b11111111111111111111111111111111 respectively. Note that Perl
2017 transparently promotes all numbers to a floating point representation
2018 internally--subject to loss of precision errors in subsequent
2021 =item Integer overflow in format string for %s
2023 (F) The indexes and widths specified in the format string of C<printf()>
2024 or C<sprintf()> are too large. The numbers must not overflow the size of
2025 integers for your architecture.
2027 =item Integer overflow in version
2029 (F) Some portion of a version initialization is too large for the
2030 size of integers for your architecture. This is not a warning
2031 because there is no rational reason for a version to try and use a
2032 element larger than typically 2**32. This is usually caused by
2033 trying to use some odd mathematical operation as a version, like
2036 =item Internal disaster in regex; marked by <-- HERE in m/%s/
2038 (P) Something went badly wrong in the regular expression parser.
2039 The <-- HERE shows in the regular expression about where the problem was
2042 =item Internal inconsistency in tracking vforks
2044 (S) A warning peculiar to VMS. Perl keeps track of the number of times
2045 you've called C<fork> and C<exec>, to determine whether the current call
2046 to C<exec> should affect the current script or a subprocess (see
2047 L<perlvms/"exec LIST">). Somehow, this count has become scrambled, so
2048 Perl is making a guess and treating this C<exec> as a request to
2049 terminate the Perl script and execute the specified command.
2051 =item Internal urp in regex; marked by <-- HERE in m/%s/
2053 (P) Something went badly awry in the regular expression parser. The
2054 <-- HERE shows in the regular expression about where the problem was
2057 =item %s (...) interpreted as function
2059 (W syntax) You've run afoul of the rule that says that any list operator
2060 followed by parentheses turns into a function, with all the list
2061 operators arguments found inside the parentheses. See
2062 L<perlop/Terms and List Operators (Leftward)>.
2064 =item Invalid %s attribute: %s
2066 The indicated attribute for a subroutine or variable was not recognized
2067 by Perl or by a user-supplied handler. See L<attributes>.
2069 =item Invalid %s attributes: %s
2071 The indicated attributes for a subroutine or variable were not
2072 recognized by Perl or by a user-supplied handler. See L<attributes>.
2074 =item Invalid conversion in %s: "%s"
2076 (W printf) Perl does not understand the given format conversion. See
2077 L<perlfunc/sprintf>.
2079 =item Invalid escape in the specified encoding in regex; marked by <-- HERE in m/%s/
2081 (W regexp) The numeric escape (for example C<\xHH>) of value < 256
2082 didn't correspond to a single character through the conversion
2083 from the encoding specified by the encoding pragma.
2084 The escape was replaced with REPLACEMENT CHARACTER (U+FFFD) instead.
2085 The <-- HERE shows in the regular expression about where the
2086 escape was discovered.
2088 =item Invalid [] range "%s" in regex; marked by <-- HERE in m/%s/
2090 (F) The range specified in a character class had a minimum character
2091 greater than the maximum character. One possibility is that you forgot the
2092 C<{}> from your ending C<\x{}> - C<\x> without the curly braces can go only
2093 up to C<ff>. The <-- HERE shows in the regular expression about where the
2094 problem was discovered. See L<perlre>.
2096 =item Invalid range "%s" in transliteration operator
2098 (F) The range specified in the tr/// or y/// operator had a minimum
2099 character greater than the maximum character. See L<perlop>.
2101 =item Invalid separator character %s in attribute list
2103 (F) Something other than a colon or whitespace was seen between the
2104 elements of an attribute list. If the previous attribute had a
2105 parenthesised parameter list, perhaps that list was terminated too soon.
2108 =item Invalid separator character %s in PerlIO layer specification %s
2110 (W layer) When pushing layers onto the Perl I/O system, something other than a
2111 colon or whitespace was seen between the elements of a layer list.
2112 If the previous attribute had a parenthesised parameter list, perhaps that
2113 list was terminated too soon.
2115 =item Invalid type '%s' in %s
2117 (F) The given character is not a valid pack or unpack type.
2118 See L<perlfunc/pack>.
2119 (W) The given character is not a valid pack or unpack type but used to be
2122 =item Invalid version format (multiple underscores)
2124 (F) Versions may contain at most a single underscore, which signals
2125 that the version is a beta release. See L<version> for the allowed
2128 =item Invalid version format (underscores before decimal)
2130 (F) Versions may not contain decimals after the optional underscore.
2131 See L<version> for the allowed version formats.
2133 =item ioctl is not implemented
2135 (F) Your machine apparently doesn't implement ioctl(), which is pretty
2136 strange for a machine that supports C.
2138 =item ioctl() on unopened %s
2140 (W unopened) You tried ioctl() on a filehandle that was never opened.
2141 Check you control flow and number of arguments.
2143 =item IO layers (like "%s") unavailable
2145 (F) Your Perl has not been configured to have PerlIO, and therefore
2146 you cannot use IO layers. To have PerlIO Perl must be configured
2149 =item IO::Socket::atmark not implemented on this architecture
2151 (F) Your machine doesn't implement the sockatmark() functionality,
2152 neither as a system call or an ioctl call (SIOCATMARK).
2154 =item $* is no longer supported
2156 (D deprecated) The special variable C<$*>, deprecated in older perls, has
2157 been removed as of 5.9.0 and is no longer supported. You should use the
2158 C<//m> and C<//s> regexp modifiers instead.
2160 =item $# is no longer supported
2162 (D deprecated) The special variable C<$#>, deprecated in older perls, has
2163 been removed as of 5.9.3 and is no longer supported. You should use the
2164 printf/sprintf functions instead.
2166 =item `%s' is not a code reference
2168 (W overload) The second (fourth, sixth, ...) argument of overload::constant
2169 needs to be a code reference. Either an anonymous subroutine, or a reference
2172 =item `%s' is not an overloadable type
2174 (W overload) You tried to overload a constant type the overload package is
2177 =item junk on end of regexp
2179 (P) The regular expression parser is confused.
2181 =item Label not found for "last %s"
2183 (F) You named a loop to break out of, but you're not currently in a loop
2184 of that name, not even if you count where you were called from. See
2187 =item Label not found for "next %s"
2189 (F) You named a loop to continue, but you're not currently in a loop of
2190 that name, not even if you count where you were called from. See
2193 =item Label not found for "redo %s"
2195 (F) You named a loop to restart, but you're not currently in a loop of
2196 that name, not even if you count where you were called from. See
2199 =item leaving effective %s failed
2201 (F) While under the C<use filetest> pragma, switching the real and
2202 effective uids or gids failed.
2204 =item length/code after end of string in unpack
2206 (F) While unpacking, the string buffer was already used up when an unpack
2207 length/code combination tried to obtain more data. This results in
2208 an undefined value for the length. See L<perlfunc/pack>.
2210 =item listen() on closed socket %s
2212 (W closed) You tried to do a listen on a closed socket. Did you forget
2213 to check the return value of your socket() call? See
2216 =item Lookbehind longer than %d not implemented in regex m/%s/
2218 (F) There is currently a limit on the length of string which lookbehind can
2219 handle. This restriction may be eased in a future release.
2221 =item lstat() on filehandle %s
2223 (W io) You tried to do an lstat on a filehandle. What did you mean
2224 by that? lstat() makes sense only on filenames. (Perl did a fstat()
2225 instead on the filehandle.)
2227 =item Lvalue subs returning %s not implemented yet
2229 (F) Due to limitations in the current implementation, array and hash
2230 values cannot be returned in subroutines used in lvalue context. See
2231 L<perlsub/"Lvalue subroutines">.
2233 =item Malformed integer in [] in pack
2235 (F) Between the brackets enclosing a numeric repeat count only digits
2236 are permitted. See L<perlfunc/pack>.
2238 =item Malformed integer in [] in unpack
2240 (F) Between the brackets enclosing a numeric repeat count only digits
2241 are permitted. See L<perlfunc/pack>.
2243 =item Malformed PERLLIB_PREFIX
2245 (F) An error peculiar to OS/2. PERLLIB_PREFIX should be of the form
2252 with nonempty prefix1 and prefix2. If C<prefix1> is indeed a prefix of
2253 a builtin library search path, prefix2 is substituted. The error may
2254 appear if components are not found, or are too long. See
2255 "PERLLIB_PREFIX" in L<perlos2>.
2257 =item Malformed prototype for %s: %s
2259 (F) You tried to use a function with a malformed prototype. The
2260 syntax of function prototypes is given a brief compile-time check for
2261 obvious errors like invalid characters. A more rigorous check is run
2262 when the function is called.
2264 =item Malformed UTF-8 character (%s)
2266 (S utf8) (F) Perl detected a string that didn't comply with UTF-8
2267 encoding rules, even though it had the UTF8 flag on.
2269 One possible cause is that you set the UTF8 flag yourself for data that
2270 you thought to be in UTF-8 but it wasn't (it was for example legacy
2271 8-bit data). To guard against this, you can use Encode::decode_utf8.
2273 If you use the C<:encoding(UTF-8)> PerlIO layer for input, invalid byte
2274 sequences are handled gracefully, but if you use C<:utf8>, the flag is
2275 set without validating the data, possibly resulting in this error
2278 See also L<Encode/"Handling Malformed Data">.
2280 =item Malformed UTF-16 surrogate
2282 Perl thought it was reading UTF-16 encoded character data but while
2283 doing it Perl met a malformed Unicode surrogate.
2285 =item Malformed UTF-8 string in pack
2287 (F) You tried to pack something that didn't comply with UTF-8 encoding
2288 rules and perl was unable to guess how to make more progress.
2290 =item Malformed UTF-8 string in unpack
2292 (F) You tried to unpack something that didn't comply with UTF-8 encoding
2293 rules and perl was unable to guess how to make more progress.
2295 =item Malformed UTF-8 string in '%c' format in unpack
2297 (F) You tried to unpack something that didn't comply with UTF-8 encoding
2298 rules and perl was unable to guess how to make more progress.
2300 =item Maximal count of pending signals (%s) exceeded
2302 (F) Perl aborted due to a too important number of signals pending. This
2303 usually indicates that your operating system tried to deliver signals
2304 too fast (with a very high priority), starving the perl process from
2305 resources it would need to reach a point where it can process signals
2306 safely. (See L<perlipc/"Deferred Signals (Safe Signals)">.)
2308 =item %s matches null string many times in regex; marked by <-- HERE in m/%s/
2310 (W regexp) The pattern you've specified would be an infinite loop if the
2311 regular expression engine didn't specifically check for that. The <-- HERE
2312 shows in the regular expression about where the problem was discovered.
2315 =item "%s" may clash with future reserved word
2317 (W) This warning may be due to running a perl5 script through a perl4
2318 interpreter, especially if the word that is being warned about is
2321 =item % may not be used in pack
2323 (F) You can't pack a string by supplying a checksum, because the
2324 checksumming process loses information, and you can't go the other way.
2325 See L<perlfunc/unpack>.
2327 =item Method for operation %s not found in package %s during blessing
2329 (F) An attempt was made to specify an entry in an overloading table that
2330 doesn't resolve to a valid subroutine. See L<overload>.
2332 =item Method %s not permitted
2336 =item Might be a runaway multi-line %s string starting on line %d
2338 (S) An advisory indicating that the previous error may have been caused
2339 by a missing delimiter on a string or pattern, because it eventually
2340 ended earlier on the current line.
2342 =item Misplaced _ in number
2344 (W syntax) An underscore (underbar) in a numeric constant did not
2345 separate two digits.
2347 =item Missing argument to -%c
2349 (F) The argument to the indicated command line switch must follow
2350 immediately after the switch, without intervening spaces.
2352 =item Missing %sbrace%s on \N{}
2354 (F) Wrong syntax of character name literal C<\N{charname}> within
2355 double-quotish context.
2357 =item Missing comma after first argument to %s function
2359 (F) While certain functions allow you to specify a filehandle or an
2360 "indirect object" before the argument list, this ain't one of them.
2362 =item Missing command in piped open
2364 (W pipe) You used the C<open(FH, "| command")> or
2365 C<open(FH, "command |")> construction, but the command was missing or
2368 =item Missing control char name in \c
2370 (F) A double-quoted string ended with "\c", without the required control
2373 =item Missing name in "my sub"
2375 (F) The reserved syntax for lexically scoped subroutines requires that
2376 they have a name with which they can be found.
2378 =item Missing $ on loop variable
2380 (F) Apparently you've been programming in B<csh> too much. Variables
2381 are always mentioned with the $ in Perl, unlike in the shells, where it
2382 can vary from one line to the next.
2384 =item (Missing operator before %s?)
2386 (S syntax) This is an educated guess made in conjunction with the message
2387 "%s found where operator expected". Often the missing operator is a comma.
2389 =item Missing right brace on %s
2391 (F) Missing right brace in C<\p{...}> or C<\P{...}>.
2393 =item Missing right curly or square bracket
2395 (F) The lexer counted more opening curly or square brackets than closing
2396 ones. As a general rule, you'll find it's missing near the place you
2399 =item (Missing semicolon on previous line?)
2401 (S syntax) This is an educated guess made in conjunction with the message
2402 "%s found where operator expected". Don't automatically put a semicolon on
2403 the previous line just because you saw this message.
2405 =item Modification of a read-only value attempted
2407 (F) You tried, directly or indirectly, to change the value of a
2408 constant. You didn't, of course, try "2 = 1", because the compiler
2409 catches that. But an easy way to do the same thing is:
2411 sub mod { $_[0] = 1 }
2414 Another way is to assign to a substr() that's off the end of the string.
2416 Yet another way is to assign to a C<foreach> loop I<VAR> when I<VAR>
2417 is aliased to a constant in the look I<LIST>:
2420 foreach my $n ($x, 2) {
2421 $n *= 2; # modifies the $x, but fails on attempt to modify the 2
2424 =item Modification of non-creatable array value attempted, %s
2426 (F) You tried to make an array value spring into existence, and the
2427 subscript was probably negative, even counting from end of the array
2430 =item Modification of non-creatable hash value attempted, %s
2432 (P) You tried to make a hash value spring into existence, and it
2433 couldn't be created for some peculiar reason.
2435 =item Module name must be constant
2437 (F) Only a bare module name is allowed as the first argument to a "use".
2439 =item Module name required with -%c option
2441 (F) The C<-M> or C<-m> options say that Perl should load some module, but
2442 you omitted the name of the module. Consult L<perlrun> for full details
2443 about C<-M> and C<-m>.
2445 =item More than one argument to open
2447 (F) The C<open> function has been asked to open multiple files. This
2448 can happen if you are trying to open a pipe to a command that takes a
2449 list of arguments, but have forgotten to specify a piped open mode.
2450 See L<perlfunc/open> for details.
2452 =item msg%s not implemented
2454 (F) You don't have System V message IPC on your system.
2456 =item Multidimensional syntax %s not supported
2458 (W syntax) Multidimensional arrays aren't written like C<$foo[1,2,3]>.
2459 They're written like C<$foo[1][2][3]>, as in C.
2461 =item '/' must follow a numeric type in unpack
2463 (F) You had an unpack template that contained a '/', but this did not
2464 follow some unpack specification producing a numeric value.
2465 See L<perlfunc/pack>.
2467 =item "my sub" not yet implemented
2469 (F) Lexically scoped subroutines are not yet implemented. Don't try
2472 =item "my" variable %s can't be in a package
2474 (F) Lexically scoped variables aren't in a package, so it doesn't make
2475 sense to try to declare one with a package qualifier on the front. Use
2476 local() if you want to localize a package variable.
2478 =item Name "%s::%s" used only once: possible typo
2480 (W once) Typographical errors often show up as unique variable names.
2481 If you had a good reason for having a unique name, then just mention it
2482 again somehow to suppress the message. The C<our> declaration is
2483 provided for this purpose.
2485 NOTE: This warning detects symbols that have been used only once so $c, @c,
2486 %c, *c, &c, sub c{}, c(), and c (the filehandle or format) are considered
2487 the same; if a program uses $c only once but also uses any of the others it
2488 will not trigger this warning.
2490 =item Negative '/' count in unpack
2492 (F) The length count obtained from a length/code unpack operation was
2493 negative. See L<perlfunc/pack>.
2495 =item Negative length
2497 (F) You tried to do a read/write/send/recv operation with a buffer
2498 length that is less than 0. This is difficult to imagine.
2500 =item Negative offset to vec in lvalue context
2502 (F) When C<vec> is called in an lvalue context, the second argument must be
2503 greater than or equal to zero.
2505 =item Nested quantifiers in regex; marked by <-- HERE in m/%s/
2507 (F) You can't quantify a quantifier without intervening parentheses. So
2508 things like ** or +* or ?* are illegal. The <-- HERE shows in the regular
2509 expression about where the problem was discovered.
2511 Note that the minimal matching quantifiers, C<*?>, C<+?>, and
2512 C<??> appear to be nested quantifiers, but aren't. See L<perlre>.
2514 =item %s never introduced
2516 (S internal) The symbol in question was declared but somehow went out of
2517 scope before it could possibly have been used.
2519 =item No %s allowed while running setuid
2521 (F) Certain operations are deemed to be too insecure for a setuid or
2522 setgid script to even be allowed to attempt. Generally speaking there
2523 will be another way to do what you want that is, if not secure, at least
2524 securable. See L<perlsec>.
2526 =item No comma allowed after %s
2528 (F) A list operator that has a filehandle or "indirect object" is not
2529 allowed to have a comma between that and the following arguments.
2530 Otherwise it'd be just another one of the arguments.
2532 One possible cause for this is that you expected to have imported a
2533 constant to your name space with B<use> or B<import> while no such
2534 importing took place, it may for example be that your operating system
2535 does not support that particular constant. Hopefully you did use an
2536 explicit import list for the constants you expect to see, please see
2537 L<perlfunc/use> and L<perlfunc/import>. While an explicit import list
2538 would probably have caught this error earlier it naturally does not
2539 remedy the fact that your operating system still does not support that
2540 constant. Maybe you have a typo in the constants of the symbol import
2541 list of B<use> or B<import> or in the constant name at the line where
2542 this error was triggered?
2544 =item No command into which to pipe on command line
2546 (F) An error peculiar to VMS. Perl handles its own command line
2547 redirection, and found a '|' at the end of the command line, so it
2548 doesn't know where you want to pipe the output from this command.
2550 =item No DB::DB routine defined
2552 (F) The currently executing code was compiled with the B<-d> switch, but
2553 for some reason the current debugger (e.g. F<perl5db.pl> or a C<Devel::>
2554 module) didn't define a routine to be called at the beginning of each
2557 =item No dbm on this machine
2559 (P) This is counted as an internal error, because every machine should
2560 supply dbm nowadays, because Perl comes with SDBM. See L<SDBM_File>.
2562 =item No DB::sub routine defined
2564 (F) The currently executing code was compiled with the B<-d> switch, but
2565 for some reason the current debugger (e.g. F<perl5db.pl> or a C<Devel::>
2566 module) didn't define a C<DB::sub> routine to be called at the beginning
2567 of each ordinary subroutine call.
2569 =item No B<-e> allowed in setuid scripts
2571 (F) A setuid script can't be specified by the user.
2573 =item No error file after 2> or 2>> on command line
2575 (F) An error peculiar to VMS. Perl handles its own command line
2576 redirection, and found a '2>' or a '2>>' on the command line, but can't
2577 find the name of the file to which to write data destined for stderr.
2579 =item No group ending character '%c' found in template
2581 (F) A pack or unpack template has an opening '(' or '[' without its
2582 matching counterpart. See L<perlfunc/pack>.
2584 =item No input file after < on command line
2586 (F) An error peculiar to VMS. Perl handles its own command line
2587 redirection, and found a '<' on the command line, but can't find the
2588 name of the file from which to read data for stdin.
2592 (F) The setuid emulator requires that scripts have a well-formed #! line
2593 even on machines that don't support the #! construct.
2595 =item "no" not allowed in expression
2597 (F) The "no" keyword is recognized and executed at compile time, and
2598 returns no useful value. See L<perlmod>.
2600 =item No output file after > on command line
2602 (F) An error peculiar to VMS. Perl handles its own command line
2603 redirection, and found a lone '>' at the end of the command line, so it
2604 doesn't know where you wanted to redirect stdout.
2606 =item No output file after > or >> on command line
2608 (F) An error peculiar to VMS. Perl handles its own command line
2609 redirection, and found a '>' or a '>>' on the command line, but can't
2610 find the name of the file to which to write data destined for stdout.
2612 =item No package name allowed for variable %s in "our"
2614 (F) Fully qualified variable names are not allowed in "our"
2615 declarations, because that doesn't make much sense under existing
2616 semantics. Such syntax is reserved for future extensions.
2618 =item No Perl script found in input
2620 (F) You called C<perl -x>, but no line was found in the file beginning
2621 with #! and containing the word "perl".
2623 =item No setregid available
2625 (F) Configure didn't find anything resembling the setregid() call for
2628 =item No setreuid available
2630 (F) Configure didn't find anything resembling the setreuid() call for
2633 =item No %s specified for -%c
2635 (F) The indicated command line switch needs a mandatory argument, but
2636 you haven't specified one.
2638 =item No such class field "%s" in variable %s of type %s
2640 (F) You tried to access a key from a hash through the indicated typed variable
2641 but that key is not allowed by the package of the same type. The indicated
2642 package has restricted the set of allowed keys using the L<fields> pragma.
2644 =item No such class %s
2646 (F) You provided a class qualifier in a "my" or "our" declaration, but
2647 this class doesn't exist at this point in your program.
2649 =item No such pipe open
2651 (P) An error peculiar to VMS. The internal routine my_pclose() tried to
2652 close a pipe which hadn't been opened. This should have been caught
2653 earlier as an attempt to close an unopened filehandle.
2655 =item No such signal: SIG%s
2657 (W signal) You specified a signal name as a subscript to %SIG that was
2658 not recognized. Say C<kill -l> in your shell to see the valid signal
2659 names on your system.
2661 =item Not a CODE reference
2663 (F) Perl was trying to evaluate a reference to a code value (that is, a
2664 subroutine), but found a reference to something else instead. You can
2665 use the ref() function to find out what kind of ref it really was. See
2668 =item Not a format reference
2670 (F) I'm not sure how you managed to generate a reference to an anonymous
2671 format, but this indicates you did, and that it didn't exist.
2673 =item Not a GLOB reference
2675 (F) Perl was trying to evaluate a reference to a "typeglob" (that is, a
2676 symbol table entry that looks like C<*foo>), but found a reference to
2677 something else instead. You can use the ref() function to find out what
2678 kind of ref it really was. See L<perlref>.
2680 =item Not a HASH reference
2682 (F) Perl was trying to evaluate a reference to a hash value, but found a
2683 reference to something else instead. You can use the ref() function to
2684 find out what kind of ref it really was. See L<perlref>.
2686 =item Not an ARRAY reference
2688 (F) Perl was trying to evaluate a reference to an array value, but found
2689 a reference to something else instead. You can use the ref() function
2690 to find out what kind of ref it really was. See L<perlref>.
2692 =item Not a perl script
2694 (F) The setuid emulator requires that scripts have a well-formed #! line
2695 even on machines that don't support the #! construct. The line must
2698 =item Not a SCALAR reference
2700 (F) Perl was trying to evaluate a reference to a scalar value, but found
2701 a reference to something else instead. You can use the ref() function
2702 to find out what kind of ref it really was. See L<perlref>.
2704 =item Not a subroutine reference
2706 (F) Perl was trying to evaluate a reference to a code value (that is, a
2707 subroutine), but found a reference to something else instead. You can
2708 use the ref() function to find out what kind of ref it really was. See
2711 =item Not a subroutine reference in overload table
2713 (F) An attempt was made to specify an entry in an overloading table that
2714 doesn't somehow point to a valid subroutine. See L<overload>.
2716 =item Not enough arguments for %s
2718 (F) The function requires more arguments than you specified.
2720 =item Not enough format arguments
2722 (W syntax) A format specified more picture fields than the next line
2723 supplied. See L<perlform>.
2727 (A) You've accidentally run your script through the Bourne shell instead
2728 of Perl. Check the #! line, or manually feed your script into Perl
2731 =item no UTC offset information; assuming local time is UTC
2733 (S) A warning peculiar to VMS. Perl was unable to find the local
2734 timezone offset, so it's assuming that local system time is equivalent
2735 to UTC. If it's not, define the logical name
2736 F<SYS$TIMEZONE_DIFFERENTIAL> to translate to the number of seconds which
2737 need to be added to UTC to get local time.
2739 =item Non-string passed as bitmask
2741 (W misc) A number has been passed as a bitmask argument to select().
2742 Use the vec() function to construct the file descriptor bitmasks for
2743 select. See L<perlfunc/select>
2745 =item Null filename used
2747 (F) You can't require the null filename, especially because on many
2748 machines that means the current directory! See L<perlfunc/require>.
2750 =item NULL OP IN RUN
2752 (P debugging) Some internal routine called run() with a null opcode
2755 =item Null picture in formline
2757 (F) The first argument to formline must be a valid format picture
2758 specification. It was found to be empty, which probably means you
2759 supplied it an uninitialized value. See L<perlform>.
2763 (P) An attempt was made to realloc NULL.
2765 =item NULL regexp argument
2767 (P) The internal pattern matching routines blew it big time.
2769 =item NULL regexp parameter
2771 (P) The internal pattern matching routines are out of their gourd.
2773 =item Number too long
2775 (F) Perl limits the representation of decimal numbers in programs to
2776 about 250 characters. You've exceeded that length. Future
2777 versions of Perl are likely to eliminate this arbitrary limitation. In
2778 the meantime, try using scientific notation (e.g. "1e6" instead of
2781 =item Octal number in vector unsupported
2783 (F) Numbers with a leading C<0> are not currently allowed in vectors.
2784 The octal number interpretation of such numbers may be supported in a
2787 =item Octal number > 037777777777 non-portable
2789 (W portable) The octal number you specified is larger than 2**32-1
2790 (4294967295) and therefore non-portable between systems. See
2791 L<perlport> for more on portability concerns.
2793 See also L<perlport> for writing portable code.
2795 =item Odd number of arguments for overload::constant
2797 (W overload) The call to overload::constant contained an odd number of
2798 arguments. The arguments should come in pairs.
2800 =item Odd number of elements in anonymous hash
2802 (W misc) You specified an odd number of elements to initialize a hash,
2803 which is odd, because hashes come in key/value pairs.
2805 =item Odd number of elements in hash assignment
2807 (W misc) You specified an odd number of elements to initialize a hash,
2808 which is odd, because hashes come in key/value pairs.
2810 =item Offset outside string
2812 (F, W layer) You tried to do a read/write/send/recv/seek operation
2813 with an offset pointing outside the buffer. This is difficult to
2814 imagine. The sole exceptions to this are that zero padding will
2815 take place when going past the end of the string when either
2816 C<sysread()>ing a file, or when seeking past the end of a scalar opened
2817 for I/O (in anticipation of future reads and to imitate the behaviour
2820 =item %s() on unopened %s
2822 (W unopened) An I/O operation was attempted on a filehandle that was
2823 never initialized. You need to do an open(), a sysopen(), or a socket()
2824 call, or call a constructor from the FileHandle package.
2826 =item -%s on unopened filehandle %s
2828 (W unopened) You tried to invoke a file test operator on a filehandle
2829 that isn't open. Check your control flow. See also L<perlfunc/-X>.
2833 (S internal) An internal warning that the grammar is screwed up.
2837 (S internal) An internal warning that the grammar is screwed up.
2839 =item Opening dirhandle %s also as a file
2841 (W io deprecated) You used open() to associate a filehandle to
2842 a symbol (glob or scalar) that already holds a dirhandle.
2843 Although legal, this idiom might render your code confusing
2846 =item Opening filehandle %s also as a directory
2848 (W io deprecated) You used opendir() to associate a dirhandle to
2849 a symbol (glob or scalar) that already holds a filehandle.
2850 Although legal, this idiom might render your code confusing
2853 =item Operation "%s": no method found, %s
2855 (F) An attempt was made to perform an overloaded operation for which no
2856 handler was defined. While some handlers can be autogenerated in terms
2857 of other handlers, there is no default handler for any operation, unless
2858 C<fallback> overloading key is specified to be true. See L<overload>.
2860 =item Operator or semicolon missing before %s
2862 (S ambiguous) You used a variable or subroutine call where the parser
2863 was expecting an operator. The parser has assumed you really meant to
2864 use an operator, but this is highly likely to be incorrect. For
2865 example, if you say "*foo *foo" it will be interpreted as if you said
2868 =item "our" variable %s redeclared
2870 (W misc) You seem to have already declared the same global once before
2871 in the current lexical scope.
2873 =item Out of memory!
2875 (X) The malloc() function returned 0, indicating there was insufficient
2876 remaining memory (or virtual memory) to satisfy the request. Perl has
2877 no option but to exit immediately.
2879 At least in Unix you may be able to get past this by increasing your
2880 process datasize limits: in csh/tcsh use C<limit> and
2881 C<limit datasize n> (where C<n> is the number of kilobytes) to check
2882 the current limits and change them, and in ksh/bash/zsh use C<ulimit -a>
2883 and C<ulimit -d n>, respectively.
2885 =item Out of memory during %s extend
2887 (X) An attempt was made to extend an array, a list, or a string beyond
2888 the largest possible memory allocation.
2890 =item Out of memory during "large" request for %s
2892 (F) The malloc() function returned 0, indicating there was insufficient
2893 remaining memory (or virtual memory) to satisfy the request. However,
2894 the request was judged large enough (compile-time default is 64K), so a
2895 possibility to shut down by trapping this error is granted.
2897 =item Out of memory during request for %s
2899 (X|F) The malloc() function returned 0, indicating there was
2900 insufficient remaining memory (or virtual memory) to satisfy the
2903 The request was judged to be small, so the possibility to trap it
2904 depends on the way perl was compiled. By default it is not trappable.
2905 However, if compiled for this, Perl may use the contents of C<$^M> as an
2906 emergency pool after die()ing with this message. In this case the error
2907 is trappable I<once>, and the error message will include the line and file
2908 where the failed request happened.
2910 =item Out of memory during ridiculously large request
2912 (F) You can't allocate more than 2^31+"small amount" bytes. This error
2913 is most likely to be caused by a typo in the Perl program. e.g.,
2914 C<$arr[time]> instead of C<$arr[$time]>.
2916 =item Out of memory for yacc stack
2918 (F) The yacc parser wanted to grow its stack so it could continue
2919 parsing, but realloc() wouldn't give it more memory, virtual or
2922 =item '.' outside of string in pack
2924 (F) The argument to a '.' in your template tried to move the working
2925 position to before the start of the packed string being built.
2927 =item '@' outside of string in unpack
2929 (F) You had a template that specified an absolute position outside
2930 the string being unpacked. See L<perlfunc/pack>.
2932 =item '@' outside of string with malformed UTF-8 in unpack
2934 (F) You had a template that specified an absolute position outside
2935 the string being unpacked. The string being unpacked was also invalid
2936 UTF-8. See L<perlfunc/pack>.
2938 =item %s package attribute may clash with future reserved word: %s
2940 (W reserved) A lowercase attribute name was used that had a
2941 package-specific handler. That name might have a meaning to Perl itself
2942 some day, even though it doesn't yet. Perhaps you should use a
2943 mixed-case attribute name, instead. See L<attributes>.
2945 =item pack/unpack repeat count overflow
2947 (F) You can't specify a repeat count so large that it overflows your
2948 signed integers. See L<perlfunc/pack>.
2952 (W io) A single call to write() produced more lines than can fit on a
2953 page. See L<perlform>.
2957 (P) An internal error.
2959 =item panic: attempt to call %s in %s
2961 (P) One of the file test operators entered a code branch that calls
2962 an ACL related-function, but that function is not available on this
2963 platform. Earlier checks mean that it should not be possible to
2964 enter this branch on this platform.
2966 =item panic: ck_grep
2968 (P) Failed an internal consistency check trying to compile a grep.
2970 =item panic: ck_split
2972 (P) Failed an internal consistency check trying to compile a split.
2974 =item panic: corrupt saved stack index
2976 (P) The savestack was requested to restore more localized values than
2977 there are in the savestack.
2979 =item panic: del_backref
2981 (P) Failed an internal consistency check while trying to reset a weak
2984 =item panic: Devel::DProf inconsistent subroutine return
2986 (P) Devel::DProf called a subroutine that exited using goto(LABEL),
2987 last(LABEL) or next(LABEL). Leaving that way a subroutine called from
2988 an XSUB will lead very probably to a crash of the interpreter. This is
2989 a bug that will hopefully one day get fixed.
2993 (P) We popped the context stack to an eval context, and then discovered
2994 it wasn't an eval context.
2996 =item panic: do_subst
2998 (P) The internal pp_subst() routine was called with invalid operational
3001 =item panic: do_trans_%s
3003 (P) The internal do_trans routines were called with invalid operational
3006 =item panic: fold_constants JMPENV_PUSH returned %d
3008 (P) While attempting folding constants an exception other than an C<eval>
3013 (P) The library function frexp() failed, making printf("%f") impossible.
3017 (P) We popped the context stack to a context with the specified label,
3018 and then discovered it wasn't a context we know how to do a goto in.
3020 =item panic: hfreeentries failed to free hash
3022 (P) The internal routine used to clear a hashes entries tried repeatedly,
3023 but each time something added more entries to the hash. Most likely the hash
3024 contains an object with a reference back to the hash and a destructor that
3025 adds a new object to the hash.
3027 =item panic: INTERPCASEMOD
3029 (P) The lexer got into a bad state at a case modifier.
3031 =item panic: INTERPCONCAT
3033 (P) The lexer got into a bad state parsing a string with brackets.
3035 =item panic: kid popen errno read
3037 (F) forked child returned an incomprehensible message about its errno.
3041 (P) We popped the context stack to a block context, and then discovered
3042 it wasn't a block context.
3044 =item panic: leave_scope clearsv
3046 (P) A writable lexical variable became read-only somehow within the
3049 =item panic: leave_scope inconsistency
3051 (P) The savestack probably got out of sync. At least, there was an
3052 invalid enum on the top of it.
3054 =item panic: magic_killbackrefs
3056 (P) Failed an internal consistency check while trying to reset all weak
3057 references to an object.
3061 (P) Something requested a negative number of bytes of malloc.
3063 =item panic: memory wrap
3065 (P) Something tried to allocate more memory than possible.
3067 =item panic: pad_alloc
3069 (P) The compiler got confused about which scratch pad it was allocating
3070 and freeing temporaries and lexicals from.
3072 =item panic: pad_free curpad
3074 (P) The compiler got confused about which scratch pad it was allocating
3075 and freeing temporaries and lexicals from.
3077 =item panic: pad_free po
3079 (P) An invalid scratch pad offset was detected internally.
3081 =item panic: pad_reset curpad
3083 (P) The compiler got confused about which scratch pad it was allocating
3084 and freeing temporaries and lexicals from.
3086 =item panic: pad_sv po
3088 (P) An invalid scratch pad offset was detected internally.
3090 =item panic: pad_swipe curpad
3092 (P) The compiler got confused about which scratch pad it was allocating
3093 and freeing temporaries and lexicals from.
3095 =item panic: pad_swipe po
3097 (P) An invalid scratch pad offset was detected internally.
3099 =item panic: pp_iter
3101 (P) The foreach iterator got called in a non-loop context frame.
3103 =item panic: pp_match%s
3105 (P) The internal pp_match() routine was called with invalid operational
3108 =item panic: pp_split
3110 (P) Something terrible went wrong in setting up for the split.
3112 =item panic: realloc
3114 (P) Something requested a negative number of bytes of realloc.
3116 =item panic: restartop
3118 (P) Some internal routine requested a goto (or something like it), and
3119 didn't supply the destination.
3123 (P) We popped the context stack to a subroutine or eval context, and
3124 then discovered it wasn't a subroutine or eval context.
3126 =item panic: scan_num
3128 (P) scan_num() got called on something that wasn't a number.
3130 =item panic: sv_insert
3132 (P) The sv_insert() routine was told to remove more string than there
3135 =item panic: top_env
3137 (P) The compiler attempted to do a goto, or something weird like that.
3139 =item panic: unimplemented op %s (#%d) called
3141 (P) The compiler is screwed up and attempted to use an op that isn't permitted
3144 =item panic: utf16_to_utf8: odd bytelen
3146 (P) Something tried to call utf16_to_utf8 with an odd (as opposed
3147 to even) byte length.
3151 (P) The lexer got into a bad state while processing a case modifier.
3153 =item Pattern subroutine nesting without pos change exceeded limit in regex; marked by <-- HERE in m/%s/
3155 (F) You used a pattern that uses too many nested subpattern calls without
3156 consuming any text. Restructure the pattern so text is consumed before the
3157 nesting limit is exceeded.
3159 The <-- HERE shows in the regular expression about where the problem was
3162 =item Parentheses missing around "%s" list
3164 (W parenthesis) You said something like
3170 my ($foo, $bar) = @_;
3172 Remember that "my", "our", and "local" bind tighter than comma.
3174 =item C<-p> destination: %s
3176 (F) An error occurred during the implicit output invoked by the C<-p>
3177 command-line switch. (This output goes to STDOUT unless you've
3178 redirected it with select().)
3180 =item (perhaps you forgot to load "%s"?)
3182 (F) This is an educated guess made in conjunction with the message
3183 "Can't locate object method \"%s\" via package \"%s\"". It often means
3184 that a method requires a package that has not been loaded.
3186 =item Perl_my_%s() not available
3188 (F) Your platform has very uncommon byte-order and integer size,
3189 so it was not possible to set up some or all fixed-width byte-order
3190 conversion functions. This is only a problem when you're using the
3191 '<' or '>' modifiers in (un)pack templates. See L<perlfunc/pack>.
3193 =item Perl %s required--this is only version %s, stopped
3195 (F) The module in question uses features of a version of Perl more
3196 recent than the currently running version. How long has it been since
3197 you upgraded, anyway? See L<perlfunc/require>.
3199 =item PERL_SH_DIR too long
3201 (F) An error peculiar to OS/2. PERL_SH_DIR is the directory to find the
3202 C<sh>-shell in. See "PERL_SH_DIR" in L<perlos2>.
3204 =item PERL_SIGNALS illegal: "%s"
3206 See L<perlrun/PERL_SIGNALS> for legal values.
3208 =item perl: warning: Setting locale failed.
3210 (S) The whole warning message will look something like:
3212 perl: warning: Setting locale failed.
3213 perl: warning: Please check that your locale settings:
3216 are supported and installed on your system.
3217 perl: warning: Falling back to the standard locale ("C").
3219 Exactly what were the failed locale settings varies. In the above the
3220 settings were that the LC_ALL was "En_US" and the LANG had no value.
3221 This error means that Perl detected that you and/or your operating
3222 system supplier and/or system administrator have set up the so-called
3223 locale system but Perl could not use those settings. This was not
3224 dead serious, fortunately: there is a "default locale" called "C" that
3225 Perl can and will use, the script will be run. Before you really fix
3226 the problem, however, you will get the same error message each time
3227 you run Perl. How to really fix the problem can be found in
3228 L<perllocale> section B<LOCALE PROBLEMS>.
3230 =item Permission denied
3232 (F) The setuid emulator in suidperl decided you were up to no good.
3234 =item pid %x not a child
3236 (W exec) A warning peculiar to VMS. Waitpid() was asked to wait for a
3237 process which isn't a subprocess of the current process. While this is
3238 fine from VMS' perspective, it's probably not what you intended.
3240 =item 'P' must have an explicit size in unpack
3242 (F) The unpack format P must have an explicit size, not "*".
3244 =item B<-P> not allowed for setuid/setgid script
3246 (F) The script would have to be opened by the C preprocessor by name,
3247 which provides a race condition that breaks security.
3249 =item POSIX class [:%s:] unknown in regex; marked by <-- HERE in m/%s/
3251 (F) The class in the character class [: :] syntax is unknown. The <-- HERE
3252 shows in the regular expression about where the problem was discovered.
3253 Note that the POSIX character classes do B<not> have the C<is> prefix
3254 the corresponding C interfaces have: in other words, it's C<[[:print:]]>,
3255 not C<isprint>. See L<perlre>.
3257 =item POSIX getpgrp can't take an argument
3259 (F) Your system has POSIX getpgrp(), which takes no argument, unlike
3260 the BSD version, which takes a pid.
3262 =item POSIX syntax [%s] belongs inside character classes in regex; marked by <-- HERE in m/%s/
3264 (W regexp) The character class constructs [: :], [= =], and [. .] go
3265 I<inside> character classes, the [] are part of the construct, for example:
3266 /[012[:alpha:]345]/. Note that [= =] and [. .] are not currently
3267 implemented; they are simply placeholders for future extensions and will
3268 cause fatal errors. The <-- HERE shows in the regular expression about
3269 where the problem was discovered. See L<perlre>.
3271 =item POSIX syntax [. .] is reserved for future extensions in regex; marked by <-- HERE in m/%s/
3273 (F regexp) Within regular expression character classes ([]) the syntax
3274 beginning with "[." and ending with ".]" is reserved for future extensions.
3275 If you need to represent those character sequences inside a regular
3276 expression character class, just quote the square brackets with the
3277 backslash: "\[." and ".\]". The <-- HERE shows in the regular expression
3278 about where the problem was discovered. See L<perlre>.
3280 =item POSIX syntax [= =] is reserved for future extensions in regex; marked by <-- HERE in m/%s/
3282 (F) Within regular expression character classes ([]) the syntax beginning
3283 with "[=" and ending with "=]" is reserved for future extensions. If you
3284 need to represent those character sequences inside a regular expression
3285 character class, just quote the square brackets with the backslash: "\[="
3286 and "=\]". The <-- HERE shows in the regular expression about where the
3287 problem was discovered. See L<perlre>.
3289 =item Possible attempt to put comments in qw() list
3291 (W qw) qw() lists contain items separated by whitespace; as with literal
3292 strings, comment characters are not ignored, but are instead treated as
3293 literal data. (You may have used different delimiters than the
3294 parentheses shown here; braces are also frequently used.)
3296 You probably wrote something like this:
3303 when you should have written this:
3310 If you really want comments, build your list the
3311 old-fashioned way, with quotes and commas:
3315 'b', # another comment
3318 =item Possible attempt to separate words with commas
3320 (W qw) qw() lists contain items separated by whitespace; therefore
3321 commas aren't needed to separate the items. (You may have used
3322 different delimiters than the parentheses shown here; braces are also
3325 You probably wrote something like this:
3329 which puts literal commas into some of the list items. Write it without
3330 commas if you don't want them to appear in your data:
3334 =item Possible memory corruption: %s overflowed 3rd argument
3336 (F) An ioctl() or fcntl() returned more than Perl was bargaining for.
3337 Perl guesses a reasonable buffer size, but puts a sentinel byte at the
3338 end of the buffer just in case. This sentinel byte got clobbered, and
3339 Perl assumes that memory is now corrupted. See L<perlfunc/ioctl>.
3341 =item Possible precedence problem on bitwise %c operator
3343 (W precedence) Your program uses a bitwise logical operator in conjunction
3344 with a numeric comparison operator, like this :
3346 if ($x & $y == 0) { ... }
3348 This expression is actually equivalent to C<$x & ($y == 0)>, due to the
3349 higher precedence of C<==>. This is probably not what you want. (If you
3350 really meant to write this, disable the warning, or, better, put the
3351 parentheses explicitly and write C<$x & ($y == 0)>).
3353 =item Possible unintended interpolation of %s in string
3355 (W ambiguous) You said something like `@foo' in a double-quoted string
3356 but there was no array C<@foo> in scope at the time. If you wanted a
3357 literal @foo, then write it as \@foo; otherwise find out what happened
3358 to the array you apparently lost track of.
3360 =item pragma "attrs" is deprecated, use "sub NAME : ATTRS" instead
3362 (D deprecated) You have written something like this:
3366 use attrs qw(locked);
3369 You should use the new declaration syntax instead.
3375 The C<use attrs> pragma is now obsolete, and is only provided for
3376 backward-compatibility. See L<perlsub/"Subroutine Attributes">.
3378 =item Precedence problem: open %s should be open(%s)
3380 (S precedence) The old irregular construct
3384 is now misinterpreted as
3388 because of the strict regularization of Perl 5's grammar into unary and
3389 list operators. (The old open was a little of both.) You must put
3390 parentheses around the filehandle, or use the new "or" operator instead
3393 =item Premature end of script headers
3397 =item printf() on closed filehandle %s
3399 (W closed) The filehandle you're writing to got itself closed sometime
3400 before now. Check your control flow.
3402 =item print() on closed filehandle %s
3404 (W closed) The filehandle you're printing on got itself closed sometime
3405 before now. Check your control flow.
3407 =item Process terminated by SIG%s
3409 (W) This is a standard message issued by OS/2 applications, while *nix
3410 applications die in silence. It is considered a feature of the OS/2
3411 port. One can easily disable this by appropriate sighandlers, see
3412 L<perlipc/"Signals">. See also "Process terminated by SIGTERM/SIGINT"
3415 =item Prototype mismatch: %s vs %s
3417 (S prototype) The subroutine being declared or defined had previously been
3418 declared or defined with a different function prototype.
3420 =item Prototype not terminated
3422 (F) You've omitted the closing parenthesis in a function prototype
3425 =item Quantifier follows nothing in regex; marked by <-- HERE in m/%s/
3427 (F) You started a regular expression with a quantifier. Backslash it if you
3428 meant it literally. The <-- HERE shows in the regular expression about
3429 where the problem was discovered. See L<perlre>.
3431 =item Quantifier in {,} bigger than %d in regex; marked by <-- HERE in m/%s/
3433 (F) There is currently a limit to the size of the min and max values of the
3434 {min,max} construct. The <-- HERE shows in the regular expression about where
3435 the problem was discovered. See L<perlre>.
3437 =item Quantifier unexpected on zero-length expression; marked by <-- HERE in m/%s/
3439 (W regexp) You applied a regular expression quantifier in a place where
3440 it makes no sense, such as on a zero-width assertion. Try putting the
3441 quantifier inside the assertion instead. For example, the way to match
3442 "abc" provided that it is followed by three repetitions of "xyz" is
3443 C</abc(?=(?:xyz){3})/>, not C</abc(?=xyz){3}/>.
3445 The <-- HERE shows in the regular expression about where the problem was
3448 =item Range iterator outside integer range
3450 (F) One (or both) of the numeric arguments to the range operator ".."
3451 are outside the range which can be represented by integers internally.
3452 One possible workaround is to force Perl to use magical string increment
3453 by prepending "0" to your numbers.
3455 =item readdir() attempted on invalid dirhandle %s
3457 (W io) The dirhandle you're reading from is either closed or not really
3458 a dirhandle. Check your control flow.
3460 =item readline() on closed filehandle %s
3462 (W closed) The filehandle you're reading from got itself closed sometime
3463 before now. Check your control flow.
3465 =item read() on closed filehandle %s
3467 (W closed) You tried to read from a closed filehandle.
3469 =item read() on unopened filehandle %s
3471 (W unopened) You tried to read from a filehandle that was never opened.
3473 =item Reallocation too large: %lx
3475 (F) You can't allocate more than 64K on an MS-DOS machine.
3477 =item realloc() of freed memory ignored
3479 (S malloc) An internal routine called realloc() on something that had
3482 =item Recompile perl with B<-D>DEBUGGING to use B<-D> switch
3484 (F debugging) You can't use the B<-D> option unless the code to produce
3485 the desired output is compiled into Perl, which entails some overhead,
3486 which is why it's currently left out of your copy.
3488 =item Recursive inheritance detected in package '%s'
3490 (F) More than 100 levels of inheritance were used. Probably indicates
3491 an unintended loop in your inheritance hierarchy.
3493 =item Recursive inheritance detected while looking for method %s
3495 (F) More than 100 levels of inheritance were encountered while invoking
3496 a method. Probably indicates an unintended loop in your inheritance
3499 =item Reference found where even-sized list expected
3501 (W misc) You gave a single reference where Perl was expecting a list
3502 with an even number of elements (for assignment to a hash). This usually
3503 means that you used the anon hash constructor when you meant to use
3504 parens. In any case, a hash requires key/value B<pairs>.
3506 %hash = { one => 1, two => 2, }; # WRONG
3507 %hash = [ qw/ an anon array / ]; # WRONG
3508 %hash = ( one => 1, two => 2, ); # right
3509 %hash = qw( one 1 two 2 ); # also fine
3511 =item Reference is already weak
3513 (W misc) You have attempted to weaken a reference that is already weak.
3514 Doing so has no effect.
3516 =item Reference miscount in sv_replace()
3518 (W internal) The internal sv_replace() function was handed a new SV with
3519 a reference count of other than 1.
3521 =item Reference to nonexistent group in regex; marked by <-- HERE in m/%s/
3523 (F) You used something like C<\7> in your regular expression, but there are
3524 not at least seven sets of capturing parentheses in the expression. If you
3525 wanted to have the character with value 7 inserted into the regular expression,
3526 prepend a zero to make the number at least two digits: C<\07>
3528 The <-- HERE shows in the regular expression about where the problem was
3531 =item Reference to nonexistent or unclosed group in regex; marked by <-- HERE in m/%s/
3533 (F) You used something like C<\g{-7}> in your regular expression, but there are
3534 not at least seven sets of closed capturing parentheses in the expression before
3535 where the C<\g{-7}> was located.
3537 The <-- HERE shows in the regular expression about where the problem was
3540 =item Reference to nonexistent named group in regex; marked by <-- HERE in m/%s/
3542 (F) You used something like C<\k'NAME'> or C<< \k<NAME> >> in your regular
3543 expression, but there is no corresponding named capturing parentheses such
3544 as C<(?'NAME'...)> or C<(?<NAME>...). Check if the name has been spelled
3545 correctly both in the backreference and the declaration.
3547 The <-- HERE shows in the regular expression about where the problem was
3550 =item (?(DEFINE)....) does not allow branches in regex; marked by <-- HERE in m/%s/
3552 (F) You used something like C<(?(DEFINE)...|..)> which is illegal. The
3553 most likely cause of this error is that you left out a parenthesis inside
3554 of the C<....> part.
3556 The <-- HERE shows in the regular expression about where the problem was
3559 =item regexp memory corruption
3561 (P) The regular expression engine got confused by what the regular
3562 expression compiler gave it.
3564 =item Regexp out of space
3566 (P) A "can't happen" error, because safemalloc() should have caught it
3569 =item Repeated format line will never terminate (~~ and @# incompatible)
3571 (F) Your format contains the ~~ repeat-until-blank sequence and a
3572 numeric field that will never go blank so that the repetition never
3573 terminates. You might use ^# instead. See L<perlform>.
3575 =item Reversed %s= operator
3577 (W syntax) You wrote your assignment operator backwards. The = must
3578 always comes last, to avoid ambiguity with subsequent unary operators.
3580 =item rewinddir() attempted on invalid dirhandle %s
3582 (W io) The dirhandle you tried to do a rewinddir() on is either closed or not
3583 really a dirhandle. Check your control flow.
3585 =item Runaway format
3587 (F) Your format contained the ~~ repeat-until-blank sequence, but it
3588 produced 200 lines at once, and the 200th line looked exactly like the
3589 199th line. Apparently you didn't arrange for the arguments to exhaust
3590 themselves, either by using ^ instead of @ (for scalar variables), or by
3591 shifting or popping (for array variables). See L<perlform>.
3593 =item Scalars leaked: %d
3595 (P) Something went wrong in Perl's internal bookkeeping of scalars:
3596 not all scalar variables were deallocated by the time Perl exited.
3597 What this usually indicates is a memory leak, which is of course bad,
3598 especially if the Perl program is intended to be long-running.
3600 =item Scalar value @%s[%s] better written as $%s[%s]
3602 (W syntax) You've used an array slice (indicated by @) to select a
3603 single element of an array. Generally it's better to ask for a scalar
3604 value (indicated by $). The difference is that C<$foo[&bar]> always
3605 behaves like a scalar, both when assigning to it and when evaluating its
3606 argument, while C<@foo[&bar]> behaves like a list when you assign to it,
3607 and provides a list context to its subscript, which can do weird things
3608 if you're expecting only one subscript.
3610 On the other hand, if you were actually hoping to treat the array
3611 element as a list, you need to look into how references work, because
3612 Perl will not magically convert between scalars and lists for you. See
3615 =item Scalar value @%s{%s} better written as $%s{%s}
3617 (W syntax) You've used a hash slice (indicated by @) to select a single
3618 element of a hash. Generally it's better to ask for a scalar value
3619 (indicated by $). The difference is that C<$foo{&bar}> always behaves
3620 like a scalar, both when assigning to it and when evaluating its
3621 argument, while C<@foo{&bar}> behaves like a list when you assign to it,
3622 and provides a list context to its subscript, which can do weird things
3623 if you're expecting only one subscript.
3625 On the other hand, if you were actually hoping to treat the hash element
3626 as a list, you need to look into how references work, because Perl will
3627 not magically convert between scalars and lists for you. See
3630 =item Script is not setuid/setgid in suidperl
3632 (F) Oddly, the suidperl program was invoked on a script without a setuid
3633 or setgid bit set. This doesn't make much sense.
3635 =item Search pattern not terminated
3637 (F) The lexer couldn't find the final delimiter of a // or m{}
3638 construct. Remember that bracketing delimiters count nesting level.
3639 Missing the leading C<$> from a variable C<$m> may cause this error.
3641 Note that since Perl 5.9.0 a // can also be the I<defined-or>
3642 construct, not just the empty search pattern. Therefore code written
3643 in Perl 5.9.0 or later that uses the // as the I<defined-or> can be
3644 misparsed by pre-5.9.0 Perls as a non-terminated search pattern.
3646 =item Search pattern not terminated or ternary operator parsed as search pattern
3648 (F) The lexer couldn't find the final delimiter of a C<?PATTERN?>
3651 The question mark is also used as part of the ternary operator (as in
3652 C<foo ? 0 : 1>) leading to some ambiguous constructions being wrongly
3653 parsed. One way to disambiguate the parsing is to put parentheses around
3654 the conditional expression, i.e. C<(foo) ? 0 : 1>.
3656 =item %sseek() on unopened filehandle
3658 (W unopened) You tried to use the seek() or sysseek() function on a
3659 filehandle that was either never opened or has since been closed.
3661 =item seekdir() attempted on invalid dirhandle %s
3663 (W io) The dirhandle you are doing a seekdir() on is either closed or not
3664 really a dirhandle. Check your control flow.
3666 =item select not implemented
3668 (F) This machine doesn't implement the select() system call.
3670 =item Self-ties of arrays and hashes are not supported
3672 (F) Self-ties are of arrays and hashes are not supported in
3673 the current implementation.
3675 =item Semicolon seems to be missing
3677 (W semicolon) A nearby syntax error was probably caused by a missing
3678 semicolon, or possibly some other missing operator, such as a comma.
3680 =item semi-panic: attempt to dup freed string
3682 (S internal) The internal newSVsv() routine was called to duplicate a
3683 scalar that had previously been marked as free.
3685 =item sem%s not implemented
3687 (F) You don't have System V semaphore IPC on your system.
3689 =item send() on closed socket %s
3691 (W closed) The socket you're sending to got itself closed sometime
3692 before now. Check your control flow.
3694 =item Sequence (? incomplete in regex; marked by <-- HERE in m/%s/
3696 (F) A regular expression ended with an incomplete extension (?. The <-- HERE
3697 shows in the regular expression about where the problem was discovered. See
3700 =item Sequence (?%s...) not implemented in regex; marked by <-- HERE in m/%s/
3702 (F) A proposed regular expression extension has the character reserved but
3703 has not yet been written. The <-- HERE shows in the regular expression about
3704 where the problem was discovered. See L<perlre>.
3706 =item Sequence (?%s...) not recognized in regex; marked by <-- HERE in m/%s/
3708 (F) You used a regular expression extension that doesn't make sense. The
3709 <-- HERE shows in the regular expression about where the problem was
3710 discovered. See L<perlre>.
3712 =item Sequence \\%s... not terminated in regex; marked by <-- HERE in m/%s/
3714 (F) The regular expression expects a mandatory argument following the escape
3715 sequence and this has been omitted or incorrectly written.
3717 =item Sequence (?#... not terminated in regex; marked by <-- HERE in m/%s/
3719 (F) A regular expression comment must be terminated by a closing
3720 parenthesis. Embedded parentheses aren't allowed. The <-- HERE shows in
3721 the regular expression about where the problem was discovered. See
3724 =item Sequence (?{...}) not terminated or not {}-balanced in regex; marked by <-- HERE in m/%s/
3726 (F) If the contents of a (?{...}) clause contains braces, they must balance
3727 for Perl to properly detect the end of the clause. The <-- HERE shows in
3728 the regular expression about where the problem was discovered. See
3731 =item 500 Server error
3737 This is the error message generally seen in a browser window when trying
3738 to run a CGI program (including SSI) over the web. The actual error text
3739 varies widely from server to server. The most frequently-seen variants
3740 are "500 Server error", "Method (something) not permitted", "Document
3741 contains no data", "Premature end of script headers", and "Did not
3742 produce a valid header".
3744 B<This is a CGI error, not a Perl error>.
3746 You need to make sure your script is executable, is accessible by the
3747 user CGI is running the script under (which is probably not the user
3748 account you tested it under), does not rely on any environment variables
3749 (like PATH) from the user it isn't running under, and isn't in a
3750 location where the CGI server can't find it, basically, more or less.
3751 Please see the following for more information:
3753 http://www.perl.org/CGI_MetaFAQ.html
3754 http://www.htmlhelp.org/faq/cgifaq.html
3755 http://www.w3.org/Security/Faq/
3757 You should also look at L<perlfaq9>.
3759 =item setegid() not implemented
3761 (F) You tried to assign to C<$)>, and your operating system doesn't
3762 support the setegid() system call (or equivalent), or at least Configure
3765 =item seteuid() not implemented
3767 (F) You tried to assign to C<< $> >>, and your operating system doesn't
3768 support the seteuid() system call (or equivalent), or at least Configure
3771 =item setpgrp can't take arguments
3773 (F) Your system has the setpgrp() from BSD 4.2, which takes no
3774 arguments, unlike POSIX setpgid(), which takes a process ID and process
3777 =item setrgid() not implemented
3779 (F) You tried to assign to C<$(>, and your operating system doesn't
3780 support the setrgid() system call (or equivalent), or at least Configure
3783 =item setruid() not implemented
3785 (F) You tried to assign to C<$<>, and your operating system doesn't
3786 support the setruid() system call (or equivalent), or at least Configure
3789 =item setsockopt() on closed socket %s
3791 (W closed) You tried to set a socket option on a closed socket. Did you
3792 forget to check the return value of your socket() call? See
3793 L<perlfunc/setsockopt>.
3795 =item Setuid/gid script is writable by world
3797 (F) The setuid emulator won't run a script that is writable by the
3798 world, because the world might have written on it already.
3800 =item Setuid script not plain file
3802 (F) The setuid emulator won't run a script that isn't read from a file,
3803 but from a socket, a pipe or another device.
3805 =item shm%s not implemented
3807 (F) You don't have System V shared memory IPC on your system.
3809 =item !=~ should be !~
3811 (W syntax) The non-matching operator is !~, not !=~. !=~ will be
3812 interpreted as the != (numeric not equal) and ~ (1's complement)
3813 operators: probably not what you intended.
3815 =item <> should be quotes
3817 (F) You wrote C<< require <file> >> when you should have written
3820 =item /%s/ should probably be written as "%s"
3822 (W syntax) You have used a pattern where Perl expected to find a string,
3823 as in the first argument to C<join>. Perl will treat the true or false
3824 result of matching the pattern against $_ as the string, which is
3825 probably not what you had in mind.
3827 =item shutdown() on closed socket %s
3829 (W closed) You tried to do a shutdown on a closed socket. Seems a bit
3832 =item SIG%s handler "%s" not defined
3834 (W signal) The signal handler named in %SIG doesn't, in fact, exist.
3835 Perhaps you put it into the wrong package?
3837 =item sort is now a reserved word
3839 (F) An ancient error message that almost nobody ever runs into anymore.
3840 But before sort was a keyword, people sometimes used it as a filehandle.
3842 =item Sort subroutine didn't return a numeric value
3844 (F) A sort comparison routine must return a number. You probably blew
3845 it by not using C<< <=> >> or C<cmp>, or by not using them correctly.
3846 See L<perlfunc/sort>.
3848 =item Sort subroutine didn't return single value
3850 (F) A sort comparison subroutine may not return a list value with more
3851 or less than one element. See L<perlfunc/sort>.
3853 =item splice() offset past end of array
3855 (W misc) You attempted to specify an offset that was past the end of
3856 the array passed to splice(). Splicing will instead commence at the end
3857 of the array, rather than past it. If this isn't what you want, try
3858 explicitly pre-extending the array by assigning $#array = $offset. See
3863 (P) The split was looping infinitely. (Obviously, a split shouldn't
3864 iterate more times than there are characters of input, which is what
3865 happened.) See L<perlfunc/split>.
3867 =item State variable %s will be reinitialized
3869 (W misc) You're declaring a C<state> variable inside a list. The list
3870 assignment will be treated by perl as a regular assignment, which means
3871 that the C<state> variable will be reinitialized each time the statement
3872 is run. The solution to have it initialized only once is to write the
3873 assignment on its own line, as in:
3877 =item Statement unlikely to be reached
3879 (W exec) You did an exec() with some statement after it other than a
3880 die(). This is almost always an error, because exec() never returns
3881 unless there was a failure. You probably wanted to use system()
3882 instead, which does return. To suppress this warning, put the exec() in
3885 =item stat() on unopened filehandle %s
3887 (W unopened) You tried to use the stat() function on a filehandle that
3888 was either never opened or has since been closed.
3890 =item Stub found while resolving method "%s" overloading "%s"
3892 (P) Overloading resolution over @ISA tree may be broken by importation
3893 stubs. Stubs should never be implicitly created, but explicit calls to
3894 C<can> may break this.
3896 =item Subroutine %s redefined
3898 (W redefine) You redefined a subroutine. To suppress this warning, say
3901 no warnings 'redefine';
3902 eval "sub name { ... }";
3905 =item Substitution loop
3907 (P) The substitution was looping infinitely. (Obviously, a substitution
3908 shouldn't iterate more times than there are characters of input, which
3909 is what happened.) See the discussion of substitution in
3910 L<perlop/"Regexp Quote-Like Operators">.
3912 =item Substitution pattern not terminated
3914 (F) The lexer couldn't find the interior delimiter of an s/// or s{}{}
3915 construct. Remember that bracketing delimiters count nesting level.
3916 Missing the leading C<$> from variable C<$s> may cause this error.
3918 =item Substitution replacement not terminated
3920 (F) The lexer couldn't find the final delimiter of an s/// or s{}{}
3921 construct. Remember that bracketing delimiters count nesting level.
3922 Missing the leading C<$> from variable C<$s> may cause this error.
3924 =item substr outside of string
3926 (W substr),(F) You tried to reference a substr() that pointed outside of
3927 a string. That is, the absolute value of the offset was larger than the
3928 length of the string. See L<perlfunc/substr>. This warning is fatal if
3929 substr is used in an lvalue context (as the left hand side of an
3930 assignment or as a subroutine argument for example).
3932 =item suidperl is no longer needed since %s
3934 (F) Your Perl was compiled with B<-D>SETUID_SCRIPTS_ARE_SECURE_NOW, but
3935 a version of the setuid emulator somehow got run anyway.
3937 =item sv_upgrade from type %d down to type %d
3939 (P) Perl tried to force the upgrade an SV to a type which was actually
3940 inferior to its current type.
3942 =item Switch (?(condition)... contains too many branches in regex; marked by <-- HERE in m/%s/
3944 (F) A (?(condition)if-clause|else-clause) construct can have at most two
3945 branches (the if-clause and the else-clause). If you want one or both to
3946 contain alternation, such as using C<this|that|other>, enclose it in
3947 clustering parentheses:
3949 (?(condition)(?:this|that|other)|else-clause)
3951 The <-- HERE shows in the regular expression about where the problem was
3952 discovered. See L<perlre>.
3954 =item Switch condition not recognized in regex; marked by <-- HERE in m/%s/
3956 (F) If the argument to the (?(...)if-clause|else-clause) construct is a
3957 number, it can be only a number. The <-- HERE shows in the regular expression
3958 about where the problem was discovered. See L<perlre>.
3960 =item switching effective %s is not implemented
3962 (F) While under the C<use filetest> pragma, we cannot switch the real
3963 and effective uids or gids.
3967 (F) The final summary message when a C<perl -c> succeeds.
3971 (F) Probably means you had a syntax error. Common reasons include:
3973 A keyword is misspelled.
3974 A semicolon is missing.
3976 An opening or closing parenthesis is missing.
3977 An opening or closing brace is missing.
3978 A closing quote is missing.
3980 Often there will be another error message associated with the syntax
3981 error giving more information. (Sometimes it helps to turn on B<-w>.)
3982 The error message itself often tells you where it was in the line when
3983 it decided to give up. Sometimes the actual error is several tokens
3984 before this, because Perl is good at understanding random input.
3985 Occasionally the line number may be misleading, and once in a blue moon
3986 the only way to figure out what's triggering the error is to call
3987 C<perl -c> repeatedly, chopping away half the program each time to see
3988 if the error went away. Sort of the cybernetic version of S<20
3991 =item syntax error at line %d: `%s' unexpected
3993 (A) You've accidentally run your script through the Bourne shell instead
3994 of Perl. Check the #! line, or manually feed your script into Perl
3997 =item syntax error in file %s at line %d, next 2 tokens "%s"
3999 (F) This error is likely to occur if you run a perl5 script through
4000 a perl4 interpreter, especially if the next 2 tokens are "use strict"
4001 or "my $var" or "our $var".
4003 =item sysread() on closed filehandle %s
4005 (W closed) You tried to read from a closed filehandle.
4007 =item sysread() on unopened filehandle %s
4009 (W unopened) You tried to read from a filehandle that was never opened.
4011 =item System V %s is not implemented on this machine
4013 (F) You tried to do something with a function beginning with "sem",
4014 "shm", or "msg" but that System V IPC is not implemented in your
4015 machine. In some machines the functionality can exist but be
4016 unconfigured. Consult your system support.
4018 =item syswrite() on closed filehandle %s
4020 (W closed) The filehandle you're writing to got itself closed sometime
4021 before now. Check your control flow.
4023 =item C<-T> and C<-B> not implemented on filehandles
4025 (F) Perl can't peek at the stdio buffer of filehandles when it doesn't
4026 know about your kind of stdio. You'll have to use a filename instead.
4028 =item Target of goto is too deeply nested
4030 (F) You tried to use C<goto> to reach a label that was too deeply nested
4031 for Perl to reach. Perl is doing you a favor by refusing.
4033 =item tell() on unopened filehandle
4035 (W unopened) You tried to use the tell() function on a filehandle that
4036 was either never opened or has since been closed.
4038 =item telldir() attempted on invalid dirhandle %s
4040 (W io) The dirhandle you tried to telldir() is either closed or not really
4041 a dirhandle. Check your control flow.
4043 =item That use of $[ is unsupported
4045 (F) Assignment to C<$[> is now strictly circumscribed, and interpreted
4046 as a compiler directive. You may say only one of
4055 This is to prevent the problem of one module changing the array base out
4056 from under another module inadvertently. See L<perlvar/$[>.
4058 =item The crypt() function is unimplemented due to excessive paranoia
4060 (F) Configure couldn't find the crypt() function on your machine,
4061 probably because your vendor didn't supply it, probably because they
4062 think the U.S. Government thinks it's a secret, or at least that they
4063 will continue to pretend that it is. And if you quote me on that, I
4066 =item The %s function is unimplemented
4068 The function indicated isn't implemented on this architecture, according
4069 to the probings of Configure.
4071 =item The stat preceding %s wasn't an lstat
4073 (F) It makes no sense to test the current stat buffer for symbolic
4074 linkhood if the last stat that wrote to the stat buffer already went
4075 past the symlink to get to the real file. Use an actual filename
4078 =item The 'unique' attribute may only be applied to 'our' variables
4080 (F) This attribute was never supported on C<my> or C<sub> declarations.
4082 =item This Perl can't reset CRTL environ elements (%s)
4084 =item This Perl can't set CRTL environ elements (%s=%s)
4086 (W internal) Warnings peculiar to VMS. You tried to change or delete an
4087 element of the CRTL's internal environ array, but your copy of Perl
4088 wasn't built with a CRTL that contained the setenv() function. You'll
4089 need to rebuild Perl with a CRTL that does, or redefine
4090 F<PERL_ENV_TABLES> (see L<perlvms>) so that the environ array isn't the
4091 target of the change to
4092 %ENV which produced the warning.
4094 =item thread failed to start: %s
4096 (W threads)(S) The entry point function of threads->create() failed for some reason.
4098 =item times not implemented
4100 (F) Your version of the C library apparently doesn't do times(). I
4101 suspect you're not running on Unix.
4103 =item "-T" is on the #! line, it must also be used on the command line
4105 (X) The #! line (or local equivalent) in a Perl script contains the
4106 B<-T> option, but Perl was not invoked with B<-T> in its command line.
4107 This is an error because, by the time Perl discovers a B<-T> in a
4108 script, it's too late to properly taint everything from the environment.
4111 If the Perl script is being executed as a command using the #!
4112 mechanism (or its local equivalent), this error can usually be fixed by
4113 editing the #! line so that the B<-T> option is a part of Perl's first
4114 argument: e.g. change C<perl -n -T> to C<perl -T -n>.
4116 If the Perl script is being executed as C<perl scriptname>, then the
4117 B<-T> option must appear on the command line: C<perl -T scriptname>.
4119 =item To%s: illegal mapping '%s'
4121 (F) You tried to define a customized To-mapping for lc(), lcfirst,
4122 uc(), or ucfirst() (or their string-inlined versions), but you
4123 specified an illegal mapping.
4124 See L<perlunicode/"User-Defined Character Properties">.
4126 =item Too deeply nested ()-groups
4128 (F) Your template contains ()-groups with a ridiculously deep nesting level.
4130 =item Too few args to syscall
4132 (F) There has to be at least one argument to syscall() to specify the
4133 system call to call, silly dilly.
4135 =item Too late for "-%s" option
4137 (X) The #! line (or local equivalent) in a Perl script contains the
4138 B<-M>, B<-m> or B<-C> option. This is an error because those options
4139 are not intended for use inside scripts. Use the C<use> pragma instead.
4141 =item Too late to run %s block
4143 (W void) A CHECK or INIT block is being defined during run time proper,
4144 when the opportunity to run them has already passed. Perhaps you are
4145 loading a file with C<require> or C<do> when you should be using C<use>
4146 instead. Or perhaps you should put the C<require> or C<do> inside a
4149 =item Too many args to syscall
4151 (F) Perl supports a maximum of only 14 args to syscall().
4153 =item Too many arguments for %s
4155 (F) The function requires fewer arguments than you specified.
4159 (A) You've accidentally run your script through B<csh> instead of Perl.
4160 Check the #! line, or manually feed your script into Perl yourself.
4164 (A) You've accidentally run your script through B<csh> instead of Perl.
4165 Check the #! line, or manually feed your script into Perl yourself.
4167 =item Trailing \ in regex m/%s/
4169 (F) The regular expression ends with an unbackslashed backslash.
4170 Backslash it. See L<perlre>.
4172 =item Transliteration pattern not terminated
4174 (F) The lexer couldn't find the interior delimiter of a tr/// or tr[][]
4175 or y/// or y[][] construct. Missing the leading C<$> from variables
4176 C<$tr> or C<$y> may cause this error.
4178 =item Transliteration replacement not terminated
4180 (F) The lexer couldn't find the final delimiter of a tr///, tr[][],
4181 y/// or y[][] construct.
4183 =item '%s' trapped by operation mask
4185 (F) You tried to use an operator from a Safe compartment in which it's
4186 disallowed. See L<Safe>.
4188 =item truncate not implemented
4190 (F) Your machine doesn't implement a file truncation mechanism that
4191 Configure knows about.
4193 =item Type of arg %d to %s must be %s (not %s)
4195 (F) This function requires the argument in that position to be of a
4196 certain type. Arrays must be @NAME or C<@{EXPR}>. Hashes must be
4197 %NAME or C<%{EXPR}>. No implicit dereferencing is allowed--use the
4198 {EXPR} forms as an explicit dereference. See L<perlref>.
4200 =item umask not implemented
4202 (F) Your machine doesn't implement the umask function and you tried to
4203 use it to restrict permissions for yourself (EXPR & 0700).
4205 =item Unable to create sub named "%s"
4207 (F) You attempted to create or access a subroutine with an illegal name.
4209 =item Unbalanced context: %d more PUSHes than POPs
4211 (W internal) The exit code detected an internal inconsistency in how
4212 many execution contexts were entered and left.
4214 =item Unbalanced saves: %d more saves than restores
4216 (W internal) The exit code detected an internal inconsistency in how
4217 many values were temporarily localized.
4219 =item Unbalanced scopes: %d more ENTERs than LEAVEs
4221 (W internal) The exit code detected an internal inconsistency in how
4222 many blocks were entered and left.
4224 =item Unbalanced tmps: %d more allocs than frees
4226 (W internal) The exit code detected an internal inconsistency in how
4227 many mortal scalars were allocated and freed.
4229 =item Undefined format "%s" called
4231 (F) The format indicated doesn't seem to exist. Perhaps it's really in
4232 another package? See L<perlform>.
4234 =item Undefined sort subroutine "%s" called
4236 (F) The sort comparison routine specified doesn't seem to exist.
4237 Perhaps it's in a different package? See L<perlfunc/sort>.
4239 =item Undefined subroutine &%s called
4241 (F) The subroutine indicated hasn't been defined, or if it was, it has
4242 since been undefined.
4244 =item Undefined subroutine called
4246 (F) The anonymous subroutine you're trying to call hasn't been defined,
4247 or if it was, it has since been undefined.
4249 =item Undefined subroutine in sort
4251 (F) The sort comparison routine specified is declared but doesn't seem
4252 to have been defined yet. See L<perlfunc/sort>.
4254 =item Undefined top format "%s" called
4256 (F) The format indicated doesn't seem to exist. Perhaps it's really in
4257 another package? See L<perlform>.
4259 =item Undefined value assigned to typeglob
4261 (W misc) An undefined value was assigned to a typeglob, a la
4262 C<*foo = undef>. This does nothing. It's possible that you really mean
4265 =item %s: Undefined variable
4267 (A) You've accidentally run your script through B<csh> instead of Perl.
4268 Check the #! line, or manually feed your script into Perl yourself.
4270 =item unexec of %s into %s failed!
4272 (F) The unexec() routine failed for some reason. See your local FSF
4273 representative, who probably put it there in the first place.
4275 =item Unicode character %s is illegal
4277 (W utf8) Certain Unicode characters have been designated off-limits by
4278 the Unicode standard and should not be generated. If you really know
4279 what you are doing you can turn off this warning by C<no warnings 'utf8';>.
4281 =item Unknown BYTEORDER
4283 (F) There are no byte-swapping functions for a machine with this byte
4286 =item Unknown open() mode '%s'
4288 (F) The second argument of 3-argument open() is not among the list
4289 of valid modes: C<< < >>, C<< > >>, C<<< >> >>>, C<< +< >>,
4290 C<< +> >>, C<<< +>> >>>, C<-|>, C<|->, C<< <& >>, C<< >& >>.
4292 =item Unknown PerlIO layer "%s"
4294 (W layer) An attempt was made to push an unknown layer onto the Perl I/O
4295 system. (Layers take care of transforming data between external and
4296 internal representations.) Note that some layers, such as C<mmap>,
4297 are not supported in all environments. If your program didn't
4298 explicitly request the failing operation, it may be the result of the
4299 value of the environment variable PERLIO.
4301 =item Unknown process %x sent message to prime_env_iter: %s
4303 (P) An error peculiar to VMS. Perl was reading values for %ENV before
4304 iterating over it, and someone else stuck a message in the stream of
4305 data Perl expected. Someone's very confused, or perhaps trying to
4306 subvert Perl's population of %ENV for nefarious purposes.
4308 =item Unknown "re" subpragma '%s' (known ones are: %s)
4310 You tried to use an unknown subpragma of the "re" pragma.
4312 =item Unknown switch condition (?(%.2s in regex; marked by <-- HERE in m/%s/
4314 (F) The condition part of a (?(condition)if-clause|else-clause) construct
4315 is not known. The condition may be lookahead or lookbehind (the condition
4316 is true if the lookahead or lookbehind is true), a (?{...}) construct (the
4317 condition is true if the code evaluates to a true value), or a number (the
4318 condition is true if the set of capturing parentheses named by the number
4321 The <-- HERE shows in the regular expression about where the problem was
4322 discovered. See L<perlre>.
4324 =item Unknown Unicode option letter '%c'
4326 You specified an unknown Unicode option. See L<perlrun> documentation
4327 of the C<-C> switch for the list of known options.
4329 =item Unknown Unicode option value %x
4331 You specified an unknown Unicode option. See L<perlrun> documentation
4332 of the C<-C> switch for the list of known options.
4334 =item Unknown warnings category '%s'
4336 (F) An error issued by the C<warnings> pragma. You specified a warnings
4337 category that is unknown to perl at this point.
4339 Note that if you want to enable a warnings category registered by a module
4340 (e.g. C<use warnings 'File::Find'>), you must have imported this module
4342 =item Unknown verb pattern '%s' in regex; marked by <-- HERE in m/%s/
4344 (F) You either made a typo or have incorrectly put a C<*> quantifier
4345 after an open brace in your pattern. Check the pattern and review
4346 L<perlre> for details on legal verb patterns.
4350 =item unmatched [ in regex; marked by <-- HERE in m/%s/
4352 (F) The brackets around a character class must match. If you wish to
4353 include a closing bracket in a character class, backslash it or put it
4354 first. The <-- HERE shows in the regular expression about where the problem
4355 was discovered. See L<perlre>.
4357 =item unmatched ( in regex; marked by <-- HERE in m/%s/
4359 (F) Unbackslashed parentheses must always be balanced in regular
4360 expressions. If you're a vi user, the % key is valuable for finding the
4361 matching parenthesis. The <-- HERE shows in the regular expression about
4362 where the problem was discovered. See L<perlre>.
4364 =item Unmatched right %s bracket
4366 (F) The lexer counted more closing curly or square brackets than opening
4367 ones, so you're probably missing a matching opening bracket. As a
4368 general rule, you'll find the missing one (so to speak) near the place
4369 you were last editing.
4371 =item Unquoted string "%s" may clash with future reserved word
4373 (W reserved) You used a bareword that might someday be claimed as a
4374 reserved word. It's best to put such a word in quotes, or capitalize it
4375 somehow, or insert an underbar into it. You might also declare it as a
4378 =item Unrecognized character %s
4380 (F) The Perl parser has no idea what to do with the specified character
4381 in your Perl script (or eval). Perhaps you tried to run a compressed
4382 script, a binary program, or a directory as a Perl program.
4384 =item Unrecognized escape \\%c in character class passed through in regex; marked by <-- HERE in m/%s/
4386 (W regexp) You used a backslash-character combination which is not
4387 recognized by Perl inside character classes. The character was
4388 understood literally.
4389 The <-- HERE shows in the regular expression about where the
4390 escape was discovered.
4392 =item Unrecognized escape \\%c passed through
4394 (W misc) You used a backslash-character combination which is not
4395 recognized by Perl. The character was understood literally.
4397 =item Unrecognized escape \\%c passed through in regex; marked by <-- HERE in m/%s/
4399 (W regexp) You used a backslash-character combination which is not
4400 recognized by Perl. The character was understood literally.
4401 The <-- HERE shows in the regular expression about where the
4402 escape was discovered.
4404 =item Unrecognized signal name "%s"
4406 (F) You specified a signal name to the kill() function that was not
4407 recognized. Say C<kill -l> in your shell to see the valid signal names
4410 =item Unrecognized switch: -%s (-h will show valid options)
4412 (F) You specified an illegal option to Perl. Don't do that. (If you
4413 think you didn't do that, check the #! line to see if it's supplying the
4414 bad switch on your behalf.)
4416 =item Unsuccessful %s on filename containing newline
4418 (W newline) A file operation was attempted on a filename, and that
4419 operation failed, PROBABLY because the filename contained a newline,
4420 PROBABLY because you forgot to chomp() it off. See L<perlfunc/chomp>.
4422 =item Unsupported directory function "%s" called
4424 (F) Your machine doesn't support opendir() and readdir().
4426 =item Unsupported function %s
4428 (F) This machine doesn't implement the indicated function, apparently.
4429 At least, Configure doesn't think so.
4431 =item Unsupported function fork
4433 (F) Your version of executable does not support forking.
4435 Note that under some systems, like OS/2, there may be different flavors
4436 of Perl executables, some of which may support fork, some not. Try
4437 changing the name you call Perl by to C<perl_>, C<perl__>, and so on.
4439 =item Unsupported script encoding %s
4441 (F) Your program file begins with a Unicode Byte Order Mark (BOM) which
4442 declares it to be in a Unicode encoding that Perl cannot read.
4444 =item Unsupported socket function "%s" called
4446 (F) Your machine doesn't support the Berkeley socket mechanism, or at
4447 least that's what Configure thought.
4449 =item Unterminated attribute list
4451 (F) The lexer found something other than a simple identifier at the
4452 start of an attribute, and it wasn't a semicolon or the start of a
4453 block. Perhaps you terminated the parameter list of the previous
4454 attribute too soon. See L<attributes>.
4456 =item Unterminated attribute parameter in attribute list
4458 (F) The lexer saw an opening (left) parenthesis character while parsing
4459 an attribute list, but the matching closing (right) parenthesis
4460 character was not found. You may need to add (or remove) a backslash
4461 character to get your parentheses to balance. See L<attributes>.
4463 =item Unterminated compressed integer
4465 (F) An argument to unpack("w",...) was incompatible with the BER
4466 compressed integer format and could not be converted to an integer.
4467 See L<perlfunc/pack>.
4469 =item Unterminated verb pattern in regex; marked by <-- HERE in m/%s/
4471 (F) You used a pattern of the form C<(*VERB)> but did not terminate
4472 the pattern with a C<)>. Fix the pattern and retry.
4474 =item Unterminated verb pattern argument in regex; marked by <-- HERE in m/%s/
4476 (F) You used a pattern of the form C<(*VERB:ARG)> but did not terminate
4477 the pattern with a C<)>. Fix the pattern and retry.
4479 =item Unterminated \g{...} pattern in regex; marked by <-- HERE in m/%s/
4481 (F) You missed a close brace on a \g{..} pattern (group reference) in
4482 a regular expression. Fix the pattern and retry.
4484 =item Unterminated <> operator
4486 (F) The lexer saw a left angle bracket in a place where it was expecting
4487 a term, so it's looking for the corresponding right angle bracket, and
4488 not finding it. Chances are you left some needed parentheses out
4489 earlier in the line, and you really meant a "less than".
4491 =item untie attempted while %d inner references still exist
4493 (W untie) A copy of the object returned from C<tie> (or C<tied>) was
4494 still valid when C<untie> was called.
4496 =item Usage: POSIX::%s(%s)
4498 (F) You called a POSIX function with incorrect arguments.
4499 See L<POSIX/FUNCTIONS> for more information.
4501 =item Usage: Win32::%s(%s)
4503 (F) You called a Win32 function with incorrect arguments.
4504 See L<Win32> for more information.
4506 =item Useless (?-%s) - don't use /%s modifier in regex; marked by <-- HERE in m/%s/
4508 (W regexp) You have used an internal modifier such as (?-o) that has no
4509 meaning unless removed from the entire regexp:
4511 if ($string =~ /(?-o)$pattern/o) { ... }
4515 if ($string =~ /$pattern/) { ... }
4517 The <-- HERE shows in the regular expression about
4518 where the problem was discovered. See L<perlre>.
4520 =item Useless localization of %s
4522 (W syntax) The localization of lvalues such as C<local($x=10)> is
4523 legal, but in fact the local() currently has no effect. This may change at
4524 some point in the future, but in the meantime such code is discouraged.
4526 =item Useless (?%s) - use /%s modifier in regex; marked by <-- HERE in m/%s/
4528 (W regexp) You have used an internal modifier such as (?o) that has no
4529 meaning unless applied to the entire regexp:
4531 if ($string =~ /(?o)$pattern/) { ... }
4535 if ($string =~ /$pattern/o) { ... }
4537 The <-- HERE shows in the regular expression about
4538 where the problem was discovered. See L<perlre>.
4540 =item Useless use of %s in void context
4542 (W void) You did something without a side effect in a context that does
4543 nothing with the return value, such as a statement that doesn't return a
4544 value from a block, or the left side of a scalar comma operator. Very
4545 often this points not to stupidity on your part, but a failure of Perl
4546 to parse your program the way you thought it would. For example, you'd
4547 get this if you mixed up your C precedence with Python precedence and
4552 when you meant to say
4554 ($one, $two) = (1, 2);
4556 Another common error is to use ordinary parentheses to construct a list
4557 reference when you should be using square or curly brackets, for
4562 when you should have said
4566 The square brackets explicitly turn a list value into a scalar value,
4567 while parentheses do not. So when a parenthesized list is evaluated in
4568 a scalar context, the comma is treated like C's comma operator, which
4569 throws away the left argument, which is not what you want. See
4570 L<perlref> for more on this.
4572 This warning will not be issued for numerical constants equal to 0 or 1
4573 since they are often used in statements like
4575 1 while sub_with_side_effects();
4577 String constants that would normally evaluate to 0 or 1 are warned
4580 =item Useless use of "re" pragma
4582 (W) You did C<use re;> without any arguments. That isn't very useful.
4584 =item Useless use of sort in scalar context
4586 (W void) You used sort in scalar context, as in :
4590 This is not very useful, and perl currently optimizes this away.
4592 =item Useless use of %s with no values
4594 (W syntax) You used the push() or unshift() function with no arguments
4595 apart from the array, like C<push(@x)> or C<unshift(@foo)>. That won't
4596 usually have any effect on the array, so is completely useless. It's
4597 possible in principle that push(@tied_array) could have some effect
4598 if the array is tied to a class which implements a PUSH method. If so,
4599 you can write it as C<push(@tied_array,())> to avoid this warning.
4601 =item "use" not allowed in expression
4603 (F) The "use" keyword is recognized and executed at compile time, and
4604 returns no useful value. See L<perlmod>.
4606 =item Use of bare << to mean <<"" is deprecated
4608 (D deprecated) You are now encouraged to use the explicitly quoted form
4609 if you wish to use an empty line as the terminator of the here-document.
4611 =item Use of chdir('') or chdir(undef) as chdir() deprecated
4613 (D deprecated) chdir() with no arguments is documented to change to
4614 $ENV{HOME} or $ENV{LOGDIR}. chdir(undef) and chdir('') share this
4615 behavior, but that has been deprecated. In future versions they
4618 Be careful to check that what you pass to chdir() is defined and not
4619 blank, else you might find yourself in your home directory.
4621 =item Use of /c modifier is meaningless in s///
4623 (W regexp) You used the /c modifier in a substitution. The /c
4624 modifier is not presently meaningful in substitutions.
4626 =item Use of /c modifier is meaningless without /g
4628 (W regexp) You used the /c modifier with a regex operand, but didn't
4629 use the /g modifier. Currently, /c is meaningful only when /g is
4630 used. (This may change in the future.)
4632 =item Use of freed value in iteration
4634 (F) Perhaps you modified the iterated array within the loop?
4635 This error is typically caused by code like the following:
4638 @a = () for (1,2,@a);
4640 You are not supposed to modify arrays while they are being iterated over.
4641 For speed and efficiency reasons, Perl internally does not do full
4642 reference-counting of iterated items, hence deleting such an item in the
4643 middle of an iteration causes Perl to see a freed value.
4645 =item Use of *glob{FILEHANDLE} is deprecated
4647 (D deprecated) You are now encouraged to use the shorter *glob{IO} form
4648 to access the filehandle slot within a typeglob.
4650 =item Use of /g modifier is meaningless in split
4652 (W regexp) You used the /g modifier on the pattern for a C<split>
4653 operator. Since C<split> always tries to match the pattern
4654 repeatedly, the C</g> has no effect.
4656 =item Use of implicit split to @_ is deprecated
4658 (D deprecated) It makes a lot of work for the compiler when you clobber
4659 a subroutine's argument list, so it's better if you assign the results
4660 of a split() explicitly to an array (or list).
4662 =item Use of inherited AUTOLOAD for non-method %s() is deprecated
4664 (D deprecated) As an (ahem) accidental feature, C<AUTOLOAD> subroutines
4665 are looked up as methods (using the C<@ISA> hierarchy) even when the
4666 subroutines to be autoloaded were called as plain functions (e.g.
4667 C<Foo::bar()>), not as methods (e.g. C<< Foo->bar() >> or C<<
4670 This bug will be rectified in future by using method lookup only for
4671 methods' C<AUTOLOAD>s. However, there is a significant base of existing
4672 code that may be using the old behavior. So, as an interim step, Perl
4673 currently issues an optional warning when non-methods use inherited
4676 The simple rule is: Inheritance will not work when autoloading
4677 non-methods. The simple fix for old code is: In any module that used
4678 to depend on inheriting C<AUTOLOAD> for non-methods from a base class
4679 named C<BaseClass>, execute C<*AUTOLOAD = \&BaseClass::AUTOLOAD> during
4682 In code that currently says C<use AutoLoader; @ISA = qw(AutoLoader);>
4683 you should remove AutoLoader from @ISA and change C<use AutoLoader;> to
4684 C<use AutoLoader 'AUTOLOAD';>.
4686 =item Use of %s in printf format not supported
4688 (F) You attempted to use a feature of printf that is accessible from
4689 only C. This usually means there's a better way to do it in Perl.
4691 =item Use of %s is deprecated
4693 (D deprecated) The construct indicated is no longer recommended for use,
4694 generally because there's a better way to do it, and also because the
4695 old way has bad side effects.
4697 =item Use of -l on filehandle %s
4699 (W io) A filehandle represents an opened file, and when you opened the file
4700 it already went past any symlink you are presumably trying to look for.
4701 The operation returned C<undef>. Use a filename instead.
4703 =item Use of "package" with no arguments is deprecated
4705 (D deprecated) You used the C<package> keyword without specifying a package
4706 name. So no namespace is current at all. Using this can cause many
4707 otherwise reasonable constructs to fail in baffling ways. C<use strict;>
4710 =item Use of reference "%s" as array index
4712 (W misc) You tried to use a reference as an array index; this probably
4713 isn't what you mean, because references in numerical context tend
4714 to be huge numbers, and so usually indicates programmer error.
4716 If you really do mean it, explicitly numify your reference, like so:
4717 C<$array[0+$ref]>. This warning is not given for overloaded objects,
4718 either, because you can overload the numification and stringification
4719 operators and then you assumedly know what you are doing.
4721 =item Use of reserved word "%s" is deprecated
4723 (D deprecated) The indicated bareword is a reserved word. Future
4724 versions of perl may use it as a keyword, so you're better off either
4725 explicitly quoting the word in a manner appropriate for its context of
4726 use, or using a different name altogether. The warning can be
4727 suppressed for subroutine names by either adding a C<&> prefix, or using
4728 a package qualifier, e.g. C<&our()>, or C<Foo::our()>.
4730 =item Use of tainted arguments in %s is deprecated
4732 (W taint, deprecated) You have supplied C<system()> or C<exec()> with multiple
4733 arguments and at least one of them is tainted. This used to be allowed
4734 but will become a fatal error in a future version of perl. Untaint your
4735 arguments. See L<perlsec>.
4737 =item Use of uninitialized value%s
4739 (W uninitialized) An undefined value was used as if it were already
4740 defined. It was interpreted as a "" or a 0, but maybe it was a mistake.
4741 To suppress this warning assign a defined value to your variables.
4743 To help you figure out what was undefined, perl will try to tell you the
4744 name of the variable (if any) that was undefined. In some cases it cannot
4745 do this, so it also tells you what operation you used the undefined value
4746 in. Note, however, that perl optimizes your program and the operation
4747 displayed in the warning may not necessarily appear literally in your
4748 program. For example, C<"that $foo"> is usually optimized into C<"that "
4749 . $foo>, and the warning will refer to the C<concatenation (.)> operator,
4750 even though there is no C<.> in your program.
4752 =item Using a hash as a reference is deprecated
4754 (D deprecated) You tried to use a hash as a reference, as in
4755 C<< %foo->{"bar"} >> or C<< %$ref->{"hello"} >>. Versions of perl <= 5.6.1
4756 used to allow this syntax, but shouldn't have. It is now deprecated, and will
4757 be removed in a future version.
4759 =item Using an array as a reference is deprecated
4761 (D deprecated) You tried to use an array as a reference, as in
4762 C<< @foo->[23] >> or C<< @$ref->[99] >>. Versions of perl <= 5.6.1 used to
4763 allow this syntax, but shouldn't have. It is now deprecated, and will be
4764 removed in a future version.
4766 =item UTF-16 surrogate %s
4768 (W utf8) You tried to generate half of an UTF-16 surrogate by
4769 requesting a Unicode character between the code points 0xD800 and
4770 0xDFFF (inclusive). That range is reserved exclusively for the use of
4771 UTF-16 encoding (by having two 16-bit UCS-2 characters); but Perl
4772 encodes its characters in UTF-8, so what you got is a very illegal
4773 character. If you really know what you are doing you can turn off
4774 this warning by C<no warnings 'utf8';>.
4776 =item Value of %s can be "0"; test with defined()
4778 (W misc) In a conditional expression, you used <HANDLE>, <*> (glob),
4779 C<each()>, or C<readdir()> as a boolean value. Each of these constructs
4780 can return a value of "0"; that would make the conditional expression
4781 false, which is probably not what you intended. When using these
4782 constructs in conditional expressions, test their values with the
4783 C<defined> operator.
4785 =item Value of CLI symbol "%s" too long
4787 (W misc) A warning peculiar to VMS. Perl tried to read the value of an
4788 %ENV element from a CLI symbol table, and found a resultant string
4789 longer than 1024 characters. The return value has been truncated to
4792 =item Variable "%s" is not available
4794 (W closure) During compilation, an inner named subroutine or eval is
4795 attempting to capture an outer lexical that is not currently available.
4796 This can happen for one of two reasons. First, the outer lexical may be
4797 declared in an outer anonymous subroutine that has not yet been created.
4798 (Remember that named subs are created at compile time, while anonymous
4799 subs are created at run-time.) For example,
4801 sub { my $a; sub f { $a } }
4803 At the time that f is created, it can't capture the current value of $a,
4804 since the anonymous subroutine hasn't been created yet. Conversely,
4805 the following won't give a warning since the anonymous subroutine has by
4806 now been created and is live:
4808 sub { my $a; eval 'sub f { $a }' }->();
4810 The second situation is caused by an eval accessing a variable that has
4811 gone out of scope, for example,
4819 Here, when the '$a' in the eval is being compiled, f() is not currently being
4820 executed, so its $a is not available for capture.
4822 =item Variable "%s" is not imported%s
4824 (F) While "use strict" in effect, you referred to a global variable that
4825 you apparently thought was imported from another module, because
4826 something else of the same name (usually a subroutine) is exported by
4827 that module. It usually means you put the wrong funny character on the
4828 front of your variable.
4830 =item Variable length lookbehind not implemented in m/%s/
4832 (F) Lookbehind is allowed only for subexpressions whose length is fixed and
4833 known at compile time. See L<perlre>.
4835 =item "%s" variable %s masks earlier declaration in same %s
4837 (W misc) A "my" or "our" variable has been redeclared in the current
4838 scope or statement, effectively eliminating all access to the previous
4839 instance. This is almost always a typographical error. Note that the
4840 earlier variable will still exist until the end of the scope or until
4841 all closure referents to it are destroyed.
4843 =item Variable syntax
4845 (A) You've accidentally run your script through B<csh> instead
4846 of Perl. Check the #! line, or manually feed your script into
4849 =item Variable "%s" will not stay shared
4851 (W closure) An inner (nested) I<named> subroutine is referencing a
4852 lexical variable defined in an outer named subroutine.
4854 When the inner subroutine is called, it will see the value of
4855 the outer subroutine's variable as it was before and during the *first*
4856 call to the outer subroutine; in this case, after the first call to the
4857 outer subroutine is complete, the inner and outer subroutines will no
4858 longer share a common value for the variable. In other words, the
4859 variable will no longer be shared.
4861 This problem can usually be solved by making the inner subroutine
4862 anonymous, using the C<sub {}> syntax. When inner anonymous subs that
4863 reference variables in outer subroutines are created, they
4864 are automatically rebound to the current values of such variables.
4866 =item Verb pattern '%s' has a mandatory argument in regex; marked by <-- HERE in m/%s/
4868 (F) You used a verb pattern that requires an argument. Supply an argument
4869 or check that you are using the right verb.
4871 =item Verb pattern '%s' may not have an argument in regex; marked by <-- HERE in m/%s/
4873 (F) You used a verb pattern that is not allowed an argument. Remove the
4874 argument or check that you are using the right verb.
4876 =item Version number must be a constant number
4878 (P) The attempt to translate a C<use Module n.n LIST> statement into
4879 its equivalent C<BEGIN> block found an internal inconsistency with
4882 =item Version string '%s' contains invalid data; ignoring: '%s'
4884 (W misc) The version string contains invalid characters at the end, which
4887 =item v-string in use/require is non-portable
4889 (W portable) The use of v-strings is non-portable to older, pre-5.6, Perls.
4890 If you want your scripts to be backward portable, use the floating
4891 point version number: for example, instead of C<use 5.6.1> say
4892 C<use 5.006_001>. This of course won't help: the older Perls
4893 won't suddenly start understanding newer features, but at least
4894 they will show a sensible error message indicating the required
4897 =item Warning: something's wrong
4899 (W) You passed warn() an empty string (the equivalent of C<warn "">) or
4900 you called it with no args and C<$@> was empty.
4902 =item Warning: unable to close filehandle %s properly
4904 (S) The implicit close() done by an open() got an error indication on
4905 the close(). This usually indicates your file system ran out of disk
4908 =item Warning: Use of "%s" without parentheses is ambiguous
4910 (S ambiguous) You wrote a unary operator followed by something that
4911 looks like a binary operator that could also have been interpreted as a
4912 term or unary operator. For instance, if you know that the rand
4913 function has a default argument of 1.0, and you write
4917 you may THINK you wrote the same thing as
4921 but in actual fact, you got
4925 So put in parentheses to say what you really mean.
4927 =item Wide character in %s
4929 (W utf8) Perl met a wide character (>255) when it wasn't expecting
4930 one. This warning is by default on for I/O (like print). The easiest
4931 way to quiet this warning is simply to add the C<:utf8> layer to the
4932 output, e.g. C<binmode STDOUT, ':utf8'>. Another way to turn off the
4933 warning is to add C<no warnings 'utf8';> but that is often closer to
4934 cheating. In general, you are supposed to explicitly mark the
4935 filehandle with an encoding, see L<open> and L<perlfunc/binmode>.
4937 =item Within []-length '%c' not allowed
4939 (F) The count in the (un)pack template may be replaced by C<[TEMPLATE]> only if
4940 C<TEMPLATE> always matches the same amount of packed bytes that can be
4941 determined from the template alone. This is not possible if it contains an
4942 of the codes @, /, U, u, w or a *-length. Redesign the template.
4944 =item write() on closed filehandle %s
4946 (W closed) The filehandle you're writing to got itself closed sometime
4947 before now. Check your control flow.
4949 =item %s "\x%s" does not map to Unicode
4951 When reading in different encodings Perl tries to map everything
4952 into Unicode characters. The bytes you read in are not legal in
4953 this encoding, for example
4955 utf8 "\xE4" does not map to Unicode
4957 if you try to read in the a-diaereses Latin-1 as UTF-8.
4959 =item 'X' outside of string
4961 (F) You had a (un)pack template that specified a relative position before
4962 the beginning of the string being (un)packed. See L<perlfunc/pack>.
4964 =item 'x' outside of string in unpack
4966 (F) You had a pack template that specified a relative position after
4967 the end of the string being unpacked. See L<perlfunc/pack>.
4969 =item YOU HAVEN'T DISABLED SET-ID SCRIPTS IN THE KERNEL YET!
4971 (F) And you probably never will, because you probably don't have the
4972 sources to your kernel, and your vendor probably doesn't give a rip
4973 about what you want. Your best bet is to put a setuid C wrapper around
4976 =item You need to quote "%s"
4978 (W syntax) You assigned a bareword as a signal handler name.
4979 Unfortunately, you already have a subroutine of that name declared,
4980 which means that Perl 5 will try to call the subroutine when the
4981 assignment is executed, which is probably not what you want. (If it IS
4982 what you want, put an & in front.)
4984 =item Your random numbers are not that random
4986 (F) When trying to initialise the random seed for hashes, Perl could
4987 not get any randomness out of your system. This usually indicates
4988 Something Very Wrong.