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 A thread exited while %d other threads were still running
49 (W) When using threaded Perl, a thread (not necessarily the main
50 thread) exited while there were still other threads running.
51 Usually it's a good idea to first collect the return values of the
52 created threads by joining them, and only then exit from the main
53 thread. See L<threads>.
55 =item accept() on closed socket %s
57 (W closed) You tried to do an accept on a closed socket. Did you forget
58 to check the return value of your socket() call? See
61 =item Allocation too large: %lx
63 (X) You can't allocate more than 64K on an MS-DOS machine.
65 =item '!' allowed only after types %s
67 (F) The '!' is allowed in pack() and unpack() only after certain types.
70 =item Ambiguous call resolved as CORE::%s(), qualify as such or use &
72 (W ambiguous) A subroutine you have declared has the same name as a Perl
73 keyword, and you have used the name without qualification for calling
74 one or the other. Perl decided to call the builtin because the
75 subroutine is not imported.
77 To force interpretation as a subroutine call, either put an ampersand
78 before the subroutine name, or qualify the name with its package.
79 Alternatively, you can import the subroutine (or pretend that it's
80 imported with the C<use subs> pragma).
82 To silently interpret it as the Perl operator, use the C<CORE::> prefix
83 on the operator (e.g. C<CORE::log($x)>) or declare the subroutine
84 to be an object method (see L<perlsub/"Subroutine Attributes"> or
87 =item Ambiguous range in transliteration operator
89 (F) You wrote something like C<tr/a-z-0//> which doesn't mean anything at
90 all. To include a C<-> character in a transliteration, put it either
91 first or last. (In the past, C<tr/a-z-0//> was synonymous with
92 C<tr/a-y//>, which was probably not what you would have expected.)
94 =item Ambiguous use of %s resolved as %s
96 (W ambiguous)(S) You said something that may not be interpreted the way
97 you thought. Normally it's pretty easy to disambiguate it by supplying
98 a missing quote, operator, parenthesis pair or declaration.
100 =item '|' and '<' may not both be specified on command line
102 (F) An error peculiar to VMS. Perl does its own command line
103 redirection, and found that STDIN was a pipe, and that you also tried to
104 redirect STDIN using '<'. Only one STDIN stream to a customer, please.
106 =item '|' and '>' may not both be specified on command line
108 (F) An error peculiar to VMS. Perl does its own command line
109 redirection, and thinks you tried to redirect stdout both to a file and
110 into a pipe to another command. You need to choose one or the other,
111 though nothing's stopping you from piping into a program or Perl script
112 which 'splits' output into two streams, such as
114 open(OUT,">$ARGV[0]") or die "Can't write to $ARGV[0]: $!";
121 =item Applying %s to %s will act on scalar(%s)
123 (W misc) The pattern match (C<//>), substitution (C<s///>), and
124 transliteration (C<tr///>) operators work on scalar values. If you apply
125 one of them to an array or a hash, it will convert the array or hash to
126 a scalar value -- the length of an array, or the population info of a
127 hash -- and then work on that scalar value. This is probably not what
128 you meant to do. See L<perlfunc/grep> and L<perlfunc/map> for
131 =item Args must match #! line
133 (F) The setuid emulator requires that the arguments Perl was invoked
134 with match the arguments specified on the #! line. Since some systems
135 impose a one-argument limit on the #! line, try combining switches;
136 for example, turn C<-w -U> into C<-wU>.
138 =item Arg too short for msgsnd
140 (F) msgsnd() requires a string at least as long as sizeof(long).
142 =item %s argument is not a HASH or ARRAY element
144 (F) The argument to exists() must be a hash or array element, such as:
149 =item %s argument is not a HASH or ARRAY element or slice
151 (F) The argument to delete() must be either a hash or array element,
157 or a hash or array slice, such as:
159 @foo[$bar, $baz, $xyzzy]
160 @{$ref->[12]}{"susie", "queue"}
162 =item %s argument is not a subroutine name
164 (F) The argument to exists() for C<exists &sub> must be a subroutine
165 name, and not a subroutine call. C<exists &sub()> will generate this
168 =item '%s' trapped by operation mask
170 (F) You tried to use an operator from a Safe compartment in which it's
171 disallowed. See L<Safe>.
173 =item Argument "%s" isn't numeric%s
175 (W numeric) The indicated string was fed as an argument to an operator
176 that expected a numeric value instead. If you're fortunate the message
177 will identify which operator was so unfortunate.
179 =item Array @%s missing the @ in argument %d of %s()
181 (D deprecated) Really old Perl let you omit the @ on array names in some
182 spots. This is now heavily deprecated.
184 =item assertion botched: %s
186 (P) The malloc package that comes with Perl had an internal failure.
188 =item Assertion failed: file "%s"
190 (P) A general assertion failed. The file in question must be examined.
192 =item Assignment to both a list and a scalar
194 (F) If you assign to a conditional operator, the 2nd and 3rd arguments
195 must either both be scalars or both be lists. Otherwise Perl won't
196 know which context to supply to the right side.
198 =item Attempt to access disallowed key '%s' in a restricted hash
200 (F) The failing code has attempted to get or set a key which is not in
201 the current set of allowed keys of a restricted hash.
203 =item Attempt to clear a restricted hash
205 (F) It is currently not allowed to clear a restricted hash, even if the
206 new hash would contain the same keys as before. This may change in
209 =item Attempt to delete readonly key '%s' from a restricted hash
211 (F) The failing code attempted to delete a key whose value has been
212 declared readonly from a restricted hash.
214 =item Attempt to delete disallowed key '%s' from a restricted hash
216 (F) The failing code attempted to delete from a restricted hash a key
217 which is not in its key set.
219 =item Attempt to bless into a reference
221 (F) The CLASSNAME argument to the bless() operator is expected to be
222 the name of the package to bless the resulting object into. You've
223 supplied instead a reference to something: perhaps you wrote
229 bless $self, ref($proto) || $proto;
231 If you actually want to bless into the stringified version
232 of the reference supplied, you need to stringify it yourself, for
235 bless $self, "$proto";
237 =item Attempt to free non-arena SV: 0x%lx
239 (P internal) All SV objects are supposed to be allocated from arenas
240 that will be garbage collected on exit. An SV was discovered to be
241 outside any of those arenas.
243 =item Attempt to free nonexistent shared string
245 (P internal) Perl maintains a reference counted internal table of
246 strings to optimize the storage and access of hash keys and other
247 strings. This indicates someone tried to decrement the reference count
248 of a string that can no longer be found in the table.
250 =item Attempt to free temp prematurely
252 (W debugging) Mortalized values are supposed to be freed by the
253 free_tmps() routine. This indicates that something else is freeing the
254 SV before the free_tmps() routine gets a chance, which means that the
255 free_tmps() routine will be freeing an unreferenced scalar when it does
258 =item Attempt to free unreferenced glob pointers
260 (P internal) The reference counts got screwed up on symbol aliases.
262 =item Attempt to free unreferenced scalar
264 (W internal) Perl went to decrement the reference count of a scalar to
265 see if it would go to 0, and discovered that it had already gone to 0
266 earlier, and should have been freed, and in fact, probably was freed.
267 This could indicate that SvREFCNT_dec() was called too many times, or
268 that SvREFCNT_inc() was called too few times, or that the SV was
269 mortalized when it shouldn't have been, or that memory has been
272 =item Attempt to join self
274 (F) You tried to join a thread from within itself, which is an
275 impossible task. You may be joining the wrong thread, or you may need
276 to move the join() to some other thread.
278 =item Attempt to pack pointer to temporary value
280 (W pack) You tried to pass a temporary value (like the result of a
281 function, or a computed expression) to the "p" pack() template. This
282 means the result contains a pointer to a location that could become
283 invalid anytime, even before the end of the current statement. Use
284 literals or global values as arguments to the "p" pack() template to
287 =item Attempt to use reference as lvalue in substr
289 (W substr) You supplied a reference as the first argument to substr()
290 used as an lvalue, which is pretty strange. Perhaps you forgot to
291 dereference it first. See L<perlfunc/substr>.
293 =item Bad arg length for %s, is %d, should be %s
295 (F) You passed a buffer of the wrong size to one of msgctl(), semctl()
296 or shmctl(). In C parlance, the correct sizes are, respectively,
297 S<sizeof(struct msqid_ds *)>, S<sizeof(struct semid_ds *)>, and
298 S<sizeof(struct shmid_ds *)>.
300 =item Bad evalled substitution pattern
302 (F) You've used the C</e> switch to evaluate the replacement for a
303 substitution, but perl found a syntax error in the code to evaluate,
304 most likely an unexpected right brace '}'.
306 =item Bad filehandle: %s
308 (F) A symbol was passed to something wanting a filehandle, but the
309 symbol has no filehandle associated with it. Perhaps you didn't do an
310 open(), or did it in another package.
312 =item Bad free() ignored
314 (S malloc) An internal routine called free() on something that had never
315 been malloc()ed in the first place. Mandatory, but can be disabled by
316 setting environment variable C<PERL_BADFREE> to 0.
318 This message can be seen quite often with DB_File on systems with "hard"
319 dynamic linking, like C<AIX> and C<OS/2>. It is a bug of C<Berkeley DB>
320 which is left unnoticed if C<DB> uses I<forgiving> system malloc().
324 (P) One of the internal hash routines was passed a null HV pointer.
326 =item Badly placed ()'s
328 (A) You've accidentally run your script through B<csh> instead
329 of Perl. Check the #! line, or manually feed your script into
332 =item Bad name after %s::
334 (F) You started to name a symbol by using a package prefix, and then
335 didn't finish the symbol. In particular, you can't interpolate outside
344 $sym = "mypack::$var";
346 =item Bad realloc() ignored
348 (S malloc) An internal routine called realloc() on something that had
349 never been malloc()ed in the first place. Mandatory, but can be disabled
350 by setting environment variable C<PERL_BADFREE> to 1.
352 =item Bad symbol for array
354 (P) An internal request asked to add an array entry to something that
355 wasn't a symbol table entry.
357 =item Bad symbol for filehandle
359 (P) An internal request asked to add a filehandle entry to something
360 that wasn't a symbol table entry.
362 =item Bad symbol for hash
364 (P) An internal request asked to add a hash entry to something that
365 wasn't a symbol table entry.
367 =item Bareword found in conditional
369 (W bareword) The compiler found a bareword where it expected a
370 conditional, which often indicates that an || or && was parsed as part
371 of the last argument of the previous construct, for example:
375 It may also indicate a misspelled constant that has been interpreted as
378 use constant TYPO => 1;
379 if (TYOP) { print "foo" }
381 The C<strict> pragma is useful in avoiding such errors.
383 =item Bareword "%s" not allowed while "strict subs" in use
385 (F) With "strict subs" in use, a bareword is only allowed as a
386 subroutine identifier, in curly brackets or to the left of the "=>"
387 symbol. Perhaps you need to predeclare a subroutine?
389 =item Bareword "%s" refers to nonexistent package
391 (W bareword) You used a qualified bareword of the form C<Foo::>, but the
392 compiler saw no other uses of that namespace before that point. Perhaps
393 you need to predeclare a package?
395 =item BEGIN failed--compilation aborted
397 (F) An untrapped exception was raised while executing a BEGIN
398 subroutine. Compilation stops immediately and the interpreter is
401 =item BEGIN not safe after errors--compilation aborted
403 (F) Perl found a C<BEGIN {}> subroutine (or a C<use> directive, which
404 implies a C<BEGIN {}>) after one or more compilation errors had already
405 occurred. Since the intended environment for the C<BEGIN {}> could not
406 be guaranteed (due to the errors), and since subsequent code likely
407 depends on its correct operation, Perl just gave up.
409 =item \1 better written as $1
411 (W syntax) Outside of patterns, backreferences live on as variables.
412 The use of backslashes is grandfathered on the right-hand side of a
413 substitution, but stylistically it's better to use the variable form
414 because other Perl programmers will expect it, and it works better if
415 there are more than 9 backreferences.
417 =item Binary number > 0b11111111111111111111111111111111 non-portable
419 (W portable) The binary number you specified is larger than 2**32-1
420 (4294967295) and therefore non-portable between systems. See
421 L<perlport> for more on portability concerns.
423 =item bind() on closed socket %s
425 (W closed) You tried to do a bind on a closed socket. Did you forget to
426 check the return value of your socket() call? See L<perlfunc/bind>.
428 =item binmode() on closed filehandle %s
430 (W unopened) You tried binmode() on a filehandle that was never opened.
431 Check you control flow and number of arguments.
433 =item Bit vector size > 32 non-portable
435 (W portable) Using bit vector sizes larger than 32 is non-portable.
437 =item Bizarre copy of %s in %s
439 (P) Perl detected an attempt to copy an internal value that is not
442 =item B<-P> not allowed for setuid/setgid script
444 (F) The script would have to be opened by the C preprocessor by name,
445 which provides a race condition that breaks security.
447 =item Buffer overflow in prime_env_iter: %s
449 (W internal) A warning peculiar to VMS. While Perl was preparing to
450 iterate over %ENV, it encountered a logical name or symbol definition
451 which was too long, so it was truncated to the string shown.
453 =item Callback called exit
455 (F) A subroutine invoked from an external package via call_sv()
456 exited by calling exit.
458 =item %s() called too early to check prototype
460 (W prototype) You've called a function that has a prototype before the
461 parser saw a definition or declaration for it, and Perl could not check
462 that the call conforms to the prototype. You need to either add an
463 early prototype declaration for the subroutine in question, or move the
464 subroutine definition ahead of the call to get proper prototype
465 checking. Alternatively, if you are certain that you're calling the
466 function correctly, you may put an ampersand before the name to avoid
467 the warning. See L<perlsub>.
469 =item / cannot take a count
471 (F) You had an unpack template indicating a counted-length string, but
472 you have also specified an explicit size for the string. See
475 =item Can't bless non-reference value
477 (F) Only hard references may be blessed. This is how Perl "enforces"
478 encapsulation of objects. See L<perlobj>.
480 =item Can't call method "%s" in empty package "%s"
482 (F) You called a method correctly, and it correctly indicated a package
483 functioning as a class, but that package doesn't have ANYTHING defined
484 in it, let alone methods. See L<perlobj>.
486 =item Can't call method "%s" on an undefined value
488 (F) You used the syntax of a method call, but the slot filled by the
489 object reference or package name contains an undefined value. Something
490 like this will reproduce the error:
493 process $BADREF 1,2,3;
494 $BADREF->process(1,2,3);
496 =item Can't call method "%s" on unblessed reference
498 (F) A method call must know in what package it's supposed to run. It
499 ordinarily finds this out from the object reference you supply, but you
500 didn't supply an object reference in this case. A reference isn't an
501 object reference until it has been blessed. See L<perlobj>.
503 =item Can't call method "%s" without a package or object reference
505 (F) You used the syntax of a method call, but the slot filled by the
506 object reference or package name contains an expression that returns a
507 defined value which is neither an object reference nor a package name.
508 Something like this will reproduce the error:
511 process $BADREF 1,2,3;
512 $BADREF->process(1,2,3);
514 =item Can't chdir to %s
516 (F) You called C<perl -x/foo/bar>, but C</foo/bar> is not a directory
517 that you can chdir to, possibly because it doesn't exist.
519 =item Can't check filesystem of script "%s" for nosuid
521 (P) For some reason you can't check the filesystem of the script for
524 =item Can't coerce array into hash
526 (F) You used an array where a hash was expected, but the array has no
527 information on how to map from keys to array indices. You can do that
528 only with arrays that have a hash reference at index 0.
530 =item Can't coerce %s to integer in %s
532 (F) Certain types of SVs, in particular real symbol table entries
533 (typeglobs), can't be forced to stop being what they are. So you can't
543 but then $foo no longer contains a glob.
545 =item Can't coerce %s to number in %s
547 (F) Certain types of SVs, in particular real symbol table entries
548 (typeglobs), can't be forced to stop being what they are.
550 =item Can't coerce %s to string in %s
552 (F) Certain types of SVs, in particular real symbol table entries
553 (typeglobs), can't be forced to stop being what they are.
555 =item Can't create pipe mailbox
557 (P) An error peculiar to VMS. The process is suffering from exhausted
558 quotas or other plumbing problems.
560 =item Can't declare class for non-scalar %s in "%s"
562 (F) Currently, only scalar variables can be declared with a specific
563 class qualifier in a "my" or "our" declaration. The semantics may be
564 extended for other types of variables in future.
566 =item Can't declare %s in "%s"
568 (F) Only scalar, array, and hash variables may be declared as "my" or
569 "our" variables. They must have ordinary identifiers as names.
571 =item Can't do inplace edit: %s is not a regular file
573 (S inplace) You tried to use the B<-i> switch on a special file, such as
574 a file in /dev, or a FIFO. The file was ignored.
576 =item Can't do inplace edit on %s: %s
578 (S inplace) The creation of the new file failed for the indicated
581 =item Can't do inplace edit without backup
583 (F) You're on a system such as MS-DOS that gets confused if you try
584 reading from a deleted (but still opened) file. You have to say
585 C<-i.bak>, or some such.
587 =item Can't do inplace edit: %s would not be unique
589 (S inplace) Your filesystem does not support filenames longer than 14
590 characters and Perl was unable to create a unique filename during
591 inplace editing with the B<-i> switch. The file was ignored.
593 =item Can't do {n,m} with n > m in regex; marked by <-- HERE in m/%s/
595 (F) Minima must be less than or equal to maxima. If you really want your
596 regexp to match something 0 times, just put {0}. The <-- HERE shows in the
597 regular expression about where the problem was discovered. See L<perlre>.
599 =item Can't do setegid!
601 (P) The setegid() call failed for some reason in the setuid emulator of
604 =item Can't do seteuid!
606 (P) The setuid emulator of suidperl failed for some reason.
608 =item Can't do setuid
610 (F) This typically means that ordinary perl tried to exec suidperl to do
611 setuid emulation, but couldn't exec it. It looks for a name of the form
612 sperl5.000 in the same directory that the perl executable resides under
613 the name perl5.000, typically /usr/local/bin on Unix machines. If the
614 file is there, check the execute permissions. If it isn't, ask your
615 sysadmin why he and/or she removed it.
617 =item Can't do waitpid with flags
619 (F) This machine doesn't have either waitpid() or wait4(), so only
620 waitpid() without flags is emulated.
622 =item Can't emulate -%s on #! line
624 (F) The #! line specifies a switch that doesn't make sense at this
625 point. For example, it'd be kind of silly to put a B<-x> on the #!
628 =item Can't exec "%s": %s
630 (W exec) A system(), exec(), or piped open call could not execute the
631 named program for the indicated reason. Typical reasons include: the
632 permissions were wrong on the file, the file wasn't found in
633 C<$ENV{PATH}>, the executable in question was compiled for another
634 architecture, or the #! line in a script points to an interpreter that
635 can't be run for similar reasons. (Or maybe your system doesn't support
640 (F) Perl was trying to execute the indicated program for you because
641 that's what the #! line said. If that's not what you wanted, you may
642 need to mention "perl" on the #! line somewhere.
644 =item Can't execute %s
646 (F) You used the B<-S> switch, but the copies of the script to execute
647 found in the PATH did not have correct permissions.
649 =item Can't find an opnumber for "%s"
651 (F) A string of a form C<CORE::word> was given to prototype(), but there
652 is no builtin with the name C<word>.
654 =item Can't find %s character property "%s"
656 (F) You used C<\p{}> or C<\P{}> but the character property by that name
657 could not be found. Maybe you misspelled the name of the property
658 (remember that the names of character properties consist only of
659 alphanumeric characters), or maybe you forgot the C<Is> or C<In> prefix?
661 =item Can't find label %s
663 (F) You said to goto a label that isn't mentioned anywhere that it's
664 possible for us to go to. See L<perlfunc/goto>.
666 =item Can't find %s on PATH
668 (F) You used the B<-S> switch, but the script to execute could not be
671 =item Can't find %s on PATH, '.' not in PATH
673 (F) You used the B<-S> switch, but the script to execute could not be
674 found in the PATH, or at least not with the correct permissions. The
675 script exists in the current directory, but PATH prohibits running it.
677 =item Can't find string terminator %s anywhere before EOF
679 (F) Perl strings can stretch over multiple lines. This message means
680 that the closing delimiter was omitted. Because bracketed quotes count
681 nesting levels, the following is missing its final parenthesis:
683 print q(The character '(' starts a side comment.);
685 If you're getting this error from a here-document, you may have included
686 unseen whitespace before or after your closing tag. A good programmer's
687 editor will have a way to help you find these characters.
689 =item Can't find %s property definition %s
691 (F) You may have tried to use C<\p> which means a Unicode property (for
692 example C<\p{Lu}> is all uppercase letters). If you did mean to use a
693 Unicode property, see L<perlunicode> for the list of known properties.
694 If you didn't mean to use a Unicode property, escape the C<\p>, either
695 by C<\\p> (just the C<\p>) or by C<\Q\p> (the rest of the string, until
700 (F) A fatal error occurred while trying to fork while opening a
703 =item Can't get filespec - stale stat buffer?
705 (S) A warning peculiar to VMS. This arises because of the difference
706 between access checks under VMS and under the Unix model Perl assumes.
707 Under VMS, access checks are done by filename, rather than by bits in
708 the stat buffer, so that ACLs and other protections can be taken into
709 account. Unfortunately, Perl assumes that the stat buffer contains all
710 the necessary information, and passes it, instead of the filespec, to
711 the access checking routine. It will try to retrieve the filespec using
712 the device name and FID present in the stat buffer, but this works only
713 if you haven't made a subsequent call to the CRTL stat() routine,
714 because the device name is overwritten with each call. If this warning
715 appears, the name lookup failed, and the access checking routine gave up
716 and returned FALSE, just to be conservative. (Note: The access checking
717 routine knows about the Perl C<stat> operator and file tests, so you
718 shouldn't ever see this warning in response to a Perl command; it arises
719 only if some internal code takes stat buffers lightly.)
721 =item Can't get pipe mailbox device name
723 (P) An error peculiar to VMS. After creating a mailbox to act as a
724 pipe, Perl can't retrieve its name for later use.
726 =item Can't get SYSGEN parameter value for MAXBUF
728 (P) An error peculiar to VMS. Perl asked $GETSYI how big you want your
729 mailbox buffers to be, and didn't get an answer.
731 =item Can't "goto" into the middle of a foreach loop
733 (F) A "goto" statement was executed to jump into the middle of a foreach
734 loop. You can't get there from here. See L<perlfunc/goto>.
736 =item Can't "goto" out of a pseudo block
738 (F) A "goto" statement was executed to jump out of what might look like
739 a block, except that it isn't a proper block. This usually occurs if
740 you tried to jump out of a sort() block or subroutine, which is a no-no.
741 See L<perlfunc/goto>.
743 =item Can't goto subroutine from an eval-string
745 (F) The "goto subroutine" call can't be used to jump out of an eval
746 "string". (You can use it to jump out of an eval {BLOCK}, but you
747 probably don't want to.)
749 =item Can't goto subroutine outside a subroutine
751 (F) The deeply magical "goto subroutine" call can only replace one
752 subroutine call for another. It can't manufacture one out of whole
753 cloth. In general you should be calling it out of only an AUTOLOAD
754 routine anyway. See L<perlfunc/goto>.
756 =item Can't ignore signal CHLD, forcing to default
758 (W signal) Perl has detected that it is being run with the SIGCHLD
759 signal (sometimes known as SIGCLD) disabled. Since disabling this
760 signal will interfere with proper determination of exit status of child
761 processes, Perl has reset the signal to its default value. This
762 situation typically indicates that the parent program under which Perl
763 may be running (e.g. cron) is being very careless.
765 =item Can't "last" outside a loop block
767 (F) A "last" statement was executed to break out of the current block,
768 except that there's this itty bitty problem called there isn't a current
769 block. Note that an "if" or "else" block doesn't count as a "loopish"
770 block, as doesn't a block given to sort(), map() or grep(). You can
771 usually double the curlies to get the same effect though, because the
772 inner curlies will be considered a block that loops once. See
775 =item Can't localize lexical variable %s
777 (F) You used local on a variable name that was previously declared as a
778 lexical variable using "my". This is not allowed. If you want to
779 localize a package variable of the same name, qualify it with the
782 =item Can't localize through a reference
784 (F) You said something like C<local $$ref>, which Perl can't currently
785 handle, because when it goes to restore the old value of whatever $ref
786 pointed to after the scope of the local() is finished, it can't be sure
787 that $ref will still be a reference.
789 =item Can't locate %s
791 (F) You said to C<do> (or C<require>, or C<use>) a file that couldn't be
792 found. Perl looks for the file in all the locations mentioned in @INC,
793 unless the file name included the full path to the file. Perhaps you
794 need to set the PERL5LIB or PERL5OPT environment variable to say where
795 the extra library is, or maybe the script needs to add the library name
796 to @INC. Or maybe you just misspelled the name of the file. See
797 L<perlfunc/require> and L<lib>.
799 =item Can't locate auto/%s.al in @INC
801 (F) A function (or method) was called in a package which allows
802 autoload, but there is no function to autoload. Most probable causes
803 are a misprint in a function/method name or a failure to C<AutoSplit>
804 the file, say, by doing C<make install>.
806 =item Can't locate object method "%s" via package "%s"
808 (F) You called a method correctly, and it correctly indicated a package
809 functioning as a class, but that package doesn't define that particular
810 method, nor does any of its base classes. See L<perlobj>.
812 =item Can't locate PerlIO%s
814 (F) You tried to use in open() a PerlIO layer that does not exist,
815 e.g. open(FH, ">:nosuchlayer", "somefile").
817 =item (perhaps you forgot to load "%s"?)
819 (F) This is an educated guess made in conjunction with the message
820 "Can't locate object method \"%s\" via package \"%s\"". It often means
821 that a method requires a package that has not been loaded.
823 =item Can't locate package %s for @%s::ISA
825 (W syntax) The @ISA array contained the name of another package that
826 doesn't seem to exist.
828 =item Can't make list assignment to \%ENV on this system
830 (F) List assignment to %ENV is not supported on some systems, notably
833 =item Can't modify %s in %s
835 (F) You aren't allowed to assign to the item indicated, or otherwise try
836 to change it, such as with an auto-increment.
838 =item Can't modify nonexistent substring
840 (P) The internal routine that does assignment to a substr() was handed
843 =item Can't modify non-lvalue subroutine call
845 (F) Subroutines meant to be used in lvalue context should be declared as
846 such, see L<perlsub/"Lvalue subroutines">.
848 =item Can't msgrcv to read-only var
850 (F) The target of a msgrcv must be modifiable to be used as a receive
853 =item Can't "next" outside a loop block
855 (F) A "next" statement was executed to reiterate the current block, but
856 there isn't a current block. Note that an "if" or "else" block doesn't
857 count as a "loopish" block, as doesn't a block given to sort(), map() or
858 grep(). You can usually double the curlies to get the same effect
859 though, because the inner curlies will be considered a block that loops
860 once. See L<perlfunc/next>.
862 =item Can't open %s: %s
864 (S inplace) The implicit opening of a file through use of the C<< <> >>
865 filehandle, either implicitly under the C<-n> or C<-p> command-line
866 switches, or explicitly, failed for the indicated reason. Usually this
867 is because you don't have read permission for a file which you named on
870 =item Can't open a reference
872 (W io) You tried to open a scalar reference for reading or writing,
873 using the 3-arg open() syntax :
877 but your version of perl is compiled without perlio, and this form of
878 open is not supported.
880 =item Can't open bidirectional pipe
882 (W pipe) You tried to say C<open(CMD, "|cmd|")>, which is not supported.
883 You can try any of several modules in the Perl library to do this, such
884 as IPC::Open2. Alternately, direct the pipe's output to a file using
885 ">", and then read it in under a different file handle.
887 =item Can't open error file %s as stderr
889 (F) An error peculiar to VMS. Perl does its own command line
890 redirection, and couldn't open the file specified after '2>' or '2>>' on
891 the command line for writing.
893 =item Can't open input file %s as stdin
895 (F) An error peculiar to VMS. Perl does its own command line
896 redirection, and couldn't open the file specified after '<' on the
897 command line for reading.
899 =item Can't open output file %s as stdout
901 (F) An error peculiar to VMS. Perl does its own command line
902 redirection, and couldn't open the file specified after '>' or '>>' on
903 the command line for writing.
905 =item Can't open output pipe (name: %s)
907 (P) An error peculiar to VMS. Perl does its own command line
908 redirection, and couldn't open the pipe into which to send data destined
911 =item Can't open perl script%s: %s
913 (F) The script you specified can't be opened for the indicated reason.
915 =item Can't read CRTL environ
917 (S) A warning peculiar to VMS. Perl tried to read an element of %ENV
918 from the CRTL's internal environment array and discovered the array was
919 missing. You need to figure out where your CRTL misplaced its environ
920 or define F<PERL_ENV_TABLES> (see L<perlvms>) so that environ is not
923 =item Can't redefine active sort subroutine %s
925 (F) Perl optimizes the internal handling of sort subroutines and keeps
926 pointers into them. You tried to redefine one such sort subroutine when
927 it was currently active, which is not allowed. If you really want to do
928 this, you should write C<sort { &func } @x> instead of C<sort func @x>.
930 =item Can't "redo" outside a loop block
932 (F) A "redo" statement was executed to restart the current block, but
933 there isn't a current block. Note that an "if" or "else" block doesn't
934 count as a "loopish" block, as doesn't a block given to sort(), map()
935 or grep(). You can usually double the curlies to get the same effect
936 though, because the inner curlies will be considered a block that
937 loops once. See L<perlfunc/redo>.
939 =item Can't remove %s: %s, skipping file
941 (S inplace) You requested an inplace edit without creating a backup
942 file. Perl was unable to remove the original file to replace it with
943 the modified file. The file was left unmodified.
945 =item Can't rename %s to %s: %s, skipping file
947 (S inplace) The rename done by the B<-i> switch failed for some reason,
948 probably because you don't have write permission to the directory.
950 =item Can't reopen input pipe (name: %s) in binary mode
952 (P) An error peculiar to VMS. Perl thought stdin was a pipe, and tried
953 to reopen it to accept binary data. Alas, it failed.
955 =item Can't resolve method `%s' overloading `%s' in package `%s'
957 (F|P) Error resolving overloading specified by a method name (as opposed
958 to a subroutine reference): no such method callable via the package. If
959 method name is C<???>, this is an internal error.
961 =item Can't reswap uid and euid
963 (P) The setreuid() call failed for some reason in the setuid emulator of
966 =item Can't return %s from lvalue subroutine
968 (F) Perl detected an attempt to return illegal lvalues (such as
969 temporary or readonly values) from a subroutine used as an lvalue. This
972 =item Can't return %s to lvalue scalar context
974 (F) You tried to return a complete array or hash from an lvalue subroutine,
975 but you called the subroutine in a way that made Perl think you meant
976 to return only one value. You probably meant to write parentheses around
977 the call to the subroutine, which tell Perl that the call should be in
980 =item Can't return outside a subroutine
982 (F) The return statement was executed in mainline code, that is, where
983 there was no subroutine call to return out of. See L<perlsub>.
985 =item Can't stat script "%s"
987 (P) For some reason you can't fstat() the script even though you have it
988 open already. Bizarre.
990 =item Can't swap uid and euid
992 (P) The setreuid() call failed for some reason in the setuid emulator of
995 =item Can't take log of %g
997 (F) For ordinary real numbers, you can't take the logarithm of a
998 negative number or zero. There's a Math::Complex package that comes
999 standard with Perl, though, if you really want to do that for the
1002 =item Can't take sqrt of %g
1004 (F) For ordinary real numbers, you can't take the square root of a
1005 negative number. There's a Math::Complex package that comes standard
1006 with Perl, though, if you really want to do that.
1008 =item Can't undef active subroutine
1010 (F) You can't undefine a routine that's currently running. You can,
1011 however, redefine it while it's running, and you can even undef the
1012 redefined subroutine while the old routine is running. Go figure.
1016 (F) You tried to unshift an "unreal" array that can't be unshifted, such
1017 as the main Perl stack.
1019 =item Can't upgrade that kind of scalar
1021 (P) The internal sv_upgrade routine adds "members" to an SV, making it
1022 into a more specialized kind of SV. The top several SV types are so
1023 specialized, however, that they cannot be interconverted. This message
1024 indicates that such a conversion was attempted.
1026 =item Can't upgrade to undef
1028 (P) The undefined SV is the bottom of the totem pole, in the scheme of
1029 upgradability. Upgrading to undef indicates an error in the code
1032 =item Can't use an undefined value as %s reference
1034 (F) A value used as either a hard reference or a symbolic reference must
1035 be a defined value. This helps to delurk some insidious errors.
1037 =item Can't use anonymous symbol table for method lookup
1039 (P) The internal routine that does method lookup was handed a symbol
1040 table that doesn't have a name. Symbol tables can become anonymous
1041 for example by undefining stashes: C<undef %Some::Package::>.
1043 =item Can't use bareword ("%s") as %s ref while "strict refs" in use
1045 (F) Only hard references are allowed by "strict refs". Symbolic
1046 references are disallowed. See L<perlref>.
1048 =item Can't use %! because Errno.pm is not available
1050 (F) The first time the %! hash is used, perl automatically loads the
1051 Errno.pm module. The Errno module is expected to tie the %! hash to
1052 provide symbolic names for C<$!> errno values.
1054 =item Can't use %s for loop variable
1056 (F) Only a simple scalar variable may be used as a loop variable on a
1059 =item Can't use global %s in "my"
1061 (F) You tried to declare a magical variable as a lexical variable. This
1062 is not allowed, because the magic can be tied to only one location
1063 (namely the global variable) and it would be incredibly confusing to
1064 have variables in your program that looked like magical variables but
1067 =item Can't use "my %s" in sort comparison
1069 (F) The global variables $a and $b are reserved for sort comparisons.
1070 You mentioned $a or $b in the same line as the <=> or cmp operator,
1071 and the variable had earlier been declared as a lexical variable.
1072 Either qualify the sort variable with the package name, or rename the
1075 =item Can't use %s ref as %s ref
1077 (F) You've mixed up your reference types. You have to dereference a
1078 reference of the type needed. You can use the ref() function to
1079 test the type of the reference, if need be.
1081 =item Can't use string ("%s") as %s ref while "strict refs" in use
1083 (F) Only hard references are allowed by "strict refs". Symbolic
1084 references are disallowed. See L<perlref>.
1086 =item Can't use subscript on %s
1088 (F) The compiler tried to interpret a bracketed expression as a
1089 subscript. But to the left of the brackets was an expression that
1090 didn't look like an array reference, or anything else subscriptable.
1092 =item Can't use \%c to mean $%c in expression
1094 (W syntax) In an ordinary expression, backslash is a unary operator that
1095 creates a reference to its argument. The use of backslash to indicate a
1096 backreference to a matched substring is valid only as part of a regular
1097 expression pattern. Trying to do this in ordinary Perl code produces a
1098 value that prints out looking like SCALAR(0xdecaf). Use the $1 form
1101 =item Can't weaken a nonreference
1103 (F) You attempted to weaken something that was not a reference. Only
1104 references can be weakened.
1106 =item Can't x= to read-only value
1108 (F) You tried to repeat a constant value (often the undefined value)
1109 with an assignment operator, which implies modifying the value itself.
1110 Perhaps you need to copy the value to a temporary, and repeat that.
1112 =item Character in "C" format wrapped
1118 where $x is either less than 0 or more than 255; the C<"C"> format is
1119 only for encoding native operating system characters (ASCII, EBCDIC,
1120 and so on) and not for Unicode characters, so Perl behaved as if you meant
1124 If you actually want to pack Unicode codepoints, use the C<"U"> format
1127 =item Character in "c" format wrapped
1133 where $x is either less than -128 or more than 127; the C<"c"> format
1134 is only for encoding native operating system characters (ASCII, EBCDIC,
1135 and so on) and not for Unicode characters, so Perl behaved as if you meant
1137 pack("c", $x & 255);
1139 If you actually want to pack Unicode codepoints, use the C<"U"> format
1142 =item close() on unopened filehandle %s
1144 (W unopened) You tried to close a filehandle that was never opened.
1146 =item %s: Command not found
1148 (A) You've accidentally run your script through B<csh> instead of Perl.
1149 Check the #! line, or manually feed your script into Perl yourself.
1151 =item Compilation failed in require
1153 (F) Perl could not compile a file specified in a C<require> statement.
1154 Perl uses this generic message when none of the errors that it
1155 encountered were severe enough to halt compilation immediately.
1157 =item Complex regular subexpression recursion limit (%d) exceeded
1159 (W regexp) The regular expression engine uses recursion in complex
1160 situations where back-tracking is required. Recursion depth is limited
1161 to 32766, or perhaps less in architectures where the stack cannot grow
1162 arbitrarily. ("Simple" and "medium" situations are handled without
1163 recursion and are not subject to a limit.) Try shortening the string
1164 under examination; looping in Perl code (e.g. with C<while>) rather than
1165 in the regular expression engine; or rewriting the regular expression so
1166 that it is simpler or backtracks less. (See L<perlfaq2> for information
1167 on I<Mastering Regular Expressions>.)
1169 =item cond_broadcast() called on unlocked variable
1171 (W threads) Within a thread-enabled program, you tried to call
1172 cond_broadcast() on a variable which wasn't locked. The cond_broadcast()
1173 function is used to wake up another thread that is waiting in a
1174 cond_wait(). To ensure that the signal isn't sent before the other thread
1175 has a chance to enter the wait, it is usual for the signaling thread to
1176 first wait for a lock on variable. This lock attempt will only succeed
1177 after the other thread has entered cond_wait() and thus relinquished the
1181 =item cond_signal() called on unlocked variable
1183 (W threads) Within a thread-enabled program, you tried to call
1184 cond_signal() on a variable which wasn't locked. The cond_signal()
1185 function is used to wake up another thread that is waiting in a
1186 cond_wait(). To ensure that the signal isn't sent before the other thread
1187 has a chance to enter the wait, it is usual for the signaling thread to
1188 first wait for a lock on variable. This lock attempt will only succeed
1189 after the other thread has entered cond_wait() and thus relinquished the
1192 =item connect() on closed socket %s
1194 (W closed) You tried to do a connect on a closed socket. Did you forget
1195 to check the return value of your socket() call? See
1196 L<perlfunc/connect>.
1198 =item Constant(%s)%s: %s
1200 (F) The parser found inconsistencies either while attempting to define
1201 an overloaded constant, or when trying to find the character name
1202 specified in the C<\N{...}> escape. Perhaps you forgot to load the
1203 corresponding C<overload> or C<charnames> pragma? See L<charnames> and
1206 =item Constant is not %s reference
1208 (F) A constant value (perhaps declared using the C<use constant> pragma)
1209 is being dereferenced, but it amounts to the wrong type of reference.
1210 The message indicates the type of reference that was expected. This
1211 usually indicates a syntax error in dereferencing the constant value.
1212 See L<perlsub/"Constant Functions"> and L<constant>.
1214 =item Constant subroutine %s redefined
1216 (S) You redefined a subroutine which had previously been
1217 eligible for inlining. See L<perlsub/"Constant Functions"> for
1218 commentary and workarounds.
1220 =item Constant subroutine %s undefined
1222 (W misc) You undefined a subroutine which had previously been eligible
1223 for inlining. See L<perlsub/"Constant Functions"> for commentary and
1226 =item Copy method did not return a reference
1228 (F) The method which overloads "=" is buggy. See
1229 L<overload/Copy Constructor>.
1231 =item CORE::%s is not a keyword
1233 (F) The CORE:: namespace is reserved for Perl keywords.
1235 =item corrupted regexp pointers
1237 (P) The regular expression engine got confused by what the regular
1238 expression compiler gave it.
1240 =item corrupted regexp program
1242 (P) The regular expression engine got passed a regexp program without a
1245 =item Corrupt malloc ptr 0x%lx at 0x%lx
1247 (P) The malloc package that comes with Perl had an internal failure.
1249 =item C<-p> destination: %s
1251 (F) An error occurred during the implicit output invoked by the C<-p>
1252 command-line switch. (This output goes to STDOUT unless you've
1253 redirected it with select().)
1255 =item C<-T> and C<-B> not implemented on filehandles
1257 (F) Perl can't peek at the stdio buffer of filehandles when it doesn't
1258 know about your kind of stdio. You'll have to use a filename instead.
1260 =item Deep recursion on subroutine "%s"
1262 (W recursion) This subroutine has called itself (directly or indirectly)
1263 100 times more than it has returned. This probably indicates an
1264 infinite recursion, unless you're writing strange benchmark programs, in
1265 which case it indicates something else.
1267 =item defined(@array) is deprecated
1269 (D deprecated) defined() is not usually useful on arrays because it
1270 checks for an undefined I<scalar> value. If you want to see if the
1271 array is empty, just use C<if (@array) { # not empty }> for example.
1273 =item defined(%hash) is deprecated
1275 (D deprecated) defined() is not usually useful on hashes because it
1276 checks for an undefined I<scalar> value. If you want to see if the hash
1277 is empty, just use C<if (%hash) { # not empty }> for example.
1279 =item %s defines neither package nor VERSION--version check failed
1281 (F) You said something like "use Module 42" but in the Module file
1282 there are neither package declarations nor a C<$VERSION>.
1284 =item Delimiter for here document is too long
1286 (F) In a here document construct like C<<<FOO>, the label C<FOO> is too
1287 long for Perl to handle. You have to be seriously twisted to write code
1288 that triggers this error.
1290 =item Did not produce a valid header
1294 =item %s did not return a true value
1296 (F) A required (or used) file must return a true value to indicate that
1297 it compiled correctly and ran its initialization code correctly. It's
1298 traditional to end such a file with a "1;", though any true value would
1299 do. See L<perlfunc/require>.
1301 =item (Did you mean &%s instead?)
1303 (W) You probably referred to an imported subroutine &FOO as $FOO or some
1306 =item (Did you mean "local" instead of "our"?)
1308 (W misc) Remember that "our" does not localize the declared global
1309 variable. You have declared it again in the same lexical scope, which
1312 =item (Did you mean $ or @ instead of %?)
1314 (W) You probably said %hash{$key} when you meant $hash{$key} or
1315 @hash{@keys}. On the other hand, maybe you just meant %hash and got
1320 (F) You passed die() an empty string (the equivalent of C<die "">) or
1321 you called it with no args and both C<$@> and C<$_> were empty.
1323 =item Document contains no data
1327 =item %s does not define %s::VERSION--version check failed
1329 (F) You said something like "use Module 42" but the Module did not
1330 define a C<$VERSION.>
1332 =item Don't know how to handle magic of type '%s'
1334 (P) The internal handling of magical variables has been cursed.
1336 =item do_study: out of memory
1338 (P) This should have been caught by safemalloc() instead.
1340 =item (Do you need to predeclare %s?)
1342 (S) This is an educated guess made in conjunction with the message "%s
1343 found where operator expected". It often means a subroutine or module
1344 name is being referenced that hasn't been declared yet. This may be
1345 because of ordering problems in your file, or because of a missing
1346 "sub", "package", "require", or "use" statement. If you're referencing
1347 something that isn't defined yet, you don't actually have to define the
1348 subroutine or package before the current location. You can use an empty
1349 "sub foo;" or "package FOO;" to enter a "forward" declaration.
1351 =item dump() better written as CORE::dump()
1353 (W misc) You used the obsolescent C<dump()> built-in function, without fully
1354 qualifying it as C<CORE::dump()>. Maybe it's a typo. See L<perlfunc/dump>.
1356 =item Duplicate free() ignored
1358 (S malloc) An internal routine called free() on something that had
1361 =item elseif should be elsif
1363 (S) There is no keyword "elseif" in Perl because Larry thinks it's ugly.
1364 Your code will be interpreted as an attempt to call a method named
1365 "elseif" for the class returned by the following block. This is
1366 unlikely to be what you want.
1370 (F) C<\p> and C<\P> are used to introduce a named Unicode property, as
1371 described in L<perlunicode> and L<perlre>. You used C<\p> or C<\P> in
1372 a regular expression without specifying the property name.
1374 =item entering effective %s failed
1376 (F) While under the C<use filetest> pragma, switching the real and
1377 effective uids or gids failed.
1379 =item Error converting file specification %s
1381 (F) An error peculiar to VMS. Because Perl may have to deal with file
1382 specifications in either VMS or Unix syntax, it converts them to a
1383 single form when it must operate on them directly. Either you've passed
1384 an invalid file specification to Perl, or you've found a case the
1385 conversion routines don't handle. Drat.
1387 =item %s: Eval-group in insecure regular expression
1389 (F) Perl detected tainted data when trying to compile a regular
1390 expression that contains the C<(?{ ... })> zero-width assertion, which
1391 is unsafe. See L<perlre/(?{ code })>, and L<perlsec>.
1393 =item %s: Eval-group not allowed at run time
1395 (F) Perl tried to compile a regular expression containing the
1396 C<(?{ ... })> zero-width assertion at run time, as it would when the
1397 pattern contains interpolated values. Since that is a security risk, it
1398 is not allowed. If you insist, you may still do this by explicitly
1399 building the pattern from an interpolated string at run time and using
1400 that in an eval(). See L<perlre/(?{ code })>.
1402 =item %s: Eval-group not allowed, use re 'eval'
1404 (F) A regular expression contained the C<(?{ ... })> zero-width
1405 assertion, but that construct is only allowed when the C<use re 'eval'>
1406 pragma is in effect. See L<perlre/(?{ code })>.
1408 =item Excessively long <> operator
1410 (F) The contents of a <> operator may not exceed the maximum size of a
1411 Perl identifier. If you're just trying to glob a long list of
1412 filenames, try using the glob() operator, or put the filenames into a
1413 variable and glob that.
1415 =item exec? I'm not *that* kind of operating system
1417 (F) The C<exec> function is not implemented in MacPerl. See L<perlport>.
1419 =item Execution of %s aborted due to compilation errors
1421 (F) The final summary message when a Perl compilation fails.
1423 =item Exiting eval via %s
1425 (W exiting) You are exiting an eval by unconventional means, such as a
1426 goto, or a loop control statement.
1428 =item Exiting format via %s
1430 (W exiting) You are exiting a format by unconventional means, such as a
1431 goto, or a loop control statement.
1433 =item Exiting pseudo-block via %s
1435 (W exiting) You are exiting a rather special block construct (like a
1436 sort block or subroutine) by unconventional means, such as a goto, or a
1437 loop control statement. See L<perlfunc/sort>.
1439 =item Exiting subroutine via %s
1441 (W exiting) You are exiting a subroutine by unconventional means, such
1442 as a goto, or a loop control statement.
1444 =item Exiting substitution via %s
1446 (W exiting) You are exiting a substitution by unconventional means, such
1447 as a return, a goto, or a loop control statement.
1449 =item Explicit blessing to '' (assuming package main)
1451 (W misc) You are blessing a reference to a zero length string. This has
1452 the effect of blessing the reference into the package main. This is
1453 usually not what you want. Consider providing a default target package,
1454 e.g. bless($ref, $p || 'MyPackage');
1456 =item %s: Expression syntax
1458 (A) You've accidentally run your script through B<csh> instead of Perl.
1459 Check the #! line, or manually feed your script into Perl yourself.
1461 =item %s failed--call queue aborted
1463 (F) An untrapped exception was raised while executing a CHECK, INIT, or
1464 END subroutine. Processing of the remainder of the queue of such
1465 routines has been prematurely ended.
1467 =item False [] range "%s" in regex; marked by <-- HERE in m/%s/
1469 (W regexp) A character class range must start and end at a literal
1470 character, not another character class like C<\d> or C<[:alpha:]>. The "-"
1471 in your false range is interpreted as a literal "-". Consider quoting the
1472 "-", "\-". The <-- HERE shows in the regular expression about where the
1473 problem was discovered. See L<perlre>.
1475 =item Fatal VMS error at %s, line %d
1477 (P) An error peculiar to VMS. Something untoward happened in a VMS
1478 system service or RTL routine; Perl's exit status should provide more
1479 details. The filename in "at %s" and the line number in "line %d" tell
1480 you which section of the Perl source code is distressed.
1482 =item fcntl is not implemented
1484 (F) Your machine apparently doesn't implement fcntl(). What is this, a
1485 PDP-11 or something?
1487 =item Filehandle %s opened only for input
1489 (W io) You tried to write on a read-only filehandle. If you intended it
1490 to be a read-write filehandle, you needed to open it with "+<" or "+>"
1491 or "+>>" instead of with "<" or nothing. If you intended only to write
1492 the file, use ">" or ">>". See L<perlfunc/open>.
1494 =item Filehandle %s opened only for output
1496 (W io) You tried to read from a filehandle opened only for writing.
1497 If you intended it to be a read/write filehandle, you needed to open it
1498 with "+<" or "+>" or "+>>" instead of with "<" or nothing. If you
1499 intended only to read from the file, use "<". See L<perlfunc/open>.
1501 =item Filehandle %s reopened as %s only for input
1503 (W io) You opened for reading a filehandle that got the same filehandle id
1504 as STDOUT or STDERR. This occured because you closed STDOUT or STDERR
1507 =item Filehandle STDIN reopened as %s only for output
1509 (W io) You opened for writing a filehandle that got the same filehandle id
1510 as STDIN. This occured because you closed STDIN previously.
1512 =item Final $ should be \$ or $name
1514 (F) You must now decide whether the final $ in a string was meant to be
1515 a literal dollar sign, or was meant to introduce a variable name that
1516 happens to be missing. So you have to put either the backslash or the
1519 =item Final @ should be \@ or @name
1521 (F) You must now decide whether the final @ in a string was meant to be
1522 a literal "at" sign, or was meant to introduce a variable name that
1523 happens to be missing. So you have to put either the backslash or the
1526 =item flock() on closed filehandle %s
1528 (W closed) The filehandle you're attempting to flock() got itself closed
1529 some time before now. Check your control flow. flock() operates on
1530 filehandles. Are you attempting to call flock() on a dirhandle by the
1533 =item Quantifier follows nothing in regex;
1535 marked by <-- HERE in m/%s/
1537 (F) You started a regular expression with a quantifier. Backslash it if you
1538 meant it literally. The <-- HERE shows in the regular expression about
1539 where the problem was discovered. See L<perlre>.
1541 =item Format not terminated
1543 (F) A format must be terminated by a line with a solitary dot. Perl got
1544 to the end of your file without finding such a line.
1546 =item Format %s redefined
1548 (W redefine) You redefined a format. To suppress this warning, say
1551 no warnings 'redefine';
1552 eval "format NAME =...";
1555 =item Found = in conditional, should be ==
1565 (or something like that).
1567 =item %s found where operator expected
1569 (S) The Perl lexer knows whether to expect a term or an operator. If it
1570 sees what it knows to be a term when it was expecting to see an
1571 operator, it gives you this warning. Usually it indicates that an
1572 operator or delimiter was omitted, such as a semicolon.
1574 =item gdbm store returned %d, errno %d, key "%s"
1576 (S) A warning from the GDBM_File extension that a store failed.
1578 =item gethostent not implemented
1580 (F) Your C library apparently doesn't implement gethostent(), probably
1581 because if it did, it'd feel morally obligated to return every hostname
1584 =item get%sname() on closed socket %s
1586 (W closed) You tried to get a socket or peer socket name on a closed
1587 socket. Did you forget to check the return value of your socket() call?
1589 =item getpwnam returned invalid UIC %#o for user "%s"
1591 (S) A warning peculiar to VMS. The call to C<sys$getuai> underlying the
1592 C<getpwnam> operator returned an invalid UIC.
1594 =item getsockopt() on closed socket %s
1596 (W closed) You tried to get a socket option on a closed socket. Did you
1597 forget to check the return value of your socket() call? See
1598 L<perlfunc/getsockopt>.
1600 =item Global symbol "%s" requires explicit package name
1602 (F) You've said "use strict vars", which indicates that all variables
1603 must either be lexically scoped (using "my"), declared beforehand using
1604 "our", or explicitly qualified to say which package the global variable
1607 =item glob failed (%s)
1609 (W glob) Something went wrong with the external program(s) used for
1610 C<glob> and C<< <*.c> >>. Usually, this means that you supplied a
1611 C<glob> pattern that caused the external program to fail and exit with a
1612 nonzero status. If the message indicates that the abnormal exit
1613 resulted in a coredump, this may also mean that your csh (C shell) is
1614 broken. If so, you should change all of the csh-related variables in
1615 config.sh: If you have tcsh, make the variables refer to it as if it
1616 were csh (e.g. C<full_csh='/usr/bin/tcsh'>); otherwise, make them all
1617 empty (except that C<d_csh> should be C<'undef'>) so that Perl will
1618 think csh is missing. In either case, after editing config.sh, run
1619 C<./Configure -S> and rebuild Perl.
1621 =item Glob not terminated
1623 (F) The lexer saw a left angle bracket in a place where it was expecting
1624 a term, so it's looking for the corresponding right angle bracket, and
1625 not finding it. Chances are you left some needed parentheses out
1626 earlier in the line, and you really meant a "less than".
1628 =item Got an error from DosAllocMem
1630 (P) An error peculiar to OS/2. Most probably you're using an obsolete
1631 version of Perl, and this should not happen anyway.
1633 =item goto must have label
1635 (F) Unlike with "next" or "last", you're not allowed to goto an
1636 unspecified destination. See L<perlfunc/goto>.
1638 =item %s-group starts with a count
1640 (F) In pack/unpack a ()-group started with a count. A count is
1641 supposed to follow something: a template character or a ()-group.
1643 =item %s had compilation errors
1645 (F) The final summary message when a C<perl -c> fails.
1647 =item Had to create %s unexpectedly
1649 (S internal) A routine asked for a symbol from a symbol table that ought
1650 to have existed already, but for some reason it didn't, and had to be
1651 created on an emergency basis to prevent a core dump.
1653 =item Hash %%s missing the % in argument %d of %s()
1655 (D deprecated) Really old Perl let you omit the % on hash names in some
1656 spots. This is now heavily deprecated.
1658 =item %s has too many errors
1660 (F) The parser has given up trying to parse the program after 10 errors.
1661 Further error messages would likely be uninformative.
1663 =item Hexadecimal number > 0xffffffff non-portable
1665 (W portable) The hexadecimal number you specified is larger than 2**32-1
1666 (4294967295) and therefore non-portable between systems. See
1667 L<perlport> for more on portability concerns.
1669 =item Identifier too long
1671 (F) Perl limits identifiers (names for variables, functions, etc.) to
1672 about 250 characters for simple names, and somewhat more for compound
1673 names (like C<$A::B>). You've exceeded Perl's limits. Future versions
1674 of Perl are likely to eliminate these arbitrary limitations.
1676 =item Illegal binary digit %s
1678 (F) You used a digit other than 0 or 1 in a binary number.
1680 =item Illegal binary digit %s ignored
1682 (W digit) You may have tried to use a digit other than 0 or 1 in a
1683 binary number. Interpretation of the binary number stopped before the
1686 =item Illegal character %s (carriage return)
1688 (F) Perl normally treats carriage returns in the program text as it
1689 would any other whitespace, which means you should never see this error
1690 when Perl was built using standard options. For some reason, your
1691 version of Perl appears to have been built without this support. Talk
1692 to your Perl administrator.
1694 =item Illegal character in prototype for %s : %s
1696 (W syntax) An illegal character was found in a prototype declaration. Legal
1697 characters in prototypes are $, @, %, *, ;, [, ], &, and \.
1699 =item Illegal division by zero
1701 (F) You tried to divide a number by 0. Either something was wrong in
1702 your logic, or you need to put a conditional in to guard against
1705 =item Illegal hexadecimal digit %s ignored
1707 (W digit) You may have tried to use a character other than 0 - 9 or
1708 A - F, a - f in a hexadecimal number. Interpretation of the hexadecimal
1709 number stopped before the illegal character.
1711 =item Illegal modulus zero
1713 (F) You tried to divide a number by 0 to get the remainder. Most
1714 numbers don't take to this kindly.
1716 =item Illegal number of bits in vec
1718 (F) The number of bits in vec() (the third argument) must be a power of
1719 two from 1 to 32 (or 64, if your platform supports that).
1721 =item Illegal octal digit %s
1723 (F) You used an 8 or 9 in an octal number.
1725 =item Illegal octal digit %s ignored
1727 (W digit) You may have tried to use an 8 or 9 in an octal number.
1728 Interpretation of the octal number stopped before the 8 or 9.
1730 =item Illegal switch in PERL5OPT: %s
1732 (X) The PERL5OPT environment variable may only be used to set the
1733 following switches: B<-[DIMUdmtw]>.
1735 =item Ill-formed CRTL environ value "%s"
1737 (W internal) A warning peculiar to VMS. Perl tried to read the CRTL's
1738 internal environ array, and encountered an element without the C<=>
1739 delimiter used to separate keys from values. The element is ignored.
1741 =item Ill-formed message in prime_env_iter: |%s|
1743 (W internal) A warning peculiar to VMS. Perl tried to read a logical
1744 name or CLI symbol definition when preparing to iterate over %ENV, and
1745 didn't see the expected delimiter between key and value, so the line was
1748 =item (in cleanup) %s
1750 (W misc) This prefix usually indicates that a DESTROY() method raised
1751 the indicated exception. Since destructors are usually called by the
1752 system at arbitrary points during execution, and often a vast number of
1753 times, the warning is issued only once for any number of failures that
1754 would otherwise result in the same message being repeated.
1756 Failure of user callbacks dispatched using the C<G_KEEPERR> flag could
1757 also result in this warning. See L<perlcall/G_KEEPERR>.
1759 =item In EBCDIC the v-string components cannot exceed 2147483647
1761 (F) An error peculiar to EBCDIC. Internally, v-strings are stored as
1762 Unicode code points, and encoded in EBCDIC as UTF-EBCDIC. The UTF-EBCDIC
1763 encoding is limited to code points no larger than 2147483647 (0x7FFFFFFF).
1765 =item Insecure dependency in %s
1767 (F) You tried to do something that the tainting mechanism didn't like.
1768 The tainting mechanism is turned on when you're running setuid or
1769 setgid, or when you specify B<-T> to turn it on explicitly. The
1770 tainting mechanism labels all data that's derived directly or indirectly
1771 from the user, who is considered to be unworthy of your trust. If any
1772 such data is used in a "dangerous" operation, you get this error. See
1773 L<perlsec> for more information.
1775 =item Insecure directory in %s
1777 (F) You can't use system(), exec(), or a piped open in a setuid or
1778 setgid script if C<$ENV{PATH}> contains a directory that is writable by
1779 the world. See L<perlsec>.
1781 =item Insecure $ENV{%s} while running %s
1783 (F) You can't use system(), exec(), or a piped open in a setuid or
1784 setgid script if any of C<$ENV{PATH}>, C<$ENV{IFS}>, C<$ENV{CDPATH}>,
1785 C<$ENV{ENV}> or C<$ENV{BASH_ENV}> are derived from data supplied (or
1786 potentially supplied) by the user. The script must set the path to a
1787 known value, using trustworthy data. See L<perlsec>.
1789 =item Integer overflow in %s number
1791 (W overflow) The hexadecimal, octal or binary number you have specified
1792 either as a literal or as an argument to hex() or oct() is too big for
1793 your architecture, and has been converted to a floating point number.
1794 On a 32-bit architecture the largest hexadecimal, octal or binary number
1795 representable without overflow is 0xFFFFFFFF, 037777777777, or
1796 0b11111111111111111111111111111111 respectively. Note that Perl
1797 transparently promotes all numbers to a floating point representation
1798 internally--subject to loss of precision errors in subsequent
1801 =item Internal disaster in regex; marked by <-- HERE in m/%s/
1803 (P) Something went badly wrong in the regular expression parser.
1804 The <-- HERE shows in the regular expression about where the problem was
1807 =item Internal inconsistency in tracking vforks
1809 (S) A warning peculiar to VMS. Perl keeps track of the number of times
1810 you've called C<fork> and C<exec>, to determine whether the current call
1811 to C<exec> should affect the current script or a subprocess (see
1812 L<perlvms/"exec LIST">). Somehow, this count has become scrambled, so
1813 Perl is making a guess and treating this C<exec> as a request to
1814 terminate the Perl script and execute the specified command.
1816 =item Internal urp in regex; marked by <-- HERE in m/%s/
1818 (P) Something went badly awry in the regular expression parser. The
1819 <-- HERE shows in the regular expression about where the problem was
1822 =item %s (...) interpreted as function
1824 (W syntax) You've run afoul of the rule that says that any list operator
1825 followed by parentheses turns into a function, with all the list
1826 operators arguments found inside the parentheses. See
1827 L<perlop/Terms and List Operators (Leftward)>.
1829 =item Invalid %s attribute: %s
1831 The indicated attribute for a subroutine or variable was not recognized
1832 by Perl or by a user-supplied handler. See L<attributes>.
1834 =item Invalid %s attributes: %s
1836 The indicated attributes for a subroutine or variable were not
1837 recognized by Perl or by a user-supplied handler. See L<attributes>.
1839 =item Invalid conversion in %s: "%s"
1841 (W printf) Perl does not understand the given format conversion. See
1842 L<perlfunc/sprintf>.
1844 =item Invalid [] range "%s" in regex; marked by <-- HERE in m/%s/
1846 (F) The range specified in a character class had a minimum character
1847 greater than the maximum character. One possibility is that you forgot the
1848 C<{}> from your ending C<\x{}> - C<\x> without the curly braces can go only
1849 up to C<ff>. The <-- HERE shows in the regular expression about where the
1850 problem was discovered. See L<perlre>.
1852 =item Invalid range "%s" in transliteration operator
1854 (F) The range specified in the tr/// or y/// operator had a minimum
1855 character greater than the maximum character. See L<perlop>.
1857 =item Invalid separator character %s in attribute list
1859 (F) Something other than a colon or whitespace was seen between the
1860 elements of an attribute list. If the previous attribute had a
1861 parenthesised parameter list, perhaps that list was terminated too soon.
1864 =item Invalid type in pack: '%s'
1866 (F) The given character is not a valid pack type. See L<perlfunc/pack>.
1867 (W pack) The given character is not a valid pack type but used to be
1870 =item Invalid type in unpack: '%s'
1872 (F) The given character is not a valid unpack type. See
1874 (W unpack) The given character is not a valid unpack type but used to be
1877 =item ioctl is not implemented
1879 (F) Your machine apparently doesn't implement ioctl(), which is pretty
1880 strange for a machine that supports C.
1882 =item ioctl() on unopened %s
1884 (W unopened) You tried ioctl() on a filehandle that was never opened.
1885 Check you control flow and number of arguments.
1887 =item IO::Socket::atmark not implemented on this architecture
1889 (F) Your machine doesn't implement the sockatmark() functionality,
1890 neither as a system call or an ioctl call (SIOCATMARK).
1892 =item `%s' is not a code reference
1894 (W overload) The second (fourth, sixth, ...) argument of overload::constant
1895 needs to be a code reference. Either an anonymous subroutine, or a reference
1898 =item `%s' is not an overloadable type
1900 (W overload) You tried to overload a constant type the overload package is
1903 =item junk on end of regexp
1905 (P) The regular expression parser is confused.
1907 =item Label not found for "last %s"
1909 (F) You named a loop to break out of, but you're not currently in a loop
1910 of that name, not even if you count where you were called from. See
1913 =item Label not found for "next %s"
1915 (F) You named a loop to continue, but you're not currently in a loop of
1916 that name, not even if you count where you were called from. See
1919 =item Label not found for "redo %s"
1921 (F) You named a loop to restart, but you're not currently in a loop of
1922 that name, not even if you count where you were called from. See
1925 =item leaving effective %s failed
1927 (F) While under the C<use filetest> pragma, switching the real and
1928 effective uids or gids failed.
1930 =item listen() on closed socket %s
1932 (W closed) You tried to do a listen on a closed socket. Did you forget
1933 to check the return value of your socket() call? See
1936 =item lstat() on filehandle %s
1938 (W io) You tried to do an lstat on a filehandle. What did you mean
1939 by that? lstat() makes sense only on filenames. (Perl did a fstat()
1940 instead on the filehandle.)
1942 =item Lvalue subs returning %s not implemented yet
1944 (F) Due to limitations in the current implementation, array and hash
1945 values cannot be returned in subroutines used in lvalue context. See
1946 L<perlsub/"Lvalue subroutines">.
1948 =item Lookbehind longer than %d not implemented in regex;
1950 marked by <-- HERE in m/%s/
1952 (F) There is currently a limit on the length of string which lookbehind can
1953 handle. This restriction may be eased in a future release. The <-- HERE
1954 shows in the regular expression about where the problem was discovered.
1956 =item Malformed PERLLIB_PREFIX
1958 (F) An error peculiar to OS/2. PERLLIB_PREFIX should be of the form
1965 with nonempty prefix1 and prefix2. If C<prefix1> is indeed a prefix of
1966 a builtin library search path, prefix2 is substituted. The error may
1967 appear if components are not found, or are too long. See
1968 "PERLLIB_PREFIX" in L<perlos2>.
1970 =item Malformed prototype for %s: %s
1972 (F) You tried to use a function with a malformed prototype. The
1973 syntax of function prototypes is given a brief compile-time check for
1974 obvious errors like invalid characters. A more rigorous check is run
1975 when the function is called.
1977 =item Malformed UTF-8 character (%s)
1979 Perl detected something that didn't comply with UTF-8 encoding rules.
1981 One possible cause is that you read in data that you thought to be in
1982 UTF-8 but it wasn't (it was for example legacy 8-bit data). Another
1983 possibility is careless use of utf8::upgrade().
1985 =item Malformed UTF-16 surrogate
1987 Perl thought it was reading UTF-16 encoded character data but while
1988 doing it Perl met a malformed Unicode surrogate.
1990 =item %s matches null string many times in regex;
1992 marked by <-- HERE in m/%s/
1994 (W regexp) The pattern you've specified would be an infinite loop if the
1995 regular expression engine didn't specifically check for that. The <-- HERE
1996 shows in the regular expression about where the problem was discovered.
1999 =item "%s" may clash with future reserved word
2001 (W) This warning may be due to running a perl5 script through a perl4
2002 interpreter, especially if the word that is being warned about is
2005 =item % may only be used in unpack
2007 (F) You can't pack a string by supplying a checksum, because the
2008 checksumming process loses information, and you can't go the other way.
2009 See L<perlfunc/unpack>.
2011 =item Method for operation %s not found in package %s during blessing
2013 (F) An attempt was made to specify an entry in an overloading table that
2014 doesn't resolve to a valid subroutine. See L<overload>.
2016 =item Method %s not permitted
2020 =item Might be a runaway multi-line %s string starting on line %d
2022 (S) An advisory indicating that the previous error may have been caused
2023 by a missing delimiter on a string or pattern, because it eventually
2024 ended earlier on the current line.
2026 =item Misplaced _ in number
2028 (W syntax) An underscore (underbar) in a numeric constant did not
2029 separate two digits.
2031 =item Missing %sbrace%s on \N{}
2033 (F) Wrong syntax of character name literal C<\N{charname}> within
2034 double-quotish context.
2036 =item Missing comma after first argument to %s function
2038 (F) While certain functions allow you to specify a filehandle or an
2039 "indirect object" before the argument list, this ain't one of them.
2041 =item Missing command in piped open
2043 (W pipe) You used the C<open(FH, "| command")> or
2044 C<open(FH, "command |")> construction, but the command was missing or
2047 =item Missing name in "my sub"
2049 (F) The reserved syntax for lexically scoped subroutines requires that
2050 they have a name with which they can be found.
2052 =item Missing $ on loop variable
2054 (F) Apparently you've been programming in B<csh> too much. Variables
2055 are always mentioned with the $ in Perl, unlike in the shells, where it
2056 can vary from one line to the next.
2058 =item (Missing operator before %s?)
2060 (S) This is an educated guess made in conjunction with the message "%s
2061 found where operator expected". Often the missing operator is a comma.
2063 =item Missing right brace on %s
2065 (F) Missing right brace in C<\p{...}> or C<\P{...}>.
2067 =item Missing right curly or square bracket
2069 (F) The lexer counted more opening curly or square brackets than closing
2070 ones. As a general rule, you'll find it's missing near the place you
2073 =item (Missing semicolon on previous line?)
2075 (S) This is an educated guess made in conjunction with the message "%s
2076 found where operator expected". Don't automatically put a semicolon on
2077 the previous line just because you saw this message.
2079 =item Modification of a read-only value attempted
2081 (F) You tried, directly or indirectly, to change the value of a
2082 constant. You didn't, of course, try "2 = 1", because the compiler
2083 catches that. But an easy way to do the same thing is:
2085 sub mod { $_[0] = 1 }
2088 Another way is to assign to a substr() that's off the end of the string.
2090 Yet another way is to assign to a C<foreach> loop I<VAR> when I<VAR>
2091 is aliased to a constant in the look I<LIST>:
2094 foreach my $n ($x, 2) {
2095 $n *= 2; # modifies the $x, but fails on attempt to modify the 2
2098 =item Modification of non-creatable array value attempted, %s
2100 (F) You tried to make an array value spring into existence, and the
2101 subscript was probably negative, even counting from end of the array
2104 =item Modification of non-creatable hash value attempted, %s
2106 (P) You tried to make a hash value spring into existence, and it
2107 couldn't be created for some peculiar reason.
2109 =item Module name must be constant
2111 (F) Only a bare module name is allowed as the first argument to a "use".
2113 =item Module name required with -%c option
2115 (F) The C<-M> or C<-m> options say that Perl should load some module, but
2116 you omitted the name of the module. Consult L<perlrun> for full details
2117 about C<-M> and C<-m>.
2119 =item More than one argument to open
2121 (F) The C<open> function has been asked to open multiple files. This
2122 can happen if you are trying to open a pipe to a command that takes a
2123 list of arguments, but have forgotten to specify a piped open mode.
2124 See L<perlfunc/open> for details.
2126 =item msg%s not implemented
2128 (F) You don't have System V message IPC on your system.
2130 =item Multidimensional syntax %s not supported
2132 (W syntax) Multidimensional arrays aren't written like C<$foo[1,2,3]>.
2133 They're written like C<$foo[1][2][3]>, as in C.
2135 =item / must be followed by a*, A* or Z*
2137 (F) You had a pack template indicating a counted-length string,
2138 Currently the only things that can have their length counted are a*, A*
2139 or Z*. See L<perlfunc/pack>.
2141 =item / must be followed by a, A or Z
2143 (F) You had an unpack template indicating a counted-length string, which
2144 must be followed by one of the letters a, A or Z to indicate what sort
2145 of string is to be unpacked. See L<perlfunc/pack>.
2147 =item / must follow a numeric type
2149 (F) You had an unpack template that contained a '#', but this did not
2150 follow some numeric unpack specification. See L<perlfunc/pack>.
2152 =item "my sub" not yet implemented
2154 (F) Lexically scoped subroutines are not yet implemented. Don't try
2157 =item "my" variable %s can't be in a package
2159 (F) Lexically scoped variables aren't in a package, so it doesn't make
2160 sense to try to declare one with a package qualifier on the front. Use
2161 local() if you want to localize a package variable.
2163 =item Name "%s::%s" used only once: possible typo
2165 (W once) Typographical errors often show up as unique variable names.
2166 If you had a good reason for having a unique name, then just mention it
2167 again somehow to suppress the message. The C<our> declaration is
2168 provided for this purpose.
2170 =item Negative length
2172 (F) You tried to do a read/write/send/recv operation with a buffer
2173 length that is less than 0. This is difficult to imagine.
2175 =item Negative offset to vec in lvalue context
2177 (F) When C<vec> is called in an lvalue context, the second argument must be
2178 greater than or equal to zero.
2180 =item Nested quantifiers in regex; marked by <-- HERE in m/%s/
2182 (F) You can't quantify a quantifier without intervening parentheses. So
2183 things like ** or +* or ?* are illegal. The <-- HERE shows in the regular
2184 expression about where the problem was discovered.
2186 Note that the minimal matching quantifiers, C<*?>, C<+?>, and
2187 C<??> appear to be nested quantifiers, but aren't. See L<perlre>.
2189 =item %s never introduced
2191 (S internal) The symbol in question was declared but somehow went out of
2192 scope before it could possibly have been used.
2194 =item No %s allowed while running setuid
2196 (F) Certain operations are deemed to be too insecure for a setuid or
2197 setgid script to even be allowed to attempt. Generally speaking there
2198 will be another way to do what you want that is, if not secure, at least
2199 securable. See L<perlsec>.
2201 =item No B<-e> allowed in setuid scripts
2203 (F) A setuid script can't be specified by the user.
2205 =item No comma allowed after %s
2207 (F) A list operator that has a filehandle or "indirect object" is not
2208 allowed to have a comma between that and the following arguments.
2209 Otherwise it'd be just another one of the arguments.
2211 One possible cause for this is that you expected to have imported a
2212 constant to your name space with B<use> or B<import> while no such
2213 importing took place, it may for example be that your operating system
2214 does not support that particular constant. Hopefully you did use an
2215 explicit import list for the constants you expect to see, please see
2216 L<perlfunc/use> and L<perlfunc/import>. While an explicit import list
2217 would probably have caught this error earlier it naturally does not
2218 remedy the fact that your operating system still does not support that
2219 constant. Maybe you have a typo in the constants of the symbol import
2220 list of B<use> or B<import> or in the constant name at the line where
2221 this error was triggered?
2223 =item No command into which to pipe on command line
2225 (F) An error peculiar to VMS. Perl handles its own command line
2226 redirection, and found a '|' at the end of the command line, so it
2227 doesn't know where you want to pipe the output from this command.
2229 =item No DB::DB routine defined
2231 (F) The currently executing code was compiled with the B<-d> switch, but
2232 for some reason the perl5db.pl file (or some facsimile thereof) didn't
2233 define a routine to be called at the beginning of each statement. Which
2234 is odd, because the file should have been required automatically, and
2235 should have blown up the require if it didn't parse right.
2237 =item No dbm on this machine
2239 (P) This is counted as an internal error, because every machine should
2240 supply dbm nowadays, because Perl comes with SDBM. See L<SDBM_File>.
2242 =item No DBsub routine
2244 (F) The currently executing code was compiled with the B<-d> switch,
2245 but for some reason the perl5db.pl file (or some facsimile thereof)
2246 didn't define a DB::sub routine to be called at the beginning of each
2247 ordinary subroutine call.
2249 =item No error file after 2> or 2>> on command line
2251 (F) An error peculiar to VMS. Perl handles its own command line
2252 redirection, and found a '2>' or a '2>>' on the command line, but can't
2253 find the name of the file to which to write data destined for stderr.
2255 =item No input file after < on command line
2257 (F) An error peculiar to VMS. Perl handles its own command line
2258 redirection, and found a '<' on the command line, but can't find the
2259 name of the file from which to read data for stdin.
2263 (F) The setuid emulator requires that scripts have a well-formed #! line
2264 even on machines that don't support the #! construct.
2266 =item "no" not allowed in expression
2268 (F) The "no" keyword is recognized and executed at compile time, and
2269 returns no useful value. See L<perlmod>.
2271 =item No output file after > on command line
2273 (F) An error peculiar to VMS. Perl handles its own command line
2274 redirection, and found a lone '>' at the end of the command line, so it
2275 doesn't know where you wanted to redirect stdout.
2277 =item No output file after > or >> on command line
2279 (F) An error peculiar to VMS. Perl handles its own command line
2280 redirection, and found a '>' or a '>>' on the command line, but can't
2281 find the name of the file to which to write data destined for stdout.
2283 =item No package name allowed for variable %s in "our"
2285 (F) Fully qualified variable names are not allowed in "our"
2286 declarations, because that doesn't make much sense under existing
2287 semantics. Such syntax is reserved for future extensions.
2289 =item No Perl script found in input
2291 (F) You called C<perl -x>, but no line was found in the file beginning
2292 with #! and containing the word "perl".
2294 =item No setregid available
2296 (F) Configure didn't find anything resembling the setregid() call for
2299 =item No setreuid available
2301 (F) Configure didn't find anything resembling the setreuid() call for
2304 =item No space allowed after -%c
2306 (F) The argument to the indicated command line switch must follow
2307 immediately after the switch, without intervening spaces.
2309 =item No %s specified for -%c
2311 (F) The indicated command line switch needs a mandatory argument, but
2312 you haven't specified one.
2314 =item No such class %s
2316 (F) You provided a class qualifier in a "my" or "our" declaration, but
2317 this class doesn't exist at this point in your program.
2319 =item No such pipe open
2321 (P) An error peculiar to VMS. The internal routine my_pclose() tried to
2322 close a pipe which hadn't been opened. This should have been caught
2323 earlier as an attempt to close an unopened filehandle.
2325 =item No such signal: SIG%s
2327 (W signal) You specified a signal name as a subscript to %SIG that was
2328 not recognized. Say C<kill -l> in your shell to see the valid signal
2329 names on your system.
2331 =item Not a CODE reference
2333 (F) Perl was trying to evaluate a reference to a code value (that is, a
2334 subroutine), but found a reference to something else instead. You can
2335 use the ref() function to find out what kind of ref it really was. See
2338 =item Not a format reference
2340 (F) I'm not sure how you managed to generate a reference to an anonymous
2341 format, but this indicates you did, and that it didn't exist.
2343 =item Not a GLOB reference
2345 (F) Perl was trying to evaluate a reference to a "typeglob" (that is, a
2346 symbol table entry that looks like C<*foo>), but found a reference to
2347 something else instead. You can use the ref() function to find out what
2348 kind of ref it really was. See L<perlref>.
2350 =item Not a HASH reference
2352 (F) Perl was trying to evaluate a reference to a hash value, but found a
2353 reference to something else instead. You can use the ref() function to
2354 find out what kind of ref it really was. See L<perlref>.
2356 =item Not an ARRAY reference
2358 (F) Perl was trying to evaluate a reference to an array value, but found
2359 a reference to something else instead. You can use the ref() function
2360 to find out what kind of ref it really was. See L<perlref>.
2362 =item Not a perl script
2364 (F) The setuid emulator requires that scripts have a well-formed #! line
2365 even on machines that don't support the #! construct. The line must
2368 =item Not a SCALAR reference
2370 (F) Perl was trying to evaluate a reference to a scalar value, but found
2371 a reference to something else instead. You can use the ref() function
2372 to find out what kind of ref it really was. See L<perlref>.
2374 =item Not a subroutine reference
2376 (F) Perl was trying to evaluate a reference to a code value (that is, a
2377 subroutine), but found a reference to something else instead. You can
2378 use the ref() function to find out what kind of ref it really was. See
2381 =item Not a subroutine reference in overload table
2383 (F) An attempt was made to specify an entry in an overloading table that
2384 doesn't somehow point to a valid subroutine. See L<overload>.
2386 =item Not enough arguments for %s
2388 (F) The function requires more arguments than you specified.
2390 =item Not enough format arguments
2392 (W syntax) A format specified more picture fields than the next line
2393 supplied. See L<perlform>.
2397 (A) You've accidentally run your script through the Bourne shell instead
2398 of Perl. Check the #! line, or manually feed your script into Perl
2401 =item %s not allowed in length fields
2403 (F) The count in the (un)pack template may be replaced by C<[TEMPLATE]> only if
2404 C<TEMPLATE> always matches the same amount of packed bytes. Redesign
2407 =item no UTC offset information; assuming local time is UTC
2409 (S) A warning peculiar to VMS. Perl was unable to find the local
2410 timezone offset, so it's assuming that local system time is equivalent
2411 to UTC. If it's not, define the logical name
2412 F<SYS$TIMEZONE_DIFFERENTIAL> to translate to the number of seconds which
2413 need to be added to UTC to get local time.
2415 =item Null filename used
2417 (F) You can't require the null filename, especially because on many
2418 machines that means the current directory! See L<perlfunc/require>.
2420 =item NULL OP IN RUN
2422 (P debugging) Some internal routine called run() with a null opcode
2425 =item Null picture in formline
2427 (F) The first argument to formline must be a valid format picture
2428 specification. It was found to be empty, which probably means you
2429 supplied it an uninitialized value. See L<perlform>.
2433 (P) An attempt was made to realloc NULL.
2435 =item NULL regexp argument
2437 (P) The internal pattern matching routines blew it big time.
2439 =item NULL regexp parameter
2441 (P) The internal pattern matching routines are out of their gourd.
2443 =item Number too long
2445 (F) Perl limits the representation of decimal numbers in programs to
2446 about 250 characters. You've exceeded that length. Future
2447 versions of Perl are likely to eliminate this arbitrary limitation. In
2448 the meantime, try using scientific notation (e.g. "1e6" instead of
2451 =item Octal number in vector unsupported
2453 (F) Numbers with a leading C<0> are not currently allowed in vectors.
2454 The octal number interpretation of such numbers may be supported in a
2457 =item Octal number > 037777777777 non-portable
2459 (W portable) The octal number you specified is larger than 2**32-1
2460 (4294967295) and therefore non-portable between systems. See
2461 L<perlport> for more on portability concerns.
2463 See also L<perlport> for writing portable code.
2465 =item Odd number of arguments for overload::constant
2467 (W overload) The call to overload::constant contained an odd number of
2468 arguments. The arguments should come in pairs.
2470 =item Odd number of elements in anonymous hash
2472 (W misc) You specified an odd number of elements to initialize a hash,
2473 which is odd, because hashes come in key/value pairs.
2475 =item Odd number of elements in hash assignment
2477 (W misc) You specified an odd number of elements to initialize a hash,
2478 which is odd, because hashes come in key/value pairs.
2480 =item Offset outside string
2482 (F) You tried to do a read/write/send/recv operation with an offset
2483 pointing outside the buffer. This is difficult to imagine. The sole
2484 exception to this is that C<sysread()>ing past the buffer will extend
2485 the buffer and zero pad the new area.
2487 =item -%s on unopened filehandle %s
2489 (W unopened) You tried to invoke a file test operator on a filehandle
2490 that isn't open. Check your control flow. See also L<perlfunc/-X>.
2492 =item %s() on unopened %s
2494 (W unopened) An I/O operation was attempted on a filehandle that was
2495 never initialized. You need to do an open(), a sysopen(), or a socket()
2496 call, or call a constructor from the FileHandle package.
2500 (S internal) An internal warning that the grammar is screwed up.
2504 (S internal) An internal warning that the grammar is screwed up.
2506 =item Operation `%s': no method found, %s
2508 (F) An attempt was made to perform an overloaded operation for which no
2509 handler was defined. While some handlers can be autogenerated in terms
2510 of other handlers, there is no default handler for any operation, unless
2511 C<fallback> overloading key is specified to be true. See L<overload>.
2513 =item Operator or semicolon missing before %s
2515 (S ambiguous) You used a variable or subroutine call where the parser
2516 was expecting an operator. The parser has assumed you really meant to
2517 use an operator, but this is highly likely to be incorrect. For
2518 example, if you say "*foo *foo" it will be interpreted as if you said
2521 =item "our" variable %s redeclared
2523 (W misc) You seem to have already declared the same global once before
2524 in the current lexical scope.
2526 =item Out of memory!
2528 (X) The malloc() function returned 0, indicating there was insufficient
2529 remaining memory (or virtual memory) to satisfy the request. Perl has
2530 no option but to exit immediately.
2532 =item Out of memory during "large" request for %s
2534 (F) The malloc() function returned 0, indicating there was insufficient
2535 remaining memory (or virtual memory) to satisfy the request. However,
2536 the request was judged large enough (compile-time default is 64K), so a
2537 possibility to shut down by trapping this error is granted.
2539 =item Out of memory during request for %s
2541 (X|F) The malloc() function returned 0, indicating there was
2542 insufficient remaining memory (or virtual memory) to satisfy the
2545 The request was judged to be small, so the possibility to trap it
2546 depends on the way perl was compiled. By default it is not trappable.
2547 However, if compiled for this, Perl may use the contents of C<$^M> as an
2548 emergency pool after die()ing with this message. In this case the error
2549 is trappable I<once>, and the error message will include the line and file
2550 where the failed request happened.
2552 =item Out of memory during ridiculously large request
2554 (F) You can't allocate more than 2^31+"small amount" bytes. This error
2555 is most likely to be caused by a typo in the Perl program. e.g.,
2556 C<$arr[time]> instead of C<$arr[$time]>.
2558 =item Out of memory for yacc stack
2560 (F) The yacc parser wanted to grow its stack so it could continue
2561 parsing, but realloc() wouldn't give it more memory, virtual or
2564 =item @ outside of string
2566 (F) You had a pack template that specified an absolute position outside
2567 the string being unpacked. See L<perlfunc/pack>.
2569 =item %s package attribute may clash with future reserved word: %s
2571 (W reserved) A lowercase attribute name was used that had a
2572 package-specific handler. That name might have a meaning to Perl itself
2573 some day, even though it doesn't yet. Perhaps you should use a
2574 mixed-case attribute name, instead. See L<attributes>.
2578 (W io) A single call to write() produced more lines than can fit on a
2579 page. See L<perlform>.
2583 (P) An internal error.
2585 =item panic: ck_grep
2587 (P) Failed an internal consistency check trying to compile a grep.
2589 =item panic: ck_split
2591 (P) Failed an internal consistency check trying to compile a split.
2593 =item panic: corrupt saved stack index
2595 (P) The savestack was requested to restore more localized values than
2596 there are in the savestack.
2598 =item panic: del_backref
2600 (P) Failed an internal consistency check while trying to reset a weak
2605 (P) We popped the context stack to an eval context, and then discovered
2606 it wasn't an eval context.
2608 =item panic: pp_match%s
2610 (P) The internal pp_match() routine was called with invalid operational
2613 =item panic: do_subst
2615 (P) The internal pp_subst() routine was called with invalid operational
2618 =item panic: do_trans_%s
2620 (P) The internal do_trans routines were called with invalid operational
2625 (P) The library function frexp() failed, making printf("%f") impossible.
2629 (P) We popped the context stack to a context with the specified label,
2630 and then discovered it wasn't a context we know how to do a goto in.
2632 =item panic: INTERPCASEMOD
2634 (P) The lexer got into a bad state at a case modifier.
2636 =item panic: INTERPCONCAT
2638 (P) The lexer got into a bad state parsing a string with brackets.
2640 =item panic: kid popen errno read
2642 (F) forked child returned an incomprehensible message about its errno.
2646 (P) We popped the context stack to a block context, and then discovered
2647 it wasn't a block context.
2649 =item panic: leave_scope clearsv
2651 (P) A writable lexical variable became read-only somehow within the
2654 =item panic: leave_scope inconsistency
2656 (P) The savestack probably got out of sync. At least, there was an
2657 invalid enum on the top of it.
2659 =item panic: magic_killbackrefs
2661 (P) Failed an internal consistency check while trying to reset all weak
2662 references to an object.
2666 (P) Something requested a negative number of bytes of malloc.
2668 =item panic: mapstart
2670 (P) The compiler is screwed up with respect to the map() function.
2672 =item panic: null array
2674 (P) One of the internal array routines was passed a null AV pointer.
2676 =item panic: pad_alloc
2678 (P) The compiler got confused about which scratch pad it was allocating
2679 and freeing temporaries and lexicals from.
2681 =item panic: pad_free curpad
2683 (P) The compiler got confused about which scratch pad it was allocating
2684 and freeing temporaries and lexicals from.
2686 =item panic: pad_free po
2688 (P) An invalid scratch pad offset was detected internally.
2690 =item panic: pad_reset curpad
2692 (P) The compiler got confused about which scratch pad it was allocating
2693 and freeing temporaries and lexicals from.
2695 =item panic: pad_sv po
2697 (P) An invalid scratch pad offset was detected internally.
2699 =item panic: pad_swipe curpad
2701 (P) The compiler got confused about which scratch pad it was allocating
2702 and freeing temporaries and lexicals from.
2704 =item panic: pad_swipe po
2706 (P) An invalid scratch pad offset was detected internally.
2708 =item panic: pp_iter
2710 (P) The foreach iterator got called in a non-loop context frame.
2712 =item panic: pp_split
2714 (P) Something terrible went wrong in setting up for the split.
2716 =item panic: realloc
2718 (P) Something requested a negative number of bytes of realloc.
2720 =item panic: restartop
2722 (P) Some internal routine requested a goto (or something like it), and
2723 didn't supply the destination.
2727 (P) We popped the context stack to a subroutine or eval context, and
2728 then discovered it wasn't a subroutine or eval context.
2730 =item panic: scan_num
2732 (P) scan_num() got called on something that wasn't a number.
2734 =item panic: sv_insert
2736 (P) The sv_insert() routine was told to remove more string than there
2739 =item panic: top_env
2741 (P) The compiler attempted to do a goto, or something weird like that.
2745 (P) The lexer got into a bad state while processing a case modifier.
2747 =item panic: utf16_to_utf8: odd bytelen
2749 (P) Something tried to call utf16_to_utf8 with an odd (as opposed
2750 to even) byte length.
2752 =item Parentheses missing around "%s" list
2754 (W parenthesis) You said something like
2760 my ($foo, $bar) = @_;
2762 Remember that "my", "our", and "local" bind tighter than comma.
2764 =item Perl %s required--this is only version %s, stopped
2766 (F) The module in question uses features of a version of Perl more
2767 recent than the currently running version. How long has it been since
2768 you upgraded, anyway? See L<perlfunc/require>.
2770 =item PERL_SH_DIR too long
2772 (F) An error peculiar to OS/2. PERL_SH_DIR is the directory to find the
2773 C<sh>-shell in. See "PERL_SH_DIR" in L<perlos2>.
2775 =item perl: warning: Setting locale failed.
2777 (S) The whole warning message will look something like:
2779 perl: warning: Setting locale failed.
2780 perl: warning: Please check that your locale settings:
2783 are supported and installed on your system.
2784 perl: warning: Falling back to the standard locale ("C").
2786 Exactly what were the failed locale settings varies. In the above the
2787 settings were that the LC_ALL was "En_US" and the LANG had no value.
2788 This error means that Perl detected that you and/or your operating
2789 system supplier and/or system administrator have set up the so-called
2790 locale system but Perl could not use those settings. This was not
2791 dead serious, fortunately: there is a "default locale" called "C" that
2792 Perl can and will use, the script will be run. Before you really fix
2793 the problem, however, you will get the same error message each time
2794 you run Perl. How to really fix the problem can be found in
2795 L<perllocale> section B<LOCALE PROBLEMS>.
2797 =item perlio: argument list not closed for layer "%s"
2799 (W layer) When pushing a layer with arguments onto the Perl I/O system you
2800 forgot the ) that closes the argument list. (Layers take care of transforming
2801 data between external and internal representations.) Perl stopped parsing
2802 the layer list at this point and did not attempt to push this layer.
2803 If your program didn't explicitly request the failing operation, it may be
2804 the result of the value of the environment variable PERLIO.
2806 =item perlio: invalid separator character %s in layer specification list %s
2808 (W layer) When pushing layers onto the Perl I/O system, something other than a
2809 colon or whitespace was seen between the elements of a layer list.
2810 If the previous attribute had a parenthesised parameter list, perhaps that
2811 list was terminated too soon.
2813 =item perlio: unknown layer "%s"
2815 (W layer) An attempt was made to push an unknown layer onto the Perl I/O
2816 system. (Layers take care of transforming data between external and
2817 internal representations.) Note that some layers, such as C<mmap>,
2818 are not supported in all environments. If your program didn't
2819 explicitly request the failing operation, it may be the result of the
2820 value of the environment variable PERLIO.
2822 =item Permission denied
2824 (F) The setuid emulator in suidperl decided you were up to no good.
2826 =item pid %x not a child
2828 (W exec) A warning peculiar to VMS. Waitpid() was asked to wait for a
2829 process which isn't a subprocess of the current process. While this is
2830 fine from VMS' perspective, it's probably not what you intended.
2832 =item P must have an explicit size
2834 (F) The unpack format P must have an explicit size, not "*".
2836 =item POSIX syntax [%s] belongs inside character classes in regex;
2838 marked by <-- HERE in m/%s/
2840 (W regexp) The character class constructs [: :], [= =], and [. .] go
2841 I<inside> character classes, the [] are part of the construct, for example:
2842 /[012[:alpha:]345]/. Note that [= =] and [. .] are not currently
2843 implemented; they are simply placeholders for future extensions and will
2844 cause fatal errors. The <-- HERE shows in the regular expression about
2845 where the problem was discovered. See L<perlre>.
2847 =item POSIX syntax [. .] is reserved for future extensions in regex;
2849 marked by <-- HERE in m/%s/
2851 (F regexp) Within regular expression character classes ([]) the syntax
2852 beginning with "[." and ending with ".]" is reserved for future extensions.
2853 If you need to represent those character sequences inside a regular
2854 expression character class, just quote the square brackets with the
2855 backslash: "\[." and ".\]". The <-- HERE shows in the regular expression
2856 about where the problem was discovered. See L<perlre>.
2858 =item POSIX syntax [= =] is reserved for future extensions in regex;
2860 marked by <-- HERE in m/%s/
2862 (F) Within regular expression character classes ([]) the syntax beginning
2863 with "[=" and ending with "=]" is reserved for future extensions. If you
2864 need to represent those character sequences inside a regular expression
2865 character class, just quote the square brackets with the backslash: "\[="
2866 and "=\]". The <-- HERE shows in the regular expression about where the
2867 problem was discovered. See L<perlre>.
2869 =item POSIX class [:%s:] unknown in regex;
2871 marked by <-- HERE in m/%s/
2873 (F) The class in the character class [: :] syntax is unknown. The <-- HERE
2874 shows in the regular expression about where the problem was discovered.
2875 Note that the POSIX character classes do B<not> have the C<is> prefix
2876 the corresponding C interfaces have: in other words, it's C<[[:print:]]>,
2877 not C<isprint>. See L<perlre>.
2879 =item POSIX getpgrp can't take an argument
2881 (F) Your system has POSIX getpgrp(), which takes no argument, unlike
2882 the BSD version, which takes a pid.
2884 =item Possible attempt to put comments in qw() list
2886 (W qw) qw() lists contain items separated by whitespace; as with literal
2887 strings, comment characters are not ignored, but are instead treated as
2888 literal data. (You may have used different delimiters than the
2889 parentheses shown here; braces are also frequently used.)
2891 You probably wrote something like this:
2898 when you should have written this:
2905 If you really want comments, build your list the
2906 old-fashioned way, with quotes and commas:
2910 'b', # another comment
2913 =item Possible attempt to separate words with commas
2915 (W qw) qw() lists contain items separated by whitespace; therefore
2916 commas aren't needed to separate the items. (You may have used
2917 different delimiters than the parentheses shown here; braces are also
2920 You probably wrote something like this:
2924 which puts literal commas into some of the list items. Write it without
2925 commas if you don't want them to appear in your data:
2929 =item Possible memory corruption: %s overflowed 3rd argument
2931 (F) An ioctl() or fcntl() returned more than Perl was bargaining for.
2932 Perl guesses a reasonable buffer size, but puts a sentinel byte at the
2933 end of the buffer just in case. This sentinel byte got clobbered, and
2934 Perl assumes that memory is now corrupted. See L<perlfunc/ioctl>.
2936 =item Possible precedence problem on bitwise %c operator
2938 (W precedence) Your program uses a bitwise logical operator in conjunction
2939 with a numeric comparison operator, like this :
2941 if ($x & $y == 0) { ... }
2943 This expression is actually equivalent to C<$x & ($y == 0)>, due to the
2944 higher precedence of C<==>. This is probably not what you want. (If you
2945 really meant to write this, disable the warning, or, better, write
2946 C<$x & ($y == 0 ? 1 : 0)>).
2948 =item Possible unintended interpolation of %s in string
2950 (W ambiguous) You said something like `@foo' in a double-quoted string
2951 but there was no array C<@foo> in scope at the time. If you wanted a
2952 literal @foo, then write it as \@foo; otherwise find out what happened
2953 to the array you apparently lost track of.
2955 =item Possible Y2K bug: %s
2957 (W y2k) You are concatenating the number 19 with another number, which
2958 could be a potential Year 2000 problem.
2960 =item pragma "attrs" is deprecated, use "sub NAME : ATTRS" instead
2962 (D deprecated) You have written something like this:
2966 use attrs qw(locked);
2969 You should use the new declaration syntax instead.
2975 The C<use attrs> pragma is now obsolete, and is only provided for
2976 backward-compatibility. See L<perlsub/"Subroutine Attributes">.
2978 =item Precedence problem: open %s should be open(%s)
2980 (S precedence) The old irregular construct
2984 is now misinterpreted as
2988 because of the strict regularization of Perl 5's grammar into unary and
2989 list operators. (The old open was a little of both.) You must put
2990 parentheses around the filehandle, or use the new "or" operator instead
2993 =item Premature end of script headers
2997 =item printf() on closed filehandle %s
2999 (W closed) The filehandle you're writing to got itself closed sometime
3000 before now. Check your control flow.
3002 =item print() on closed filehandle %s
3004 (W closed) The filehandle you're printing on got itself closed sometime
3005 before now. Check your control flow.
3007 =item Process terminated by SIG%s
3009 (W) This is a standard message issued by OS/2 applications, while *nix
3010 applications die in silence. It is considered a feature of the OS/2
3011 port. One can easily disable this by appropriate sighandlers, see
3012 L<perlipc/"Signals">. See also "Process terminated by SIGTERM/SIGINT"
3015 =item Prototype mismatch: %s vs %s
3017 (S prototype) The subroutine being declared or defined had previously been
3018 declared or defined with a different function prototype.
3020 =item Prototype not terminated
3022 (F) You've omitted the closing parenthesis in a function prototype
3025 =item Quantifier in {,} bigger than %d in regex;
3027 marked by <-- HERE in m/%s/
3029 (F) There is currently a limit to the size of the min and max values of the
3030 {min,max} construct. The <-- HERE shows in the regular expression about where
3031 the problem was discovered. See L<perlre>.
3033 =item Quantifier unexpected on zero-length expression;
3035 marked by <-- HERE in m/%s/
3037 (W regexp) You applied a regular expression quantifier in a place where
3038 it makes no sense, such as on a zero-width assertion. Try putting the
3039 quantifier inside the assertion instead. For example, the way to match
3040 "abc" provided that it is followed by three repetitions of "xyz" is
3041 C</abc(?=(?:xyz){3})/>, not C</abc(?=xyz){3}/>.
3043 The <-- HERE shows in the regular expression about where the problem was
3046 =item Range iterator outside integer range
3048 (F) One (or both) of the numeric arguments to the range operator ".."
3049 are outside the range which can be represented by integers internally.
3050 One possible workaround is to force Perl to use magical string increment
3051 by prepending "0" to your numbers.
3053 =item readline() on closed filehandle %s
3055 (W closed) The filehandle you're reading from got itself closed sometime
3056 before now. Check your control flow.
3058 =item Reallocation too large: %lx
3060 (F) You can't allocate more than 64K on an MS-DOS machine.
3062 =item realloc() of freed memory ignored
3064 (S malloc) An internal routine called realloc() on something that had
3067 =item Recompile perl with B<-D>DEBUGGING to use B<-D> switch
3069 (F debugging) You can't use the B<-D> option unless the code to produce
3070 the desired output is compiled into Perl, which entails some overhead,
3071 which is why it's currently left out of your copy.
3073 =item Recursive inheritance detected in package '%s'
3075 (F) More than 100 levels of inheritance were used. Probably indicates
3076 an unintended loop in your inheritance hierarchy.
3078 =item Recursive inheritance detected while looking for method %s
3080 (F) More than 100 levels of inheritance were encountered while invoking
3081 a method. Probably indicates an unintended loop in your inheritance
3084 =item Reference found where even-sized list expected
3086 (W misc) You gave a single reference where Perl was expecting a list
3087 with an even number of elements (for assignment to a hash). This usually
3088 means that you used the anon hash constructor when you meant to use
3089 parens. In any case, a hash requires key/value B<pairs>.
3091 %hash = { one => 1, two => 2, }; # WRONG
3092 %hash = [ qw/ an anon array / ]; # WRONG
3093 %hash = ( one => 1, two => 2, ); # right
3094 %hash = qw( one 1 two 2 ); # also fine
3096 =item Reference is already weak
3098 (W misc) You have attempted to weaken a reference that is already weak.
3099 Doing so has no effect.
3101 =item Reference miscount in sv_replace()
3103 (W internal) The internal sv_replace() function was handed a new SV with
3104 a reference count of other than 1.
3106 =item Reference to nonexistent group in regex;
3108 marked by <-- HERE in m/%s/
3110 (F) You used something like C<\7> in your regular expression, but there are
3111 not at least seven sets of capturing parentheses in the expression. If you
3112 wanted to have the character with value 7 inserted into the regular expression,
3113 prepend a zero to make the number at least two digits: C<\07>
3115 The <-- HERE shows in the regular expression about where the problem was
3118 =item regexp memory corruption
3120 (P) The regular expression engine got confused by what the regular
3121 expression compiler gave it.
3123 =item Regexp out of space
3125 (P) A "can't happen" error, because safemalloc() should have caught it
3128 =item Repeat count in pack overflows
3130 (F) You can't specify a repeat count so large that it overflows your
3131 signed integers. See L<perlfunc/pack>.
3133 =item Repeat count in unpack overflows
3135 (F) You can't specify a repeat count so large that it overflows your
3136 signed integers. See L<perlfunc/unpack>.
3138 =item Reversed %s= operator
3140 (W syntax) You wrote your assignment operator backwards. The = must
3141 always comes last, to avoid ambiguity with subsequent unary operators.
3143 =item Runaway format
3145 (F) Your format contained the ~~ repeat-until-blank sequence, but it
3146 produced 200 lines at once, and the 200th line looked exactly like the
3147 199th line. Apparently you didn't arrange for the arguments to exhaust
3148 themselves, either by using ^ instead of @ (for scalar variables), or by
3149 shifting or popping (for array variables). See L<perlform>.
3151 =item Scalar value @%s[%s] better written as $%s[%s]
3153 (W syntax) You've used an array slice (indicated by @) to select a
3154 single element of an array. Generally it's better to ask for a scalar
3155 value (indicated by $). The difference is that C<$foo[&bar]> always
3156 behaves like a scalar, both when assigning to it and when evaluating its
3157 argument, while C<@foo[&bar]> behaves like a list when you assign to it,
3158 and provides a list context to its subscript, which can do weird things
3159 if you're expecting only one subscript.
3161 On the other hand, if you were actually hoping to treat the array
3162 element as a list, you need to look into how references work, because
3163 Perl will not magically convert between scalars and lists for you. See
3166 =item Scalar value @%s{%s} better written as $%s{%s}
3168 (W syntax) You've used a hash slice (indicated by @) to select a single
3169 element of a hash. Generally it's better to ask for a scalar value
3170 (indicated by $). The difference is that C<$foo{&bar}> always behaves
3171 like a scalar, both when assigning to it and when evaluating its
3172 argument, while C<@foo{&bar}> behaves like a list when you assign to it,
3173 and provides a list context to its subscript, which can do weird things
3174 if you're expecting only one subscript.
3176 On the other hand, if you were actually hoping to treat the hash element
3177 as a list, you need to look into how references work, because Perl will
3178 not magically convert between scalars and lists for you. See
3181 =item Scalars leaked: %d
3183 (P) Something went wrong in Perl's internal bookkeeping of scalars:
3184 not all scalar variables were deallocated by the time Perl exited.
3185 What this usually indicates is a memory leak, which is of course bad,
3186 especially if the Perl program is intended to be long-running.
3188 =item Script is not setuid/setgid in suidperl
3190 (F) Oddly, the suidperl program was invoked on a script without a setuid
3191 or setgid bit set. This doesn't make much sense.
3193 =item Search pattern not terminated
3195 (F) The lexer couldn't find the final delimiter of a // or m{}
3196 construct. Remember that bracketing delimiters count nesting level.
3197 Missing the leading C<$> from a variable C<$m> may cause this error.
3199 =item %sseek() on unopened filehandle
3201 (W unopened) You tried to use the seek() or sysseek() function on a
3202 filehandle that was either never opened or has since been closed.
3204 =item select not implemented
3206 (F) This machine doesn't implement the select() system call.
3208 =item Self-ties of arrays and hashes are not supported
3210 (F) Self-ties are of arrays and hashes are not supported in
3211 the current implementation.
3213 =item Semicolon seems to be missing
3215 (W semicolon) A nearby syntax error was probably caused by a missing
3216 semicolon, or possibly some other missing operator, such as a comma.
3218 =item semi-panic: attempt to dup freed string
3220 (S internal) The internal newSVsv() routine was called to duplicate a
3221 scalar that had previously been marked as free.
3223 =item sem%s not implemented
3225 (F) You don't have System V semaphore IPC on your system.
3227 =item send() on closed socket %s
3229 (W closed) The socket you're sending to got itself closed sometime
3230 before now. Check your control flow.
3232 =item Sequence (? incomplete in regex; marked by <-- HERE in m/%s/
3234 (F) A regular expression ended with an incomplete extension (?. The <-- HERE
3235 shows in the regular expression about where the problem was discovered. See
3238 =item Sequence (?{...}) not terminated or not {}-balanced in regex;
3240 marked by <-- HERE in m/%s/
3242 (F) If the contents of a (?{...}) clause contains braces, they must balance
3243 for Perl to properly detect the end of the clause. The <-- HERE shows in
3244 the regular expression about where the problem was discovered. See
3247 =item Sequence (?%s...) not implemented in regex;
3249 marked by <-- HERE in m/%s/
3251 (F) A proposed regular expression extension has the character reserved but
3252 has not yet been written. The <-- HERE shows in the regular expression about
3253 where the problem was discovered. See L<perlre>.
3255 =item Sequence (?%s...) not recognized in regex;
3257 marked by <-- HERE in m/%s/
3259 (F) You used a regular expression extension that doesn't make sense. The
3260 <-- HERE shows in the regular expression about where the problem was
3261 discovered. See L<perlre>.
3263 =item Sequence (?#... not terminated in regex;
3265 marked by <-- HERE in m/%s/
3267 (F) A regular expression comment must be terminated by a closing
3268 parenthesis. Embedded parentheses aren't allowed. The <-- HERE shows in
3269 the regular expression about where the problem was discovered. See
3272 =item 500 Server error
3278 This is the error message generally seen in a browser window when trying
3279 to run a CGI program (including SSI) over the web. The actual error text
3280 varies widely from server to server. The most frequently-seen variants
3281 are "500 Server error", "Method (something) not permitted", "Document
3282 contains no data", "Premature end of script headers", and "Did not
3283 produce a valid header".
3285 B<This is a CGI error, not a Perl error>.
3287 You need to make sure your script is executable, is accessible by the
3288 user CGI is running the script under (which is probably not the user
3289 account you tested it under), does not rely on any environment variables
3290 (like PATH) from the user it isn't running under, and isn't in a
3291 location where the CGI server can't find it, basically, more or less.
3292 Please see the following for more information:
3294 http://www.perl.org/CGI_MetaFAQ.html
3295 http://www.htmlhelp.org/faq/cgifaq.html
3296 http://www.w3.org/Security/Faq/
3298 You should also look at L<perlfaq9>.
3300 =item setegid() not implemented
3302 (F) You tried to assign to C<$)>, and your operating system doesn't
3303 support the setegid() system call (or equivalent), or at least Configure
3306 =item seteuid() not implemented
3308 (F) You tried to assign to C<< $> >>, and your operating system doesn't
3309 support the seteuid() system call (or equivalent), or at least Configure
3312 =item setpgrp can't take arguments
3314 (F) Your system has the setpgrp() from BSD 4.2, which takes no
3315 arguments, unlike POSIX setpgid(), which takes a process ID and process
3318 =item setrgid() not implemented
3320 (F) You tried to assign to C<$(>, and your operating system doesn't
3321 support the setrgid() system call (or equivalent), or at least Configure
3324 =item setruid() not implemented
3326 (F) You tried to assign to C<$<>, and your operating system doesn't
3327 support the setruid() system call (or equivalent), or at least Configure
3330 =item setsockopt() on closed socket %s
3332 (W closed) You tried to set a socket option on a closed socket. Did you
3333 forget to check the return value of your socket() call? See
3334 L<perlfunc/setsockopt>.
3336 =item Setuid/gid script is writable by world
3338 (F) The setuid emulator won't run a script that is writable by the
3339 world, because the world might have written on it already.
3341 =item shm%s not implemented
3343 (F) You don't have System V shared memory IPC on your system.
3345 =item <> should be quotes
3347 (F) You wrote C<< require <file> >> when you should have written
3350 =item /%s/ should probably be written as "%s"
3352 (W syntax) You have used a pattern where Perl expected to find a string,
3353 as in the first argument to C<join>. Perl will treat the true or false
3354 result of matching the pattern against $_ as the string, which is
3355 probably not what you had in mind.
3357 =item shutdown() on closed socket %s
3359 (W closed) You tried to do a shutdown on a closed socket. Seems a bit
3362 =item SIG%s handler "%s" not defined
3364 (W signal) The signal handler named in %SIG doesn't, in fact, exist.
3365 Perhaps you put it into the wrong package?
3367 =item sort is now a reserved word
3369 (F) An ancient error message that almost nobody ever runs into anymore.
3370 But before sort was a keyword, people sometimes used it as a filehandle.
3372 =item Sort subroutine didn't return a numeric value
3374 (F) A sort comparison routine must return a number. You probably blew
3375 it by not using C<< <=> >> or C<cmp>, or by not using them correctly.
3376 See L<perlfunc/sort>.
3378 =item Sort subroutine didn't return single value
3380 (F) A sort comparison subroutine may not return a list value with more
3381 or less than one element. See L<perlfunc/sort>.
3383 =item splice() offset past end of array
3385 (W misc) You attempted to specify an offset that was past the end of
3386 the array passed to splice(). Splicing will instead commence at the end
3387 of the array, rather than past it. If this isn't what you want, try
3388 explicitly pre-extending the array by assigning $#array = $offset. See
3393 (P) The split was looping infinitely. (Obviously, a split shouldn't
3394 iterate more times than there are characters of input, which is what
3395 happened.) See L<perlfunc/split>.
3397 =item Statement unlikely to be reached
3399 (W exec) You did an exec() with some statement after it other than a
3400 die(). This is almost always an error, because exec() never returns
3401 unless there was a failure. You probably wanted to use system()
3402 instead, which does return. To suppress this warning, put the exec() in
3405 =item stat() on unopened filehandle %s
3407 (W unopened) You tried to use the stat() function on a filehandle that
3408 was either never opened or has since been closed.
3410 =item Stub found while resolving method `%s' overloading %s
3412 (P) Overloading resolution over @ISA tree may be broken by importation
3413 stubs. Stubs should never be implicitly created, but explicit calls to
3414 C<can> may break this.
3416 =item Subroutine %s redefined
3418 (W redefine) You redefined a subroutine. To suppress this warning, say
3421 no warnings 'redefine';
3422 eval "sub name { ... }";
3425 =item Substitution loop
3427 (P) The substitution was looping infinitely. (Obviously, a substitution
3428 shouldn't iterate more times than there are characters of input, which
3429 is what happened.) See the discussion of substitution in
3430 L<perlop/"Quote and Quote-like Operators">.
3432 =item Substitution pattern not terminated
3434 (F) The lexer couldn't find the interior delimiter of an s/// or s{}{}
3435 construct. Remember that bracketing delimiters count nesting level.
3436 Missing the leading C<$> from variable C<$s> may cause this error.
3438 =item Substitution replacement not terminated
3440 (F) The lexer couldn't find the final delimiter of an s/// or s{}{}
3441 construct. Remember that bracketing delimiters count nesting level.
3442 Missing the leading C<$> from variable C<$s> may cause this error.
3444 =item substr outside of string
3446 (W substr),(F) You tried to reference a substr() that pointed outside of
3447 a string. That is, the absolute value of the offset was larger than the
3448 length of the string. See L<perlfunc/substr>. This warning is fatal if
3449 substr is used in an lvalue context (as the left hand side of an
3450 assignment or as a subroutine argument for example).
3452 =item suidperl is no longer needed since %s
3454 (F) Your Perl was compiled with B<-D>SETUID_SCRIPTS_ARE_SECURE_NOW, but
3455 a version of the setuid emulator somehow got run anyway.
3457 =item Switch (?(condition)... contains too many branches in regex;
3459 marked by <-- HERE in m/%s/
3461 (F) A (?(condition)if-clause|else-clause) construct can have at most two
3462 branches (the if-clause and the else-clause). If you want one or both to
3463 contain alternation, such as using C<this|that|other>, enclose it in
3464 clustering parentheses:
3466 (?(condition)(?:this|that|other)|else-clause)
3468 The <-- HERE shows in the regular expression about where the problem was
3469 discovered. See L<perlre>.
3471 =item Switch condition not recognized in regex;
3473 marked by <-- HERE in m/%s/
3475 (F) If the argument to the (?(...)if-clause|else-clause) construct is a
3476 number, it can be only a number. The <-- HERE shows in the regular expression
3477 about where the problem was discovered. See L<perlre>.
3479 =item switching effective %s is not implemented
3481 (F) While under the C<use filetest> pragma, we cannot switch the real
3482 and effective uids or gids.
3486 (F) Probably means you had a syntax error. Common reasons include:
3488 A keyword is misspelled.
3489 A semicolon is missing.
3491 An opening or closing parenthesis is missing.
3492 An opening or closing brace is missing.
3493 A closing quote is missing.
3495 Often there will be another error message associated with the syntax
3496 error giving more information. (Sometimes it helps to turn on B<-w>.)
3497 The error message itself often tells you where it was in the line when
3498 it decided to give up. Sometimes the actual error is several tokens
3499 before this, because Perl is good at understanding random input.
3500 Occasionally the line number may be misleading, and once in a blue moon
3501 the only way to figure out what's triggering the error is to call
3502 C<perl -c> repeatedly, chopping away half the program each time to see
3503 if the error went away. Sort of the cybernetic version of S<20
3506 =item syntax error at line %d: `%s' unexpected
3508 (A) You've accidentally run your script through the Bourne shell instead
3509 of Perl. Check the #! line, or manually feed your script into Perl
3512 =item syntax error in file %s at line %d, next 2 tokens "%s"
3514 (F) This error is likely to occur if you run a perl5 script through
3515 a perl4 interpreter, especially if the next 2 tokens are "use strict"
3516 or "my $var" or "our $var".
3520 (F) The final summary message when a C<perl -c> succeeds.
3522 =item System V %s is not implemented on this machine
3524 (F) You tried to do something with a function beginning with "sem",
3525 "shm", or "msg" but that System V IPC is not implemented in your
3526 machine. In some machines the functionality can exist but be
3527 unconfigured. Consult your system support.
3529 =item syswrite() on closed filehandle %s
3531 (W closed) The filehandle you're writing to got itself closed sometime
3532 before now. Check your control flow.
3534 =item Target of goto is too deeply nested
3536 (F) You tried to use C<goto> to reach a label that was too deeply nested
3537 for Perl to reach. Perl is doing you a favor by refusing.
3539 =item tell() on unopened filehandle
3541 (W unopened) You tried to use the tell() function on a filehandle that
3542 was either never opened or has since been closed.
3544 =item That use of $[ is unsupported
3546 (F) Assignment to C<$[> is now strictly circumscribed, and interpreted
3547 as a compiler directive. You may say only one of
3556 This is to prevent the problem of one module changing the array base out
3557 from under another module inadvertently. See L<perlvar/$[>.
3559 =item The crypt() function is unimplemented due to excessive paranoia
3561 (F) Configure couldn't find the crypt() function on your machine,
3562 probably because your vendor didn't supply it, probably because they
3563 think the U.S. Government thinks it's a secret, or at least that they
3564 will continue to pretend that it is. And if you quote me on that, I
3567 =item The %s function is unimplemented
3569 The function indicated isn't implemented on this architecture, according
3570 to the probings of Configure.
3572 =item The stat preceding %s wasn't an lstat
3574 (F) It makes no sense to test the current stat buffer for symbolic
3575 linkhood if the last stat that wrote to the stat buffer already went
3576 past the symlink to get to the real file. Use an actual filename
3579 =item This Perl can't reset CRTL environ elements (%s)
3581 =item This Perl can't set CRTL environ elements (%s=%s)
3583 (W internal) Warnings peculiar to VMS. You tried to change or delete an
3584 element of the CRTL's internal environ array, but your copy of Perl
3585 wasn't built with a CRTL that contained the setenv() function. You'll
3586 need to rebuild Perl with a CRTL that does, or redefine
3587 F<PERL_ENV_TABLES> (see L<perlvms>) so that the environ array isn't the
3588 target of the change to
3589 %ENV which produced the warning.
3591 =item thread failed to start: %s
3593 (F) The entry point function of threads->create() failed for some reason.
3595 =item times not implemented
3597 (F) Your version of the C library apparently doesn't do times(). I
3598 suspect you're not running on Unix.
3600 =item Too few args to syscall
3602 (F) There has to be at least one argument to syscall() to specify the
3603 system call to call, silly dilly.
3605 =item Too late for "B<-T>" option
3607 (X) The #! line (or local equivalent) in a Perl script contains the
3608 B<-T> option, but Perl was not invoked with B<-T> in its command line.
3609 This is an error because, by the time Perl discovers a B<-T> in a
3610 script, it's too late to properly taint everything from the environment.
3613 If the Perl script is being executed as a command using the #!
3614 mechanism (or its local equivalent), this error can usually be fixed by
3615 editing the #! line so that the B<-T> option is a part of Perl's first
3616 argument: e.g. change C<perl -n -T> to C<perl -T -n>.
3618 If the Perl script is being executed as C<perl scriptname>, then the
3619 B<-T> option must appear on the command line: C<perl -T scriptname>.
3621 =item Too late for "-%s" option
3623 (X) The #! line (or local equivalent) in a Perl script contains the
3624 B<-M> or B<-m> option. This is an error because B<-M> and B<-m> options
3625 are not intended for use inside scripts. Use the C<use> pragma instead.
3627 =item Too late to run %s block
3629 (W void) A CHECK or INIT block is being defined during run time proper,
3630 when the opportunity to run them has already passed. Perhaps you are
3631 loading a file with C<require> or C<do> when you should be using C<use>
3632 instead. Or perhaps you should put the C<require> or C<do> inside a
3635 =item Too many args to syscall
3637 (F) Perl supports a maximum of only 14 args to syscall().
3639 =item Too many arguments for %s
3641 (F) The function requires fewer arguments than you specified.
3647 (A) You've accidentally run your script through B<csh> instead of Perl.
3648 Check the #! line, or manually feed your script into Perl yourself.
3650 =item Trailing \ in regex m/%s/
3652 (F) The regular expression ends with an unbackslashed backslash.
3653 Backslash it. See L<perlre>.
3655 =item Transliteration pattern not terminated
3657 (F) The lexer couldn't find the interior delimiter of a tr/// or tr[][]
3658 or y/// or y[][] construct. Missing the leading C<$> from variables
3659 C<$tr> or C<$y> may cause this error.
3661 =item Transliteration replacement not terminated
3663 (F) The lexer couldn't find the final delimiter of a tr/// or tr[][]
3666 =item truncate not implemented
3668 (F) Your machine doesn't implement a file truncation mechanism that
3669 Configure knows about.
3671 =item Type of arg %d to %s must be %s (not %s)
3673 (F) This function requires the argument in that position to be of a
3674 certain type. Arrays must be @NAME or C<@{EXPR}>. Hashes must be
3675 %NAME or C<%{EXPR}>. No implicit dereferencing is allowed--use the
3676 {EXPR} forms as an explicit dereference. See L<perlref>.
3678 =item umask not implemented
3680 (F) Your machine doesn't implement the umask function and you tried to
3681 use it to restrict permissions for yourself (EXPR & 0700).
3683 =item Unable to create sub named "%s"
3685 (F) You attempted to create or access a subroutine with an illegal name.
3687 =item Unbalanced context: %d more PUSHes than POPs
3689 (W internal) The exit code detected an internal inconsistency in how
3690 many execution contexts were entered and left.
3692 =item Unbalanced saves: %d more saves than restores
3694 (W internal) The exit code detected an internal inconsistency in how
3695 many values were temporarily localized.
3697 =item Unbalanced scopes: %d more ENTERs than LEAVEs
3699 (W internal) The exit code detected an internal inconsistency in how
3700 many blocks were entered and left.
3702 =item Unbalanced tmps: %d more allocs than frees
3704 (W internal) The exit code detected an internal inconsistency in how
3705 many mortal scalars were allocated and freed.
3707 =item Undefined format "%s" called
3709 (F) The format indicated doesn't seem to exist. Perhaps it's really in
3710 another package? See L<perlform>.
3712 =item Undefined sort subroutine "%s" called
3714 (F) The sort comparison routine specified doesn't seem to exist.
3715 Perhaps it's in a different package? See L<perlfunc/sort>.
3717 =item Undefined subroutine &%s called
3719 (F) The subroutine indicated hasn't been defined, or if it was, it has
3720 since been undefined.
3722 =item Undefined subroutine called
3724 (F) The anonymous subroutine you're trying to call hasn't been defined,
3725 or if it was, it has since been undefined.
3727 =item Undefined subroutine in sort
3729 (F) The sort comparison routine specified is declared but doesn't seem
3730 to have been defined yet. See L<perlfunc/sort>.
3732 =item Undefined top format "%s" called
3734 (F) The format indicated doesn't seem to exist. Perhaps it's really in
3735 another package? See L<perlform>.
3737 =item Undefined value assigned to typeglob
3739 (W misc) An undefined value was assigned to a typeglob, a la
3740 C<*foo = undef>. This does nothing. It's possible that you really mean
3743 =item %s: Undefined variable
3745 (A) You've accidentally run your script through B<csh> instead of Perl.
3746 Check the #! line, or manually feed your script into Perl yourself.
3748 =item unexec of %s into %s failed!
3750 (F) The unexec() routine failed for some reason. See your local FSF
3751 representative, who probably put it there in the first place.
3753 =item Unicode character %s is illegal
3755 (W utf8) Certain Unicode characters have been designated off-limits by
3756 the Unicode standard and should not be generated. If you really know
3757 what you are doing you can turn off this warning by C<no warnings 'utf8';>.
3759 =item Unknown BYTEORDER
3761 (F) There are no byte-swapping functions for a machine with this byte
3764 =item Unknown "re" subpragma '%s' (known ones are: %s)
3766 You tried to use an unknown subpragma of the "re" pragma.
3768 =item Unknown switch condition (?(%.2s in regex;
3770 marked by <-- HERE in m/%s/
3772 (F) The condition part of a (?(condition)if-clause|else-clause) construct
3773 is not known. The condition may be lookahead or lookbehind (the condition
3774 is true if the lookahead or lookbehind is true), a (?{...}) construct (the
3775 condition is true if the code evaluates to a true value), or a number (the
3776 condition is true if the set of capturing parentheses named by the number
3779 The <-- HERE shows in the regular expression about where the problem was
3780 discovered. See L<perlre>.
3782 =item Unknown open() mode '%s'
3784 (F) The second argument of 3-argument open() is not among the list
3785 of valid modes: C<< < >>, C<< > >>, C<<< >> >>>, C<< +< >>,
3786 C<< +> >>, C<<< +>> >>>, C<-|>, C<|->, C<< <& >>, C<< >& >>.
3788 =item Unknown process %x sent message to prime_env_iter: %s
3790 (P) An error peculiar to VMS. Perl was reading values for %ENV before
3791 iterating over it, and someone else stuck a message in the stream of
3792 data Perl expected. Someone's very confused, or perhaps trying to
3793 subvert Perl's population of %ENV for nefarious purposes.
3795 =item Unknown warnings category '%s'
3797 (F) An error issued by the C<warnings> pragma. You specified a warnings
3798 category that is unknown to perl at this point.
3800 Note that if you want to enable a warnings category registered by a module
3801 (e.g. C<use warnings 'File::Find'>), you must have imported this module
3804 =item unmatched [ in regex; marked by <-- HERE in m/%s/
3806 (F) The brackets around a character class must match. If you wish to
3807 include a closing bracket in a character class, backslash it or put it
3808 first. The <-- HERE shows in the regular expression about where the problem
3809 was discovered. See L<perlre>.
3811 =item unmatched ( in regex; marked by <-- HERE in m/%s/
3813 (F) Unbackslashed parentheses must always be balanced in regular
3814 expressions. If you're a vi user, the % key is valuable for finding the
3815 matching parenthesis. The <-- HERE shows in the regular expression about
3816 where the problem was discovered. See L<perlre>.
3818 =item Unmatched right %s bracket
3820 (F) The lexer counted more closing curly or square brackets than opening
3821 ones, so you're probably missing a matching opening bracket. As a
3822 general rule, you'll find the missing one (so to speak) near the place
3823 you were last editing.
3825 =item Unquoted string "%s" may clash with future reserved word
3827 (W reserved) You used a bareword that might someday be claimed as a
3828 reserved word. It's best to put such a word in quotes, or capitalize it
3829 somehow, or insert an underbar into it. You might also declare it as a
3832 =item Unrecognized character %s
3834 (F) The Perl parser has no idea what to do with the specified character
3835 in your Perl script (or eval). Perhaps you tried to run a compressed
3836 script, a binary program, or a directory as a Perl program.
3838 =item /%s/: Unrecognized escape \\%c in character class passed through
3840 (W regexp) You used a backslash-character combination which is not
3841 recognized by Perl inside character classes. The character was
3842 understood literally.
3844 =item Unrecognized escape \\%c passed through in regex;
3846 marked by <-- HERE in m/%s/
3848 (W regexp) You used a backslash-character combination which is not
3849 recognized by Perl. This combination appears in an interpolated variable or
3850 a C<'>-delimited regular expression. The character was understood
3851 literally. The <-- HERE shows in the regular expression about where the
3852 escape was discovered.
3854 =item Unrecognized escape \\%c passed through
3856 (W misc) You used a backslash-character combination which is not
3859 =item Unrecognized signal name "%s"
3861 (F) You specified a signal name to the kill() function that was not
3862 recognized. Say C<kill -l> in your shell to see the valid signal names
3865 =item Unrecognized switch: -%s (-h will show valid options)
3867 (F) You specified an illegal option to Perl. Don't do that. (If you
3868 think you didn't do that, check the #! line to see if it's supplying the
3869 bad switch on your behalf.)
3871 =item Unsuccessful %s on filename containing newline
3873 (W newline) A file operation was attempted on a filename, and that
3874 operation failed, PROBABLY because the filename contained a newline,
3875 PROBABLY because you forgot to chomp() it off. See L<perlfunc/chomp>.
3877 =item Unsupported directory function "%s" called
3879 (F) Your machine doesn't support opendir() and readdir().
3881 =item Unsupported function %s
3883 (F) This machine doesn't implement the indicated function, apparently.
3884 At least, Configure doesn't think so.
3886 =item Unsupported function fork
3888 (F) Your version of executable does not support forking.
3890 Note that under some systems, like OS/2, there may be different flavors
3891 of Perl executables, some of which may support fork, some not. Try
3892 changing the name you call Perl by to C<perl_>, C<perl__>, and so on.
3894 =item Unsupported script encoding
3896 (F) Your program file begins with a Unicode Byte Order Mark (BOM) which
3897 declares it to be in a Unicode encoding that Perl cannot yet read.
3899 =item Unsupported socket function "%s" called
3901 (F) Your machine doesn't support the Berkeley socket mechanism, or at
3902 least that's what Configure thought.
3904 =item Unterminated attribute list
3906 (F) The lexer found something other than a simple identifier at the
3907 start of an attribute, and it wasn't a semicolon or the start of a
3908 block. Perhaps you terminated the parameter list of the previous
3909 attribute too soon. See L<attributes>.
3911 =item Unterminated attribute parameter in attribute list
3913 (F) The lexer saw an opening (left) parenthesis character while parsing
3914 an attribute list, but the matching closing (right) parenthesis
3915 character was not found. You may need to add (or remove) a backslash
3916 character to get your parentheses to balance. See L<attributes>.
3918 =item Unterminated compressed integer
3920 (F) An argument to unpack("w",...) was incompatible with the BER
3921 compressed integer format and could not be converted to an integer.
3922 See L<perlfunc/pack>.
3924 =item Unterminated <> operator
3926 (F) The lexer saw a left angle bracket in a place where it was expecting
3927 a term, so it's looking for the corresponding right angle bracket, and
3928 not finding it. Chances are you left some needed parentheses out
3929 earlier in the line, and you really meant a "less than".
3931 =item untie attempted while %d inner references still exist
3933 (W untie) A copy of the object returned from C<tie> (or C<tied>) was
3934 still valid when C<untie> was called.
3936 =item Useless (?%s) - use /%s modifier in regex;
3938 marked by <-- HERE in m/%s/
3940 (W regexp) You have used an internal modifier such as (?o) that has no
3941 meaning unless applied to the entire regexp:
3943 if ($string =~ /(?o)$pattern/) { ... }
3947 if ($string =~ /$pattern/o) { ... }
3949 The <-- HERE shows in the regular expression about
3950 where the problem was discovered. See L<perlre>.
3952 =item Useless (?-%s) - don't use /%s modifier in regex;
3954 marked by <-- HERE in m/%s/
3956 (W regexp) You have used an internal modifier such as (?-o) that has no
3957 meaning unless removed from the entire regexp:
3959 if ($string =~ /(?-o)$pattern/o) { ... }
3963 if ($string =~ /$pattern/) { ... }
3965 The <-- HERE shows in the regular expression about
3966 where the problem was discovered. See L<perlre>.
3968 =item Useless use of %s in void context
3970 (W void) You did something without a side effect in a context that does
3971 nothing with the return value, such as a statement that doesn't return a
3972 value from a block, or the left side of a scalar comma operator. Very
3973 often this points not to stupidity on your part, but a failure of Perl
3974 to parse your program the way you thought it would. For example, you'd
3975 get this if you mixed up your C precedence with Python precedence and
3980 when you meant to say
3982 ($one, $two) = (1, 2);
3984 Another common error is to use ordinary parentheses to construct a list
3985 reference when you should be using square or curly brackets, for
3990 when you should have said
3994 The square brackets explicitly turn a list value into a scalar value,
3995 while parentheses do not. So when a parenthesized list is evaluated in
3996 a scalar context, the comma is treated like C's comma operator, which
3997 throws away the left argument, which is not what you want. See
3998 L<perlref> for more on this.
4000 This warning will not be issued for numerical constants equal to 0 or 1
4001 since they are often used in statements like
4003 1 while sub_with_side_effects() ;
4005 String constants that would normally evaluate to 0 or 1 are warned
4008 =item Useless use of "re" pragma
4010 (W) You did C<use re;> without any arguments. That isn't very useful.
4012 =item Useless use of sort in scalar context
4014 (W void) You used sort in scalar context, as in :
4018 This is not very useful, and perl currently optimizes this away.
4020 =item Useless use of %s with no values
4022 (W syntax) You used the push() or unshift() function with no arguments
4023 apart from the array, like C<push(@x)> or C<unshift(@foo)>. That won't
4024 usually have any effect on the array, so is completely useless. It's
4025 possible in principle that push(@tied_array) could have some effect
4026 if the array is tied to a class which implements a PUSH method. If so,
4027 you can write it as C<push(@tied_array,())> to avoid this warning.
4029 =item "use" not allowed in expression
4031 (F) The "use" keyword is recognized and executed at compile time, and
4032 returns no useful value. See L<perlmod>.
4034 =item Use of bare << to mean <<"" is deprecated
4036 (D deprecated) You are now encouraged to use the explicitly quoted form
4037 if you wish to use an empty line as the terminator of the here-document.
4039 =item Use of /c modifier is meaningless in s///
4041 (W regexp) You used the /c modifier in a substitution. The /c
4042 modifier is not presently meaningful in substitutions.
4044 =item Use of /c modifier is meaningless without /g
4046 (W regexp) You used the /c modifier with a regex operand, but didn't
4047 use the /g modifier. Currently, /c is meaningful only when /g is
4048 used. (This may change in the future.)
4050 =item Use of /g modifier is meaningless in split
4052 (W regexp) You used the /g modifier on the pattern for a C<split>
4053 operator. Since C<split> always tries to match the pattern
4054 repeatedly, the C</g> has no effect.
4056 =item Use of *glob{FILEHANDLE} is deprecated
4058 (D deprecated) You are now encouraged to use the shorter *glob{IO} form
4059 to access the filehandle slot within a typeglob.
4061 =item Use of chdir('') or chdir(undef) as chdir() deprecated
4063 (D deprecated) chdir() with no arguments is documented to change to
4064 $ENV{HOME} or $ENV{LOGDIR}. chdir(undef) and chdir('') share this
4065 behavior, but that has been deprecated. In future versions they
4068 Be careful to check that what you pass to chdir() is defined and not
4069 blank, else you might find yourself in your home directory.
4071 =item Use of implicit split to @_ is deprecated
4073 (D deprecated) It makes a lot of work for the compiler when you clobber
4074 a subroutine's argument list, so it's better if you assign the results
4075 of a split() explicitly to an array (or list).
4077 =item Use of inherited AUTOLOAD for non-method %s() is deprecated
4079 (D deprecated) As an (ahem) accidental feature, C<AUTOLOAD> subroutines
4080 are looked up as methods (using the C<@ISA> hierarchy) even when the
4081 subroutines to be autoloaded were called as plain functions (e.g.
4082 C<Foo::bar()>), not as methods (e.g. C<< Foo->bar() >> or C<<
4085 This bug will be rectified in future by using method lookup only for
4086 methods' C<AUTOLOAD>s. However, there is a significant base of existing
4087 code that may be using the old behavior. So, as an interim step, Perl
4088 currently issues an optional warning when non-methods use inherited
4091 The simple rule is: Inheritance will not work when autoloading
4092 non-methods. The simple fix for old code is: In any module that used
4093 to depend on inheriting C<AUTOLOAD> for non-methods from a base class
4094 named C<BaseClass>, execute C<*AUTOLOAD = \&BaseClass::AUTOLOAD> during
4097 In code that currently says C<use AutoLoader; @ISA = qw(AutoLoader);>
4098 you should remove AutoLoader from @ISA and change C<use AutoLoader;> to
4099 C<use AutoLoader 'AUTOLOAD';>.
4101 =item Use of -l on filehandle %s
4103 (W io) A filehandle represents an opened file, and when you opened the file
4104 it already went past any symlink you are presumably trying to look for.
4105 The operation returned C<undef>. Use a filename instead.
4107 =item Use of "package" with no arguments is deprecated
4109 (D deprecated) You used the C<package> keyword without specifying a package
4110 name. So no namespace is current at all. Using this can cause many
4111 otherwise reasonable constructs to fail in baffling ways. C<use strict;>
4114 =item Use of %s in printf format not supported
4116 (F) You attempted to use a feature of printf that is accessible from
4117 only C. This usually means there's a better way to do it in Perl.
4119 =item Use of $* is deprecated
4121 (D deprecated) This variable magically turned on multi-line pattern
4122 matching, both for you and for any luckless subroutine that you happen
4123 to call. You should use the new C<//m> and C<//s> modifiers now to do
4124 that without the dangerous action-at-a-distance effects of C<$*>.
4126 =item Use of %s is deprecated
4128 (D deprecated) The construct indicated is no longer recommended for use,
4129 generally because there's a better way to do it, and also because the
4130 old way has bad side effects.
4132 =item Use of $# is deprecated
4134 (D deprecated) This was an ill-advised attempt to emulate a poorly
4135 defined B<awk> feature. Use an explicit printf() or sprintf() instead.
4137 =item Use of reference "%s" as array index
4139 (W misc) You tried to use a reference as an array index; this probably
4140 isn't what you mean, because references in numerical context tend
4141 to be huge numbers, and so usually indicates programmer error.
4143 If you really do mean it, explicitly numify your reference, like so:
4144 C<$array[0+$ref]>. This warning is not given for overloaded objects,
4145 either, because you can overload the numification and stringification
4146 operators and then you assumedly know what you are doing.
4148 =item Use of reserved word "%s" is deprecated
4150 (D deprecated) The indicated bareword is a reserved word. Future
4151 versions of perl may use it as a keyword, so you're better off either
4152 explicitly quoting the word in a manner appropriate for its context of
4153 use, or using a different name altogether. The warning can be
4154 suppressed for subroutine names by either adding a C<&> prefix, or using
4155 a package qualifier, e.g. C<&our()>, or C<Foo::our()>.
4157 =item Use of tainted arguments in %s is deprecated
4159 (W taint, deprecated) You have supplied C<system()> or C<exec()> with multiple
4160 arguments and at least one of them is tainted. This used to be allowed
4161 but will become a fatal error in a future version of perl. Untaint your
4162 arguments. See L<perlsec>.
4164 =item Use of uninitialized value%s
4166 (W uninitialized) An undefined value was used as if it were already
4167 defined. It was interpreted as a "" or a 0, but maybe it was a mistake.
4168 To suppress this warning assign a defined value to your variables.
4170 To help you figure out what was undefined, perl tells you what operation
4171 you used the undefined value in. Note, however, that perl optimizes your
4172 program and the operation displayed in the warning may not necessarily
4173 appear literally in your program. For example, C<"that $foo"> is
4174 usually optimized into C<"that " . $foo>, and the warning will refer to
4175 the C<concatenation (.)> operator, even though there is no C<.> in your
4178 =item Using a hash as a reference is deprecated
4180 (D deprecated) You tried to use a hash as a reference, as in
4181 C<< %foo->{"bar"} >> or C<< %$ref->{"hello"} >>. Versions of perl <= 5.6.1
4182 used to allow this syntax, but shouldn't have. It is now deprecated, and will
4183 be removed in a future version.
4185 =item Using an array as a reference is deprecated
4187 (D deprecated) You tried to use an array as a reference, as in
4188 C<< @foo->[23] >> or C<< @$ref->[99] >>. Versions of perl <= 5.6.1 used to
4189 allow this syntax, but shouldn't have. It is now deprecated, and will be
4190 removed in a future version.
4192 =item UTF-16 surrogate %s
4194 (W utf8) You tried to generate half of an UTF-16 surrogate by
4195 requesting a Unicode character between the code points 0xD800 and
4196 0xDFFF (inclusive). That range is reserved exclusively for the use of
4197 UTF-16 encoding (by having two 16-bit UCS-2 characters); but Perl
4198 encodes its characters in UTF-8, so what you got is a very illegal
4199 character. If you really know what you are doing you can turn off
4200 this warning by C<no warnings 'utf8';>.
4202 =item Value of %s can be "0"; test with defined()
4204 (W misc) In a conditional expression, you used <HANDLE>, <*> (glob),
4205 C<each()>, or C<readdir()> as a boolean value. Each of these constructs
4206 can return a value of "0"; that would make the conditional expression
4207 false, which is probably not what you intended. When using these
4208 constructs in conditional expressions, test their values with the
4209 C<defined> operator.
4211 =item Value of CLI symbol "%s" too long
4213 (W misc) A warning peculiar to VMS. Perl tried to read the value of an
4214 %ENV element from a CLI symbol table, and found a resultant string
4215 longer than 1024 characters. The return value has been truncated to
4218 =item Variable "%s" is not imported%s
4220 (F) While "use strict" in effect, you referred to a global variable that
4221 you apparently thought was imported from another module, because
4222 something else of the same name (usually a subroutine) is exported by
4223 that module. It usually means you put the wrong funny character on the
4224 front of your variable.
4226 =item "%s" variable %s masks earlier declaration in same %s
4228 (W misc) A "my" or "our" variable has been redeclared in the current
4229 scope or statement, effectively eliminating all access to the previous
4230 instance. This is almost always a typographical error. Note that the
4231 earlier variable will still exist until the end of the scope or until
4232 all closure referents to it are destroyed.
4234 =item Variable "%s" may be unavailable
4236 (W closure) An inner (nested) I<anonymous> subroutine is inside a
4237 I<named> subroutine, and outside that is another subroutine; and the
4238 anonymous (innermost) subroutine is referencing a lexical variable
4239 defined in the outermost subroutine. For example:
4241 sub outermost { my $a; sub middle { sub { $a } } }
4243 If the anonymous subroutine is called or referenced (directly or
4244 indirectly) from the outermost subroutine, it will share the variable as
4245 you would expect. But if the anonymous subroutine is called or
4246 referenced when the outermost subroutine is not active, it will see the
4247 value of the shared variable as it was before and during the *first*
4248 call to the outermost subroutine, which is probably not what you want.
4250 In these circumstances, it is usually best to make the middle subroutine
4251 anonymous, using the C<sub {}> syntax. Perl has specific support for
4252 shared variables in nested anonymous subroutines; a named subroutine in
4253 between interferes with this feature.
4255 =item Variable syntax
4257 (A) You've accidentally run your script through B<csh> instead
4258 of Perl. Check the #! line, or manually feed your script into
4261 =item Variable "%s" will not stay shared
4263 (W closure) An inner (nested) I<named> subroutine is referencing a
4264 lexical variable defined in an outer subroutine.
4266 When the inner subroutine is called, it will probably see the value of
4267 the outer subroutine's variable as it was before and during the *first*
4268 call to the outer subroutine; in this case, after the first call to the
4269 outer subroutine is complete, the inner and outer subroutines will no
4270 longer share a common value for the variable. In other words, the
4271 variable will no longer be shared.
4273 Furthermore, if the outer subroutine is anonymous and references a
4274 lexical variable outside itself, then the outer and inner subroutines
4275 will I<never> share the given variable.
4277 This problem can usually be solved by making the inner subroutine
4278 anonymous, using the C<sub {}> syntax. When inner anonymous subs that
4279 reference variables in outer subroutines are called or referenced, they
4280 are automatically rebound to the current values of such variables.
4282 =item Variable length lookbehind not implemented in regex;
4284 marked by <-- HERE in m/%s/
4286 (F) Lookbehind is allowed only for subexpressions whose length is fixed and
4287 known at compile time. The <-- HERE shows in the regular expression about
4288 where the problem was discovered. See L<perlre>.
4290 =item Version number must be a constant number
4292 (P) The attempt to translate a C<use Module n.n LIST> statement into
4293 its equivalent C<BEGIN> block found an internal inconsistency with
4296 =item v-string in use/require is non-portable
4298 (W portable) The use of v-strings is non-portable to older, pre-5.6, Perls.
4299 If you want your scripts to be backward portable, use the floating
4300 point version number: for example, instead of C<use 5.6.1> say
4301 C<use 5.006_001>. This of course won't help: the older Perls
4302 won't suddenly start understanding newer features, but at least
4303 they will show a sensible error message indicating the required
4306 =item Warning: something's wrong
4308 (W) You passed warn() an empty string (the equivalent of C<warn "">) or
4309 you called it with no args and C<$_> was empty.
4311 =item Warning: unable to close filehandle %s properly
4313 (S) The implicit close() done by an open() got an error indication on
4314 the close(). This usually indicates your file system ran out of disk
4317 =item Warning: Use of "%s" without parentheses is ambiguous
4319 (S ambiguous) You wrote a unary operator followed by something that
4320 looks like a binary operator that could also have been interpreted as a
4321 term or unary operator. For instance, if you know that the rand
4322 function has a default argument of 1.0, and you write
4326 you may THINK you wrote the same thing as
4330 but in actual fact, you got
4334 So put in parentheses to say what you really mean.
4336 =item Wide character in %s
4338 (W utf8) Perl met a wide character (>255) when it wasn't expecting
4339 one. This warning is by default on for I/O (like print) but can be
4340 turned off by C<no warnings 'utf8';>. You are supposed to explicitly
4341 mark the filehandle with an encoding, see L<open> and L<perlfunc/binmode>.
4343 =item write() on closed filehandle %s
4345 (W closed) The filehandle you're writing to got itself closed sometime
4346 before now. Check your control flow.
4348 =item X outside of string
4350 (F) You had a pack template that specified a relative position before
4351 the beginning of the string being unpacked. See L<perlfunc/pack>.
4353 =item x outside of string
4355 (F) You had a pack template that specified a relative position after
4356 the end of the string being unpacked. See L<perlfunc/pack>.
4358 =item Xsub "%s" called in sort
4360 (F) The use of an external subroutine as a sort comparison is not yet
4363 =item Xsub called in sort
4365 (F) The use of an external subroutine as a sort comparison is not yet
4368 =item YOU HAVEN'T DISABLED SET-ID SCRIPTS IN THE KERNEL YET!
4370 (F) And you probably never will, because you probably don't have the
4371 sources to your kernel, and your vendor probably doesn't give a rip
4372 about what you want. Your best bet is to put a setuid C wrapper around
4375 =item You need to quote "%s"
4377 (W syntax) You assigned a bareword as a signal handler name.
4378 Unfortunately, you already have a subroutine of that name declared,
4379 which means that Perl 5 will try to call the subroutine when the
4380 assignment is executed, which is probably not what you want. (If it IS
4381 what you want, put an & in front.)