the native status to be interpreted as being what VMS classifies as
SEVERE_ERROR severity for DCL error handling.
-When the future POSIX_EXIT mode is active, C<die>, the native VMS exit
+When C<PERL_VMS_POSIX_EXIT> is active (see L</"$?"> below), the native VMS exit
status value will have either one of the C<$!> or C<$?> or C<$^E> or
the UNIX value 255 encoded into it in a way that the effective original
value can be decoded by other programs written in C, including Perl
a native VMS exit status value.
Please note a significant difference in the behavior of C<die> in
-the future POSIX_EXIT mode is that it does not force a VMS
+the C<PERL_VMS_POSIX_EXIT> mode is that it does not force a VMS
SEVERE_ERROR status on exit. The UNIX exit values of 2 through
255 will be encoded in VMS status values with severity levels of
SUCCESS. The UNIX exit value of 1 will be encoded in a VMS status
value with a severity level of ERROR. This is to be compatible with
how the VMS C library encodes these values.
-The minimum severity level set by C<die> in a future POSIX_EXIT mode
-may be changed to be ERROR or higher before that mode becomes fully active
-depending on the results of testing and further review. If this is
-done, the behavior of c<DIE> in the future POSIX_EXIT will close enough
-to the default mode that most DCL shell scripts will probably not notice
-a difference.
+The minimum severity level set by C<die> in C<PERL_VMS_POSIX_EXIT> mode
+may be changed to be ERROR or higher in the future depending on the
+results of testing and further review.
-See C<$?> for a description of the encoding of the UNIX value to
+See L</"$?"> for a description of the encoding of the UNIX value to
produce a native VMS status containing it.
SS$_NORMAL, and setting C<$?> to a non-zero value results in the
generic failure status SS$_ABORT. See also L<perlport/exit>.
-With the future POSIX_EXIT mode set, setting C<$?> will cause the
-new value to also be encoded into C<$^E> so that the either the
-original parent or child exit status values of 0 to 255
-can be automatically recovered by C programs expecting _POSIX_EXIT
-behavior. If both a parent and a child exit value are non-zero, then it
-will be assumed that this is actually a VMS native status value to
-be passed through. The special value of 0xFFFF is almost a NOOP as
-it will cause the current native VMS status in the C library to
-become the current native Perl VMS status, and is handled this way
-as consequence of it known to not be a valid native VMS status value.
-It is recommend that only values in range of normal UNIX parent or
+With the C<PERL_VMS_POSIX_EXIT> logical name defined as "ENABLE",
+setting C<$?> will cause the new value to be encoded into C<$^E>
+so that either the original parent or child exit status values
+ 0 to 255 can be automatically recovered by C programs expecting
+_POSIX_EXIT behavior. If both a parent and a child exit value are
+non-zero, then it will be assumed that this is actually a VMS native
+status value to be passed through. The special value of 0xFFFF is
+almost a NOOP as it will cause the current native VMS status in the
+C library to become the current native Perl VMS status, and is handled
+this way as it is known to not be a valid native VMS status value.
+It is recommend that only values in the range of normal UNIX parent or
child status numbers, 0 to 255 are used.
The pragma C<use vmsish 'status'> makes C<$?> reflect the actual
non-zero values to SS$_ABORT when setting C<$?> in an END
block (but zero will still be converted to SS$_NORMAL).
-Do not use the pragma C<use vmsish 'status'> with the future
-POSIX_EXIT mode, as they are at times requesting conflicting
-actions and the consequence of ignoring this advice will be
-undefined to allow future improvements in the POSIX exit handling.
+Do not use the pragma C<use vmsish 'status'> with C<PERL_VMS_POSIX_EXIT>
+enabled, as they are at times requesting conflicting actions and the
+consequence of ignoring this advice will be undefined to allow future
+improvements in the POSIX exit handling.
+
+In general, with C<PERL_VMS_POSIX_EXIT> enabled, more detailed information
+will be availble in the exit status for DCL scripts or other native VMS tools,
+and will give the expected information for Posix programs. It has not been
+made the default in order to preserve backward compatibility.
+
+N.B. Setting C<DECC$FILENAME_UNIX_REPORT> implicitly enables
+C<PERL_VMS_POSIX_EXIT>.
=item $|
=head1 Revision date
-This document was last updated on 3-Dec-2007, for Perl 5,
-patchlevel 10.
+Please see the git repository for revision history.
=head1 AUTHOR
projects / p5sagit/p5-mst-13.2.git / blobdiff