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Fixes bug in change 11717 that bus errored on HP-UX 10.20
[perl5.git] / pod / perldiag.pod
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1=head1 NAME
2
3perldiag - various Perl diagnostics
4
5=head1 DESCRIPTION
6
7These messages are classified as follows (listed in increasing order of
8desperation):
9
10 (W) A warning (optional).
11 (D) A deprecation (optional).
e476b1b5 12 (S) A severe warning (default).
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13 (F) A fatal error (trappable).
14 (P) An internal error you should never see (trappable).
54310121 15 (X) A very fatal error (nontrappable).
cb1a09d0 16 (A) An alien error message (not generated by Perl).
a0d0e21e 17
75b44862 18The majority of messages from the first three classifications above
64977eb6 19(W, D & S) can be controlled using the C<warnings> pragma.
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20
21If a message can be controlled by the C<warnings> pragma, its warning
22category is included with the classification letter in the description
23below.
24
25Optional warnings are enabled by using the C<warnings> pragma or the B<-w>
26and B<-W> switches. Warnings may be captured by setting C<$SIG{__WARN__}>
27to a reference to a routine that will be called on each warning instead
28of printing it. See L<perlvar>.
29
30Default warnings are always enabled unless they are explicitly disabled
31with the C<warnings> pragma or the B<-X> switch.
4438c4b7 32
748a9306 33Trappable errors may be trapped using the eval operator. See
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34L<perlfunc/eval>. In almost all cases, warnings may be selectively
35disabled or promoted to fatal errors using the C<warnings> pragma.
36See L<warnings>.
a0d0e21e 37
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38The messages are in alphabetical order, without regard to upper or
39lower-case. Some of these messages are generic. Spots that vary are
40denoted with a %s or other printf-style escape. These escapes are
41ignored by the alphabetical order, as are all characters other than
42letters. To look up your message, just ignore anything that is not a
43letter.
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44
45=over 4
46
6df41af2 47=item accept() on closed socket %s
33633739 48
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49(W closed) You tried to do an accept on a closed socket. Did you forget
50to check the return value of your socket() call? See
51L<perlfunc/accept>.
33633739 52
6df41af2 53=item Allocation too large: %lx
a0d0e21e 54
6df41af2 55(X) You can't allocate more than 64K on an MS-DOS machine.
a0d0e21e 56
f61d411c 57=item '!' allowed only after types %s
ef54e1a4 58
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59(F) The '!' is allowed in pack() and unpack() only after certain types.
60See L<perlfunc/pack>.
ef54e1a4 61
6df41af2 62=item Ambiguous call resolved as CORE::%s(), qualify as such or use &
43192e07 63
75b44862 64(W ambiguous) A subroutine you have declared has the same name as a Perl
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65keyword, and you have used the name without qualification for calling
66one or the other. Perl decided to call the builtin because the
67subroutine is not imported.
43192e07 68
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69To force interpretation as a subroutine call, either put an ampersand
70before the subroutine name, or qualify the name with its package.
71Alternatively, you can import the subroutine (or pretend that it's
72imported with the C<use subs> pragma).
43192e07 73
6df41af2 74To silently interpret it as the Perl operator, use the C<CORE::> prefix
496a33f5 75on the operator (e.g. C<CORE::log($x)>) or declare the subroutine
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76to be an object method (see L<perlsub/"Subroutine Attributes"> or
77L<attributes>).
43192e07 78
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79=item Ambiguous range in transliteration operator
80
81(F) You wrote something like C<tr/a-z-0//> which doesn't mean anything at
82all. To include a C<-> character in a transliteration, put it either
83first or last. (In the past, C<tr/a-z-0//> was synonymous with
84C<tr/a-y//>, which was probably not what you would have expected.)
85
6df41af2 86=item Ambiguous use of %s resolved as %s
43192e07 87
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88(W ambiguous)(S) You said something that may not be interpreted the way
89you thought. Normally it's pretty easy to disambiguate it by supplying
90a missing quote, operator, parenthesis pair or declaration.
a0d0e21e 91
6df41af2 92=item '|' and '<' may not both be specified on command line
a0d0e21e 93
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94(F) An error peculiar to VMS. Perl does its own command line
95redirection, and found that STDIN was a pipe, and that you also tried to
96redirect STDIN using '<'. Only one STDIN stream to a customer, please.
c9f97d15 97
6df41af2 98=item '|' and '>' may not both be specified on command line
1028017a 99
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100(F) An error peculiar to VMS. Perl does its own command line
101redirection, and thinks you tried to redirect stdout both to a file and
102into a pipe to another command. You need to choose one or the other,
103though nothing's stopping you from piping into a program or Perl script
104which 'splits' output into two streams, such as
1028017a 105
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106 open(OUT,">$ARGV[0]") or die "Can't write to $ARGV[0]: $!";
107 while (<STDIN>) {
108 print;
109 print OUT;
110 }
111 close OUT;
c9f97d15 112
6df41af2 113=item Applying %s to %s will act on scalar(%s)
eb6e2d6f 114
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115(W misc) The pattern match (C<//>), substitution (C<s///>), and
116transliteration (C<tr///>) operators work on scalar values. If you apply
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117one of them to an array or a hash, it will convert the array or hash to
118a scalar value -- the length of an array, or the population info of a
119hash -- and then work on that scalar value. This is probably not what
120you meant to do. See L<perlfunc/grep> and L<perlfunc/map> for
121alternatives.
eb6e2d6f 122
6df41af2 123=item Args must match #! line
a0d0e21e 124
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125(F) The setuid emulator requires that the arguments Perl was invoked
126with match the arguments specified on the #! line. Since some systems
127impose a one-argument limit on the #! line, try combining switches;
128for example, turn C<-w -U> into C<-wU>.
a0d0e21e 129
6df41af2 130=item Arg too short for msgsnd
76cd736e 131
6df41af2 132(F) msgsnd() requires a string at least as long as sizeof(long).
76cd736e 133
8ea97a1e 134=item %s argument is not a HASH or ARRAY element
a0d0e21e 135
8ea97a1e 136(F) The argument to exists() must be a hash or array element, such as:
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137
138 $foo{$bar}
cb4f522a 139 $ref->{"susie"}[12]
a0d0e21e 140
8ea97a1e 141=item %s argument is not a HASH or ARRAY element or slice
5f05dabc 142
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143(F) The argument to delete() must be either a hash or array element,
144such as:
5f05dabc 145
146 $foo{$bar}
cb4f522a 147 $ref->{"susie"}[12]
5f05dabc 148
8ea97a1e 149or a hash or array slice, such as:
5f05dabc 150
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151 @foo[$bar, $baz, $xyzzy]
152 @{$ref->[12]}{"susie", "queue"}
5315574d 153
6df41af2 154=item %s argument is not a subroutine name
a0d0e21e 155
6df41af2 156(F) The argument to exists() for C<exists &sub> must be a subroutine
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157name, and not a subroutine call. C<exists &sub()> will generate this
158error.
a0d0e21e 159
f86702cc 160=item Argument "%s" isn't numeric%s
a0d0e21e 161
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162(W numeric) The indicated string was fed as an argument to an operator
163that expected a numeric value instead. If you're fortunate the message
164will identify which operator was so unfortunate.
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165
166=item Array @%s missing the @ in argument %d of %s()
167
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168(D deprecated) Really old Perl let you omit the @ on array names in some
169spots. This is now heavily deprecated.
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170
171=item assertion botched: %s
172
173(P) The malloc package that comes with Perl had an internal failure.
174
175=item Assertion failed: file "%s"
176
177(P) A general assertion failed. The file in question must be examined.
178
179=item Assignment to both a list and a scalar
180
181(F) If you assign to a conditional operator, the 2nd and 3rd arguments
182must either both be scalars or both be lists. Otherwise Perl won't
183know which context to supply to the right side.
184
5243b939 185=item Negative offset to vec in lvalue context
fe58ced6 186
496a33f5 187(F) When C<vec> is called in an lvalue context, the second argument must be
5243b939 188greater than or equal to zero.
fe58ced6 189
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190=item Attempt to bless into a reference
191
192(F) The CLASSNAME argument to the bless() operator is expected to be
193the name of the package to bless the resulting object into. You've
194supplied instead a reference to something: perhaps you wrote
195
196 bless $self, $proto;
197
198when you intended
199
200 bless $self, ref($proto) || $proto;
201
202If you actually want to bless into the stringified version
203of the reference supplied, you need to stringify it yourself, for
204example by:
205
206 bless $self, "$proto";
207
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208=item Attempt to free non-arena SV: 0x%lx
209
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210(P internal) All SV objects are supposed to be allocated from arenas
211that will be garbage collected on exit. An SV was discovered to be
212outside any of those arenas.
a0d0e21e 213
54310121 214=item Attempt to free nonexistent shared string
bbce6d69 215
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216(P internal) Perl maintains a reference counted internal table of
217strings to optimize the storage and access of hash keys and other
218strings. This indicates someone tried to decrement the reference count
219of a string that can no longer be found in the table.
bbce6d69 220
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221=item Attempt to free temp prematurely
222
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223(W debugging) Mortalized values are supposed to be freed by the
224free_tmps() routine. This indicates that something else is freeing the
225SV before the free_tmps() routine gets a chance, which means that the
226free_tmps() routine will be freeing an unreferenced scalar when it does
227try to free it.
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228
229=item Attempt to free unreferenced glob pointers
230
e476b1b5 231(P internal) The reference counts got screwed up on symbol aliases.
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232
233=item Attempt to free unreferenced scalar
234
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235(W internal) Perl went to decrement the reference count of a scalar to
236see if it would go to 0, and discovered that it had already gone to 0
237earlier, and should have been freed, and in fact, probably was freed.
238This could indicate that SvREFCNT_dec() was called too many times, or
239that SvREFCNT_inc() was called too few times, or that the SV was
240mortalized when it shouldn't have been, or that memory has been
241corrupted.
a0d0e21e 242
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243=item Attempt to join self
244
245(F) You tried to join a thread from within itself, which is an
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246impossible task. You may be joining the wrong thread, or you may need
247to move the join() to some other thread.
dcdda58d 248
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249=item Attempt to pack pointer to temporary value
250
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251(W pack) You tried to pass a temporary value (like the result of a
252function, or a computed expression) to the "p" pack() template. This
253means the result contains a pointer to a location that could become
254invalid anytime, even before the end of the current statement. Use
255literals or global values as arguments to the "p" pack() template to
256avoid this warning.
84902520 257
b7a902f4 258=item Attempt to use reference as lvalue in substr
259
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260(W substr) You supplied a reference as the first argument to substr()
261used as an lvalue, which is pretty strange. Perhaps you forgot to
262dereference it first. See L<perlfunc/substr>.
b7a902f4 263
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264=item Bad arg length for %s, is %d, should be %d
265
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266(F) You passed a buffer of the wrong size to one of msgctl(), semctl()
267or shmctl(). In C parlance, the correct sizes are, respectively,
5f05dabc 268S<sizeof(struct msqid_ds *)>, S<sizeof(struct semid_ds *)>, and
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269S<sizeof(struct shmid_ds *)>.
270
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271=item Bad evalled substitution pattern
272
496a33f5 273(F) You've used the C</e> switch to evaluate the replacement for a
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274substitution, but perl found a syntax error in the code to evaluate,
275most likely an unexpected right brace '}'.
276
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277=item Bad filehandle: %s
278
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279(F) A symbol was passed to something wanting a filehandle, but the
280symbol has no filehandle associated with it. Perhaps you didn't do an
281open(), or did it in another package.
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282
283=item Bad free() ignored
284
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285(S malloc) An internal routine called free() on something that had never
286been malloc()ed in the first place. Mandatory, but can be disabled by
9ea8bc6d 287setting environment variable C<PERL_BADFREE> to 0.
33c8a3fe 288
9ea8bc6d 289This message can be seen quite often with DB_File on systems with "hard"
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290dynamic linking, like C<AIX> and C<OS/2>. It is a bug of C<Berkeley DB>
291which is left unnoticed if C<DB> uses I<forgiving> system malloc().
a0d0e21e 292
aa689395 293=item Bad hash
294
295(P) One of the internal hash routines was passed a null HV pointer.
296
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297=item Bad index while coercing array into hash
298
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299(F) The index looked up in the hash found as the 0'th element of a
300pseudo-hash is not legal. Index values must be at 1 or greater.
301See L<perlref>.
57079c46 302
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303=item Badly placed ()'s
304
305(A) You've accidentally run your script through B<csh> instead
306of Perl. Check the #! line, or manually feed your script into
307Perl yourself.
308
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309=item Bad name after %s::
310
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311(F) You started to name a symbol by using a package prefix, and then
312didn't finish the symbol. In particular, you can't interpolate outside
313of quotes, so
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314
315 $var = 'myvar';
316 $sym = mypack::$var;
317
318is not the same as
319
320 $var = 'myvar';
321 $sym = "mypack::$var";
322
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323=item Bad realloc() ignored
324
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325(S malloc) An internal routine called realloc() on something that had
326never been malloc()ed in the first place. Mandatory, but can be disabled
327by setting environment variable C<PERL_BADFREE> to 1.
4ad56ec9 328
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329=item Bad symbol for array
330
331(P) An internal request asked to add an array entry to something that
332wasn't a symbol table entry.
333
334=item Bad symbol for filehandle
335
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336(P) An internal request asked to add a filehandle entry to something
337that wasn't a symbol table entry.
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338
339=item Bad symbol for hash
340
341(P) An internal request asked to add a hash entry to something that
342wasn't a symbol table entry.
343
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344=item Bareword found in conditional
345
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346(W bareword) The compiler found a bareword where it expected a
347conditional, which often indicates that an || or && was parsed as part
348of the last argument of the previous construct, for example:
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349
350 open FOO || die;
351
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352It may also indicate a misspelled constant that has been interpreted as
353a bareword:
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354
355 use constant TYPO => 1;
356 if (TYOP) { print "foo" }
357
358The C<strict> pragma is useful in avoiding such errors.
359
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360=item Bareword "%s" not allowed while "strict subs" in use
361
362(F) With "strict subs" in use, a bareword is only allowed as a
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363subroutine identifier, in curly brackets or to the left of the "=>"
364symbol. Perhaps you need to predeclare a subroutine?
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365
366=item Bareword "%s" refers to nonexistent package
367
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368(W bareword) You used a qualified bareword of the form C<Foo::>, but the
369compiler saw no other uses of that namespace before that point. Perhaps
370you need to predeclare a package?
6df41af2 371
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372=item BEGIN failed--compilation aborted
373
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374(F) An untrapped exception was raised while executing a BEGIN
375subroutine. Compilation stops immediately and the interpreter is
376exited.
a0d0e21e 377
68dc0745 378=item BEGIN not safe after errors--compilation aborted
379
380(F) Perl found a C<BEGIN {}> subroutine (or a C<use> directive, which
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381implies a C<BEGIN {}>) after one or more compilation errors had already
382occurred. Since the intended environment for the C<BEGIN {}> could not
383be guaranteed (due to the errors), and since subsequent code likely
384depends on its correct operation, Perl just gave up.
68dc0745 385
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386=item \1 better written as $1
387
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388(W syntax) Outside of patterns, backreferences live on as variables.
389The use of backslashes is grandfathered on the right-hand side of a
390substitution, but stylistically it's better to use the variable form
391because other Perl programmers will expect it, and it works better if
392there are more than 9 backreferences.
6df41af2 393
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394=item Binary number > 0b11111111111111111111111111111111 non-portable
395
e476b1b5 396(W portable) The binary number you specified is larger than 2**32-1
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397(4294967295) and therefore non-portable between systems. See
398L<perlport> for more on portability concerns.
252aa082 399
69282e91 400=item bind() on closed socket %s
a0d0e21e 401
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402(W closed) You tried to do a bind on a closed socket. Did you forget to
403check the return value of your socket() call? See L<perlfunc/bind>.
a0d0e21e 404
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405=item binmode() on closed filehandle %s
406
407(W unopened) You tried binmode() on a filehandle that was never opened.
408Check you control flow and number of arguments.
409
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410=item Bit vector size > 32 non-portable
411
e476b1b5 412(W portable) Using bit vector sizes larger than 32 is non-portable.
c5a0f51a 413
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414=item Bizarre copy of %s in %s
415
be771a83 416(P) Perl detected an attempt to copy an internal value that is not
b45f050a 417copyable.
4633a7c4 418
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419=item B<-P> not allowed for setuid/setgid script
420
421(F) The script would have to be opened by the C preprocessor by name,
422which provides a race condition that breaks security.
423
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424=item Buffer overflow in prime_env_iter: %s
425
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426(W internal) A warning peculiar to VMS. While Perl was preparing to
427iterate over %ENV, it encountered a logical name or symbol definition
428which was too long, so it was truncated to the string shown.
f675dbe5 429
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430=item Callback called exit
431
4929bf7b 432(F) A subroutine invoked from an external package via call_sv()
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433exited by calling exit.
434
6df41af2 435=item %s() called too early to check prototype
f675dbe5 436
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437(W prototype) You've called a function that has a prototype before the
438parser saw a definition or declaration for it, and Perl could not check
439that the call conforms to the prototype. You need to either add an
440early prototype declaration for the subroutine in question, or move the
441subroutine definition ahead of the call to get proper prototype
442checking. Alternatively, if you are certain that you're calling the
443function correctly, you may put an ampersand before the name to avoid
444the warning. See L<perlsub>.
f675dbe5 445
6df41af2 446=item / cannot take a count
a0d0e21e 447
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448(F) You had an unpack template indicating a counted-length string, but
449you have also specified an explicit size for the string. See
450L<perlfunc/pack>.
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451
452=item Can't bless non-reference value
453
454(F) Only hard references may be blessed. This is how Perl "enforces"
455encapsulation of objects. See L<perlobj>.
456
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457=item Can't call method "%s" in empty package "%s"
458
459(F) You called a method correctly, and it correctly indicated a package
460functioning as a class, but that package doesn't have ANYTHING defined
461in it, let alone methods. See L<perlobj>.
462
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463=item Can't call method "%s" on an undefined value
464
465(F) You used the syntax of a method call, but the slot filled by the
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466object reference or package name contains an undefined value. Something
467like this will reproduce the error:
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468
469 $BADREF = undef;
470 process $BADREF 1,2,3;
471 $BADREF->process(1,2,3);
472
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473=item Can't call method "%s" on unblessed reference
474
54310121 475(F) A method call must know in what package it's supposed to run. It
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476ordinarily finds this out from the object reference you supply, but you
477didn't supply an object reference in this case. A reference isn't an
478object reference until it has been blessed. See L<perlobj>.
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479
480=item Can't call method "%s" without a package or object reference
481
482(F) You used the syntax of a method call, but the slot filled by the
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483object reference or package name contains an expression that returns a
484defined value which is neither an object reference nor a package name.
72b5445b
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485Something like this will reproduce the error:
486
487 $BADREF = 42;
488 process $BADREF 1,2,3;
489 $BADREF->process(1,2,3);
490
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491=item Can't chdir to %s
492
493(F) You called C<perl -x/foo/bar>, but C</foo/bar> is not a directory
494that you can chdir to, possibly because it doesn't exist.
495
0545a864 496=item Can't check filesystem of script "%s" for nosuid
104d25b7 497
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498(P) For some reason you can't check the filesystem of the script for
499nosuid.
104d25b7 500
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501=item Can't coerce array into hash
502
503(F) You used an array where a hash was expected, but the array has no
504information on how to map from keys to array indices. You can do that
505only with arrays that have a hash reference at index 0.
506
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507=item Can't coerce %s to integer in %s
508
509(F) Certain types of SVs, in particular real symbol table entries
55497cff 510(typeglobs), can't be forced to stop being what they are. So you can't
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511say things like:
512
513 *foo += 1;
514
515You CAN say
516
517 $foo = *foo;
518 $foo += 1;
519
520but then $foo no longer contains a glob.
521
522=item Can't coerce %s to number in %s
523
524(F) Certain types of SVs, in particular real symbol table entries
55497cff 525(typeglobs), can't be forced to stop being what they are.
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526
527=item Can't coerce %s to string in %s
528
529(F) Certain types of SVs, in particular real symbol table entries
55497cff 530(typeglobs), can't be forced to stop being what they are.
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531
532=item Can't create pipe mailbox
533
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534(P) An error peculiar to VMS. The process is suffering from exhausted
535quotas or other plumbing problems.
a0d0e21e 536
eb64745e 537=item Can't declare class for non-scalar %s in "%s"
a0d0e21e 538
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539(S) Currently, only scalar variables can declared with a specific class
540qualifier in a "my" or "our" declaration. The semantics may be extended
541for other types of variables in future.
542
543=item Can't declare %s in "%s"
544
545(F) Only scalar, array, and hash variables may be declared as "my" or
546"our" variables. They must have ordinary identifiers as names.
a0d0e21e 547
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548=item Can't do inplace edit: %s is not a regular file
549
be771a83
GS
550(S inplace) You tried to use the B<-i> switch on a special file, such as
551a file in /dev, or a FIFO. The file was ignored.
6df41af2 552
a0d0e21e
LW
553=item Can't do inplace edit on %s: %s
554
be771a83
GS
555(S inplace) The creation of the new file failed for the indicated
556reason.
a0d0e21e 557
54310121 558=item Can't do inplace edit without backup
a0d0e21e 559
be771a83
GS
560(F) You're on a system such as MS-DOS that gets confused if you try
561reading from a deleted (but still opened) file. You have to say
562C<-i.bak>, or some such.
a0d0e21e 563
10f9c03d 564=item Can't do inplace edit: %s would not be unique
a0d0e21e 565
e476b1b5 566(S inplace) Your filesystem does not support filenames longer than 14
10f9c03d
CK
567characters and Perl was unable to create a unique filename during
568inplace editing with the B<-i> switch. The file was ignored.
a0d0e21e 569
7253e4e3 570=item Can't do {n,m} with n > m in regex; marked by <-- HERE in m/%s/
a0d0e21e 571
b45f050a 572(F) Minima must be less than or equal to maxima. If you really want your
7253e4e3 573regexp to match something 0 times, just put {0}. The <-- HERE shows in the
b45f050a 574regular expression about where the problem was discovered. See L<perlre>.
a0d0e21e
LW
575
576=item Can't do setegid!
577
be771a83
GS
578(P) The setegid() call failed for some reason in the setuid emulator of
579suidperl.
a0d0e21e
LW
580
581=item Can't do seteuid!
582
583(P) The setuid emulator of suidperl failed for some reason.
584
585=item Can't do setuid
586
be771a83
GS
587(F) This typically means that ordinary perl tried to exec suidperl to do
588setuid emulation, but couldn't exec it. It looks for a name of the form
589sperl5.000 in the same directory that the perl executable resides under
590the name perl5.000, typically /usr/local/bin on Unix machines. If the
591file is there, check the execute permissions. If it isn't, ask your
592sysadmin why he and/or she removed it.
a0d0e21e
LW
593
594=item Can't do waitpid with flags
595
be771a83
GS
596(F) This machine doesn't have either waitpid() or wait4(), so only
597waitpid() without flags is emulated.
a0d0e21e 598
a0d0e21e
LW
599=item Can't emulate -%s on #! line
600
be771a83
GS
601(F) The #! line specifies a switch that doesn't make sense at this
602point. For example, it'd be kind of silly to put a B<-x> on the #!
603line.
a0d0e21e
LW
604
605=item Can't exec "%s": %s
606
be771a83
GS
607(W exec) An system(), exec(), or piped open call could not execute the
608named program for the indicated reason. Typical reasons include: the
609permissions were wrong on the file, the file wasn't found in
610C<$ENV{PATH}>, the executable in question was compiled for another
611architecture, or the #! line in a script points to an interpreter that
612can't be run for similar reasons. (Or maybe your system doesn't support
613#! at all.)
a0d0e21e
LW
614
615=item Can't exec %s
616
be771a83
GS
617(F) Perl was trying to execute the indicated program for you because
618that's what the #! line said. If that's not what you wanted, you may
619need to mention "perl" on the #! line somewhere.
a0d0e21e
LW
620
621=item Can't execute %s
622
be771a83
GS
623(F) You used the B<-S> switch, but the copies of the script to execute
624found in the PATH did not have correct permissions.
2a92aaa0 625
6df41af2 626=item Can't find an opnumber for "%s"
2a92aaa0 627
be771a83
GS
628(F) A string of a form C<CORE::word> was given to prototype(), but there
629is no builtin with the name C<word>.
6df41af2 630
56ca2fc0
JH
631=item Can't find %s character property "%s"
632
633(F) You used C<\p{}> or C<\P{}> but the character property by that name
89d60977 634could not be found. Maybe you misspelled the name of the property
56ca2fc0
JH
635(remember that the names of character properties consist only of
636alphanumeric characters), or maybe you forgot the C<Is> or C<In> prefix?
637
6df41af2
GS
638=item Can't find label %s
639
be771a83
GS
640(F) You said to goto a label that isn't mentioned anywhere that it's
641possible for us to go to. See L<perlfunc/goto>.
2a92aaa0
GS
642
643=item Can't find %s on PATH
644
be771a83
GS
645(F) You used the B<-S> switch, but the script to execute could not be
646found in the PATH.
a0d0e21e 647
6df41af2 648=item Can't find %s on PATH, '.' not in PATH
a0d0e21e 649
be771a83
GS
650(F) You used the B<-S> switch, but the script to execute could not be
651found in the PATH, or at least not with the correct permissions. The
652script exists in the current directory, but PATH prohibits running it.
a0d0e21e
LW
653
654=item Can't find string terminator %s anywhere before EOF
655
be771a83
GS
656(F) Perl strings can stretch over multiple lines. This message means
657that the closing delimiter was omitted. Because bracketed quotes count
658nesting levels, the following is missing its final parenthesis:
a0d0e21e 659
fb73857a 660 print q(The character '(' starts a side comment.);
661
be771a83
GS
662If you're getting this error from a here-document, you may have included
663unseen whitespace before or after your closing tag. A good programmer's
664editor will have a way to help you find these characters.
a0d0e21e 665
64977eb6 666=item Can't find %s property definition %s
0103b764 667
f91328b7
JH
668(F) You may have tried to use C<\p> which means a Unicode property for
669example \p{Lu} is all uppercase letters. Escape the C<\p>, either
670C<\\p> (just the C<\p>) or by C<\Q\p> (the rest of the string, until
671possible C<\E>).
0103b764 672
a0d0e21e
LW
673=item Can't fork
674
be771a83
GS
675(F) A fatal error occurred while trying to fork while opening a
676pipeline.
a0d0e21e 677
748a9306
LW
678=item Can't get filespec - stale stat buffer?
679
be771a83
GS
680(S) A warning peculiar to VMS. This arises because of the difference
681between access checks under VMS and under the Unix model Perl assumes.
682Under VMS, access checks are done by filename, rather than by bits in
683the stat buffer, so that ACLs and other protections can be taken into
684account. Unfortunately, Perl assumes that the stat buffer contains all
685the necessary information, and passes it, instead of the filespec, to
686the access checking routine. It will try to retrieve the filespec using
687the device name and FID present in the stat buffer, but this works only
688if you haven't made a subsequent call to the CRTL stat() routine,
689because the device name is overwritten with each call. If this warning
690appears, the name lookup failed, and the access checking routine gave up
691and returned FALSE, just to be conservative. (Note: The access checking
692routine knows about the Perl C<stat> operator and file tests, so you
693shouldn't ever see this warning in response to a Perl command; it arises
694only if some internal code takes stat buffers lightly.)
748a9306 695
a0d0e21e
LW
696=item Can't get pipe mailbox device name
697
be771a83
GS
698(P) An error peculiar to VMS. After creating a mailbox to act as a
699pipe, Perl can't retrieve its name for later use.
a0d0e21e
LW
700
701=item Can't get SYSGEN parameter value for MAXBUF
702
748a9306
LW
703(P) An error peculiar to VMS. Perl asked $GETSYI how big you want your
704mailbox buffers to be, and didn't get an answer.
a0d0e21e 705
6df41af2 706=item Can't "goto" into the middle of a foreach loop
a0d0e21e 707
be771a83
GS
708(F) A "goto" statement was executed to jump into the middle of a foreach
709loop. You can't get there from here. See L<perlfunc/goto>.
6df41af2
GS
710
711=item Can't "goto" out of a pseudo block
712
be771a83
GS
713(F) A "goto" statement was executed to jump out of what might look like
714a block, except that it isn't a proper block. This usually occurs if
715you tried to jump out of a sort() block or subroutine, which is a no-no.
716See L<perlfunc/goto>.
a0d0e21e 717
b150fb22
RH
718=item Can't goto subroutine from an eval-string
719
be771a83
GS
720(F) The "goto subroutine" call can't be used to jump out of an eval
721"string". (You can use it to jump out of an eval {BLOCK}, but you
722probably don't want to.)
b150fb22 723
6df41af2
GS
724=item Can't goto subroutine outside a subroutine
725
be771a83
GS
726(F) The deeply magical "goto subroutine" call can only replace one
727subroutine call for another. It can't manufacture one out of whole
728cloth. In general you should be calling it out of only an AUTOLOAD
729routine anyway. See L<perlfunc/goto>.
6df41af2 730
0b5b802d
GS
731=item Can't ignore signal CHLD, forcing to default
732
be771a83
GS
733(W signal) Perl has detected that it is being run with the SIGCHLD
734signal (sometimes known as SIGCLD) disabled. Since disabling this
735signal will interfere with proper determination of exit status of child
736processes, Perl has reset the signal to its default value. This
737situation typically indicates that the parent program under which Perl
738may be running (e.g. cron) is being very careless.
0b5b802d 739
6df41af2 740=item Can't "last" outside a loop block
4633a7c4 741
6df41af2 742(F) A "last" statement was executed to break out of the current block,
be771a83
GS
743except that there's this itty bitty problem called there isn't a current
744block. Note that an "if" or "else" block doesn't count as a "loopish"
745block, as doesn't a block given to sort(), map() or grep(). You can
746usually double the curlies to get the same effect though, because the
747inner curlies will be considered a block that loops once. See
748L<perlfunc/last>.
4633a7c4 749
748a9306
LW
750=item Can't localize lexical variable %s
751
2ba9eb46 752(F) You used local on a variable name that was previously declared as a
748a9306
LW
753lexical variable using "my". This is not allowed. If you want to
754localize a package variable of the same name, qualify it with the
755package name.
756
0ebe0038
SM
757=item Can't localize pseudo-hash element
758
be771a83
GS
759(F) You said something like C<< local $ar->{'key'} >>, where $ar is a
760reference to a pseudo-hash. That hasn't been implemented yet, but you
761can get a similar effect by localizing the corresponding array element
762directly -- C<< local $ar->[$ar->[0]{'key'}] >>.
0ebe0038 763
6df41af2 764=item Can't localize through a reference
4727527e 765
6df41af2
GS
766(F) You said something like C<local $$ref>, which Perl can't currently
767handle, because when it goes to restore the old value of whatever $ref
be771a83 768pointed to after the scope of the local() is finished, it can't be sure
64977eb6 769that $ref will still be a reference.
4727527e 770
ec889f3a
GS
771=item Can't locate %s
772
773(F) You said to C<do> (or C<require>, or C<use>) a file that couldn't be
774found. Perl looks for the file in all the locations mentioned in @INC,
be771a83
GS
775unless the file name included the full path to the file. Perhaps you
776need to set the PERL5LIB or PERL5OPT environment variable to say where
777the extra library is, or maybe the script needs to add the library name
778to @INC. Or maybe you just misspelled the name of the file. See
779L<perlfunc/require> and L<lib>.
a0d0e21e 780
6df41af2
GS
781=item Can't locate auto/%s.al in @INC
782
be771a83
GS
783(F) A function (or method) was called in a package which allows
784autoload, but there is no function to autoload. Most probable causes
785are a misprint in a function/method name or a failure to C<AutoSplit>
786the file, say, by doing C<make install>.
6df41af2 787
a0d0e21e
LW
788=item Can't locate object method "%s" via package "%s"
789
790(F) You called a method correctly, and it correctly indicated a package
791functioning as a class, but that package doesn't define that particular
2ba9eb46 792method, nor does any of its base classes. See L<perlobj>.
a0d0e21e 793
c1899e02
GS
794=item (perhaps you forgot to load "%s"?)
795
796(F) This is an educated guess made in conjunction with the message
797"Can't locate object method \"%s\" via package \"%s\"". It often means
798that a method requires a package that has not been loaded.
799
a0d0e21e
LW
800=item Can't locate package %s for @%s::ISA
801
be771a83
GS
802(W syntax) The @ISA array contained the name of another package that
803doesn't seem to exist.
a0d0e21e 804
3e3baf6d
TB
805=item Can't make list assignment to \%ENV on this system
806
be771a83
GS
807(F) List assignment to %ENV is not supported on some systems, notably
808VMS.
3e3baf6d 809
a0d0e21e
LW
810=item Can't modify %s in %s
811
be771a83
GS
812(F) You aren't allowed to assign to the item indicated, or otherwise try
813to change it, such as with an auto-increment.
a0d0e21e 814
54310121 815=item Can't modify nonexistent substring
a0d0e21e
LW
816
817(P) The internal routine that does assignment to a substr() was handed
818a NULL.
819
6df41af2
GS
820=item Can't modify non-lvalue subroutine call
821
822(F) Subroutines meant to be used in lvalue context should be declared as
823such, see L<perlsub/"Lvalue subroutines">.
824
5f05dabc 825=item Can't msgrcv to read-only var
a0d0e21e 826
5f05dabc 827(F) The target of a msgrcv must be modifiable to be used as a receive
a0d0e21e
LW
828buffer.
829
6df41af2
GS
830=item Can't "next" outside a loop block
831
832(F) A "next" statement was executed to reiterate the current block, but
833there isn't a current block. Note that an "if" or "else" block doesn't
be771a83
GS
834count as a "loopish" block, as doesn't a block given to sort(), map() or
835grep(). You can usually double the curlies to get the same effect
836though, because the inner curlies will be considered a block that loops
837once. See L<perlfunc/next>.
6df41af2 838
a0d0e21e
LW
839=item Can't open %s: %s
840
c47ff5f1 841(S inplace) The implicit opening of a file through use of the C<< <> >>
08e9d68e
DD
842filehandle, either implicitly under the C<-n> or C<-p> command-line
843switches, or explicitly, failed for the indicated reason. Usually this
be771a83
GS
844is because you don't have read permission for a file which you named on
845the command line.
a0d0e21e
LW
846
847=item Can't open bidirectional pipe
848
be771a83
GS
849(W pipe) You tried to say C<open(CMD, "|cmd|")>, which is not supported.
850You can try any of several modules in the Perl library to do this, such
851as IPC::Open2. Alternately, direct the pipe's output to a file using
852">", and then read it in under a different file handle.
a0d0e21e 853
748a9306
LW
854=item Can't open error file %s as stderr
855
be771a83
GS
856(F) An error peculiar to VMS. Perl does its own command line
857redirection, and couldn't open the file specified after '2>' or '2>>' on
858the command line for writing.
748a9306
LW
859
860=item Can't open input file %s as stdin
861
be771a83
GS
862(F) An error peculiar to VMS. Perl does its own command line
863redirection, and couldn't open the file specified after '<' on the
864command line for reading.
748a9306
LW
865
866=item Can't open output file %s as stdout
867
be771a83
GS
868(F) An error peculiar to VMS. Perl does its own command line
869redirection, and couldn't open the file specified after '>' or '>>' on
870the command line for writing.
748a9306
LW
871
872=item Can't open output pipe (name: %s)
873
be771a83
GS
874(P) An error peculiar to VMS. Perl does its own command line
875redirection, and couldn't open the pipe into which to send data destined
876for stdout.
748a9306 877
584d69ec 878=item Can't open perl script%s: %s
a0d0e21e
LW
879
880(F) The script you specified can't be opened for the indicated reason.
881
6df41af2
GS
882=item Can't read CRTL environ
883
884(S) A warning peculiar to VMS. Perl tried to read an element of %ENV
885from the CRTL's internal environment array and discovered the array was
886missing. You need to figure out where your CRTL misplaced its environ
be771a83
GS
887or define F<PERL_ENV_TABLES> (see L<perlvms>) so that environ is not
888searched.
6df41af2 889
7bac28a0 890=item Can't redefine active sort subroutine %s
891
892(F) Perl optimizes the internal handling of sort subroutines and keeps
be771a83
GS
893pointers into them. You tried to redefine one such sort subroutine when
894it was currently active, which is not allowed. If you really want to do
7bac28a0 895this, you should write C<sort { &func } @x> instead of C<sort func @x>.
896
6df41af2
GS
897=item Can't "redo" outside a loop block
898
899(F) A "redo" statement was executed to restart the current block, but
900there isn't a current block. Note that an "if" or "else" block doesn't
901count as a "loopish" block, as doesn't a block given to sort(), map()
902or grep(). You can usually double the curlies to get the same effect
903though, because the inner curlies will be considered a block that
904loops once. See L<perlfunc/redo>.
905
64977eb6 906=item Can't remove %s: %s, skipping file
10f9c03d 907
be771a83
GS
908(S inplace) You requested an inplace edit without creating a backup
909file. Perl was unable to remove the original file to replace it with
910the modified file. The file was left unmodified.
10f9c03d 911
a0d0e21e
LW
912=item Can't rename %s to %s: %s, skipping file
913
e476b1b5 914(S inplace) The rename done by the B<-i> switch failed for some reason,
10f9c03d 915probably because you don't have write permission to the directory.
a0d0e21e 916
748a9306
LW
917=item Can't reopen input pipe (name: %s) in binary mode
918
be771a83
GS
919(P) An error peculiar to VMS. Perl thought stdin was a pipe, and tried
920to reopen it to accept binary data. Alas, it failed.
748a9306 921
6df41af2
GS
922=item Can't resolve method `%s' overloading `%s' in package `%s'
923
be771a83
GS
924(F|P) Error resolving overloading specified by a method name (as opposed
925to a subroutine reference): no such method callable via the package. If
926method name is C<???>, this is an internal error.
6df41af2 927
a0d0e21e
LW
928=item Can't reswap uid and euid
929
be771a83
GS
930(P) The setreuid() call failed for some reason in the setuid emulator of
931suidperl.
a0d0e21e 932
cd06dffe
GS
933=item Can't return %s from lvalue subroutine
934
be771a83
GS
935(F) Perl detected an attempt to return illegal lvalues (such as
936temporary or readonly values) from a subroutine used as an lvalue. This
937is not allowed.
cd06dffe 938
78f9721b
SM
939=item Can't return %s to lvalue scalar context
940
941(F) You tried to return a complete array or hash from an lvalue subroutine,
942but you called the subroutine in a way that made Perl think you meant
943to return only one value. You probably meant to write parentheses around
944the call to the subroutine, which tell Perl that the call should be in
945list context.
946
6df41af2
GS
947=item Can't return outside a subroutine
948
949(F) The return statement was executed in mainline code, that is, where
950there was no subroutine call to return out of. See L<perlsub>.
951
a0d0e21e
LW
952=item Can't stat script "%s"
953
be771a83
GS
954(P) For some reason you can't fstat() the script even though you have it
955open already. Bizarre.
a0d0e21e
LW
956
957=item Can't swap uid and euid
958
be771a83
GS
959(P) The setreuid() call failed for some reason in the setuid emulator of
960suidperl.
a0d0e21e
LW
961
962=item Can't take log of %g
963
fb73857a 964(F) For ordinary real numbers, you can't take the logarithm of a
965negative number or zero. There's a Math::Complex package that comes
be771a83
GS
966standard with Perl, though, if you really want to do that for the
967negative numbers.
a0d0e21e
LW
968
969=item Can't take sqrt of %g
970
971(F) For ordinary real numbers, you can't take the square root of a
fb73857a 972negative number. There's a Math::Complex package that comes standard
973with Perl, though, if you really want to do that.
a0d0e21e
LW
974
975=item Can't undef active subroutine
976
977(F) You can't undefine a routine that's currently running. You can,
978however, redefine it while it's running, and you can even undef the
979redefined subroutine while the old routine is running. Go figure.
980
981=item Can't unshift
982
983(F) You tried to unshift an "unreal" array that can't be unshifted, such
984as the main Perl stack.
985
986=item Can't upgrade that kind of scalar
987
be771a83
GS
988(P) The internal sv_upgrade routine adds "members" to an SV, making it
989into a more specialized kind of SV. The top several SV types are so
990specialized, however, that they cannot be interconverted. This message
991indicates that such a conversion was attempted.
a0d0e21e
LW
992
993=item Can't upgrade to undef
994
be771a83
GS
995(P) The undefined SV is the bottom of the totem pole, in the scheme of
996upgradability. Upgrading to undef indicates an error in the code
997calling sv_upgrade.
a0d0e21e 998
6df41af2
GS
999=item Can't use an undefined value as %s reference
1000
1001(F) A value used as either a hard reference or a symbolic reference must
1002be a defined value. This helps to delurk some insidious errors.
1003
1db89ea5
BS
1004=item Can't use anonymous symbol table for method lookup
1005
1006(P) The internal routine that does method lookup was handed a symbol
1007table that doesn't have a name. Symbol tables can become anonymous
1008for example by undefining stashes: C<undef %Some::Package::>.
1009
6df41af2
GS
1010=item Can't use bareword ("%s") as %s ref while "strict refs" in use
1011
be771a83
GS
1012(F) Only hard references are allowed by "strict refs". Symbolic
1013references are disallowed. See L<perlref>.
6df41af2 1014
90b75b61 1015=item Can't use %! because Errno.pm is not available
1d2dff63
GS
1016
1017(F) The first time the %! hash is used, perl automatically loads the
1018Errno.pm module. The Errno module is expected to tie the %! hash to
1019provide symbolic names for C<$!> errno values.
1020
6df41af2
GS
1021=item Can't use %s for loop variable
1022
be771a83
GS
1023(F) Only a simple scalar variable may be used as a loop variable on a
1024foreach.
6df41af2
GS
1025
1026=item Can't use global %s in "my"
1027
be771a83
GS
1028(F) You tried to declare a magical variable as a lexical variable. This
1029is not allowed, because the magic can be tied to only one location
1030(namely the global variable) and it would be incredibly confusing to
1031have variables in your program that looked like magical variables but
6df41af2
GS
1032weren't.
1033
c07a80fd 1034=item Can't use "my %s" in sort comparison
1035
1036(F) The global variables $a and $b are reserved for sort comparisons.
c47ff5f1 1037You mentioned $a or $b in the same line as the <=> or cmp operator,
c07a80fd 1038and the variable had earlier been declared as a lexical variable.
1039Either qualify the sort variable with the package name, or rename the
1040lexical variable.
1041
a0d0e21e
LW
1042=item Can't use %s ref as %s ref
1043
1044(F) You've mixed up your reference types. You have to dereference a
1045reference of the type needed. You can use the ref() function to
1046test the type of the reference, if need be.
1047
748a9306 1048=item Can't use string ("%s") as %s ref while "strict refs" in use
a0d0e21e 1049
be771a83
GS
1050(F) Only hard references are allowed by "strict refs". Symbolic
1051references are disallowed. See L<perlref>.
a0d0e21e 1052
748a9306
LW
1053=item Can't use subscript on %s
1054
1055(F) The compiler tried to interpret a bracketed expression as a
1056subscript. But to the left of the brackets was an expression that
1057didn't look like an array reference, or anything else subscriptable.
1058
6df41af2
GS
1059=item Can't use \%c to mean $%c in expression
1060
75b44862
GS
1061(W syntax) In an ordinary expression, backslash is a unary operator that
1062creates a reference to its argument. The use of backslash to indicate a
1063backreference to a matched substring is valid only as part of a regular
be771a83
GS
1064expression pattern. Trying to do this in ordinary Perl code produces a
1065value that prints out looking like SCALAR(0xdecaf). Use the $1 form
1066instead.
6df41af2 1067
810b8aa5
GS
1068=item Can't weaken a nonreference
1069
1070(F) You attempted to weaken something that was not a reference. Only
1071references can be weakened.
1072
5f05dabc 1073=item Can't x= to read-only value
a0d0e21e 1074
be771a83
GS
1075(F) You tried to repeat a constant value (often the undefined value)
1076with an assignment operator, which implies modifying the value itself.
a0d0e21e
LW
1077Perhaps you need to copy the value to a temporary, and repeat that.
1078
ac7cd81a
SC
1079=item Character in "C" format wrapped
1080
1081(W pack) You said
1082
1083 pack("C", $x)
1084
1085where $x is either less than 0 or more than 255; the C<"C"> format is
1086only for encoding native operating system characters (ASCII, EBCDIC,
1087and so on) and not for Unicode characters, so Perl behaved as if you meant
1088
1089 pack("C", $x & 255)
1090
1091If you actually want to pack Unicode codepoints, use the C<"U"> format
1092instead.
1093
1094=item Character in "c" format wrapped
1095
1096(W pack) You said
1097
1098 pack("c", $x)
1099
1100where $x is either less than -128 or more than 127; the C<"c"> format
1101is only for encoding native operating system characters (ASCII, EBCDIC,
1102and so on) and not for Unicode characters, so Perl behaved as if you meant
1103
1104 pack("c", $x & 255);
1105
1106If you actually want to pack Unicode codepoints, use the C<"U"> format
1107instead.
1108
9ddeeac9 1109=item close() on unopened filehandle %s
a0d0e21e 1110
e476b1b5 1111(W unopened) You tried to close a filehandle that was never opened.
a0d0e21e 1112
6df41af2
GS
1113=item %s: Command not found
1114
be771a83
GS
1115(A) You've accidentally run your script through B<csh> instead of Perl.
1116Check the #! line, or manually feed your script into Perl yourself.
6df41af2 1117
7a2e2cd6 1118=item Compilation failed in require
1119
1120(F) Perl could not compile a file specified in a C<require> statement.
be771a83
GS
1121Perl uses this generic message when none of the errors that it
1122encountered were severe enough to halt compilation immediately.
7a2e2cd6 1123
c3464db5
DD
1124=item Complex regular subexpression recursion limit (%d) exceeded
1125
be771a83
GS
1126(W regexp) The regular expression engine uses recursion in complex
1127situations where back-tracking is required. Recursion depth is limited
1128to 32766, or perhaps less in architectures where the stack cannot grow
1129arbitrarily. ("Simple" and "medium" situations are handled without
1130recursion and are not subject to a limit.) Try shortening the string
1131under examination; looping in Perl code (e.g. with C<while>) rather than
1132in the regular expression engine; or rewriting the regular expression so
c2e66d9e 1133that it is simpler or backtracks less. (See L<perlfaq2> for information
be771a83 1134on I<Mastering Regular Expressions>.)
c3464db5 1135
69282e91 1136=item connect() on closed socket %s
a0d0e21e 1137
be771a83
GS
1138(W closed) You tried to do a connect on a closed socket. Did you forget
1139to check the return value of your socket() call? See
1140L<perlfunc/connect>.
a0d0e21e 1141
41ab332f 1142=item Constant(%s)%s: %s
6df41af2 1143
be771a83
GS
1144(F) The parser found inconsistencies either while attempting to define
1145an overloaded constant, or when trying to find the character name
1146specified in the C<\N{...}> escape. Perhaps you forgot to load the
1147corresponding C<overload> or C<charnames> pragma? See L<charnames> and
1148L<overload>.
6df41af2 1149
779c5bc9
GS
1150=item Constant is not %s reference
1151
1152(F) A constant value (perhaps declared using the C<use constant> pragma)
be771a83
GS
1153is being dereferenced, but it amounts to the wrong type of reference.
1154The message indicates the type of reference that was expected. This
1155usually indicates a syntax error in dereferencing the constant value.
779c5bc9
GS
1156See L<perlsub/"Constant Functions"> and L<constant>.
1157
4cee8e80
CS
1158=item Constant subroutine %s redefined
1159
be771a83
GS
1160(S|W redefine) You redefined a subroutine which had previously been
1161eligible for inlining. See L<perlsub/"Constant Functions"> for
1162commentary and workarounds.
4cee8e80 1163
9607fc9c 1164=item Constant subroutine %s undefined
1165
be771a83
GS
1166(W misc) You undefined a subroutine which had previously been eligible
1167for inlining. See L<perlsub/"Constant Functions"> for commentary and
1168workarounds.
9607fc9c 1169
e7ea3e70
IZ
1170=item Copy method did not return a reference
1171
64977eb6 1172(F) The method which overloads "=" is buggy. See
13a2d996 1173L<overload/Copy Constructor>.
e7ea3e70 1174
6798c92b
GS
1175=item CORE::%s is not a keyword
1176
1177(F) The CORE:: namespace is reserved for Perl keywords.
1178
a0d0e21e
LW
1179=item corrupted regexp pointers
1180
1181(P) The regular expression engine got confused by what the regular
1182expression compiler gave it.
1183
1184=item corrupted regexp program
1185
be771a83
GS
1186(P) The regular expression engine got passed a regexp program without a
1187valid magic number.
a0d0e21e 1188
6df41af2
GS
1189=item Corrupt malloc ptr 0x%lx at 0x%lx
1190
1191(P) The malloc package that comes with Perl had an internal failure.
1192
1193=item C<-p> destination: %s
1194
1195(F) An error occurred during the implicit output invoked by the C<-p>
1196command-line switch. (This output goes to STDOUT unless you've
1197redirected it with select().)
1198
1199=item C<-T> and C<-B> not implemented on filehandles
1200
1201(F) Perl can't peek at the stdio buffer of filehandles when it doesn't
1202know about your kind of stdio. You'll have to use a filename instead.
1203
a0d0e21e
LW
1204=item Deep recursion on subroutine "%s"
1205
be771a83
GS
1206(W recursion) This subroutine has called itself (directly or indirectly)
1207100 times more than it has returned. This probably indicates an
1208infinite recursion, unless you're writing strange benchmark programs, in
1209which case it indicates something else.
a0d0e21e 1210
f10b0346 1211=item defined(@array) is deprecated
69794302 1212
be771a83
GS
1213(D deprecated) defined() is not usually useful on arrays because it
1214checks for an undefined I<scalar> value. If you want to see if the
64977eb6 1215array is empty, just use C<if (@array) { # not empty }> for example.
69794302 1216
f10b0346 1217=item defined(%hash) is deprecated
69794302 1218
be771a83
GS
1219(D deprecated) defined() is not usually useful on hashes because it
1220checks for an undefined I<scalar> value. If you want to see if the hash
64977eb6 1221is empty, just use C<if (%hash) { # not empty }> for example.
69794302 1222
fc36a67e 1223=item Delimiter for here document is too long
1224
be771a83
GS
1225(F) In a here document construct like C<<<FOO>, the label C<FOO> is too
1226long for Perl to handle. You have to be seriously twisted to write code
1227that triggers this error.
fc36a67e 1228
3cdd684c
TP
1229=item Did not produce a valid header
1230
1231See Server error.
1232
6df41af2
GS
1233=item %s did not return a true value
1234
1235(F) A required (or used) file must return a true value to indicate that
1236it compiled correctly and ran its initialization code correctly. It's
1237traditional to end such a file with a "1;", though any true value would
1238do. See L<perlfunc/require>.
1239
cc507455 1240=item (Did you mean &%s instead?)
4633a7c4 1241
be771a83
GS
1242(W) You probably referred to an imported subroutine &FOO as $FOO or some
1243such.
4633a7c4 1244
cc507455 1245=item (Did you mean "local" instead of "our"?)
33633739 1246
be771a83
GS
1247(W misc) Remember that "our" does not localize the declared global
1248variable. You have declared it again in the same lexical scope, which
1249seems superfluous.
33633739 1250
cc507455 1251=item (Did you mean $ or @ instead of %?)
a0d0e21e 1252
be771a83
GS
1253(W) You probably said %hash{$key} when you meant $hash{$key} or
1254@hash{@keys}. On the other hand, maybe you just meant %hash and got
1255carried away.
748a9306 1256
7e1af8bc 1257=item Died
5f05dabc 1258
1259(F) You passed die() an empty string (the equivalent of C<die "">) or
1260you called it with no args and both C<$@> and C<$_> were empty.
1261
3cdd684c
TP
1262=item Document contains no data
1263
1264See Server error.
1265
a0d0e21e
LW
1266=item Don't know how to handle magic of type '%s'
1267
1268(P) The internal handling of magical variables has been cursed.
1269
1270=item do_study: out of memory
1271
1272(P) This should have been caught by safemalloc() instead.
1273
6df41af2
GS
1274=item (Do you need to predeclare %s?)
1275
1276(S) This is an educated guess made in conjunction with the message "%s
1277found where operator expected". It often means a subroutine or module
1278name is being referenced that hasn't been declared yet. This may be
1279because of ordering problems in your file, or because of a missing
be771a83
GS
1280"sub", "package", "require", or "use" statement. If you're referencing
1281something that isn't defined yet, you don't actually have to define the
1282subroutine or package before the current location. You can use an empty
1283"sub foo;" or "package FOO;" to enter a "forward" declaration.
6df41af2 1284
a0d0e21e
LW
1285=item Duplicate free() ignored
1286
be771a83
GS
1287(S malloc) An internal routine called free() on something that had
1288already been freed.
a0d0e21e 1289
4633a7c4
LW
1290=item elseif should be elsif
1291
be771a83
GS
1292(S) There is no keyword "elseif" in Perl because Larry thinks it's ugly.
1293Your code will be interpreted as an attempt to call a method named
1294"elseif" for the class returned by the following block. This is
4633a7c4
LW
1295unlikely to be what you want.
1296
85ab1d1d 1297=item entering effective %s failed
5ff3f7a4 1298
85ab1d1d 1299(F) While under the C<use filetest> pragma, switching the real and
5ff3f7a4
GS
1300effective uids or gids failed.
1301
748a9306
LW
1302=item Error converting file specification %s
1303
5f05dabc 1304(F) An error peculiar to VMS. Because Perl may have to deal with file
748a9306 1305specifications in either VMS or Unix syntax, it converts them to a
be771a83
GS
1306single form when it must operate on them directly. Either you've passed
1307an invalid file specification to Perl, or you've found a case the
1308conversion routines don't handle. Drat.
748a9306 1309
e4d48cc9
GS
1310=item %s: Eval-group in insecure regular expression
1311
be771a83
GS
1312(F) Perl detected tainted data when trying to compile a regular
1313expression that contains the C<(?{ ... })> zero-width assertion, which
1314is unsafe. See L<perlre/(?{ code })>, and L<perlsec>.
e4d48cc9 1315
e4d48cc9
GS
1316=item %s: Eval-group not allowed at run time
1317
be771a83
GS
1318(F) Perl tried to compile a regular expression containing the
1319C<(?{ ... })> zero-width assertion at run time, as it would when the
1320pattern contains interpolated values. Since that is a security risk, it
1321is not allowed. If you insist, you may still do this by explicitly
1322building the pattern from an interpolated string at run time and using
1323that in an eval(). See L<perlre/(?{ code })>.
e4d48cc9 1324
6df41af2
GS
1325=item %s: Eval-group not allowed, use re 'eval'
1326
be771a83
GS
1327(F) A regular expression contained the C<(?{ ... })> zero-width
1328assertion, but that construct is only allowed when the C<use re 'eval'>
1329pragma is in effect. See L<perlre/(?{ code })>.
6df41af2 1330
fc36a67e 1331=item Excessively long <> operator
1332
1333(F) The contents of a <> operator may not exceed the maximum size of a
1334Perl identifier. If you're just trying to glob a long list of
1335filenames, try using the glob() operator, or put the filenames into a
1336variable and glob that.
1337
f86702cc 1338=item Execution of %s aborted due to compilation errors
a0d0e21e
LW
1339
1340(F) The final summary message when a Perl compilation fails.
1341
1342=item Exiting eval via %s
1343
be771a83
GS
1344(W exiting) You are exiting an eval by unconventional means, such as a
1345goto, or a loop control statement.
e476b1b5
GS
1346
1347=item Exiting format via %s
1348
be771a83
GS
1349(W exiting) You are exiting an eval by unconventional means, such as a
1350goto, or a loop control statement.
a0d0e21e 1351
0a753a76 1352=item Exiting pseudo-block via %s
1353
be771a83
GS
1354(W exiting) You are exiting a rather special block construct (like a
1355sort block or subroutine) by unconventional means, such as a goto, or a
1356loop control statement. See L<perlfunc/sort>.
0a753a76 1357
a0d0e21e
LW
1358=item Exiting subroutine via %s
1359
be771a83
GS
1360(W exiting) You are exiting a subroutine by unconventional means, such
1361as a goto, or a loop control statement.
a0d0e21e
LW
1362
1363=item Exiting substitution via %s
1364
be771a83
GS
1365(W exiting) You are exiting a substitution by unconventional means, such
1366as a return, a goto, or a loop control statement.
a0d0e21e 1367
7b8d334a
GS
1368=item Explicit blessing to '' (assuming package main)
1369
be771a83
GS
1370(W misc) You are blessing a reference to a zero length string. This has
1371the effect of blessing the reference into the package main. This is
1372usually not what you want. Consider providing a default target package,
1373e.g. bless($ref, $p || 'MyPackage');
7b8d334a 1374
6df41af2
GS
1375=item %s: Expression syntax
1376
be771a83
GS
1377(A) You've accidentally run your script through B<csh> instead of Perl.
1378Check the #! line, or manually feed your script into Perl yourself.
6df41af2
GS
1379
1380=item %s failed--call queue aborted
1381
1382(F) An untrapped exception was raised while executing a CHECK, INIT, or
1383END subroutine. Processing of the remainder of the queue of such
1384routines has been prematurely ended.
1385
7253e4e3 1386=item False [] range "%s" in regex; marked by <-- HERE in m/%s/
73b437c8 1387
be771a83 1388(W regexp) A character class range must start and end at a literal
7253e4e3
RK
1389character, not another character class like C<\d> or C<[:alpha:]>. The "-"
1390in your false range is interpreted as a literal "-". Consider quoting the
1391"-", "\-". The <-- HERE shows in the regular expression about where the
1392problem was discovered. See L<perlre>.
73b437c8 1393
748a9306 1394=item Fatal VMS error at %s, line %d
a0d0e21e 1395
be771a83
GS
1396(P) An error peculiar to VMS. Something untoward happened in a VMS
1397system service or RTL routine; Perl's exit status should provide more
1398details. The filename in "at %s" and the line number in "line %d" tell
1399you which section of the Perl source code is distressed.
a0d0e21e
LW
1400
1401=item fcntl is not implemented
1402
1403(F) Your machine apparently doesn't implement fcntl(). What is this, a
1404PDP-11 or something?
1405
af8c498a 1406=item Filehandle %s opened only for input
a0d0e21e 1407
be771a83
GS
1408(W io) You tried to write on a read-only filehandle. If you intended it
1409to be a read-write filehandle, you needed to open it with "+<" or "+>"
1410or "+>>" instead of with "<" or nothing. If you intended only to write
1411the file, use ">" or ">>". See L<perlfunc/open>.
a0d0e21e 1412
af8c498a 1413=item Filehandle %s opened only for output
a0d0e21e 1414
be771a83
GS
1415(W io) You tried to read from a filehandle opened only for writing. If
1416you intended it to be a read/write filehandle, you needed to open it
1417with "+<" or "+>" or "+>>" instead of with "<" or nothing. If you
1418intended only to read from the file, use "<". See L<perlfunc/open>.
a0d0e21e
LW
1419
1420=item Final $ should be \$ or $name
1421
1422(F) You must now decide whether the final $ in a string was meant to be
be771a83
GS
1423a literal dollar sign, or was meant to introduce a variable name that
1424happens to be missing. So you have to put either the backslash or the
1425name.
a0d0e21e
LW
1426
1427=item Final @ should be \@ or @name
1428
1429(F) You must now decide whether the final @ in a string was meant to be
be771a83
GS
1430a literal "at" sign, or was meant to introduce a variable name that
1431happens to be missing. So you have to put either the backslash or the
1432name.
a0d0e21e 1433
56e90b21
GS
1434=item flock() on closed filehandle %s
1435
be771a83 1436(W closed) The filehandle you're attempting to flock() got itself closed
c289d2f7 1437some time before now. Check your control flow. flock() operates on
be771a83
GS
1438filehandles. Are you attempting to call flock() on a dirhandle by the
1439same name?
56e90b21 1440
5cd5c422
RB
1441=item Quantifier follows nothing in regex;
1442
1443marked by <-- HERE in m/%s/
6df41af2 1444
b45f050a 1445(F) You started a regular expression with a quantifier. Backslash it if you
7253e4e3
RK
1446meant it literally. The <-- HERE shows in the regular expression about
1447where the problem was discovered. See L<perlre>.
6df41af2
GS
1448
1449=item Format not terminated
1450
1451(F) A format must be terminated by a line with a solitary dot. Perl got
1452to the end of your file without finding such a line.
1453
a0d0e21e
LW
1454=item Format %s redefined
1455
e476b1b5 1456(W redefine) You redefined a format. To suppress this warning, say
a0d0e21e
LW
1457
1458 {
4438c4b7 1459 no warnings;
a0d0e21e
LW
1460 eval "format NAME =...";
1461 }
1462
a0d0e21e
LW
1463=item Found = in conditional, should be ==
1464
e476b1b5 1465(W syntax) You said
a0d0e21e
LW
1466
1467 if ($foo = 123)
1468
1469when you meant
1470
1471 if ($foo == 123)
1472
1473(or something like that).
1474
6df41af2
GS
1475=item %s found where operator expected
1476
1477(S) The Perl lexer knows whether to expect a term or an operator. If it
be771a83
GS
1478sees what it knows to be a term when it was expecting to see an
1479operator, it gives you this warning. Usually it indicates that an
1480operator or delimiter was omitted, such as a semicolon.
6df41af2 1481
a0d0e21e
LW
1482=item gdbm store returned %d, errno %d, key "%s"
1483
1484(S) A warning from the GDBM_File extension that a store failed.
1485
1486=item gethostent not implemented
1487
1488(F) Your C library apparently doesn't implement gethostent(), probably
1489because if it did, it'd feel morally obligated to return every hostname
1490on the Internet.
1491
69282e91 1492=item get%sname() on closed socket %s
a0d0e21e 1493
be771a83
GS
1494(W closed) You tried to get a socket or peer socket name on a closed
1495socket. Did you forget to check the return value of your socket() call?
a0d0e21e 1496
748a9306
LW
1497=item getpwnam returned invalid UIC %#o for user "%s"
1498
1499(S) A warning peculiar to VMS. The call to C<sys$getuai> underlying the
1500C<getpwnam> operator returned an invalid UIC.
1501
6df41af2
GS
1502=item getsockopt() on closed socket %s
1503
be771a83
GS
1504(W closed) You tried to get a socket option on a closed socket. Did you
1505forget to check the return value of your socket() call? See
6df41af2
GS
1506L<perlfunc/getsockopt>.
1507
1508=item Global symbol "%s" requires explicit package name
1509
1510(F) You've said "use strict vars", which indicates that all variables
1511must either be lexically scoped (using "my"), declared beforehand using
1512"our", or explicitly qualified to say which package the global variable
1513is in (using "::").
1514
e476b1b5
GS
1515=item glob failed (%s)
1516
be771a83
GS
1517(W glob) Something went wrong with the external program(s) used for
1518C<glob> and C<< <*.c> >>. Usually, this means that you supplied a
1519C<glob> pattern that caused the external program to fail and exit with a
1520nonzero status. If the message indicates that the abnormal exit
1521resulted in a coredump, this may also mean that your csh (C shell) is
1522broken. If so, you should change all of the csh-related variables in
1523config.sh: If you have tcsh, make the variables refer to it as if it
1524were csh (e.g. C<full_csh='/usr/bin/tcsh'>); otherwise, make them all
1525empty (except that C<d_csh> should be C<'undef'>) so that Perl will
1526think csh is missing. In either case, after editing config.sh, run
75b44862 1527C<./Configure -S> and rebuild Perl.
e476b1b5 1528
a0d0e21e
LW
1529=item Glob not terminated
1530
1531(F) The lexer saw a left angle bracket in a place where it was expecting
be771a83
GS
1532a term, so it's looking for the corresponding right angle bracket, and
1533not finding it. Chances are you left some needed parentheses out
1534earlier in the line, and you really meant a "less than".
a0d0e21e 1535
6df41af2 1536=item Got an error from DosAllocMem
a0d0e21e 1537
6df41af2
GS
1538(P) An error peculiar to OS/2. Most probably you're using an obsolete
1539version of Perl, and this should not happen anyway.
a0d0e21e
LW
1540
1541=item goto must have label
1542
1543(F) Unlike with "next" or "last", you're not allowed to goto an
1544unspecified destination. See L<perlfunc/goto>.
1545
6df41af2
GS
1546=item %s had compilation errors
1547
1548(F) The final summary message when a C<perl -c> fails.
1549
a0d0e21e
LW
1550=item Had to create %s unexpectedly
1551
be771a83
GS
1552(S internal) A routine asked for a symbol from a symbol table that ought
1553to have existed already, but for some reason it didn't, and had to be
1554created on an emergency basis to prevent a core dump.
a0d0e21e
LW
1555
1556=item Hash %%s missing the % in argument %d of %s()
1557
be771a83
GS
1558(D deprecated) Really old Perl let you omit the % on hash names in some
1559spots. This is now heavily deprecated.
a0d0e21e 1560
6df41af2
GS
1561=item %s has too many errors
1562
1563(F) The parser has given up trying to parse the program after 10 errors.
1564Further error messages would likely be uninformative.
1565
252aa082
JH
1566=item Hexadecimal number > 0xffffffff non-portable
1567
e476b1b5 1568(W portable) The hexadecimal number you specified is larger than 2**32-1
9e24b6e2
JH
1569(4294967295) and therefore non-portable between systems. See
1570L<perlport> for more on portability concerns.
252aa082 1571
8903cb82 1572=item Identifier too long
1573
1574(F) Perl limits identifiers (names for variables, functions, etc.) to
fc36a67e 1575about 250 characters for simple names, and somewhat more for compound
be771a83
GS
1576names (like C<$A::B>). You've exceeded Perl's limits. Future versions
1577of Perl are likely to eliminate these arbitrary limitations.
8903cb82 1578
6df41af2 1579=item Illegal binary digit %s
f675dbe5 1580
6df41af2 1581(F) You used a digit other than 0 or 1 in a binary number.
f675dbe5 1582
6df41af2 1583=item Illegal binary digit %s ignored
a0d0e21e 1584
be771a83
GS
1585(W digit) You may have tried to use a digit other than 0 or 1 in a
1586binary number. Interpretation of the binary number stopped before the
1587offending digit.
a0d0e21e 1588
4fdae800 1589=item Illegal character %s (carriage return)
1590
d5898338 1591(F) Perl normally treats carriage returns in the program text as it
be771a83
GS
1592would any other whitespace, which means you should never see this error
1593when Perl was built using standard options. For some reason, your
1594version of Perl appears to have been built without this support. Talk
1595to your Perl administrator.
4fdae800 1596
a0d0e21e
LW
1597=item Illegal division by zero
1598
be771a83
GS
1599(F) You tried to divide a number by 0. Either something was wrong in
1600your logic, or you need to put a conditional in to guard against
1601meaningless input.
a0d0e21e 1602
6df41af2
GS
1603=item Illegal hexadecimal digit %s ignored
1604
be771a83
GS
1605(W digit) You may have tried to use a character other than 0 - 9 or
1606A - F, a - f in a hexadecimal number. Interpretation of the hexadecimal
1607number stopped before the illegal character.
6df41af2 1608
a0d0e21e
LW
1609=item Illegal modulus zero
1610
be771a83
GS
1611(F) You tried to divide a number by 0 to get the remainder. Most
1612numbers don't take to this kindly.
a0d0e21e 1613
6df41af2 1614=item Illegal number of bits in vec
399388f4 1615
6df41af2
GS
1616(F) The number of bits in vec() (the third argument) must be a power of
1617two from 1 to 32 (or 64, if your platform supports that).
399388f4
GS
1618
1619=item Illegal octal digit %s
a0d0e21e
LW
1620
1621(F) You used an 8 or 9 in a octal number.
1622
399388f4 1623=item Illegal octal digit %s ignored
748a9306 1624
75b44862
GS
1625(W digit) You may have tried to use an 8 or 9 in a octal number.
1626Interpretation of the octal number stopped before the 8 or 9.
748a9306 1627
6df41af2 1628=item Illegal switch in PERL5OPT: %s
6ff81951 1629
6df41af2
GS
1630(X) The PERL5OPT environment variable may only be used to set the
1631following switches: B<-[DIMUdmw]>.
6ff81951 1632
6df41af2 1633=item Ill-formed CRTL environ value "%s"
81e118e0 1634
75b44862 1635(W internal) A warning peculiar to VMS. Perl tried to read the CRTL's
be771a83
GS
1636internal environ array, and encountered an element without the C<=>
1637delimiter used to separate keys from values. The element is ignored.
09bef843 1638
6df41af2 1639=item Ill-formed message in prime_env_iter: |%s|
54310121 1640
be771a83
GS
1641(W internal) A warning peculiar to VMS. Perl tried to read a logical
1642name or CLI symbol definition when preparing to iterate over %ENV, and
1643didn't see the expected delimiter between key and value, so the line was
1644ignored.
54310121 1645
6df41af2 1646=item (in cleanup) %s
9607fc9c 1647
be771a83
GS
1648(W misc) This prefix usually indicates that a DESTROY() method raised
1649the indicated exception. Since destructors are usually called by the
1650system at arbitrary points during execution, and often a vast number of
1651times, the warning is issued only once for any number of failures that
1652would otherwise result in the same message being repeated.
6df41af2 1653
be771a83
GS
1654Failure of user callbacks dispatched using the C<G_KEEPERR> flag could
1655also result in this warning. See L<perlcall/G_KEEPERR>.
9607fc9c 1656
a0d0e21e
LW
1657=item Insecure dependency in %s
1658
8b1a09fc 1659(F) You tried to do something that the tainting mechanism didn't like.
be771a83
GS
1660The tainting mechanism is turned on when you're running setuid or
1661setgid, or when you specify B<-T> to turn it on explicitly. The
1662tainting mechanism labels all data that's derived directly or indirectly
1663from the user, who is considered to be unworthy of your trust. If any
1664such data is used in a "dangerous" operation, you get this error. See
1665L<perlsec> for more information.
a0d0e21e
LW
1666
1667=item Insecure directory in %s
1668
be771a83
GS
1669(F) You can't use system(), exec(), or a piped open in a setuid or
1670setgid script if C<$ENV{PATH}> contains a directory that is writable by
1671the world. See L<perlsec>.
a0d0e21e 1672
62f468fc 1673=item Insecure $ENV{%s} while running %s
a0d0e21e
LW
1674
1675(F) You can't use system(), exec(), or a piped open in a setuid or
62f468fc
MG
1676setgid script if any of C<$ENV{PATH}>, C<$ENV{IFS}>, C<$ENV{CDPATH}>,
1677C<$ENV{ENV}> or C<$ENV{BASH_ENV}> are derived from data supplied (or
a0d0e21e
LW
1678potentially supplied) by the user. The script must set the path to a
1679known value, using trustworthy data. See L<perlsec>.
1680
a7ae9550
GS
1681=item Integer overflow in %s number
1682
75b44862 1683(W overflow) The hexadecimal, octal or binary number you have specified
be771a83
GS
1684either as a literal or as an argument to hex() or oct() is too big for
1685your architecture, and has been converted to a floating point number.
1686On a 32-bit architecture the largest hexadecimal, octal or binary number
9e24b6e2
JH
1687representable without overflow is 0xFFFFFFFF, 037777777777, or
16880b11111111111111111111111111111111 respectively. Note that Perl
1689transparently promotes all numbers to a floating point representation
1690internally--subject to loss of precision errors in subsequent
1691operations.
bbce6d69 1692
7253e4e3 1693=item Internal disaster in regex; marked by <-- HERE in m/%s/
6df41af2
GS
1694
1695(P) Something went badly wrong in the regular expression parser.
7253e4e3 1696The <-- HERE shows in the regular expression about where the problem was
b45f050a
JF
1697discovered.
1698
6df41af2 1699
748a9306
LW
1700=item Internal inconsistency in tracking vforks
1701
be771a83
GS
1702(S) A warning peculiar to VMS. Perl keeps track of the number of times
1703you've called C<fork> and C<exec>, to determine whether the current call
1704to C<exec> should affect the current script or a subprocess (see
1705L<perlvms/"exec LIST">). Somehow, this count has become scrambled, so
1706Perl is making a guess and treating this C<exec> as a request to
1707terminate the Perl script and execute the specified command.
748a9306 1708
7253e4e3 1709=item Internal urp in regex; marked by <-- HERE in m/%s/
b45f050a 1710
7253e4e3
RK
1711(P) Something went badly awry in the regular expression parser. The
1712<-- HERE shows in the regular expression about where the problem was
1713discovered.
a0d0e21e 1714
a0d0e21e 1715
6df41af2
GS
1716=item %s (...) interpreted as function
1717
75b44862 1718(W syntax) You've run afoul of the rule that says that any list operator
be771a83 1719followed by parentheses turns into a function, with all the list
64977eb6 1720operators arguments found inside the parentheses. See
13a2d996 1721L<perlop/Terms and List Operators (Leftward)>.
6df41af2 1722
09bef843
SB
1723=item Invalid %s attribute: %s
1724
1725The indicated attribute for a subroutine or variable was not recognized
1726by Perl or by a user-supplied handler. See L<attributes>.
1727
1728=item Invalid %s attributes: %s
1729
be771a83
GS
1730The indicated attributes for a subroutine or variable were not
1731recognized by Perl or by a user-supplied handler. See L<attributes>.
09bef843 1732
c635e13b 1733=item Invalid conversion in %s: "%s"
1734
be771a83
GS
1735(W printf) Perl does not understand the given format conversion. See
1736L<perlfunc/sprintf>.
c635e13b 1737
7253e4e3 1738=item Invalid [] range "%s" in regex; marked by <-- HERE in m/%s/
6df41af2
GS
1739
1740(F) The range specified in a character class had a minimum character
7253e4e3
RK
1741greater than the maximum character. One possibility is that you forgot the
1742C<{}> from your ending C<\x{}> - C<\x> without the curly braces can go only
1743up to C<ff>. The <-- HERE shows in the regular expression about where the
1744problem was discovered. See L<perlre>.
6df41af2 1745
7253e4e3 1746=item Invalid [] range "%s" in transliteration operator
c2e66d9e
GS
1747
1748(F) The range specified in the tr/// or y/// operator had a minimum
1749character greater than the maximum character. See L<perlop>.
1750
09bef843
SB
1751=item Invalid separator character %s in attribute list
1752
0120eecf 1753(F) Something other than a colon or whitespace was seen between the
be771a83
GS
1754elements of an attribute list. If the previous attribute had a
1755parenthesised parameter list, perhaps that list was terminated too soon.
1756See L<attributes>.
09bef843 1757
96e4d5b1 1758=item Invalid type in pack: '%s'
1759
8903cb82 1760(F) The given character is not a valid pack type. See L<perlfunc/pack>.
be771a83
GS
1761(W pack) The given character is not a valid pack type but used to be
1762silently ignored.
96e4d5b1 1763
1764=item Invalid type in unpack: '%s'
1765
be771a83
GS
1766(F) The given character is not a valid unpack type. See
1767L<perlfunc/unpack>.
75b44862
GS
1768(W unpack) The given character is not a valid unpack type but used to be
1769silently ignored.
96e4d5b1 1770
a0d0e21e
LW
1771=item ioctl is not implemented
1772
1773(F) Your machine apparently doesn't implement ioctl(), which is pretty
1774strange for a machine that supports C.
1775
c289d2f7
JH
1776=item ioctl() on unopened %s
1777
1778(W unopened) You tried ioctl() on a filehandle that was never opened.
1779Check you control flow and number of arguments.
1780
80cbd5ad
JH
1781=item IO::Socket::atmark not implemented on this architecture
1782
1783(F) Your machine doesn't implement the sockatmark() functionality,
1784neither as a system call or an ioctl call (SIOCATMARK).
1785
6ad11d81
JH
1786=item `%s' is not a code reference
1787
1788(W) The second (fourth, sixth, ...) argument of overload::constant needs
1789to be a code reference. Either an anonymous subroutine, or a reference
1790to a subroutine.
1791
1792=item `%s' is not an overloadable type
1793
1794(W) You tried to overload a constant type the overload package is unaware of.
1795
a0d0e21e
LW
1796=item junk on end of regexp
1797
1798(P) The regular expression parser is confused.
1799
1800=item Label not found for "last %s"
1801
be771a83
GS
1802(F) You named a loop to break out of, but you're not currently in a loop
1803of that name, not even if you count where you were called from. See
1804L<perlfunc/last>.
a0d0e21e
LW
1805
1806=item Label not found for "next %s"
1807
1808(F) You named a loop to continue, but you're not currently in a loop of
1809that name, not even if you count where you were called from. See
1810L<perlfunc/last>.
1811
1812=item Label not found for "redo %s"
1813
1814(F) You named a loop to restart, but you're not currently in a loop of
1815that name, not even if you count where you were called from. See
1816L<perlfunc/last>.
1817
85ab1d1d 1818=item leaving effective %s failed
5ff3f7a4 1819
85ab1d1d 1820(F) While under the C<use filetest> pragma, switching the real and
5ff3f7a4
GS
1821effective uids or gids failed.
1822
69282e91 1823=item listen() on closed socket %s
a0d0e21e 1824
be771a83
GS
1825(W closed) You tried to do a listen on a closed socket. Did you forget
1826to check the return value of your socket() call? See
1827L<perlfunc/listen>.
a0d0e21e 1828
9d837945
TM
1829=item lstat() on filehandle %s
1830
1831(W io) You tried to do a lstat on a filehandle. What did you mean
1832by that? lstat() makes sense only on filenames. (Perl did a fstat()
1833instead on the filehandle.)
1834
cd06dffe
GS
1835=item Lvalue subs returning %s not implemented yet
1836
1837(F) Due to limitations in the current implementation, array and hash
be771a83
GS
1838values cannot be returned in subroutines used in lvalue context. See
1839L<perlsub/"Lvalue subroutines">.
cd06dffe 1840
5cd5c422
RB
1841=item Lookbehind longer than %d not implemented in regex;
1842
1843marked by <-- HERE in m/%s/
b45f050a
JF
1844
1845(F) There is currently a limit on the length of string which lookbehind can
7253e4e3
RK
1846handle. This restriction may be eased in a future release. The <-- HERE
1847shows in the regular expression about where the problem was discovered.
2e50fd82 1848
6df41af2
GS
1849=item Malformed PERLLIB_PREFIX
1850
1851(F) An error peculiar to OS/2. PERLLIB_PREFIX should be of the form
1852
1853 prefix1;prefix2
1854
1855or
1856
1857 prefix1 prefix2
1858
be771a83
GS
1859with nonempty prefix1 and prefix2. If C<prefix1> is indeed a prefix of
1860a builtin library search path, prefix2 is substituted. The error may
1861appear if components are not found, or are too long. See
fecfaeb8 1862"PERLLIB_PREFIX" in L<perlos2>.
6df41af2 1863
ba210ebe
JH
1864=item Malformed UTF-8 character (%s)
1865
1866Perl detected something that didn't comply with UTF-8 encoding rules.
1867
dea0fc0b
JH
1868=item Malformed UTF-16 surrogate
1869
1870Perl thought it was reading UTF-16 encoded character data but while
1871doing it Perl met a malformed Unicode surrogate.
1872
5cd5c422
RB
1873=item %s matches null string many times in regex;
1874
1875marked by <-- HERE in m/%s/
6df41af2
GS
1876
1877(W regexp) The pattern you've specified would be an infinite loop if the
7253e4e3
RK
1878regular expression engine didn't specifically check for that. The <-- HERE
1879shows in the regular expression about where the problem was discovered.
1880See L<perlre>.
6df41af2
GS
1881
1882=item % may only be used in unpack
1883
1884(F) You can't pack a string by supplying a checksum, because the
be771a83
GS
1885checksumming process loses information, and you can't go the other way.
1886See L<perlfunc/unpack>.
6df41af2 1887
a0d0e21e
LW
1888=item Method for operation %s not found in package %s during blessing
1889
1890(F) An attempt was made to specify an entry in an overloading table that
e7ea3e70 1891doesn't resolve to a valid subroutine. See L<overload>.
a0d0e21e 1892
3cdd684c
TP
1893=item Method %s not permitted
1894
1895See Server error.
1896
a0d0e21e
LW
1897=item Might be a runaway multi-line %s string starting on line %d
1898
1899(S) An advisory indicating that the previous error may have been caused
1900by a missing delimiter on a string or pattern, because it eventually
1901ended earlier on the current line.
1902
1903=item Misplaced _ in number
1904
d4ced10d
JH
1905(W syntax) An underscore (underbar) in a numeric constant did not
1906separate two digits.
a0d0e21e 1907
4a2d328f 1908=item Missing %sbrace%s on \N{}
423cee85 1909
4a2d328f 1910(F) Wrong syntax of character name literal C<\N{charname}> within
423cee85
JH
1911double-quotish context.
1912
a0d0e21e
LW
1913=item Missing comma after first argument to %s function
1914
1915(F) While certain functions allow you to specify a filehandle or an
1916"indirect object" before the argument list, this ain't one of them.
1917
06eaf0bc
GS
1918=item Missing command in piped open
1919
be771a83
GS
1920(W pipe) You used the C<open(FH, "| command")> or
1921C<open(FH, "command |")> construction, but the command was missing or
1922blank.
06eaf0bc 1923
6df41af2
GS
1924=item Missing name in "my sub"
1925
be771a83
GS
1926(F) The reserved syntax for lexically scoped subroutines requires that
1927they have a name with which they can be found.
6df41af2
GS
1928
1929=item Missing $ on loop variable
1930
be771a83
GS
1931(F) Apparently you've been programming in B<csh> too much. Variables
1932are always mentioned with the $ in Perl, unlike in the shells, where it
1933can vary from one line to the next.
6df41af2 1934
cc507455 1935=item (Missing operator before %s?)
748a9306
LW
1936
1937(S) This is an educated guess made in conjunction with the message "%s
1938found where operator expected". Often the missing operator is a comma.
1939
d98d5fff 1940=item Missing right curly or square bracket
a0d0e21e 1941
be771a83
GS
1942(F) The lexer counted more opening curly or square brackets than closing
1943ones. As a general rule, you'll find it's missing near the place you
1944were last editing.
a0d0e21e 1945
6df41af2
GS
1946=item (Missing semicolon on previous line?)
1947
1948(S) This is an educated guess made in conjunction with the message "%s
1949found where operator expected". Don't automatically put a semicolon on
1950the previous line just because you saw this message.
1951
a0d0e21e
LW
1952=item Modification of a read-only value attempted
1953
1954(F) You tried, directly or indirectly, to change the value of a
5f05dabc 1955constant. You didn't, of course, try "2 = 1", because the compiler
a0d0e21e
LW
1956catches that. But an easy way to do the same thing is:
1957
1958 sub mod { $_[0] = 1 }
1959 mod(2);
1960
1961Another way is to assign to a substr() that's off the end of the string.
1962
c5674021
PDF
1963Yet another way is to assign to a C<foreach> loop I<VAR> when I<VAR>
1964is aliased to a constant in the look I<LIST>:
1965
1966 $x = 1;
1967 foreach my $n ($x, 2) {
1968 $n *= 2; # modifies the $x, but fails on attempt to modify the 2
64977eb6 1969 }
c5674021 1970
7a4340ed 1971=item Modification of non-creatable array value attempted, %s
a0d0e21e
LW
1972
1973(F) You tried to make an array value spring into existence, and the
1974subscript was probably negative, even counting from end of the array
1975backwards.
1976
7a4340ed 1977=item Modification of non-creatable hash value attempted, %s
a0d0e21e 1978
be771a83
GS
1979(P) You tried to make a hash value spring into existence, and it
1980couldn't be created for some peculiar reason.
a0d0e21e
LW
1981
1982=item Module name must be constant
1983
1984(F) Only a bare module name is allowed as the first argument to a "use".
1985
be98fb35 1986=item Module name required with -%c option
6df41af2 1987
be98fb35
GS
1988(F) The C<-M> or C<-m> options say that Perl should load some module, but
1989you omitted the name of the module. Consult L<perlrun> for full details
1990about C<-M> and C<-m>.
6df41af2 1991
a0d0e21e
LW
1992=item msg%s not implemented
1993
1994(F) You don't have System V message IPC on your system.
1995
1996=item Multidimensional syntax %s not supported
1997
75b44862
GS
1998(W syntax) Multidimensional arrays aren't written like C<$foo[1,2,3]>.
1999They're written like C<$foo[1][2][3]>, as in C.
8b1a09fc 2000
6df41af2 2001=item / must be followed by a*, A* or Z*
09bef843 2002
6df41af2 2003(F) You had a pack template indicating a counted-length string,
be771a83
GS
2004Currently the only things that can have their length counted are a*, A*
2005or Z*. See L<perlfunc/pack>.
6df41af2
GS
2006
2007=item / must be followed by a, A or Z
2008
be771a83
GS
2009(F) You had an unpack template indicating a counted-length string, which
2010must be followed by one of the letters a, A or Z to indicate what sort
2011of string is to be unpacked. See L<perlfunc/pack>.
6df41af2
GS
2012
2013=item / must follow a numeric type
2014
be771a83
GS
2015(F) You had an unpack template that contained a '#', but this did not
2016follow some numeric unpack specification. See L<perlfunc/pack>.
6df41af2
GS
2017
2018=item "my sub" not yet implemented
2019
be771a83
GS
2020(F) Lexically scoped subroutines are not yet implemented. Don't try
2021that yet.
6df41af2
GS
2022
2023=item "my" variable %s can't be in a package
2024
be771a83
GS
2025(F) Lexically scoped variables aren't in a package, so it doesn't make
2026sense to try to declare one with a package qualifier on the front. Use
2027local() if you want to localize a package variable.
09bef843 2028
8b1a09fc 2029=item Name "%s::%s" used only once: possible typo
2030
e476b1b5 2031(W once) Typographical errors often show up as unique variable names.
be771a83
GS
2032If you had a good reason for having a unique name, then just mention it
2033again somehow to suppress the message. The C<our> declaration is
77ca0c92 2034provided for this purpose.
a0d0e21e
LW
2035
2036=item Negative length
2037
be771a83
GS
2038(F) You tried to do a read/write/send/recv operation with a buffer
2039length that is less than 0. This is difficult to imagine.
a0d0e21e 2040
7253e4e3 2041=item Nested quantifiers in regex; marked by <-- HERE in m/%s/
a0d0e21e 2042
b45f050a 2043(F) You can't quantify a quantifier without intervening parentheses. So
7253e4e3 2044things like ** or +* or ?* are illegal. The <-- HERE shows in the regular
b45f050a 2045expression about where the problem was discovered.
a0d0e21e 2046
7253e4e3 2047Note that the minimal matching quantifiers, C<*?>, C<+?>, and
be771a83 2048C<??> appear to be nested quantifiers, but aren't. See L<perlre>.
a0d0e21e 2049
6df41af2 2050=item %s never introduced
a0d0e21e 2051
be771a83
GS
2052(S internal) The symbol in question was declared but somehow went out of
2053scope before it could possibly have been used.
a0d0e21e
LW
2054
2055=item No %s allowed while running setuid
2056
be771a83
GS
2057(F) Certain operations are deemed to be too insecure for a setuid or
2058setgid script to even be allowed to attempt. Generally speaking there
2059will be another way to do what you want that is, if not secure, at least
2060securable. See L<perlsec>.
a0d0e21e
LW
2061
2062=item No B<-e> allowed in setuid scripts
2063
2064(F) A setuid script can't be specified by the user.
2065
2066=item No comma allowed after %s
2067
2068(F) A list operator that has a filehandle or "indirect object" is not
2069allowed to have a comma between that and the following arguments.
2070Otherwise it'd be just another one of the arguments.
2071
0a753a76 2072One possible cause for this is that you expected to have imported a
2073constant to your name space with B<use> or B<import> while no such
2074importing took place, it may for example be that your operating system
2075does not support that particular constant. Hopefully you did use an
2076explicit import list for the constants you expect to see, please see
2077L<perlfunc/use> and L<perlfunc/import>. While an explicit import list
2078would probably have caught this error earlier it naturally does not
2079remedy the fact that your operating system still does not support that
2080constant. Maybe you have a typo in the constants of the symbol import
2081list of B<use> or B<import> or in the constant name at the line where
2082this error was triggered?
2083
748a9306
LW
2084=item No command into which to pipe on command line
2085
be771a83
GS
2086(F) An error peculiar to VMS. Perl handles its own command line
2087redirection, and found a '|' at the end of the command line, so it
2088doesn't know where you want to pipe the output from this command.
748a9306 2089
a0d0e21e
LW
2090=item No DB::DB routine defined
2091
be771a83
GS
2092(F) The currently executing code was compiled with the B<-d> switch, but
2093for some reason the perl5db.pl file (or some facsimile thereof) didn't
2094define a routine to be called at the beginning of each statement. Which
2095is odd, because the file should have been required automatically, and
2096should have blown up the require if it didn't parse right.
a0d0e21e
LW
2097
2098=item No dbm on this machine
2099
2100(P) This is counted as an internal error, because every machine should
5f05dabc 2101supply dbm nowadays, because Perl comes with SDBM. See L<SDBM_File>.
a0d0e21e
LW
2102
2103=item No DBsub routine
2104
2105(F) The currently executing code was compiled with the B<-d> switch,
2106but for some reason the perl5db.pl file (or some facsimile thereof)
2107didn't define a DB::sub routine to be called at the beginning of each
2108ordinary subroutine call.
2109
c47ff5f1 2110=item No error file after 2> or 2>> on command line
748a9306 2111
be771a83
GS
2112(F) An error peculiar to VMS. Perl handles its own command line
2113redirection, and found a '2>' or a '2>>' on the command line, but can't
2114find the name of the file to which to write data destined for stderr.
748a9306 2115
c47ff5f1 2116=item No input file after < on command line
748a9306 2117
be771a83
GS
2118(F) An error peculiar to VMS. Perl handles its own command line
2119redirection, and found a '<' on the command line, but can't find the
2120name of the file from which to read data for stdin.
748a9306 2121
6df41af2
GS
2122=item No #! line
2123
2124(F) The setuid emulator requires that scripts have a well-formed #! line
2125even on machines that don't support the #! construct.
2126
2127=item "no" not allowed in expression
2128
be771a83
GS
2129(F) The "no" keyword is recognized and executed at compile time, and
2130returns no useful value. See L<perlmod>.
6df41af2 2131
c47ff5f1 2132=item No output file after > on command line
748a9306 2133
be771a83
GS
2134(F) An error peculiar to VMS. Perl handles its own command line
2135redirection, and found a lone '>' at the end of the command line, so it
2136doesn't know where you wanted to redirect stdout.
748a9306 2137
c47ff5f1 2138=item No output file after > or >> on command line
748a9306 2139
be771a83
GS
2140(F) An error peculiar to VMS. Perl handles its own command line
2141redirection, and found a '>' or a '>>' on the command line, but can't
2142find the name of the file to which to write data destined for stdout.
748a9306 2143
1ec3e8de
GS
2144=item No package name allowed for variable %s in "our"
2145
be771a83
GS
2146(F) Fully qualified variable names are not allowed in "our"
2147declarations, because that doesn't make much sense under existing
2148semantics. Such syntax is reserved for future extensions.
1ec3e8de 2149
a0d0e21e
LW
2150=item No Perl script found in input
2151
2152(F) You called C<perl -x>, but no line was found in the file beginning
2153with #! and containing the word "perl".
2154
2155=item No setregid available
2156
2157(F) Configure didn't find anything resembling the setregid() call for
2158your system.
2159
2160=item No setreuid available
2161
2162(F) Configure didn't find anything resembling the setreuid() call for
2163your system.
2164
a67e862a 2165=item No space allowed after -%c
a0d0e21e 2166
be771a83
GS
2167(F) The argument to the indicated command line switch must follow
2168immediately after the switch, without intervening spaces.
a0d0e21e 2169
6df41af2
GS
2170=item No %s specified for -%c
2171
2172(F) The indicated command line switch needs a mandatory argument, but
2173you haven't specified one.
2174
2175=item No such pipe open
2176
2177(P) An error peculiar to VMS. The internal routine my_pclose() tried to
be771a83
GS
2178close a pipe which hadn't been opened. This should have been caught
2179earlier as an attempt to close an unopened filehandle.
6df41af2 2180
88e9b055 2181=item No such pseudo-hash field "%s"
57079c46 2182
88e9b055 2183(F) You tried to access an array as a hash, but the field name used is
57079c46
GA
2184not defined. The hash at index 0 should map all valid field names to
2185array indices for that to work.
2186
88e9b055 2187=item No such pseudo-hash field "%s" in variable %s of type %s
f1192cee 2188
be771a83
GS
2189(F) You tried to access a field of a typed variable where the type does
2190not know about the field name. The field names are looked up in the
2191%FIELDS hash in the type package at compile time. The %FIELDS hash is
2192%usually set up with the 'fields' pragma.
f1192cee 2193
a0d0e21e
LW
2194=item No such signal: SIG%s
2195
be771a83
GS
2196(W signal) You specified a signal name as a subscript to %SIG that was
2197not recognized. Say C<kill -l> in your shell to see the valid signal
2198names on your system.
a0d0e21e
LW
2199
2200=item Not a CODE reference
2201
2202(F) Perl was trying to evaluate a reference to a code value (that is, a
2203subroutine), but found a reference to something else instead. You can
be771a83
GS
2204use the ref() function to find out what kind of ref it really was. See
2205also L<perlref>.
a0d0e21e
LW
2206
2207=item Not a format reference
2208
2209(F) I'm not sure how you managed to generate a reference to an anonymous
2210format, but this indicates you did, and that it didn't exist.
2211
2212=item Not a GLOB reference
2213
be771a83
GS
2214(F) Perl was trying to evaluate a reference to a "typeglob" (that is, a
2215symbol table entry that looks like C<*foo>), but found a reference to
2216something else instead. You can use the ref() function to find out what
2217kind of ref it really was. See L<perlref>.
a0d0e21e
LW
2218
2219=item Not a HASH reference
2220
be771a83
GS
2221(F) Perl was trying to evaluate a reference to a hash value, but found a
2222reference to something else instead. You can use the ref() function to
2223find out what kind of ref it really was. See L<perlref>.
a0d0e21e 2224
6df41af2
GS
2225=item Not an ARRAY reference
2226
be771a83
GS
2227(F) Perl was trying to evaluate a reference to an array value, but found
2228a reference to something else instead. You can use the ref() function
2229to find out what kind of ref it really was. See L<perlref>.
6df41af2 2230
a0d0e21e
LW
2231=item Not a perl script
2232
2233(F) The setuid emulator requires that scripts have a well-formed #! line
2234even on machines that don't support the #! construct. The line must
2235mention perl.
2236
2237=item Not a SCALAR reference
2238
be771a83
GS
2239(F) Perl was trying to evaluate a reference to a scalar value, but found
2240a reference to something else instead. You can use the ref() function
2241to find out what kind of ref it really was. See L<perlref>.
a0d0e21e
LW
2242
2243=item Not a subroutine reference
2244
2245(F) Perl was trying to evaluate a reference to a code value (that is, a
2246subroutine), but found a reference to something else instead. You can
be771a83
GS
2247use the ref() function to find out what kind of ref it really was. See
2248also L<perlref>.
a0d0e21e 2249
e7ea3e70 2250=item Not a subroutine reference in overload table
a0d0e21e
LW
2251
2252(F) An attempt was made to specify an entry in an overloading table that
8b1a09fc 2253doesn't somehow point to a valid subroutine. See L<overload>.
a0d0e21e 2254
a0d0e21e
LW
2255=item Not enough arguments for %s
2256
2257(F) The function requires more arguments than you specified.
2258
6df41af2
GS
2259=item Not enough format arguments
2260
be771a83
GS
2261(W syntax) A format specified more picture fields than the next line
2262supplied. See L<perlform>.
6df41af2
GS
2263
2264=item %s: not found
2265
be771a83
GS
2266(A) You've accidentally run your script through the Bourne shell instead
2267of Perl. Check the #! line, or manually feed your script into Perl
2268yourself.
6df41af2
GS
2269
2270=item no UTC offset information; assuming local time is UTC
a0d0e21e 2271
6df41af2
GS
2272(S) A warning peculiar to VMS. Perl was unable to find the local
2273timezone offset, so it's assuming that local system time is equivalent
be771a83
GS
2274to UTC. If it's not, define the logical name
2275F<SYS$TIMEZONE_DIFFERENTIAL> to translate to the number of seconds which
2276need to be added to UTC to get local time.
a0d0e21e
LW
2277
2278=item Null filename used
2279
be771a83
GS
2280(F) You can't require the null filename, especially because on many
2281machines that means the current directory! See L<perlfunc/require>.
a0d0e21e 2282
6df41af2
GS
2283=item NULL OP IN RUN
2284
be771a83
GS
2285(P debugging) Some internal routine called run() with a null opcode
2286pointer.
6df41af2 2287
55497cff 2288=item Null picture in formline
2289
2290(F) The first argument to formline must be a valid format picture
2291specification. It was found to be empty, which probably means you
2292supplied it an uninitialized value. See L<perlform>.
2293
a0d0e21e
LW
2294=item Null realloc
2295
2296(P) An attempt was made to realloc NULL.
2297
2298=item NULL regexp argument
2299
5f05dabc 2300(P) The internal pattern matching routines blew it big time.
a0d0e21e
LW
2301
2302=item NULL regexp parameter
2303
2304(P) The internal pattern matching routines are out of their gourd.
2305
fc36a67e 2306=item Number too long
2307
be771a83
GS
2308(F) Perl limits the representation of decimal numbers in programs to
2309about about 250 characters. You've exceeded that length. Future
2310versions of Perl are likely to eliminate this arbitrary limitation. In
2311the meantime, try using scientific notation (e.g. "1e6" instead of
2312"1_000_000").
fc36a67e 2313
6df41af2
GS
2314=item Octal number in vector unsupported
2315
be771a83
GS
2316(F) Numbers with a leading C<0> are not currently allowed in vectors.
2317The octal number interpretation of such numbers may be supported in a
2318future version.
6df41af2 2319
252aa082
JH
2320=item Octal number > 037777777777 non-portable
2321
75b44862 2322(W portable) The octal number you specified is larger than 2**32-1
be771a83
GS
2323(4294967295) and therefore non-portable between systems. See
2324L<perlport> for more on portability concerns.
252aa082
JH
2325
2326See also L<perlport> for writing portable code.
2327
6ad11d81
JH
2328=item Odd number of arguments for overload::constant
2329
2330(W) The call to overload::constant contained an odd number of arguments.
2331The arguments should come in pairs.
2332
1930e939 2333=item Odd number of elements in hash assignment
a0d0e21e 2334
be771a83
GS
2335(W misc) You specified an odd number of elements to initialize a hash,
2336which is odd, because hashes come in key/value pairs.
a0d0e21e 2337
bbce6d69 2338=item Offset outside string
2339
2340(F) You tried to do a read/write/send/recv operation with an offset
be771a83
GS
2341pointing outside the buffer. This is difficult to imagine. The sole
2342exception to this is that C<sysread()>ing past the buffer will extend
2343the buffer and zero pad the new area.
bbce6d69 2344
9ddeeac9
JH
2345=item -%s on unopened filehandle %s
2346
2347(W unopened) You tried to invoke a file test operator on a filehandle
c289d2f7 2348that isn't open. Check your control flow. See also L<perlfunc/-X>.
9ddeeac9 2349
c289d2f7 2350=item %s() on unopened %s
2dd78f96
JH
2351
2352(W unopened) An I/O operation was attempted on a filehandle that was
2353never initialized. You need to do an open(), a sysopen(), or a socket()
2354call, or call a constructor from the FileHandle package.
2355
a0d0e21e
LW
2356=item oops: oopsAV
2357
e476b1b5 2358(S internal) An internal warning that the grammar is screwed up.
a0d0e21e
LW
2359
2360=item oops: oopsHV
2361
e476b1b5 2362(S internal) An internal warning that the grammar is screwed up.
a0d0e21e 2363
56f7f34b 2364=item Operation `%s': no method found, %s
44a8e56a 2365
be771a83
GS
2366(F) An attempt was made to perform an overloaded operation for which no
2367handler was defined. While some handlers can be autogenerated in terms
2368of other handlers, there is no default handler for any operation, unless
2369C<fallback> overloading key is specified to be true. See L<overload>.
44a8e56a 2370
748a9306
LW
2371=item Operator or semicolon missing before %s
2372
be771a83
GS
2373(S ambiguous) You used a variable or subroutine call where the parser
2374was expecting an operator. The parser has assumed you really meant to
2375use an operator, but this is highly likely to be incorrect. For
2376example, if you say "*foo *foo" it will be interpreted as if you said
2377"*foo * 'foo'".
748a9306 2378
6df41af2
GS
2379=item "our" variable %s redeclared
2380
be771a83
GS
2381(W misc) You seem to have already declared the same global once before
2382in the current lexical scope.
6df41af2 2383
a80b8354
GS
2384=item Out of memory!
2385
2386(X) The malloc() function returned 0, indicating there was insufficient
be771a83
GS
2387remaining memory (or virtual memory) to satisfy the request. Perl has
2388no option but to exit immediately.
a80b8354 2389
6df41af2 2390=item Out of memory during "large" request for %s
a0d0e21e 2391
6df41af2
GS
2392(F) The malloc() function returned 0, indicating there was insufficient
2393remaining memory (or virtual memory) to satisfy the request. However,
be771a83
GS
2394the request was judged large enough (compile-time default is 64K), so a
2395possibility to shut down by trapping this error is granted.
a0d0e21e 2396
1b979e0a 2397=item Out of memory during request for %s
a0d0e21e 2398
be771a83
GS
2399(X|F) The malloc() function returned 0, indicating there was
2400insufficient remaining memory (or virtual memory) to satisfy the
2401request.
eff9c6e2
CS
2402
2403The request was judged to be small, so the possibility to trap it
2404depends on the way perl was compiled. By default it is not trappable.
be771a83
GS
2405However, if compiled for this, Perl may use the contents of C<$^M> as an
2406emergency pool after die()ing with this message. In this case the error
b022d2d2
IZ
2407is trappable I<once>, and the error message will include the line and file
2408where the failed request happened.
55497cff 2409
1b979e0a
IZ
2410=item Out of memory during ridiculously large request
2411
2412(F) You can't allocate more than 2^31+"small amount" bytes. This error
be771a83
GS
2413is most likely to be caused by a typo in the Perl program. e.g.,
2414C<$arr[time]> instead of C<$arr[$time]>.
1b979e0a 2415
6df41af2
GS
2416=item Out of memory for yacc stack
2417
be771a83
GS
2418(F) The yacc parser wanted to grow its stack so it could continue
2419parsing, but realloc() wouldn't give it more memory, virtual or
2420otherwise.
6df41af2
GS
2421
2422=item @ outside of string
2423
2424(F) You had a pack template that specified an absolute position outside
2425the string being unpacked. See L<perlfunc/pack>.
2426
2427=item %s package attribute may clash with future reserved word: %s
2428
be771a83
GS
2429(W reserved) A lowercase attribute name was used that had a
2430package-specific handler. That name might have a meaning to Perl itself
2431some day, even though it doesn't yet. Perhaps you should use a
2432mixed-case attribute name, instead. See L<attributes>.
6df41af2 2433
5b027e89
RGS
2434=item Package '%s' not found (did you use the incorrect case?)
2435
2436(W misc) You included a package file via C<use>, but the package name
5b7c7e90 2437did not match the file name. It's possible that you misspelled the
5b027e89
RGS
2438package name.
2439
a0d0e21e
LW
2440=item page overflow
2441
be771a83
GS
2442(W io) A single call to write() produced more lines than can fit on a
2443page. See L<perlform>.
a0d0e21e 2444
6df41af2
GS
2445=item panic: %s
2446
2447(P) An internal error.
2448
a0d0e21e
LW
2449=item panic: ck_grep
2450
2451(P) Failed an internal consistency check trying to compile a grep.
2452
2453=item panic: ck_split
2454
2455(P) Failed an internal consistency check trying to compile a split.
2456
2457=item panic: corrupt saved stack index
2458
be771a83
GS
2459(P) The savestack was requested to restore more localized values than
2460there are in the savestack.
a0d0e21e 2461
810b8aa5
GS
2462=item panic: del_backref
2463
2464(P) Failed an internal consistency check while trying to reset a weak
2465reference.
2466
a0d0e21e
LW
2467=item panic: die %s
2468
2469(P) We popped the context stack to an eval context, and then discovered
2470it wasn't an eval context.
2471
2269b42e 2472=item panic: pp_match
a0d0e21e 2473
be771a83
GS
2474(P) The internal pp_match() routine was called with invalid operational
2475data.
a0d0e21e 2476
a0d0e21e
LW
2477=item panic: do_subst
2478
be771a83
GS
2479(P) The internal pp_subst() routine was called with invalid operational
2480data.
a0d0e21e 2481
2269b42e 2482=item panic: do_trans_%s
a0d0e21e 2483
2269b42e 2484(P) The internal do_trans routines were called with invalid operational
be771a83 2485data.
a0d0e21e 2486
c635e13b 2487=item panic: frexp
2488
2489(P) The library function frexp() failed, making printf("%f") impossible.
2490
a0d0e21e
LW
2491=item panic: goto
2492
2493(P) We popped the context stack to a context with the specified label,
2494and then discovered it wasn't a context we know how to do a goto in.
2495
2496=item panic: INTERPCASEMOD
2497
2498(P) The lexer got into a bad state at a case modifier.
2499
2500=item panic: INTERPCONCAT
2501
2502(P) The lexer got into a bad state parsing a string with brackets.
2503
e446cec8
IZ
2504=item panic: kid popen errno read
2505
2506(F) forked child returned an incomprehensible message about its errno.
2507
a0d0e21e
LW
2508=item panic: last
2509
2510(P) We popped the context stack to a block context, and then discovered
2511it wasn't a block context.
2512
2513=item panic: leave_scope clearsv
2514
be771a83
GS
2515(P) A writable lexical variable became read-only somehow within the
2516scope.
a0d0e21e
LW
2517
2518=item panic: leave_scope inconsistency
2519
2520(P) The savestack probably got out of sync. At least, there was an
2521invalid enum on the top of it.
2522
810b8aa5
GS
2523=item panic: magic_killbackrefs
2524
2525(P) Failed an internal consistency check while trying to reset all weak
2526references to an object.
2527
6df41af2
GS
2528=item panic: malloc
2529
2530(P) Something requested a negative number of bytes of malloc.
2531
a0d0e21e
LW
2532=item panic: mapstart
2533
2534(P) The compiler is screwed up with respect to the map() function.
2535
2536=item panic: null array
2537
2538(P) One of the internal array routines was passed a null AV pointer.
2539
2540=item panic: pad_alloc
2541
2542(P) The compiler got confused about which scratch pad it was allocating
2543and freeing temporaries and lexicals from.
2544
2545=item panic: pad_free curpad
2546
2547(P) The compiler got confused about which scratch pad it was allocating
2548and freeing temporaries and lexicals from.
2549
2550=item panic: pad_free po
2551
2552(P) An invalid scratch pad offset was detected internally.
2553
2554=item panic: pad_reset curpad
2555
2556(P) The compiler got confused about which scratch pad it was allocating
2557and freeing temporaries and lexicals from.
2558
2559=item panic: pad_sv po
2560
2561(P) An invalid scratch pad offset was detected internally.
2562
2563=item panic: pad_swipe curpad
2564
2565(P) The compiler got confused about which scratch pad it was allocating
2566and freeing temporaries and lexicals from.
2567
2568=item panic: pad_swipe po
2569
2570(P) An invalid scratch pad offset was detected internally.
2571
2572=item panic: pp_iter
2573
2574(P) The foreach iterator got called in a non-loop context frame.
2575
2269b42e
JH
2576=item panic: pp_split
2577
2578(P) Something terrible went wrong in setting up for the split.
2579
a0d0e21e
LW
2580=item panic: realloc
2581
2582(P) Something requested a negative number of bytes of realloc.
2583
2584=item panic: restartop
2585
2586(P) Some internal routine requested a goto (or something like it), and
2587didn't supply the destination.
2588
2589=item panic: return
2590
2591(P) We popped the context stack to a subroutine or eval context, and
2592then discovered it wasn't a subroutine or eval context.
2593
2594=item panic: scan_num
2595
2596(P) scan_num() got called on something that wasn't a number.
2597
2598=item panic: sv_insert
2599
2600(P) The sv_insert() routine was told to remove more string than there
2601was string.
2602
2603=item panic: top_env
2604
6224f72b 2605(P) The compiler attempted to do a goto, or something weird like that.
a0d0e21e
LW
2606
2607=item panic: yylex
2608
2609(P) The lexer got into a bad state while processing a case modifier.
2610
dea0fc0b
JH
2611=item panic: utf16_to_utf8: odd bytelen
2612
2613(P) Something tried to call utf16_to_utf8 with an odd (as opposed
64977eb6 2614to even) byte length.
dea0fc0b 2615
7b8d334a 2616=item Parentheses missing around "%s" list
a0d0e21e 2617
e476b1b5 2618(W parenthesis) You said something like
a0d0e21e
LW
2619
2620 my $foo, $bar = @_;
2621
2622when you meant
2623
2624 my ($foo, $bar) = @_;
2625
54884818 2626Remember that "my", "our", and "local" bind tighter than comma.
a0d0e21e 2627
75b44862 2628=item Perl %s required--this is only version %s, stopped
a0d0e21e 2629
be771a83
GS
2630(F) The module in question uses features of a version of Perl more
2631recent than the currently running version. How long has it been since
2632you upgraded, anyway? See L<perlfunc/require>.
a0d0e21e 2633
6df41af2
GS
2634=item PERL_SH_DIR too long
2635
2636(F) An error peculiar to OS/2. PERL_SH_DIR is the directory to find the
fecfaeb8 2637C<sh>-shell in. See "PERL_SH_DIR" in L<perlos2>.
6df41af2
GS
2638
2639=item perl: warning: Setting locale failed.
2640
2641(S) The whole warning message will look something like:
2642
2643 perl: warning: Setting locale failed.
2644 perl: warning: Please check that your locale settings:
2645 LC_ALL = "En_US",
2646 LANG = (unset)
2647 are supported and installed on your system.
2648 perl: warning: Falling back to the standard locale ("C").
2649
2650Exactly what were the failed locale settings varies. In the above the
2651settings were that the LC_ALL was "En_US" and the LANG had no value.
0ea6b70f
JH
2652This error means that Perl detected that you and/or your operating
2653system supplier and/or system administrator have set up the so-called
2654locale system but Perl could not use those settings. This was not
2655dead serious, fortunately: there is a "default locale" called "C" that
2656Perl can and will use, the script will be run. Before you really fix
2657the problem, however, you will get the same error message each time
2658you run Perl. How to really fix the problem can be found in
2659L<perllocale> section B<LOCALE PROBLEMS>.
6df41af2 2660
bccbfa77
NC
2661=item perlio: argument list not closed for layer "%s"
2662
64977eb6 2663(S) When pushing a layer with arguments onto the Perl I/O system you forgot
bccbfa77 2664the ) that closes the argument list. (Layers take care of transforming
64977eb6
NC
2665data between external and internal representations.) Perl stopped parsing
2666the layer list at this point and did not attempt to push this layer.
2667If your program didn't explicitly request the failing operation, it may be
2668the result of the value of the environment variable PERLIO.
2669
2670=item perlio: invalid separator character %s in attribute list
2671
2672(S) When pushing layers onto the Perl I/O system, something other than a
2673colon or whitespace was seen between the elements of an layer list.
2674If the previous attribute had a parenthesised parameter list, perhaps that
2675list was terminated too soon.
bccbfa77 2676
ef0f9817
DD
2677=item perlio: unknown layer "%s"
2678
2679(S) An attempt was made to push an unknown layer onto the Perl I/O
2680system. (Layers take care of transforming data between external and
2681internal representations.) Note that some layers, such as C<mmap>,
2682are not supported in all environments. If your program didn't
2683explicitly request the failing operation, it may be the result of the
2684value of the environment variable PERLIO.
2685
a0d0e21e
LW
2686=item Permission denied
2687
2688(F) The setuid emulator in suidperl decided you were up to no good.
2689
bd3fa61c 2690=item pid %x not a child
748a9306 2691
be771a83
GS
2692(W exec) A warning peculiar to VMS. Waitpid() was asked to wait for a
2693process which isn't a subprocess of the current process. While this is
2694fine from VMS' perspective, it's probably not what you intended.
748a9306 2695
5cd5c422
RB
2696=item POSIX syntax [%s] belongs inside character classes in regex;
2697
2698marked by <-- HERE in m/%s/
b45f050a
JF
2699
2700(W unsafe) The character class constructs [: :], [= =], and [. .] go
7253e4e3
RK
2701I<inside> character classes, the [] are part of the construct, for example:
2702/[012[:alpha:]345]/. Note that [= =] and [. .] are not currently
2703implemented; they are simply placeholders for future extensions and will
2704cause fatal errors. The <-- HERE shows in the regular expression about
2705where the problem was discovered. See L<perlre>.
b45f050a 2706
5cd5c422
RB
2707=item POSIX syntax [. .] is reserved for future extensions in regex;
2708
2709marked by <-- HERE in m/%s/
b45f050a
JF
2710
2711(F regexp) Within regular expression character classes ([]) the syntax
7253e4e3
RK
2712beginning with "[." and ending with ".]" is reserved for future extensions.
2713If you need to represent those character sequences inside a regular
2714expression character class, just quote the square brackets with the
2715backslash: "\[." and ".\]". The <-- HERE shows in the regular expression
2716about where the problem was discovered. See L<perlre>.
b45f050a 2717
5cd5c422
RB
2718=item POSIX syntax [= =] is reserved for future extensions in regex;
2719
2720marked by <-- HERE in m/%s/
b45f050a 2721
7253e4e3
RK
2722(F) Within regular expression character classes ([]) the syntax beginning
2723with "[=" and ending with "=]" is reserved for future extensions. If you
2724need to represent those character sequences inside a regular expression
2725character class, just quote the square brackets with the backslash: "\[="
2726and "=\]". The <-- HERE shows in the regular expression about where the
2727problem was discovered. See L<perlre>.
b45f050a 2728
5cd5c422
RB
2729=item POSIX class [:%s:] unknown in regex;
2730
2731marked by <-- HERE in m/%s/
b45f050a 2732
7253e4e3
RK
2733(F) The class in the character class [: :] syntax is unknown. The <-- HERE
2734shows in the regular expression about where the problem was discovered.
2735See L<perlre>.
b45f050a 2736
a0d0e21e
LW
2737=item POSIX getpgrp can't take an argument
2738
81777298 2739(F) Your system has POSIX getpgrp(), which takes no argument, unlike
a0d0e21e
LW
2740the BSD version, which takes a pid.
2741
bbce6d69 2742=item Possible attempt to put comments in qw() list
2743
e476b1b5 2744(W qw) qw() lists contain items separated by whitespace; as with literal
75b44862 2745strings, comment characters are not ignored, but are instead treated as
be771a83
GS
2746literal data. (You may have used different delimiters than the
2747parentheses shown here; braces are also frequently used.)
bbce6d69 2748
774d564b 2749You probably wrote something like this:
2750
54310121 2751 @list = qw(
774d564b 2752 a # a comment
bbce6d69 2753 b # another comment
774d564b 2754 );
bbce6d69 2755
2756when you should have written this:
2757
774d564b 2758 @list = qw(
54310121 2759 a
2760 b
774d564b 2761 );
2762
2763If you really want comments, build your list the
2764old-fashioned way, with quotes and commas:
2765
2766 @list = (
2767 'a', # a comment
2768 'b', # another comment
2769 );
bbce6d69 2770
2771=item Possible attempt to separate words with commas
2772
be771a83
GS
2773(W qw) qw() lists contain items separated by whitespace; therefore
2774commas aren't needed to separate the items. (You may have used
2775different delimiters than the parentheses shown here; braces are also
2776frequently used.)
bbce6d69 2777
54310121 2778You probably wrote something like this:
bbce6d69 2779
774d564b 2780 qw! a, b, c !;
2781
2782which puts literal commas into some of the list items. Write it without
2783commas if you don't want them to appear in your data:
bbce6d69 2784
774d564b 2785 qw! a b c !;
bbce6d69 2786
a0d0e21e
LW
2787=item Possible memory corruption: %s overflowed 3rd argument
2788
2789(F) An ioctl() or fcntl() returned more than Perl was bargaining for.
2790Perl guesses a reasonable buffer size, but puts a sentinel byte at the
2791end of the buffer just in case. This sentinel byte got clobbered, and
2792Perl assumes that memory is now corrupted. See L<perlfunc/ioctl>.
2793
6df41af2
GS
2794=item Possible Y2K bug: %s
2795
2796(W y2k) You are concatenating the number 19 with another number, which
2797could be a potential Year 2000 problem.
2798
8cd79558
GS
2799=item pragma "attrs" is deprecated, use "sub NAME : ATTRS" instead
2800
a1063b2d 2801(D deprecated) You have written something like this:
8cd79558
GS
2802
2803 sub doit
2804 {
2805 use attrs qw(locked);
2806 }
2807
2808You should use the new declaration syntax instead.
2809
2810 sub doit : locked
2811 {
2812 ...
2813
2814The C<use attrs> pragma is now obsolete, and is only provided for
2815backward-compatibility. See L<perlsub/"Subroutine Attributes">.
2816
a0d0e21e
LW
2817=item Precedence problem: open %s should be open(%s)
2818
e476b1b5 2819(S precedence) The old irregular construct
cb1a09d0 2820
a0d0e21e
LW
2821 open FOO || die;
2822
2823is now misinterpreted as
2824
2825 open(FOO || die);
2826
be771a83
GS
2827because of the strict regularization of Perl 5's grammar into unary and
2828list operators. (The old open was a little of both.) You must put
2829parentheses around the filehandle, or use the new "or" operator instead
2830of "||".
a0d0e21e 2831
3cdd684c
TP
2832=item Premature end of script headers
2833
2834See Server error.
2835
6df41af2
GS
2836=item printf() on closed filehandle %s
2837
be771a83 2838(W closed) The filehandle you're writing to got itself closed sometime
c289d2f7 2839before now. Check your control flow.
6df41af2 2840
9a7dcd9c 2841=item print() on closed filehandle %s
a0d0e21e 2842
be771a83 2843(W closed) The filehandle you're printing on got itself closed sometime
c289d2f7 2844before now. Check your control flow.
a0d0e21e 2845
6df41af2 2846=item Process terminated by SIG%s
a0d0e21e 2847
6df41af2
GS
2848(W) This is a standard message issued by OS/2 applications, while *nix
2849applications die in silence. It is considered a feature of the OS/2
2850port. One can easily disable this by appropriate sighandlers, see
2851L<perlipc/"Signals">. See also "Process terminated by SIGTERM/SIGINT"
fecfaeb8 2852in L<perlos2>.
a0d0e21e 2853
3fe9a6f1 2854=item Prototype mismatch: %s vs %s
4633a7c4 2855
be771a83
GS
2856(S unsafe) The subroutine being declared or defined had previously been
2857declared or defined with a different function prototype.
4633a7c4 2858
5cd5c422
RB
2859=item Quantifier in {,} bigger than %d in regex;
2860
2861marked by <-- HERE in m/%s/
9baa0206 2862
b45f050a 2863(F) There is currently a limit to the size of the min and max values of the
7253e4e3 2864{min,max} construct. The <-- HERE shows in the regular expression about where
b45f050a 2865the problem was discovered. See L<perlre>.
9baa0206 2866
5cd5c422
RB
2867=item Quantifier unexpected on zero-length expression;
2868
2869marked by <-- HERE in m/%s/
9baa0206 2870
b45f050a
JF
2871(W regexp) You applied a regular expression quantifier in a place where
2872it makes no sense, such as on a zero-width assertion. Try putting the
2873quantifier inside the assertion instead. For example, the way to match
2874"abc" provided that it is followed by three repetitions of "xyz" is
2875C</abc(?=(?:xyz){3})/>, not C</abc(?=xyz){3}/>.
9baa0206 2876
7253e4e3
RK
2877The <-- HERE shows in the regular expression about where the problem was
2878discovered.
2879
89ea2908
GA
2880=item Range iterator outside integer range
2881
2882(F) One (or both) of the numeric arguments to the range operator ".."
2883are outside the range which can be represented by integers internally.
be771a83
GS
2884One possible workaround is to force Perl to use magical string increment
2885by prepending "0" to your numbers.
89ea2908 2886
9a7dcd9c 2887=item readline() on closed filehandle %s
a0d0e21e 2888
75b44862 2889(W closed) The filehandle you're reading from got itself closed sometime
c289d2f7 2890before now. Check your control flow.
a0d0e21e 2891
6df41af2
GS
2892=item Reallocation too large: %lx
2893
2894(F) You can't allocate more than 64K on an MS-DOS machine.
2895
4ad56ec9
IZ
2896=item realloc() of freed memory ignored
2897
be771a83
GS
2898(S malloc) An internal routine called realloc() on something that had
2899already been freed.
4ad56ec9 2900
a0d0e21e
LW
2901=item Recompile perl with B<-D>DEBUGGING to use B<-D> switch
2902
be771a83
GS
2903(F debugging) You can't use the B<-D> option unless the code to produce
2904the desired output is compiled into Perl, which entails some overhead,
a0d0e21e
LW
2905which is why it's currently left out of your copy.
2906
3e0ccd42 2907=item Recursive inheritance detected in package '%s'
a0d0e21e
LW
2908
2909(F) More than 100 levels of inheritance were used. Probably indicates
2910an unintended loop in your inheritance hierarchy.
2911
7a4340ed 2912=item Recursive inheritance detected while looking for method %s
3e0ccd42 2913
be771a83
GS
2914(F) More than 100 levels of inheritance were encountered while invoking
2915a method. Probably indicates an unintended loop in your inheritance
2916hierarchy.
3e0ccd42 2917
1930e939
TP
2918=item Reference found where even-sized list expected
2919
be771a83
GS
2920(W misc) You gave a single reference where Perl was expecting a list
2921with an even number of elements (for assignment to a hash). This usually
2922means that you used the anon hash constructor when you meant to use
2923parens. In any case, a hash requires key/value B<pairs>.
7b8d334a
GS
2924
2925 %hash = { one => 1, two => 2, }; # WRONG
2926 %hash = [ qw/ an anon array / ]; # WRONG
2927 %hash = ( one => 1, two => 2, ); # right
2928 %hash = qw( one 1 two 2 ); # also fine
2929
810b8aa5
GS
2930=item Reference is already weak
2931
e476b1b5 2932(W misc) You have attempted to weaken a reference that is already weak.
810b8aa5
GS
2933Doing so has no effect.
2934
a0d0e21e
LW
2935=item Reference miscount in sv_replace()
2936
be771a83
GS
2937(W internal) The internal sv_replace() function was handed a new SV with
2938a reference count of other than 1.
a0d0e21e 2939
5cd5c422
RB
2940=item Reference to nonexistent group in regex;
2941
2942marked by <-- HERE in m/%s/
b45f050a
JF
2943
2944(F) You used something like C<\7> in your regular expression, but there are
2945not at least seven sets of capturing parentheses in the expression. If you
2946wanted to have the character with value 7 inserted into the regular expression,
2947prepend a zero to make the number at least two digits: C<\07>
9baa0206 2948
7253e4e3 2949The <-- HERE shows in the regular expression about where the problem was
b45f050a 2950discovered.
9baa0206 2951
a0d0e21e
LW
2952=item regexp memory corruption
2953
2954(P) The regular expression engine got confused by what the regular
2955expression compiler gave it.
2956
b45f050a 2957=item Regexp out of space
a0d0e21e 2958
be771a83
GS
2959(P) A "can't happen" error, because safemalloc() should have caught it
2960earlier.
a0d0e21e 2961
7a95317d
GS
2962=item Repeat count in pack overflows
2963
be771a83
GS
2964(F) You can't specify a repeat count so large that it overflows your
2965signed integers. See L<perlfunc/pack>.
7a95317d
GS
2966
2967=item Repeat count in unpack overflows
2968
be771a83
GS
2969(F) You can't specify a repeat count so large that it overflows your
2970signed integers. See L<perlfunc/unpack>.
7a95317d 2971
a0d0e21e
LW
2972=item Reversed %s= operator
2973
be771a83
GS
2974(W syntax) You wrote your assignment operator backwards. The = must
2975always comes last, to avoid ambiguity with subsequent unary operators.
a0d0e21e
LW
2976
2977=item Runaway format
2978
2979(F) Your format contained the ~~ repeat-until-blank sequence, but it
2980produced 200 lines at once, and the 200th line looked exactly like the
2981199th line. Apparently you didn't arrange for the arguments to exhaust
2982themselves, either by using ^ instead of @ (for scalar variables), or by
2983shifting or popping (for array variables). See L<perlform>.
2984
2985=item Scalar value @%s[%s] better written as $%s[%s]
2986
be771a83
GS
2987(W syntax) You've used an array slice (indicated by @) to select a
2988single element of an array. Generally it's better to ask for a scalar
2989value (indicated by $). The difference is that C<$foo[&bar]> always
2990behaves like a scalar, both when assigning to it and when evaluating its
2991argument, while C<@foo[&bar]> behaves like a list when you assign to it,
2992and provides a list context to its subscript, which can do weird things
2993if you're expecting only one subscript.
a0d0e21e 2994
748a9306 2995On the other hand, if you were actually hoping to treat the array
5f05dabc 2996element as a list, you need to look into how references work, because
748a9306
LW
2997Perl will not magically convert between scalars and lists for you. See
2998L<perlref>.
2999
a6006777 3000=item Scalar value @%s{%s} better written as $%s{%s}
3001
75b44862 3002(W syntax) You've used a hash slice (indicated by @) to select a single
be771a83
GS
3003element of a hash. Generally it's better to ask for a scalar value
3004(indicated by $). The difference is that C<$foo{&bar}> always behaves
3005like a scalar, both when assigning to it and when evaluating its
3006argument, while C<@foo{&bar}> behaves like a list when you assign to it,
3007and provides a list context to its subscript, which can do weird things
3008if you're expecting only one subscript.
3009
3010On the other hand, if you were actually hoping to treat the hash element
3011as a list, you need to look into how references work, because Perl will
3012not magically convert between scalars and lists for you. See
a6006777 3013L<perlref>.
3014
3e2f796a
NIS
3015=item Scalars leaked: %d
3016
3017(P) Something went wrong in Perl's internal bookkeeping of scalars:
3018not all scalar variables were deallocated by the time Perl exited.
3019What this usually indicates is a memory leak, which is of course bad,
3020especially if the Perl program is intended to be long-running.
3021
a0d0e21e
LW
3022=item Script is not setuid/setgid in suidperl
3023
54310121 3024(F) Oddly, the suidperl program was invoked on a script without a setuid
3025or setgid bit set. This doesn't make much sense.
a0d0e21e
LW
3026
3027=item Search pattern not terminated
3028
3029(F) The lexer couldn't find the final delimiter of a // or m{}
3030construct. Remember that bracketing delimiters count nesting level.
fb73857a 3031Missing the leading C<$> from a variable C<$m> may cause this error.
a0d0e21e 3032
9ddeeac9 3033=item %sseek() on unopened filehandle
a0d0e21e 3034
be771a83
GS
3035(W unopened) You tried to use the seek() or sysseek() function on a
3036filehandle that was either never opened or has since been closed.
a0d0e21e
LW
3037
3038=item select not implemented
3039
3040(F) This machine doesn't implement the select() system call.
3041
ae21d580 3042=item Self-ties of arrays and hashes are not supported
68a4a7e4 3043
ae21d580
JH
3044(F) Self-ties are of arrays and hashes are not supported in
3045the current implementation.
68a4a7e4 3046
6df41af2 3047=item Semicolon seems to be missing
a0d0e21e 3048
75b44862
GS
3049(W semicolon) A nearby syntax error was probably caused by a missing
3050semicolon, or possibly some other missing operator, such as a comma.
a0d0e21e
LW
3051
3052=item semi-panic: attempt to dup freed string
3053
be771a83
GS
3054(S internal) The internal newSVsv() routine was called to duplicate a
3055scalar that had previously been marked as free.
a0d0e21e 3056
6df41af2 3057=item sem%s not implemented
a0d0e21e 3058
6df41af2 3059(F) You don't have System V semaphore IPC on your system.
a0d0e21e 3060
69282e91 3061=item send() on closed socket %s
a0d0e21e 3062
be771a83 3063(W closed) The socket you're sending to got itself closed sometime
c289d2f7 3064before now. Check your control flow.
a0d0e21e 3065
7253e4e3 3066=item Sequence (? incomplete in regex; marked by <-- HERE in m/%s/
7b8d334a 3067
7253e4e3 3068(F) A regular expression ended with an incomplete extension (?. The <-- HERE
b45f050a 3069shows in the regular expression about where the problem was discovered. See
be771a83 3070L<perlre>.
1b1626e4 3071
5cd5c422
RB
3072=item Sequence (?{...}) not terminated or not {}-balanced in regex;
3073
3074marked by <-- HERE in m/%s/
b45f050a
JF
3075
3076(F) If the contents of a (?{...}) clause contains braces, they must balance
7253e4e3
RK
3077for Perl to properly detect the end of the clause. The <-- HERE shows in
3078the regular expression about where the problem was discovered. See
3079L<perlre>.
a0d0e21e 3080
5cd5c422
RB
3081=item Sequence (?%s...) not implemented in regex;
3082
3083marked by <-- HERE in m/%s/
a0d0e21e 3084
b45f050a 3085(F) A proposed regular expression extension has the character reserved but
7253e4e3 3086has not yet been written. The <-- HERE shows in the regular expression about
b45f050a
JF
3087where the problem was discovered. See L<perlre>.
3088
5cd5c422
RB
3089=item Sequence (?%s...) not recognized in regex;
3090
3091marked by <-- HERE in m/%s/
a0d0e21e 3092
7253e4e3
RK
3093(F) You used a regular expression extension that doesn't make sense. The
3094<-- HERE shows in the regular expression about where the problem was
3095discovered. See L<perlre>.
a0d0e21e 3096
5cd5c422
RB
3097=item Sequence (?#... not terminated in regex;
3098
3099marked by <-- HERE in m/%s/
6df41af2
GS
3100
3101(F) A regular expression comment must be terminated by a closing
7253e4e3
RK
3102parenthesis. Embedded parentheses aren't allowed. The <-- HERE shows in
3103the regular expression about where the problem was discovered. See
3104L<perlre>.
6df41af2
GS
3105
3106=item 500 Server error
3107
3108See Server error.
3109
a5f75d66
AD
3110=item Server error
3111
3cdd684c 3112This is the error message generally seen in a browser window when trying
be771a83
GS
3113to run a CGI program (including SSI) over the web. The actual error text
3114varies widely from server to server. The most frequently-seen variants
3115are "500 Server error", "Method (something) not permitted", "Document
3116contains no data", "Premature end of script headers", and "Did not
3117produce a valid header".
9607fc9c 3118
3119B<This is a CGI error, not a Perl error>.
3120
be771a83
GS
3121You need to make sure your script is executable, is accessible by the
3122user CGI is running the script under (which is probably not the user
3123account you tested it under), does not rely on any environment variables
3124(like PATH) from the user it isn't running under, and isn't in a
3125location where the CGI server can't find it, basically, more or less.
3126Please see the following for more information:
9607fc9c 3127
be94a901
GS
3128 http://www.perl.com/CPAN/doc/FAQs/cgi/idiots-guide.html
3129 http://www.perl.com/CPAN/doc/FAQs/cgi/perl-cgi-faq.html
9607fc9c 3130 ftp://rtfm.mit.edu/pub/usenet/news.answers/www/cgi-faq
3131 http://hoohoo.ncsa.uiuc.edu/cgi/interface.html
3132 http://www-genome.wi.mit.edu/WWW/faqs/www-security-faq.html
a5f75d66 3133
be94a901
GS
3134You should also look at L<perlfaq9>.
3135
a0d0e21e
LW
3136=item setegid() not implemented
3137
be771a83
GS
3138(F) You tried to assign to C<$)>, and your operating system doesn't
3139support the setegid() system call (or equivalent), or at least Configure
3140didn't think so.
a0d0e21e
LW
3141
3142=item seteuid() not implemented
3143
be771a83
GS
3144(F) You tried to assign to C<< $> >>, and your operating system doesn't
3145support the seteuid() system call (or equivalent), or at least Configure
3146didn't think so.
a0d0e21e 3147
81777298
GS
3148=item setpgrp can't take arguments
3149
be771a83
GS
3150(F) Your system has the setpgrp() from BSD 4.2, which takes no
3151arguments, unlike POSIX setpgid(), which takes a process ID and process
3152group ID.
81777298 3153
a0d0e21e
LW
3154=item setrgid() not implemented
3155
be771a83
GS
3156(F) You tried to assign to C<$(>, and your operating system doesn't
3157support the setrgid() system call (or equivalent), or at least Configure
3158didn't think so.
a0d0e21e
LW
3159
3160=item setruid() not implemented
3161
be771a83
GS
3162(F) You tried to assign to C<$<>, and your operating system doesn't
3163support the setruid() system call (or equivalent), or at least Configure
3164didn't think so.
a0d0e21e 3165
6df41af2
GS
3166=item setsockopt() on closed socket %s
3167
be771a83
GS
3168(W closed) You tried to set a socket option on a closed socket. Did you
3169forget to check the return value of your socket() call? See
6df41af2
GS
3170L<perlfunc/setsockopt>.
3171
a0d0e21e
LW
3172=item Setuid/gid script is writable by world
3173
be771a83
GS
3174(F) The setuid emulator won't run a script that is writable by the
3175world, because the world might have written on it already.
a0d0e21e
LW
3176
3177=item shm%s not implemented
3178
3179(F) You don't have System V shared memory IPC on your system.
3180
6df41af2
GS
3181=item <> should be quotes
3182
3183(F) You wrote C<< require <file> >> when you should have written
3184C<require 'file'>.
3185
3186=item /%s/ should probably be written as "%s"
3187
3188(W syntax) You have used a pattern where Perl expected to find a string,
be771a83
GS
3189as in the first argument to C<join>. Perl will treat the true or false
3190result of matching the pattern against $_ as the string, which is
3191probably not what you had in mind.
6df41af2 3192
69282e91 3193=item shutdown() on closed socket %s
a0d0e21e 3194
75b44862
GS
3195(W closed) You tried to do a shutdown on a closed socket. Seems a bit
3196superfluous.
a0d0e21e 3197
f86702cc 3198=item SIG%s handler "%s" not defined
a0d0e21e 3199
be771a83
GS
3200(W signal) The signal handler named in %SIG doesn't, in fact, exist.
3201Perhaps you put it into the wrong package?
a0d0e21e
LW
3202
3203=item sort is now a reserved word
3204
3205(F) An ancient error message that almost nobody ever runs into anymore.
3206But before sort was a keyword, people sometimes used it as a filehandle.
3207
3208=item Sort subroutine didn't return a numeric value
3209
3210(F) A sort comparison routine must return a number. You probably blew
c47ff5f1 3211it by not using C<< <=> >> or C<cmp>, or by not using them correctly.
a0d0e21e
LW
3212See L<perlfunc/sort>.
3213
3214=item Sort subroutine didn't return single value
3215
3216(F) A sort comparison subroutine may not return a list value with more
3217or less than one element. See L<perlfunc/sort>.
3218
3219=item Split loop
3220
be771a83
GS
3221(P) The split was looping infinitely. (Obviously, a split shouldn't
3222iterate more times than there are characters of input, which is what
3223happened.) See L<perlfunc/split>.
a0d0e21e 3224
a0d0e21e
LW
3225=item Statement unlikely to be reached
3226
be771a83
GS
3227(W exec) You did an exec() with some statement after it other than a
3228die(). This is almost always an error, because exec() never returns
3229unless there was a failure. You probably wanted to use system()
3230instead, which does return. To suppress this warning, put the exec() in
3231a block by itself.
a0d0e21e 3232
9ddeeac9 3233=item stat() on unopened filehandle %s
6df41af2 3234
355b1299
JH
3235(W unopened) You tried to use the stat() function on a filehandle that
3236was either never opened or has since been closed.
6df41af2 3237
7a4340ed 3238=item Stub found while resolving method `%s' overloading %s
e7ea3e70 3239
be771a83
GS
3240(P) Overloading resolution over @ISA tree may be broken by importation
3241stubs. Stubs should never be implicitly created, but explicit calls to
3242C<can> may break this.
e7ea3e70 3243
a0d0e21e
LW
3244=item Subroutine %s redefined
3245
e476b1b5 3246(W redefine) You redefined a subroutine. To suppress this warning, say
a0d0e21e
LW
3247
3248 {
4438c4b7 3249 no warnings;
a0d0e21e
LW
3250 eval "sub name { ... }";
3251 }
3252
3253=item Substitution loop
3254
be771a83
GS
3255(P) The substitution was looping infinitely. (Obviously, a substitution
3256shouldn't iterate more times than there are characters of input, which
3257is what happened.) See the discussion of substitution in
5f05dabc 3258L<perlop/"Quote and Quote-like Operators">.
a0d0e21e
LW
3259
3260=item Substitution pattern not terminated
3261
3262(F) The lexer couldn't find the interior delimiter of a s/// or s{}{}
3263construct. Remember that bracketing delimiters count nesting level.
fb73857a 3264Missing the leading C<$> from variable C<$s> may cause this error.
a0d0e21e
LW
3265
3266=item Substitution replacement not terminated
3267
3268(F) The lexer couldn't find the final delimiter of a s/// or s{}{}
3269construct. Remember that bracketing delimiters count nesting level.
fb73857a 3270Missing the leading C<$> from variable C<$s> may cause this error.
a0d0e21e
LW
3271
3272=item substr outside of string
3273
be771a83
GS
3274(W substr),(F) You tried to reference a substr() that pointed outside of
3275a string. That is, the absolute value of the offset was larger than the
3276length of the string. See L<perlfunc/substr>. This warning is fatal if
3277substr is used in an lvalue context (as the left hand side of an
3278assignment or as a subroutine argument for example).
a0d0e21e 3279
f86702cc 3280=item suidperl is no longer needed since %s
a0d0e21e 3281
be771a83
GS
3282(F) Your Perl was compiled with B<-D>SETUID_SCRIPTS_ARE_SECURE_NOW, but
3283a version of the setuid emulator somehow got run anyway.
a0d0e21e 3284
5cd5c422
RB
3285=item Switch (?(condition)... contains too many branches in regex;
3286
3287marked by <-- HERE in m/%s/
b45f050a
JF
3288
3289(F) A (?(condition)if-clause|else-clause) construct can have at most two
3290branches (the if-clause and the else-clause). If you want one or both to
3291contain alternation, such as using C<this|that|other>, enclose it in
3292clustering parentheses:
3293
3294 (?(condition)(?:this|that|other)|else-clause)
3295
7253e4e3 3296The <-- HERE shows in the regular expression about where the problem was
b45f050a
JF
3297discovered. See L<perlre>.
3298
5cd5c422
RB
3299=item Switch condition not recognized in regex;
3300
3301marked by <-- HERE in m/%s/
b45f050a
JF
3302
3303(F) If the argument to the (?(...)if-clause|else-clause) construct is a
7253e4e3 3304number, it can be only a number. The <-- HERE shows in the regular expression
b45f050a
JF
3305about where the problem was discovered. See L<perlre>.
3306
85ab1d1d
JH
3307=item switching effective %s is not implemented
3308
be771a83
GS
3309(F) While under the C<use filetest> pragma, we cannot switch the real
3310and effective uids or gids.
85ab1d1d 3311
a0d0e21e
LW
3312=item syntax error
3313
3314(F) Probably means you had a syntax error. Common reasons include:
3315
3316 A keyword is misspelled.
3317 A semicolon is missing.
3318 A comma is missing.
3319 An opening or closing parenthesis is missing.
3320 An opening or closing brace is missing.
3321 A closing quote is missing.
3322
3323Often there will be another error message associated with the syntax
3324error giving more information. (Sometimes it helps to turn on B<-w>.)
3325The error message itself often tells you where it was in the line when
3326it decided to give up. Sometimes the actual error is several tokens
5f05dabc 3327before this, because Perl is good at understanding random input.
a0d0e21e
LW
3328Occasionally the line number may be misleading, and once in a blue moon
3329the only way to figure out what's triggering the error is to call
3330C<perl -c> repeatedly, chopping away half the program each time to see
be771a83
GS
3331if the error went away. Sort of the cybernetic version of S<20
3332questions>.
a0d0e21e 3333
cb1a09d0
AD
3334=item syntax error at line %d: `%s' unexpected
3335
be771a83
GS
3336(A) You've accidentally run your script through the Bourne shell instead
3337of Perl. Check the #! line, or manually feed your script into Perl
3338yourself.
cb1a09d0 3339
6df41af2
GS
3340=item %s syntax OK
3341
3342(F) The final summary message when a C<perl -c> succeeds.
3343
6087ac44 3344=item System V %s is not implemented on this machine
a0d0e21e 3345
6087ac44
JH
3346(F) You tried to do something with a function beginning with "sem",
3347"shm", or "msg" but that System V IPC is not implemented in your
3348machine. In some machines the functionality can exist but be
3349unconfigured. Consult your system support.
a0d0e21e 3350
69282e91 3351=item syswrite() on closed filehandle %s
a0d0e21e 3352
be771a83 3353(W closed) The filehandle you're writing to got itself closed sometime
c289d2f7 3354before now. Check your control flow.
a0d0e21e 3355
fc36a67e 3356=item Target of goto is too deeply nested
3357
be771a83
GS
3358(F) You tried to use C<goto> to reach a label that was too deeply nested
3359for Perl to reach. Perl is doing you a favor by refusing.
fc36a67e 3360
9ddeeac9 3361=item tell() on unopened filehandle
a0d0e21e 3362
be771a83
GS
3363(W unopened) You tried to use the tell() function on a filehandle that
3364was either never opened or has since been closed.
a0d0e21e 3365
a0d0e21e
LW
3366=item That use of $[ is unsupported
3367