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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
921106c8 59(F) The '!' is allowed in pack() or unpack() only after certain types.
f61d411c 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.
a0d0e21e 165
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166=item Argument list not closed for PerlIO layer "%s"
167
168(W layer) When pushing a layer with arguments onto the Perl I/O system you
169forgot the ) that closes the argument list. (Layers take care of transforming
170data between external and internal representations.) Perl stopped parsing
171the layer list at this point and did not attempt to push this layer.
172If your program didn't explicitly request the failing operation, it may be
173the result of the value of the environment variable PERLIO.
174
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175=item Array @%s missing the @ in argument %d of %s()
176
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177(D deprecated) Really old Perl let you omit the @ on array names in some
178spots. This is now heavily deprecated.
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179
180=item assertion botched: %s
181
182(P) The malloc package that comes with Perl had an internal failure.
183
184=item Assertion failed: file "%s"
185
186(P) A general assertion failed. The file in question must be examined.
187
188=item Assignment to both a list and a scalar
189
190(F) If you assign to a conditional operator, the 2nd and 3rd arguments
191must either both be scalars or both be lists. Otherwise Perl won't
192know which context to supply to the right side.
193
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194=item A thread exited while %d threads were running
195
196(W) When using threaded Perl, a thread (not necessarily the main
197thread) exited while there were still other threads running.
198Usually it's a good idea to first collect the return values of the
199created threads by joining them, and only then exit from the main
200thread. See L<threads>.
201
2393f1b9 202=item Attempt to access disallowed key '%s' in a restricted hash
1b1f1335 203
49293501 204(F) The failing code has attempted to get or set a key which is not in
2393f1b9 205the current set of allowed keys of a restricted hash.
49293501 206
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207=item Attempt to bless into a reference
208
209(F) The CLASSNAME argument to the bless() operator is expected to be
210the name of the package to bless the resulting object into. You've
211supplied instead a reference to something: perhaps you wrote
212
213 bless $self, $proto;
214
215when you intended
216
217 bless $self, ref($proto) || $proto;
218
219If you actually want to bless into the stringified version
220of the reference supplied, you need to stringify it yourself, for
221example by:
222
223 bless $self, "$proto";
224
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225=item Attempt to delete disallowed key '%s' from a restricted hash
226
227(F) The failing code attempted to delete from a restricted hash a key
228which is not in its key set.
229
230=item Attempt to delete readonly key '%s' from a restricted hash
231
232(F) The failing code attempted to delete a key whose value has been
233declared readonly from a restricted hash.
234
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235=item Attempt to free non-arena SV: 0x%lx
236
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237(P internal) All SV objects are supposed to be allocated from arenas
238that will be garbage collected on exit. An SV was discovered to be
239outside any of those arenas.
a0d0e21e 240
54310121 241=item Attempt to free nonexistent shared string
bbce6d69 242
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243(P internal) Perl maintains a reference counted internal table of
244strings to optimize the storage and access of hash keys and other
245strings. This indicates someone tried to decrement the reference count
246of a string that can no longer be found in the table.
bbce6d69 247
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248=item Attempt to free temp prematurely
249
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250(W debugging) Mortalized values are supposed to be freed by the
251free_tmps() routine. This indicates that something else is freeing the
252SV before the free_tmps() routine gets a chance, which means that the
253free_tmps() routine will be freeing an unreferenced scalar when it does
254try to free it.
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255
256=item Attempt to free unreferenced glob pointers
257
e476b1b5 258(P internal) The reference counts got screwed up on symbol aliases.
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259
260=item Attempt to free unreferenced scalar
261
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262(W internal) Perl went to decrement the reference count of a scalar to
263see if it would go to 0, and discovered that it had already gone to 0
264earlier, and should have been freed, and in fact, probably was freed.
265This could indicate that SvREFCNT_dec() was called too many times, or
266that SvREFCNT_inc() was called too few times, or that the SV was
267mortalized when it shouldn't have been, or that memory has been
268corrupted.
a0d0e21e 269
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270=item Attempt to join self
271
272(F) You tried to join a thread from within itself, which is an
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273impossible task. You may be joining the wrong thread, or you may need
274to move the join() to some other thread.
dcdda58d 275
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276=item Attempt to pack pointer to temporary value
277
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278(W pack) You tried to pass a temporary value (like the result of a
279function, or a computed expression) to the "p" pack() template. This
280means the result contains a pointer to a location that could become
281invalid anytime, even before the end of the current statement. Use
282literals or global values as arguments to the "p" pack() template to
283avoid this warning.
84902520 284
b7a902f4 285=item Attempt to use reference as lvalue in substr
286
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287(W substr) You supplied a reference as the first argument to substr()
288used as an lvalue, which is pretty strange. Perhaps you forgot to
289dereference it first. See L<perlfunc/substr>.
b7a902f4 290
dc26df50 291=item Bad arg length for %s, is %d, should be %s
a0d0e21e 292
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293(F) You passed a buffer of the wrong size to one of msgctl(), semctl()
294or shmctl(). In C parlance, the correct sizes are, respectively,
5f05dabc 295S<sizeof(struct msqid_ds *)>, S<sizeof(struct semid_ds *)>, and
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296S<sizeof(struct shmid_ds *)>.
297
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298=item Bad evalled substitution pattern
299
496a33f5 300(F) You've used the C</e> switch to evaluate the replacement for a
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301substitution, but perl found a syntax error in the code to evaluate,
302most likely an unexpected right brace '}'.
303
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304=item Bad filehandle: %s
305
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306(F) A symbol was passed to something wanting a filehandle, but the
307symbol has no filehandle associated with it. Perhaps you didn't do an
308open(), or did it in another package.
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309
310=item Bad free() ignored
311
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312(S malloc) An internal routine called free() on something that had never
313been malloc()ed in the first place. Mandatory, but can be disabled by
9ea8bc6d 314setting environment variable C<PERL_BADFREE> to 0.
33c8a3fe 315
9ea8bc6d 316This message can be seen quite often with DB_File on systems with "hard"
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317dynamic linking, like C<AIX> and C<OS/2>. It is a bug of C<Berkeley DB>
318which is left unnoticed if C<DB> uses I<forgiving> system malloc().
a0d0e21e 319
aa689395 320=item Bad hash
321
322(P) One of the internal hash routines was passed a null HV pointer.
323
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324=item Badly placed ()'s
325
326(A) You've accidentally run your script through B<csh> instead
327of Perl. Check the #! line, or manually feed your script into
328Perl yourself.
329
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330=item Bad name after %s::
331
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332(F) You started to name a symbol by using a package prefix, and then
333didn't finish the symbol. In particular, you can't interpolate outside
334of quotes, so
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335
336 $var = 'myvar';
337 $sym = mypack::$var;
338
339is not the same as
340
341 $var = 'myvar';
342 $sym = "mypack::$var";
343
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344=item Bad realloc() ignored
345
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346(S malloc) An internal routine called realloc() on something that had
347never been malloc()ed in the first place. Mandatory, but can be disabled
348by setting environment variable C<PERL_BADFREE> to 1.
4ad56ec9 349
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350=item Bad symbol for array
351
352(P) An internal request asked to add an array entry to something that
353wasn't a symbol table entry.
354
355=item Bad symbol for filehandle
356
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357(P) An internal request asked to add a filehandle entry to something
358that wasn't a symbol table entry.
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359
360=item Bad symbol for hash
361
362(P) An internal request asked to add a hash entry to something that
363wasn't a symbol table entry.
364
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365=item Bareword found in conditional
366
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367(W bareword) The compiler found a bareword where it expected a
368conditional, which often indicates that an || or && was parsed as part
369of the last argument of the previous construct, for example:
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370
371 open FOO || die;
372
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373It may also indicate a misspelled constant that has been interpreted as
374a bareword:
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375
376 use constant TYPO => 1;
377 if (TYOP) { print "foo" }
378
379The C<strict> pragma is useful in avoiding such errors.
380
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381=item Bareword "%s" not allowed while "strict subs" in use
382
383(F) With "strict subs" in use, a bareword is only allowed as a
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384subroutine identifier, in curly brackets or to the left of the "=>"
385symbol. Perhaps you need to predeclare a subroutine?
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386
387=item Bareword "%s" refers to nonexistent package
388
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389(W bareword) You used a qualified bareword of the form C<Foo::>, but the
390compiler saw no other uses of that namespace before that point. Perhaps
391you need to predeclare a package?
6df41af2 392
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393=item BEGIN failed--compilation aborted
394
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395(F) An untrapped exception was raised while executing a BEGIN
396subroutine. Compilation stops immediately and the interpreter is
397exited.
a0d0e21e 398
68dc0745 399=item BEGIN not safe after errors--compilation aborted
400
401(F) Perl found a C<BEGIN {}> subroutine (or a C<use> directive, which
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402implies a C<BEGIN {}>) after one or more compilation errors had already
403occurred. Since the intended environment for the C<BEGIN {}> could not
404be guaranteed (due to the errors), and since subsequent code likely
405depends on its correct operation, Perl just gave up.
68dc0745 406
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407=item \1 better written as $1
408
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409(W syntax) Outside of patterns, backreferences live on as variables.
410The use of backslashes is grandfathered on the right-hand side of a
411substitution, but stylistically it's better to use the variable form
412because other Perl programmers will expect it, and it works better if
413there are more than 9 backreferences.
6df41af2 414
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415=item Binary number > 0b11111111111111111111111111111111 non-portable
416
e476b1b5 417(W portable) The binary number you specified is larger than 2**32-1
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418(4294967295) and therefore non-portable between systems. See
419L<perlport> for more on portability concerns.
252aa082 420
69282e91 421=item bind() on closed socket %s
a0d0e21e 422
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423(W closed) You tried to do a bind on a closed socket. Did you forget to
424check the return value of your socket() call? See L<perlfunc/bind>.
a0d0e21e 425
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426=item binmode() on closed filehandle %s
427
428(W unopened) You tried binmode() on a filehandle that was never opened.
429Check you control flow and number of arguments.
430
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431=item Bit vector size > 32 non-portable
432
e476b1b5 433(W portable) Using bit vector sizes larger than 32 is non-portable.
c5a0f51a 434
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435=item Bizarre copy of %s in %s
436
be771a83 437(P) Perl detected an attempt to copy an internal value that is not
b45f050a 438copyable.
4633a7c4 439
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440=item Buffer overflow in prime_env_iter: %s
441
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442(W internal) A warning peculiar to VMS. While Perl was preparing to
443iterate over %ENV, it encountered a logical name or symbol definition
444which was too long, so it was truncated to the string shown.
f675dbe5 445
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446=item Callback called exit
447
4929bf7b 448(F) A subroutine invoked from an external package via call_sv()
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449exited by calling exit.
450
6df41af2 451=item %s() called too early to check prototype
f675dbe5 452
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453(W prototype) You've called a function that has a prototype before the
454parser saw a definition or declaration for it, and Perl could not check
455that the call conforms to the prototype. You need to either add an
456early prototype declaration for the subroutine in question, or move the
457subroutine definition ahead of the call to get proper prototype
458checking. Alternatively, if you are certain that you're calling the
459function correctly, you may put an ampersand before the name to avoid
460the warning. See L<perlsub>.
f675dbe5 461
49704364 462=item Cannot compress integer in pack
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463
464(F) An argument to pack("w",...) was too large to compress. The BER
465compressed integer format can only be used with positive integers, and you
466attempted to compress Infinity or a very large number (> 1e308).
467See L<perlfunc/pack>.
468
49704364 469=item Cannot compress negative numbers in pack
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470
471(F) An argument to pack("w",...) was negative. The BER compressed integer
472format can only be used with positive integers. See L<perlfunc/pack>.
473
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474=item Can only compress unsigned integers in pack
475
476(F) An argument to pack("w",...) was not an integer. The BER compressed
477integer format can only be used with positive integers, and you attempted
478to compress something else. See L<perlfunc/pack>.
479
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480=item Can't bless non-reference value
481
482(F) Only hard references may be blessed. This is how Perl "enforces"
483encapsulation of objects. See L<perlobj>.
484
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485=item Can't call method "%s" in empty package "%s"
486
487(F) You called a method correctly, and it correctly indicated a package
488functioning as a class, but that package doesn't have ANYTHING defined
489in it, let alone methods. See L<perlobj>.
490
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491=item Can't call method "%s" on an undefined value
492
493(F) You used the syntax of a method call, but the slot filled by the
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494object reference or package name contains an undefined value. Something
495like this will reproduce the error:
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496
497 $BADREF = undef;
498 process $BADREF 1,2,3;
499 $BADREF->process(1,2,3);
500
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501=item Can't call method "%s" on unblessed reference
502
54310121 503(F) A method call must know in what package it's supposed to run. It
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504ordinarily finds this out from the object reference you supply, but you
505didn't supply an object reference in this case. A reference isn't an
506object reference until it has been blessed. See L<perlobj>.
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507
508=item Can't call method "%s" without a package or object reference
509
510(F) You used the syntax of a method call, but the slot filled by the
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511object reference or package name contains an expression that returns a
512defined value which is neither an object reference nor a package name.
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513Something like this will reproduce the error:
514
515 $BADREF = 42;
516 process $BADREF 1,2,3;
517 $BADREF->process(1,2,3);
518
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519=item Can't chdir to %s
520
521(F) You called C<perl -x/foo/bar>, but C</foo/bar> is not a directory
522that you can chdir to, possibly because it doesn't exist.
523
0545a864 524=item Can't check filesystem of script "%s" for nosuid
104d25b7 525
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526(P) For some reason you can't check the filesystem of the script for
527nosuid.
104d25b7 528
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529=item Can't coerce array into hash
530
531(F) You used an array where a hash was expected, but the array has no
532information on how to map from keys to array indices. You can do that
533only with arrays that have a hash reference at index 0.
534
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535=item Can't coerce %s to integer in %s
536
537(F) Certain types of SVs, in particular real symbol table entries
55497cff 538(typeglobs), can't be forced to stop being what they are. So you can't
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539say things like:
540
541 *foo += 1;
542
543You CAN say
544
545 $foo = *foo;
546 $foo += 1;
547
548but then $foo no longer contains a glob.
549
550=item Can't coerce %s to number in %s
551
552(F) Certain types of SVs, in particular real symbol table entries
55497cff 553(typeglobs), can't be forced to stop being what they are.
a0d0e21e
LW
554
555=item Can't coerce %s to string in %s
556
557(F) Certain types of SVs, in particular real symbol table entries
55497cff 558(typeglobs), can't be forced to stop being what they are.
a0d0e21e
LW
559
560=item Can't create pipe mailbox
561
be771a83
GS
562(P) An error peculiar to VMS. The process is suffering from exhausted
563quotas or other plumbing problems.
a0d0e21e 564
eb64745e 565=item Can't declare class for non-scalar %s in "%s"
a0d0e21e 566
2f7e735d
AMS
567(F) Currently, only scalar variables can be declared with a specific
568class qualifier in a "my" or "our" declaration. The semantics may be
569extended for other types of variables in future.
eb64745e
GS
570
571=item Can't declare %s in "%s"
572
573(F) Only scalar, array, and hash variables may be declared as "my" or
574"our" variables. They must have ordinary identifiers as names.
a0d0e21e 575
6df41af2
GS
576=item Can't do inplace edit: %s is not a regular file
577
be771a83
GS
578(S inplace) You tried to use the B<-i> switch on a special file, such as
579a file in /dev, or a FIFO. The file was ignored.
6df41af2 580
a0d0e21e
LW
581=item Can't do inplace edit on %s: %s
582
be771a83
GS
583(S inplace) The creation of the new file failed for the indicated
584reason.
a0d0e21e 585
54310121 586=item Can't do inplace edit without backup
a0d0e21e 587
be771a83
GS
588(F) You're on a system such as MS-DOS that gets confused if you try
589reading from a deleted (but still opened) file. You have to say
590C<-i.bak>, or some such.
a0d0e21e 591
10f9c03d 592=item Can't do inplace edit: %s would not be unique
a0d0e21e 593
e476b1b5 594(S inplace) Your filesystem does not support filenames longer than 14
10f9c03d
CK
595characters and Perl was unable to create a unique filename during
596inplace editing with the B<-i> switch. The file was ignored.
a0d0e21e 597
7253e4e3 598=item Can't do {n,m} with n > m in regex; marked by <-- HERE in m/%s/
a0d0e21e 599
b45f050a 600(F) Minima must be less than or equal to maxima. If you really want your
7253e4e3 601regexp to match something 0 times, just put {0}. The <-- HERE shows in the
b45f050a 602regular expression about where the problem was discovered. See L<perlre>.
a0d0e21e
LW
603
604=item Can't do setegid!
605
be771a83
GS
606(P) The setegid() call failed for some reason in the setuid emulator of
607suidperl.
a0d0e21e
LW
608
609=item Can't do seteuid!
610
611(P) The setuid emulator of suidperl failed for some reason.
612
613=item Can't do setuid
614
be771a83
GS
615(F) This typically means that ordinary perl tried to exec suidperl to do
616setuid emulation, but couldn't exec it. It looks for a name of the form
617sperl5.000 in the same directory that the perl executable resides under
618the name perl5.000, typically /usr/local/bin on Unix machines. If the
619file is there, check the execute permissions. If it isn't, ask your
620sysadmin why he and/or she removed it.
a0d0e21e
LW
621
622=item Can't do waitpid with flags
623
be771a83
GS
624(F) This machine doesn't have either waitpid() or wait4(), so only
625waitpid() without flags is emulated.
a0d0e21e 626
a0d0e21e
LW
627=item Can't emulate -%s on #! line
628
be771a83
GS
629(F) The #! line specifies a switch that doesn't make sense at this
630point. For example, it'd be kind of silly to put a B<-x> on the #!
631line.
a0d0e21e
LW
632
633=item Can't exec "%s": %s
634
d1be9408 635(W exec) A system(), exec(), or piped open call could not execute the
be771a83
GS
636named program for the indicated reason. Typical reasons include: the
637permissions were wrong on the file, the file wasn't found in
638C<$ENV{PATH}>, the executable in question was compiled for another
639architecture, or the #! line in a script points to an interpreter that
640can't be run for similar reasons. (Or maybe your system doesn't support
641#! at all.)
a0d0e21e
LW
642
643=item Can't exec %s
644
be771a83
GS
645(F) Perl was trying to execute the indicated program for you because
646that's what the #! line said. If that's not what you wanted, you may
647need to mention "perl" on the #! line somewhere.
a0d0e21e
LW
648
649=item Can't execute %s
650
be771a83
GS
651(F) You used the B<-S> switch, but the copies of the script to execute
652found in the PATH did not have correct permissions.
2a92aaa0 653
6df41af2 654=item Can't find an opnumber for "%s"
2a92aaa0 655
be771a83
GS
656(F) A string of a form C<CORE::word> was given to prototype(), but there
657is no builtin with the name C<word>.
6df41af2 658
56ca2fc0
JH
659=item Can't find %s character property "%s"
660
661(F) You used C<\p{}> or C<\P{}> but the character property by that name
89d60977 662could not be found. Maybe you misspelled the name of the property
56ca2fc0
JH
663(remember that the names of character properties consist only of
664alphanumeric characters), or maybe you forgot the C<Is> or C<In> prefix?
665
6df41af2
GS
666=item Can't find label %s
667
be771a83
GS
668(F) You said to goto a label that isn't mentioned anywhere that it's
669possible for us to go to. See L<perlfunc/goto>.
2a92aaa0
GS
670
671=item Can't find %s on PATH
672
be771a83
GS
673(F) You used the B<-S> switch, but the script to execute could not be
674found in the PATH.
a0d0e21e 675
6df41af2 676=item Can't find %s on PATH, '.' not in PATH
a0d0e21e 677
be771a83
GS
678(F) You used the B<-S> switch, but the script to execute could not be
679found in the PATH, or at least not with the correct permissions. The
680script exists in the current directory, but PATH prohibits running it.
a0d0e21e 681
96ebfdd7
RK
682=item Can't find %s property definition %s
683
684(F) You may have tried to use C<\p> which means a Unicode property (for
685example C<\p{Lu}> is all uppercase letters). If you did mean to use a
686Unicode property, see L<perlunicode> for the list of known properties.
687If you didn't mean to use a Unicode property, escape the C<\p>, either
688by C<\\p> (just the C<\p>) or by C<\Q\p> (the rest of the string, until
689possible C<\E>).
690
a0d0e21e
LW
691=item Can't find string terminator %s anywhere before EOF
692
be771a83
GS
693(F) Perl strings can stretch over multiple lines. This message means
694that the closing delimiter was omitted. Because bracketed quotes count
695nesting levels, the following is missing its final parenthesis:
a0d0e21e 696
fb73857a 697 print q(The character '(' starts a side comment.);
698
be771a83
GS
699If you're getting this error from a here-document, you may have included
700unseen whitespace before or after your closing tag. A good programmer's
701editor will have a way to help you find these characters.
a0d0e21e
LW
702
703=item Can't fork
704
be771a83
GS
705(F) A fatal error occurred while trying to fork while opening a
706pipeline.
a0d0e21e 707
748a9306
LW
708=item Can't get filespec - stale stat buffer?
709
be771a83
GS
710(S) A warning peculiar to VMS. This arises because of the difference
711between access checks under VMS and under the Unix model Perl assumes.
712Under VMS, access checks are done by filename, rather than by bits in
713the stat buffer, so that ACLs and other protections can be taken into
714account. Unfortunately, Perl assumes that the stat buffer contains all
715the necessary information, and passes it, instead of the filespec, to
716the access checking routine. It will try to retrieve the filespec using
717the device name and FID present in the stat buffer, but this works only
718if you haven't made a subsequent call to the CRTL stat() routine,
719because the device name is overwritten with each call. If this warning
720appears, the name lookup failed, and the access checking routine gave up
721and returned FALSE, just to be conservative. (Note: The access checking
722routine knows about the Perl C<stat> operator and file tests, so you
723shouldn't ever see this warning in response to a Perl command; it arises
724only if some internal code takes stat buffers lightly.)
748a9306 725
a0d0e21e
LW
726=item Can't get pipe mailbox device name
727
be771a83
GS
728(P) An error peculiar to VMS. After creating a mailbox to act as a
729pipe, Perl can't retrieve its name for later use.
a0d0e21e
LW
730
731=item Can't get SYSGEN parameter value for MAXBUF
732
748a9306
LW
733(P) An error peculiar to VMS. Perl asked $GETSYI how big you want your
734mailbox buffers to be, and didn't get an answer.
a0d0e21e 735
6df41af2 736=item Can't "goto" into the middle of a foreach loop
a0d0e21e 737
be771a83
GS
738(F) A "goto" statement was executed to jump into the middle of a foreach
739loop. You can't get there from here. See L<perlfunc/goto>.
6df41af2
GS
740
741=item Can't "goto" out of a pseudo block
742
be771a83
GS
743(F) A "goto" statement was executed to jump out of what might look like
744a block, except that it isn't a proper block. This usually occurs if
745you tried to jump out of a sort() block or subroutine, which is a no-no.
746See L<perlfunc/goto>.
a0d0e21e 747
b150fb22
RH
748=item Can't goto subroutine from an eval-string
749
be771a83
GS
750(F) The "goto subroutine" call can't be used to jump out of an eval
751"string". (You can use it to jump out of an eval {BLOCK}, but you
752probably don't want to.)
b150fb22 753
6df41af2
GS
754=item Can't goto subroutine outside a subroutine
755
be771a83
GS
756(F) The deeply magical "goto subroutine" call can only replace one
757subroutine call for another. It can't manufacture one out of whole
758cloth. In general you should be calling it out of only an AUTOLOAD
759routine anyway. See L<perlfunc/goto>.
6df41af2 760
0b5b802d
GS
761=item Can't ignore signal CHLD, forcing to default
762
be771a83
GS
763(W signal) Perl has detected that it is being run with the SIGCHLD
764signal (sometimes known as SIGCLD) disabled. Since disabling this
765signal will interfere with proper determination of exit status of child
766processes, Perl has reset the signal to its default value. This
767situation typically indicates that the parent program under which Perl
768may be running (e.g. cron) is being very careless.
0b5b802d 769
6df41af2 770=item Can't "last" outside a loop block
4633a7c4 771
6df41af2 772(F) A "last" statement was executed to break out of the current block,
be771a83
GS
773except that there's this itty bitty problem called there isn't a current
774block. Note that an "if" or "else" block doesn't count as a "loopish"
775block, as doesn't a block given to sort(), map() or grep(). You can
776usually double the curlies to get the same effect though, because the
777inner curlies will be considered a block that loops once. See
778L<perlfunc/last>.
4633a7c4 779
748a9306
LW
780=item Can't localize lexical variable %s
781
2ba9eb46 782(F) You used local on a variable name that was previously declared as a
748a9306
LW
783lexical variable using "my". This is not allowed. If you want to
784localize a package variable of the same name, qualify it with the
785package name.
786
6df41af2 787=item Can't localize through a reference
4727527e 788
6df41af2
GS
789(F) You said something like C<local $$ref>, which Perl can't currently
790handle, because when it goes to restore the old value of whatever $ref
be771a83 791pointed to after the scope of the local() is finished, it can't be sure
64977eb6 792that $ref will still be a reference.
4727527e 793
ea071790 794=item Can't locate %s
ec889f3a
GS
795
796(F) You said to C<do> (or C<require>, or C<use>) a file that couldn't be
797found. Perl looks for the file in all the locations mentioned in @INC,
be771a83
GS
798unless the file name included the full path to the file. Perhaps you
799need to set the PERL5LIB or PERL5OPT environment variable to say where
800the extra library is, or maybe the script needs to add the library name
801to @INC. Or maybe you just misspelled the name of the file. See
802L<perlfunc/require> and L<lib>.
a0d0e21e 803
6df41af2
GS
804=item Can't locate auto/%s.al in @INC
805
be771a83
GS
806(F) A function (or method) was called in a package which allows
807autoload, but there is no function to autoload. Most probable causes
808are a misprint in a function/method name or a failure to C<AutoSplit>
809the file, say, by doing C<make install>.
6df41af2 810
a0d0e21e
LW
811=item Can't locate object method "%s" via package "%s"
812
813(F) You called a method correctly, and it correctly indicated a package
814functioning as a class, but that package doesn't define that particular
2ba9eb46 815method, nor does any of its base classes. See L<perlobj>.
a0d0e21e
LW
816
817=item Can't locate package %s for @%s::ISA
818
be771a83
GS
819(W syntax) The @ISA array contained the name of another package that
820doesn't seem to exist.
a0d0e21e 821
2f7da168
RK
822=item Can't locate PerlIO%s
823
824(F) You tried to use in open() a PerlIO layer that does not exist,
825e.g. open(FH, ">:nosuchlayer", "somefile").
826
3e3baf6d
TB
827=item Can't make list assignment to \%ENV on this system
828
be771a83
GS
829(F) List assignment to %ENV is not supported on some systems, notably
830VMS.
3e3baf6d 831
a0d0e21e
LW
832=item Can't modify %s in %s
833
be771a83
GS
834(F) You aren't allowed to assign to the item indicated, or otherwise try
835to change it, such as with an auto-increment.
a0d0e21e 836
54310121 837=item Can't modify nonexistent substring
a0d0e21e
LW
838
839(P) The internal routine that does assignment to a substr() was handed
840a NULL.
841
6df41af2
GS
842=item Can't modify non-lvalue subroutine call
843
844(F) Subroutines meant to be used in lvalue context should be declared as
845such, see L<perlsub/"Lvalue subroutines">.
846
5f05dabc 847=item Can't msgrcv to read-only var
a0d0e21e 848
5f05dabc 849(F) The target of a msgrcv must be modifiable to be used as a receive
a0d0e21e
LW
850buffer.
851
6df41af2
GS
852=item Can't "next" outside a loop block
853
854(F) A "next" statement was executed to reiterate the current block, but
855there isn't a current block. Note that an "if" or "else" block doesn't
be771a83
GS
856count as a "loopish" block, as doesn't a block given to sort(), map() or
857grep(). You can usually double the curlies to get the same effect
858though, because the inner curlies will be considered a block that loops
859once. See L<perlfunc/next>.
6df41af2 860
a0d0e21e
LW
861=item Can't open %s: %s
862
c47ff5f1 863(S inplace) The implicit opening of a file through use of the C<< <> >>
08e9d68e
DD
864filehandle, either implicitly under the C<-n> or C<-p> command-line
865switches, or explicitly, failed for the indicated reason. Usually this
be771a83
GS
866is because you don't have read permission for a file which you named on
867the command line.
a0d0e21e 868
9a869a14
RGS
869=item Can't open a reference
870
871(W io) You tried to open a scalar reference for reading or writing,
872using the 3-arg open() syntax :
873
874 open FH, '>', $ref;
875
876but your version of perl is compiled without perlio, and this form of
877open is not supported.
878
a0d0e21e
LW
879=item Can't open bidirectional pipe
880
be771a83
GS
881(W pipe) You tried to say C<open(CMD, "|cmd|")>, which is not supported.
882You can try any of several modules in the Perl library to do this, such
883as IPC::Open2. Alternately, direct the pipe's output to a file using
884">", and then read it in under a different file handle.
a0d0e21e 885
748a9306
LW
886=item Can't open error file %s as stderr
887
be771a83
GS
888(F) An error peculiar to VMS. Perl does its own command line
889redirection, and couldn't open the file specified after '2>' or '2>>' on
890the command line for writing.
748a9306
LW
891
892=item Can't open input file %s as stdin
893
be771a83
GS
894(F) An error peculiar to VMS. Perl does its own command line
895redirection, and couldn't open the file specified after '<' on the
896command line for reading.
748a9306
LW
897
898=item Can't open output file %s as stdout
899
be771a83
GS
900(F) An error peculiar to VMS. Perl does its own command line
901redirection, and couldn't open the file specified after '>' or '>>' on
902the command line for writing.
748a9306
LW
903
904=item Can't open output pipe (name: %s)
905
be771a83
GS
906(P) An error peculiar to VMS. Perl does its own command line
907redirection, and couldn't open the pipe into which to send data destined
908for stdout.
748a9306 909
2b8ca739 910=item Can't open perl script%s
a0d0e21e
LW
911
912(F) The script you specified can't be opened for the indicated reason.
913
6df41af2
GS
914=item Can't read CRTL environ
915
916(S) A warning peculiar to VMS. Perl tried to read an element of %ENV
917from the CRTL's internal environment array and discovered the array was
918missing. You need to figure out where your CRTL misplaced its environ
be771a83
GS
919or define F<PERL_ENV_TABLES> (see L<perlvms>) so that environ is not
920searched.
6df41af2 921
7bac28a0 922=item Can't redefine active sort subroutine %s
923
924(F) Perl optimizes the internal handling of sort subroutines and keeps
be771a83
GS
925pointers into them. You tried to redefine one such sort subroutine when
926it was currently active, which is not allowed. If you really want to do
7bac28a0 927this, you should write C<sort { &func } @x> instead of C<sort func @x>.
928
6df41af2
GS
929=item Can't "redo" outside a loop block
930
931(F) A "redo" statement was executed to restart the current block, but
932there isn't a current block. Note that an "if" or "else" block doesn't
933count as a "loopish" block, as doesn't a block given to sort(), map()
934or grep(). You can usually double the curlies to get the same effect
935though, because the inner curlies will be considered a block that
936loops once. See L<perlfunc/redo>.
937
64977eb6 938=item Can't remove %s: %s, skipping file
10f9c03d 939
be771a83
GS
940(S inplace) You requested an inplace edit without creating a backup
941file. Perl was unable to remove the original file to replace it with
942the modified file. The file was left unmodified.
10f9c03d 943
a0d0e21e
LW
944=item Can't rename %s to %s: %s, skipping file
945
e476b1b5 946(S inplace) The rename done by the B<-i> switch failed for some reason,
10f9c03d 947probably because you don't have write permission to the directory.
a0d0e21e 948
748a9306
LW
949=item Can't reopen input pipe (name: %s) in binary mode
950
be771a83
GS
951(P) An error peculiar to VMS. Perl thought stdin was a pipe, and tried
952to reopen it to accept binary data. Alas, it failed.
748a9306 953
6df41af2
GS
954=item Can't resolve method `%s' overloading `%s' in package `%s'
955
be771a83
GS
956(F|P) Error resolving overloading specified by a method name (as opposed
957to a subroutine reference): no such method callable via the package. If
958method name is C<???>, this is an internal error.
6df41af2 959
a0d0e21e
LW
960=item Can't reswap uid and euid
961
be771a83
GS
962(P) The setreuid() call failed for some reason in the setuid emulator of
963suidperl.
a0d0e21e 964
cd06dffe
GS
965=item Can't return %s from lvalue subroutine
966
be771a83
GS
967(F) Perl detected an attempt to return illegal lvalues (such as
968temporary or readonly values) from a subroutine used as an lvalue. This
969is not allowed.
cd06dffe 970
96ebfdd7
RK
971=item Can't return outside a subroutine
972
973(F) The return statement was executed in mainline code, that is, where
974there was no subroutine call to return out of. See L<perlsub>.
975
78f9721b
SM
976=item Can't return %s to lvalue scalar context
977
978(F) You tried to return a complete array or hash from an lvalue subroutine,
979but you called the subroutine in a way that made Perl think you meant
980to return only one value. You probably meant to write parentheses around
981the call to the subroutine, which tell Perl that the call should be in
982list context.
983
a0d0e21e
LW
984=item Can't stat script "%s"
985
be771a83
GS
986(P) For some reason you can't fstat() the script even though you have it
987open already. Bizarre.
a0d0e21e
LW
988
989=item Can't swap uid and euid
990
be771a83
GS
991(P) The setreuid() call failed for some reason in the setuid emulator of
992suidperl.
a0d0e21e
LW
993
994=item Can't take log of %g
995
fb73857a 996(F) For ordinary real numbers, you can't take the logarithm of a
997negative number or zero. There's a Math::Complex package that comes
be771a83
GS
998standard with Perl, though, if you really want to do that for the
999negative numbers.
a0d0e21e
LW
1000
1001=item Can't take sqrt of %g
1002
1003(F) For ordinary real numbers, you can't take the square root of a
fb73857a 1004negative number. There's a Math::Complex package that comes standard
1005with Perl, though, if you really want to do that.
a0d0e21e
LW
1006
1007=item Can't undef active subroutine
1008
1009(F) You can't undefine a routine that's currently running. You can,
1010however, redefine it while it's running, and you can even undef the
1011redefined subroutine while the old routine is running. Go figure.
1012
1013=item Can't unshift
1014
1015(F) You tried to unshift an "unreal" array that can't be unshifted, such
1016as the main Perl stack.
1017
1018=item Can't upgrade that kind of scalar
1019
be771a83
GS
1020(P) The internal sv_upgrade routine adds "members" to an SV, making it
1021into a more specialized kind of SV. The top several SV types are so
1022specialized, however, that they cannot be interconverted. This message
1023indicates that such a conversion was attempted.
a0d0e21e
LW
1024
1025=item Can't upgrade to undef
1026
be771a83
GS
1027(P) The undefined SV is the bottom of the totem pole, in the scheme of
1028upgradability. Upgrading to undef indicates an error in the code
1029calling sv_upgrade.
a0d0e21e 1030
1db89ea5
BS
1031=item Can't use anonymous symbol table for method lookup
1032
e27ad1f2 1033(F) The internal routine that does method lookup was handed a symbol
1db89ea5
BS
1034table that doesn't have a name. Symbol tables can become anonymous
1035for example by undefining stashes: C<undef %Some::Package::>.
1036
96ebfdd7
RK
1037=item Can't use an undefined value as %s reference
1038
1039(F) A value used as either a hard reference or a symbolic reference must
1040be a defined value. This helps to delurk some insidious errors.
1041
6df41af2
GS
1042=item Can't use bareword ("%s") as %s ref while "strict refs" in use
1043
be771a83
GS
1044(F) Only hard references are allowed by "strict refs". Symbolic
1045references are disallowed. See L<perlref>.
6df41af2 1046
90b75b61 1047=item Can't use %! because Errno.pm is not available
1d2dff63
GS
1048
1049(F) The first time the %! hash is used, perl automatically loads the
1050Errno.pm module. The Errno module is expected to tie the %! hash to
1051provide symbolic names for C<$!> errno values.
1052
6df41af2
GS
1053=item Can't use %s for loop variable
1054
be771a83
GS
1055(F) Only a simple scalar variable may be used as a loop variable on a
1056foreach.
6df41af2
GS
1057
1058=item Can't use global %s in "my"
1059
be771a83
GS
1060(F) You tried to declare a magical variable as a lexical variable. This
1061is not allowed, because the magic can be tied to only one location
1062(namely the global variable) and it would be incredibly confusing to
1063have variables in your program that looked like magical variables but
6df41af2
GS
1064weren't.
1065
c07a80fd 1066=item Can't use "my %s" in sort comparison
1067
1068(F) The global variables $a and $b are reserved for sort comparisons.
c47ff5f1 1069You mentioned $a or $b in the same line as the <=> or cmp operator,
c07a80fd 1070and the variable had earlier been declared as a lexical variable.
1071Either qualify the sort variable with the package name, or rename the
1072lexical variable.
1073
a0d0e21e
LW
1074=item Can't use %s ref as %s ref
1075
1076(F) You've mixed up your reference types. You have to dereference a
1077reference of the type needed. You can use the ref() function to
1078test the type of the reference, if need be.
1079
748a9306 1080=item Can't use string ("%s") as %s ref while "strict refs" in use
a0d0e21e 1081
be771a83
GS
1082(F) Only hard references are allowed by "strict refs". Symbolic
1083references are disallowed. See L<perlref>.
a0d0e21e 1084
748a9306
LW
1085=item Can't use subscript on %s
1086
1087(F) The compiler tried to interpret a bracketed expression as a
1088subscript. But to the left of the brackets was an expression that
1089didn't look like an array reference, or anything else subscriptable.
1090
6df41af2
GS
1091=item Can't use \%c to mean $%c in expression
1092
75b44862
GS
1093(W syntax) In an ordinary expression, backslash is a unary operator that
1094creates a reference to its argument. The use of backslash to indicate a
1095backreference to a matched substring is valid only as part of a regular
be771a83
GS
1096expression pattern. Trying to do this in ordinary Perl code produces a
1097value that prints out looking like SCALAR(0xdecaf). Use the $1 form
1098instead.
6df41af2 1099
810b8aa5
GS
1100=item Can't weaken a nonreference
1101
1102(F) You attempted to weaken something that was not a reference. Only
1103references can be weakened.
1104
5f05dabc 1105=item Can't x= to read-only value
a0d0e21e 1106
be771a83
GS
1107(F) You tried to repeat a constant value (often the undefined value)
1108with an assignment operator, which implies modifying the value itself.
a0d0e21e
LW
1109Perhaps you need to copy the value to a temporary, and repeat that.
1110
49704364 1111=item Character in "C" format wrapped in pack
ac7cd81a
SC
1112
1113(W pack) You said
1114
1115 pack("C", $x)
1116
1117where $x is either less than 0 or more than 255; the C<"C"> format is
1118only for encoding native operating system characters (ASCII, EBCDIC,
1119and so on) and not for Unicode characters, so Perl behaved as if you meant
1120
1121 pack("C", $x & 255)
1122
1123If you actually want to pack Unicode codepoints, use the C<"U"> format
1124instead.
1125
49704364 1126=item Character in "c" format wrapped in pack
ac7cd81a
SC
1127
1128(W pack) You said
1129
1130 pack("c", $x)
1131
1132where $x is either less than -128 or more than 127; the C<"c"> format
1133is only for encoding native operating system characters (ASCII, EBCDIC,
1134and so on) and not for Unicode characters, so Perl behaved as if you meant
1135
1136 pack("c", $x & 255);
1137
1138If you actually want to pack Unicode codepoints, use the C<"U"> format
1139instead.
1140
96ebfdd7
RK
1141=item close() on unopened filehandle %s
1142
1143(W unopened) You tried to close a filehandle that was never opened.
1144
49704364
WL
1145=item Code missing after '/'
1146
1147(F) You had a (sub-)template that ends with a '/'. There must be another
1148template code following the slash. See L<perlfunc/pack>.
1149
6df41af2
GS
1150=item %s: Command not found
1151
be771a83
GS
1152(A) You've accidentally run your script through B<csh> instead of Perl.
1153Check the #! line, or manually feed your script into Perl yourself.
6df41af2 1154
7a2e2cd6 1155=item Compilation failed in require
1156
1157(F) Perl could not compile a file specified in a C<require> statement.
be771a83
GS
1158Perl uses this generic message when none of the errors that it
1159encountered were severe enough to halt compilation immediately.
7a2e2cd6 1160
c3464db5
DD
1161=item Complex regular subexpression recursion limit (%d) exceeded
1162
be771a83
GS
1163(W regexp) The regular expression engine uses recursion in complex
1164situations where back-tracking is required. Recursion depth is limited
1165to 32766, or perhaps less in architectures where the stack cannot grow
1166arbitrarily. ("Simple" and "medium" situations are handled without
1167recursion and are not subject to a limit.) Try shortening the string
1168under examination; looping in Perl code (e.g. with C<while>) rather than
1169in the regular expression engine; or rewriting the regular expression so
c2e66d9e 1170that it is simpler or backtracks less. (See L<perlfaq2> for information
be771a83 1171on I<Mastering Regular Expressions>.)
c3464db5 1172
38875929
DM
1173=item cond_broadcast() called on unlocked variable
1174
1175(W threads) Within a thread-enabled program, you tried to call
1176cond_broadcast() on a variable which wasn't locked. The cond_broadcast()
1177function is used to wake up another thread that is waiting in a
1178cond_wait(). To ensure that the signal isn't sent before the other thread
1179has a chance to enter the wait, it is usual for the signaling thread to
1180first wait for a lock on variable. This lock attempt will only succeed
1181after the other thread has entered cond_wait() and thus relinquished the
1182lock.
1183
38875929
DM
1184=item cond_signal() called on unlocked variable
1185
1186(W threads) Within a thread-enabled program, you tried to call
1187cond_signal() on a variable which wasn't locked. The cond_signal()
1188function is used to wake up another thread that is waiting in a
1189cond_wait(). To ensure that the signal isn't sent before the other thread
1190has a chance to enter the wait, it is usual for the signaling thread to
1191first wait for a lock on variable. This lock attempt will only succeed
1192after the other thread has entered cond_wait() and thus relinquished the
1193lock.
1194
69282e91 1195=item connect() on closed socket %s
a0d0e21e 1196
be771a83
GS
1197(W closed) You tried to do a connect on a closed socket. Did you forget
1198to check the return value of your socket() call? See
1199L<perlfunc/connect>.
a0d0e21e 1200
41ab332f 1201=item Constant(%s)%s: %s
6df41af2 1202
be771a83
GS
1203(F) The parser found inconsistencies either while attempting to define
1204an overloaded constant, or when trying to find the character name
1205specified in the C<\N{...}> escape. Perhaps you forgot to load the
1206corresponding C<overload> or C<charnames> pragma? See L<charnames> and
1207L<overload>.
6df41af2 1208
779c5bc9
GS
1209=item Constant is not %s reference
1210
1211(F) A constant value (perhaps declared using the C<use constant> pragma)
be771a83
GS
1212is being dereferenced, but it amounts to the wrong type of reference.
1213The message indicates the type of reference that was expected. This
1214usually indicates a syntax error in dereferencing the constant value.
779c5bc9
GS
1215See L<perlsub/"Constant Functions"> and L<constant>.
1216
4cee8e80
CS
1217=item Constant subroutine %s redefined
1218
bb028877 1219(S) You redefined a subroutine which had previously been
be771a83
GS
1220eligible for inlining. See L<perlsub/"Constant Functions"> for
1221commentary and workarounds.
4cee8e80 1222
9607fc9c 1223=item Constant subroutine %s undefined
1224
be771a83
GS
1225(W misc) You undefined a subroutine which had previously been eligible
1226for inlining. See L<perlsub/"Constant Functions"> for commentary and
1227workarounds.
9607fc9c 1228
e7ea3e70
IZ
1229=item Copy method did not return a reference
1230
64977eb6 1231(F) The method which overloads "=" is buggy. See
13a2d996 1232L<overload/Copy Constructor>.
e7ea3e70 1233
6798c92b
GS
1234=item CORE::%s is not a keyword
1235
1236(F) The CORE:: namespace is reserved for Perl keywords.
1237
a0d0e21e
LW
1238=item corrupted regexp pointers
1239
1240(P) The regular expression engine got confused by what the regular
1241expression compiler gave it.
1242
1243=item corrupted regexp program
1244
be771a83
GS
1245(P) The regular expression engine got passed a regexp program without a
1246valid magic number.
a0d0e21e 1247
6df41af2
GS
1248=item Corrupt malloc ptr 0x%lx at 0x%lx
1249
1250(P) The malloc package that comes with Perl had an internal failure.
1251
49704364
WL
1252=item Count after length/code in unpack
1253
1254(F) You had an unpack template indicating a counted-length string, but
1255you have also specified an explicit size for the string. See
1256L<perlfunc/pack>.
1257
a0d0e21e
LW
1258=item Deep recursion on subroutine "%s"
1259
be771a83
GS
1260(W recursion) This subroutine has called itself (directly or indirectly)
1261100 times more than it has returned. This probably indicates an
1262infinite recursion, unless you're writing strange benchmark programs, in
1263which case it indicates something else.
a0d0e21e 1264
f10b0346 1265=item defined(@array) is deprecated
69794302 1266
be771a83
GS
1267(D deprecated) defined() is not usually useful on arrays because it
1268checks for an undefined I<scalar> value. If you want to see if the
64977eb6 1269array is empty, just use C<if (@array) { # not empty }> for example.
69794302 1270
f10b0346 1271=item defined(%hash) is deprecated
69794302 1272
be771a83
GS
1273(D deprecated) defined() is not usually useful on hashes because it
1274checks for an undefined I<scalar> value. If you want to see if the hash
64977eb6 1275is empty, just use C<if (%hash) { # not empty }> for example.
69794302 1276
62658f4d
PM
1277=item %s defines neither package nor VERSION--version check failed
1278
1279(F) You said something like "use Module 42" but in the Module file
1280there are neither package declarations nor a C<$VERSION>.
1281
fc36a67e 1282=item Delimiter for here document is too long
1283
be771a83
GS
1284(F) In a here document construct like C<<<FOO>, the label C<FOO> is too
1285long for Perl to handle. You have to be seriously twisted to write code
1286that triggers this error.
fc36a67e 1287
500ab966
RGS
1288=item DESTROY created new reference to dead object '%s'
1289
1290(F) A DESTROY() method created a new reference to the object which is
1291just being DESTROYed. Perl is confused, and prefers to abort rather than
1292to create a dangling reference.
1293
3cdd684c
TP
1294=item Did not produce a valid header
1295
1296See Server error.
1297
6df41af2
GS
1298=item %s did not return a true value
1299
1300(F) A required (or used) file must return a true value to indicate that
1301it compiled correctly and ran its initialization code correctly. It's
1302traditional to end such a file with a "1;", though any true value would
1303do. See L<perlfunc/require>.
1304
cc507455 1305=item (Did you mean &%s instead?)
4633a7c4 1306
be771a83
GS
1307(W) You probably referred to an imported subroutine &FOO as $FOO or some
1308such.
4633a7c4 1309
cc507455 1310=item (Did you mean "local" instead of "our"?)
33633739 1311
be771a83
GS
1312(W misc) Remember that "our" does not localize the declared global
1313variable. You have declared it again in the same lexical scope, which
1314seems superfluous.
33633739 1315
cc507455 1316=item (Did you mean $ or @ instead of %?)
a0d0e21e 1317
be771a83
GS
1318(W) You probably said %hash{$key} when you meant $hash{$key} or
1319@hash{@keys}. On the other hand, maybe you just meant %hash and got
1320carried away.
748a9306 1321
7e1af8bc 1322=item Died
5f05dabc 1323
1324(F) You passed die() an empty string (the equivalent of C<die "">) or
1325you called it with no args and both C<$@> and C<$_> were empty.
1326
3cdd684c
TP
1327=item Document contains no data
1328
1329See Server error.
1330
62658f4d
PM
1331=item %s does not define %s::VERSION--version check failed
1332
1333(F) You said something like "use Module 42" but the Module did not
1334define a C<$VERSION.>
1335
49704364
WL
1336=item '/' does not take a repeat count
1337
1338(F) You cannot put a repeat count of any kind right after the '/' code.
1339See L<perlfunc/pack>.
1340
a0d0e21e
LW
1341=item Don't know how to handle magic of type '%s'
1342
1343(P) The internal handling of magical variables has been cursed.
1344
1345=item do_study: out of memory
1346
1347(P) This should have been caught by safemalloc() instead.
1348
6df41af2
GS
1349=item (Do you need to predeclare %s?)
1350
1351(S) This is an educated guess made in conjunction with the message "%s
1352found where operator expected". It often means a subroutine or module
1353name is being referenced that hasn't been declared yet. This may be
1354because of ordering problems in your file, or because of a missing
be771a83
GS
1355"sub", "package", "require", or "use" statement. If you're referencing
1356something that isn't defined yet, you don't actually have to define the
1357subroutine or package before the current location. You can use an empty
1358"sub foo;" or "package FOO;" to enter a "forward" declaration.
6df41af2 1359
ac206dc8
RGS
1360=item dump() better written as CORE::dump()
1361
1362(W misc) You used the obsolescent C<dump()> built-in function, without fully
1363qualifying it as C<CORE::dump()>. Maybe it's a typo. See L<perlfunc/dump>.
1364
a0d0e21e
LW
1365=item Duplicate free() ignored
1366
be771a83
GS
1367(S malloc) An internal routine called free() on something that had
1368already been freed.
a0d0e21e 1369
4633a7c4
LW
1370=item elseif should be elsif
1371
be771a83
GS
1372(S) There is no keyword "elseif" in Perl because Larry thinks it's ugly.
1373Your code will be interpreted as an attempt to call a method named
1374"elseif" for the class returned by the following block. This is
4633a7c4
LW
1375unlikely to be what you want.
1376
ab13f0c7
JH
1377=item Empty %s
1378
af6f566e
HS
1379(F) C<\p> and C<\P> are used to introduce a named Unicode property, as
1380described in L<perlunicode> and L<perlre>. You used C<\p> or C<\P> in
1381a regular expression without specifying the property name.
ab13f0c7 1382
85ab1d1d 1383=item entering effective %s failed
5ff3f7a4 1384
85ab1d1d 1385(F) While under the C<use filetest> pragma, switching the real and
5ff3f7a4
GS
1386effective uids or gids failed.
1387
c038024b
RGS
1388=item %ENV is aliased to %s
1389
1390(F) You're running under taint mode, and the C<%ENV> variable has been
1391aliased to another hash, so it doesn't reflect anymore the state of the
1392program's environment. This is potentially insecure.
1393
748a9306
LW
1394=item Error converting file specification %s
1395
5f05dabc 1396(F) An error peculiar to VMS. Because Perl may have to deal with file
748a9306 1397specifications in either VMS or Unix syntax, it converts them to a
be771a83
GS
1398single form when it must operate on them directly. Either you've passed
1399an invalid file specification to Perl, or you've found a case the
1400conversion routines don't handle. Drat.
748a9306 1401
e4d48cc9
GS
1402=item %s: Eval-group in insecure regular expression
1403
be771a83
GS
1404(F) Perl detected tainted data when trying to compile a regular
1405expression that contains the C<(?{ ... })> zero-width assertion, which
1406is unsafe. See L<perlre/(?{ code })>, and L<perlsec>.
e4d48cc9 1407
e4d48cc9
GS
1408=item %s: Eval-group not allowed at run time
1409
be771a83
GS
1410(F) Perl tried to compile a regular expression containing the
1411C<(?{ ... })> zero-width assertion at run time, as it would when the
1412pattern contains interpolated values. Since that is a security risk, it
1413is not allowed. If you insist, you may still do this by explicitly
1414building the pattern from an interpolated string at run time and using
1415that in an eval(). See L<perlre/(?{ code })>.
e4d48cc9 1416
6df41af2
GS
1417=item %s: Eval-group not allowed, use re 'eval'
1418
be771a83
GS
1419(F) A regular expression contained the C<(?{ ... })> zero-width
1420assertion, but that construct is only allowed when the C<use re 'eval'>
1421pragma is in effect. See L<perlre/(?{ code })>.
6df41af2 1422
fc36a67e 1423=item Excessively long <> operator
1424
1425(F) The contents of a <> operator may not exceed the maximum size of a
1426Perl identifier. If you're just trying to glob a long list of
1427filenames, try using the glob() operator, or put the filenames into a
1428variable and glob that.
1429
ed9aa3b7
SG
1430=item exec? I'm not *that* kind of operating system
1431
1432(F) The C<exec> function is not implemented in MacPerl. See L<perlport>.
1433
f86702cc 1434=item Execution of %s aborted due to compilation errors
a0d0e21e
LW
1435
1436(F) The final summary message when a Perl compilation fails.
1437
1438=item Exiting eval via %s
1439
be771a83
GS
1440(W exiting) You are exiting an eval by unconventional means, such as a
1441goto, or a loop control statement.
e476b1b5
GS
1442
1443=item Exiting format via %s
1444
9a2ff54b 1445(W exiting) You are exiting a format by unconventional means, such as a
be771a83 1446goto, or a loop control statement.
a0d0e21e 1447
0a753a76 1448=item Exiting pseudo-block via %s
1449
be771a83
GS
1450(W exiting) You are exiting a rather special block construct (like a
1451sort block or subroutine) by unconventional means, such as a goto, or a
1452loop control statement. See L<perlfunc/sort>.
0a753a76 1453
a0d0e21e
LW
1454=item Exiting subroutine via %s
1455
be771a83
GS
1456(W exiting) You are exiting a subroutine by unconventional means, such
1457as a goto, or a loop control statement.
a0d0e21e
LW
1458
1459=item Exiting substitution via %s
1460
be771a83
GS
1461(W exiting) You are exiting a substitution by unconventional means, such
1462as a return, a goto, or a loop control statement.
a0d0e21e 1463
7b8d334a
GS
1464=item Explicit blessing to '' (assuming package main)
1465
be771a83
GS
1466(W misc) You are blessing a reference to a zero length string. This has
1467the effect of blessing the reference into the package main. This is
1468usually not what you want. Consider providing a default target package,
1469e.g. bless($ref, $p || 'MyPackage');
7b8d334a 1470
6df41af2
GS
1471=item %s: Expression syntax
1472
be771a83
GS
1473(A) You've accidentally run your script through B<csh> instead of Perl.
1474Check the #! line, or manually feed your script into Perl yourself.
6df41af2
GS
1475
1476=item %s failed--call queue aborted
1477
1478(F) An untrapped exception was raised while executing a CHECK, INIT, or
1479END subroutine. Processing of the remainder of the queue of such
1480routines has been prematurely ended.
1481
7253e4e3 1482=item False [] range "%s" in regex; marked by <-- HERE in m/%s/
73b437c8 1483
be771a83 1484(W regexp) A character class range must start and end at a literal
7253e4e3
RK
1485character, not another character class like C<\d> or C<[:alpha:]>. The "-"
1486in your false range is interpreted as a literal "-". Consider quoting the
1487"-", "\-". The <-- HERE shows in the regular expression about where the
1488problem was discovered. See L<perlre>.
73b437c8 1489
748a9306 1490=item Fatal VMS error at %s, line %d
a0d0e21e 1491
be771a83
GS
1492(P) An error peculiar to VMS. Something untoward happened in a VMS
1493system service or RTL routine; Perl's exit status should provide more
1494details. The filename in "at %s" and the line number in "line %d" tell
1495you which section of the Perl source code is distressed.
a0d0e21e
LW
1496
1497=item fcntl is not implemented
1498
1499(F) Your machine apparently doesn't implement fcntl(). What is this, a
1500PDP-11 or something?
1501
af8c498a 1502=item Filehandle %s opened only for input
a0d0e21e 1503
6c8d78fb
HS
1504(W io) You tried to write on a read-only filehandle. If you intended
1505it to be a read-write filehandle, you needed to open it with "+<" or
1506"+>" or "+>>" instead of with "<" or nothing. If you intended only to
1507write the file, use ">" or ">>". See L<perlfunc/open>.
a0d0e21e 1508
af8c498a 1509=item Filehandle %s opened only for output
a0d0e21e 1510
6c8d78fb
HS
1511(W io) You tried to read from a filehandle opened only for writing, If
1512you intended it to be a read/write filehandle, you needed to open it
be771a83
GS
1513with "+<" or "+>" or "+>>" instead of with "<" or nothing. If you
1514intended only to read from the file, use "<". See L<perlfunc/open>.
6c8d78fb
HS
1515Another possibility is that you attempted to open filedescriptor 0
1516(also known as STDIN) for output (maybe you closed STDIN earlier?).
97828cef
RGS
1517
1518=item Filehandle %s reopened as %s only for input
1519
1520(W io) You opened for reading a filehandle that got the same filehandle id
1521as STDOUT or STDERR. This occured because you closed STDOUT or STDERR
1522previously.
1523
1524=item Filehandle STDIN reopened as %s only for output
1525
1526(W io) You opened for writing a filehandle that got the same filehandle id
1527as STDIN. This occured because you closed STDIN previously.
a0d0e21e
LW
1528
1529=item Final $ should be \$ or $name
1530
1531(F) You must now decide whether the final $ in a string was meant to be
be771a83
GS
1532a literal dollar sign, or was meant to introduce a variable name that
1533happens to be missing. So you have to put either the backslash or the
1534name.
a0d0e21e 1535
56e90b21
GS
1536=item flock() on closed filehandle %s
1537
be771a83 1538(W closed) The filehandle you're attempting to flock() got itself closed
c289d2f7 1539some time before now. Check your control flow. flock() operates on
be771a83
GS
1540filehandles. Are you attempting to call flock() on a dirhandle by the
1541same name?
56e90b21 1542
6df41af2
GS
1543=item Format not terminated
1544
1545(F) A format must be terminated by a line with a solitary dot. Perl got
1546to the end of your file without finding such a line.
1547
a0d0e21e
LW
1548=item Format %s redefined
1549
e476b1b5 1550(W redefine) You redefined a format. To suppress this warning, say
a0d0e21e
LW
1551
1552 {
271595cc 1553 no warnings 'redefine';
a0d0e21e
LW
1554 eval "format NAME =...";
1555 }
1556
a0d0e21e
LW
1557=item Found = in conditional, should be ==
1558
e476b1b5 1559(W syntax) You said
a0d0e21e
LW
1560
1561 if ($foo = 123)
1562
1563when you meant
1564
1565 if ($foo == 123)
1566
1567(or something like that).
1568
6df41af2
GS
1569=item %s found where operator expected
1570
1571(S) The Perl lexer knows whether to expect a term or an operator. If it
be771a83
GS
1572sees what it knows to be a term when it was expecting to see an
1573operator, it gives you this warning. Usually it indicates that an
1574operator or delimiter was omitted, such as a semicolon.
6df41af2 1575
a0d0e21e
LW
1576=item gdbm store returned %d, errno %d, key "%s"
1577
1578(S) A warning from the GDBM_File extension that a store failed.
1579
1580=item gethostent not implemented
1581
1582(F) Your C library apparently doesn't implement gethostent(), probably
1583because if it did, it'd feel morally obligated to return every hostname
1584on the Internet.
1585
69282e91 1586=item get%sname() on closed socket %s
a0d0e21e 1587
be771a83
GS
1588(W closed) You tried to get a socket or peer socket name on a closed
1589socket. Did you forget to check the return value of your socket() call?
a0d0e21e 1590
748a9306
LW
1591=item getpwnam returned invalid UIC %#o for user "%s"
1592
1593(S) A warning peculiar to VMS. The call to C<sys$getuai> underlying the
1594C<getpwnam> operator returned an invalid UIC.
1595
6df41af2
GS
1596=item getsockopt() on closed socket %s
1597
be771a83
GS
1598(W closed) You tried to get a socket option on a closed socket. Did you
1599forget to check the return value of your socket() call? See
6df41af2
GS
1600L<perlfunc/getsockopt>.
1601
1602=item Global symbol "%s" requires explicit package name
1603
1604(F) You've said "use strict vars", which indicates that all variables
1605must either be lexically scoped (using "my"), declared beforehand using
1606"our", or explicitly qualified to say which package the global variable
1607is in (using "::").
1608
e476b1b5
GS
1609=item glob failed (%s)
1610
be771a83
GS
1611(W glob) Something went wrong with the external program(s) used for
1612C<glob> and C<< <*.c> >>. Usually, this means that you supplied a
1613C<glob> pattern that caused the external program to fail and exit with a
1614nonzero status. If the message indicates that the abnormal exit
1615resulted in a coredump, this may also mean that your csh (C shell) is
1616broken. If so, you should change all of the csh-related variables in
1617config.sh: If you have tcsh, make the variables refer to it as if it
1618were csh (e.g. C<full_csh='/usr/bin/tcsh'>); otherwise, make them all
1619empty (except that C<d_csh> should be C<'undef'>) so that Perl will
1620think csh is missing. In either case, after editing config.sh, run
75b44862 1621C<./Configure -S> and rebuild Perl.
e476b1b5 1622
a0d0e21e
LW
1623=item Glob not terminated
1624
1625(F) The lexer saw a left angle bracket in a place where it was expecting
be771a83
GS
1626a term, so it's looking for the corresponding right angle bracket, and
1627not finding it. Chances are you left some needed parentheses out
1628earlier in the line, and you really meant a "less than".
a0d0e21e 1629
6df41af2 1630=item Got an error from DosAllocMem
a0d0e21e 1631
6df41af2
GS
1632(P) An error peculiar to OS/2. Most probably you're using an obsolete
1633version of Perl, and this should not happen anyway.
a0d0e21e
LW
1634
1635=item goto must have label
1636
1637(F) Unlike with "next" or "last", you're not allowed to goto an
1638unspecified destination. See L<perlfunc/goto>.
1639
49704364 1640=item ()-group starts with a count
18529408 1641
49704364 1642(F) A ()-group started with a count. A count is
18529408 1643supposed to follow something: a template character or a ()-group.
49704364 1644 See L<perlfunc/pack>.
18529408 1645
6df41af2
GS
1646=item %s had compilation errors
1647
1648(F) The final summary message when a C<perl -c> fails.
1649
a0d0e21e
LW
1650=item Had to create %s unexpectedly
1651
be771a83
GS
1652(S internal) A routine asked for a symbol from a symbol table that ought
1653to have existed already, but for some reason it didn't, and had to be
1654created on an emergency basis to prevent a core dump.
a0d0e21e
LW
1655
1656=item Hash %%s missing the % in argument %d of %s()
1657
be771a83
GS
1658(D deprecated) Really old Perl let you omit the % on hash names in some
1659spots. This is now heavily deprecated.
a0d0e21e 1660
6df41af2
GS
1661=item %s has too many errors
1662
1663(F) The parser has given up trying to parse the program after 10 errors.
1664Further error messages would likely be uninformative.
1665
252aa082
JH
1666=item Hexadecimal number > 0xffffffff non-portable
1667
e476b1b5 1668(W portable) The hexadecimal number you specified is larger than 2**32-1
9e24b6e2
JH
1669(4294967295) and therefore non-portable between systems. See
1670L<perlport> for more on portability concerns.
252aa082 1671
8903cb82 1672=item Identifier too long
1673
1674(F) Perl limits identifiers (names for variables, functions, etc.) to
fc36a67e 1675about 250 characters for simple names, and somewhat more for compound
be771a83
GS
1676names (like C<$A::B>). You've exceeded Perl's limits. Future versions
1677of Perl are likely to eliminate these arbitrary limitations.
8903cb82 1678
6df41af2 1679=item Illegal binary digit %s
f675dbe5 1680
6df41af2 1681(F) You used a digit other than 0 or 1 in a binary number.
f675dbe5 1682
6df41af2 1683=item Illegal binary digit %s ignored
a0d0e21e 1684
be771a83
GS
1685(W digit) You may have tried to use a digit other than 0 or 1 in a
1686binary number. Interpretation of the binary number stopped before the
1687offending digit.
a0d0e21e 1688
4fdae800 1689=item Illegal character %s (carriage return)
1690
d5898338 1691(F) Perl normally treats carriage returns in the program text as it
be771a83
GS
1692would any other whitespace, which means you should never see this error
1693when Perl was built using standard options. For some reason, your
1694version of Perl appears to have been built without this support. Talk
1695to your Perl administrator.
4fdae800 1696
d37a9538
ST
1697=item Illegal character in prototype for %s : %s
1698
420cdfc1 1699(W syntax) An illegal character was found in a prototype declaration. Legal
d37a9538
ST
1700characters in prototypes are $, @, %, *, ;, [, ], &, and \.
1701
904d85c5
RGS
1702=item Illegal declaration of anonymous subroutine
1703
1704(F) When using the C<sub> keyword to construct an anonymous subroutine,
1705you must always specify a block of code. See L<perlsub>.
1706
a0d0e21e
LW
1707=item Illegal division by zero
1708
be771a83
GS
1709(F) You tried to divide a number by 0. Either something was wrong in
1710your logic, or you need to put a conditional in to guard against
1711meaningless input.
a0d0e21e 1712
6df41af2
GS
1713=item Illegal hexadecimal digit %s ignored
1714
be771a83
GS
1715(W digit) You may have tried to use a character other than 0 - 9 or
1716A - F, a - f in a hexadecimal number. Interpretation of the hexadecimal
1717number stopped before the illegal character.
6df41af2 1718
a0d0e21e
LW
1719=item Illegal modulus zero
1720
be771a83
GS
1721(F) You tried to divide a number by 0 to get the remainder. Most
1722numbers don't take to this kindly.
a0d0e21e 1723
6df41af2 1724=item Illegal number of bits in vec
399388f4 1725
6df41af2
GS
1726(F) The number of bits in vec() (the third argument) must be a power of
1727two from 1 to 32 (or 64, if your platform supports that).
399388f4
GS
1728
1729=item Illegal octal digit %s
a0d0e21e 1730
d1be9408 1731(F) You used an 8 or 9 in an octal number.
a0d0e21e 1732
399388f4 1733=item Illegal octal digit %s ignored
748a9306 1734
d1be9408 1735(W digit) You may have tried to use an 8 or 9 in an octal number.
75b44862 1736Interpretation of the octal number stopped before the 8 or 9.
748a9306 1737
6df41af2 1738=item Illegal switch in PERL5OPT: %s
6ff81951 1739
6df41af2 1740(X) The PERL5OPT environment variable may only be used to set the
1c4db469 1741following switches: B<-[DIMUdmtw]>.
6ff81951 1742
6df41af2 1743=item Ill-formed CRTL environ value "%s"
81e118e0 1744
75b44862 1745(W internal) A warning peculiar to VMS. Perl tried to read the CRTL's
be771a83
GS
1746internal environ array, and encountered an element without the C<=>
1747delimiter used to separate keys from values. The element is ignored.
09bef843 1748
6df41af2 1749=item Ill-formed message in prime_env_iter: |%s|
54310121 1750
be771a83
GS
1751(W internal) A warning peculiar to VMS. Perl tried to read a logical
1752name or CLI symbol definition when preparing to iterate over %ENV, and
1753didn't see the expected delimiter between key and value, so the line was
1754ignored.
54310121 1755
8fa7688f
SF
1756=item Impossible to activate assertion call
1757
1758(W assertions) You're calling an assertion function in a block that is
1759not under the control of the C<assertions> pragma.
1760
6df41af2 1761=item (in cleanup) %s
9607fc9c 1762
be771a83
GS
1763(W misc) This prefix usually indicates that a DESTROY() method raised
1764the indicated exception. Since destructors are usually called by the
1765system at arbitrary points during execution, and often a vast number of
1766times, the warning is issued only once for any number of failures that
1767would otherwise result in the same message being repeated.
6df41af2 1768
be771a83
GS
1769Failure of user callbacks dispatched using the C<G_KEEPERR> flag could
1770also result in this warning. See L<perlcall/G_KEEPERR>.
9607fc9c 1771
979699d9
JH
1772=item In EBCDIC the v-string components cannot exceed 2147483647
1773
1774(F) An error peculiar to EBCDIC. Internally, v-strings are stored as
1775Unicode code points, and encoded in EBCDIC as UTF-EBCDIC. The UTF-EBCDIC
1776encoding is limited to code points no larger than 2147483647 (0x7FFFFFFF).
1777
a0d0e21e
LW
1778=item Insecure dependency in %s
1779
8b1a09fc 1780(F) You tried to do something that the tainting mechanism didn't like.
be771a83
GS
1781The tainting mechanism is turned on when you're running setuid or
1782setgid, or when you specify B<-T> to turn it on explicitly. The
1783tainting mechanism labels all data that's derived directly or indirectly
1784from the user, who is considered to be unworthy of your trust. If any
1785such data is used in a "dangerous" operation, you get this error. See
1786L<perlsec> for more information.
a0d0e21e
LW
1787
1788=item Insecure directory in %s
1789
be771a83
GS
1790(F) You can't use system(), exec(), or a piped open in a setuid or
1791setgid script if C<$ENV{PATH}> contains a directory that is writable by
1792the world. See L<perlsec>.
a0d0e21e 1793
62f468fc 1794=item Insecure $ENV{%s} while running %s
a0d0e21e
LW
1795
1796(F) You can't use system(), exec(), or a piped open in a setuid or
62f468fc 1797setgid script if any of C<$ENV{PATH}>, C<$ENV{IFS}>, C<$ENV{CDPATH}>,
332d5f78
SR
1798C<$ENV{ENV}>, C<$ENV{BASH_ENV}> or C<$ENV{TERM}> are derived from data
1799supplied (or potentially supplied) by the user. The script must set
1800the path to a known value, using trustworthy data. See L<perlsec>.
a0d0e21e 1801
a7ae9550
GS
1802=item Integer overflow in %s number
1803
75b44862 1804(W overflow) The hexadecimal, octal or binary number you have specified
be771a83
GS
1805either as a literal or as an argument to hex() or oct() is too big for
1806your architecture, and has been converted to a floating point number.
1807On a 32-bit architecture the largest hexadecimal, octal or binary number
9e24b6e2
JH
1808representable without overflow is 0xFFFFFFFF, 037777777777, or
18090b11111111111111111111111111111111 respectively. Note that Perl
1810transparently promotes all numbers to a floating point representation
1811internally--subject to loss of precision errors in subsequent
1812operations.
bbce6d69 1813
46314c13
JP
1814=item Integer overflow in version
1815
1816(F) Some portion of a version initialization is too large for the
1817size of integers for your architecture. This is not a warning
1818because there is no rational reason for a version to try and use a
1819element larger than typically 2**32. This is usually caused by
1820trying to use some odd mathematical operation as a version, like
1821100/9.
1822
7253e4e3 1823=item Internal disaster in regex; marked by <-- HERE in m/%s/
6df41af2
GS
1824
1825(P) Something went badly wrong in the regular expression parser.
7253e4e3 1826The <-- HERE shows in the regular expression about where the problem was
b45f050a
JF
1827discovered.
1828
748a9306
LW
1829=item Internal inconsistency in tracking vforks
1830
be771a83
GS
1831(S) A warning peculiar to VMS. Perl keeps track of the number of times
1832you've called C<fork> and C<exec>, to determine whether the current call
1833to C<exec> should affect the current script or a subprocess (see
1834L<perlvms/"exec LIST">). Somehow, this count has become scrambled, so
1835Perl is making a guess and treating this C<exec> as a request to
1836terminate the Perl script and execute the specified command.
748a9306 1837
7253e4e3 1838=item Internal urp in regex; marked by <-- HERE in m/%s/
b45f050a 1839
7253e4e3
RK
1840(P) Something went badly awry in the regular expression parser. The
1841<-- HERE shows in the regular expression about where the problem was
1842discovered.
a0d0e21e 1843
6df41af2
GS
1844=item %s (...) interpreted as function
1845
75b44862 1846(W syntax) You've run afoul of the rule that says that any list operator
be771a83 1847followed by parentheses turns into a function, with all the list
64977eb6 1848operators arguments found inside the parentheses. See
13a2d996 1849L<perlop/Terms and List Operators (Leftward)>.
6df41af2 1850
09bef843
SB
1851=item Invalid %s attribute: %s
1852
1853The indicated attribute for a subroutine or variable was not recognized
1854by Perl or by a user-supplied handler. See L<attributes>.
1855
1856=item Invalid %s attributes: %s
1857
be771a83
GS
1858The indicated attributes for a subroutine or variable were not
1859recognized by Perl or by a user-supplied handler. See L<attributes>.
09bef843 1860
c635e13b 1861=item Invalid conversion in %s: "%s"
1862
be771a83
GS
1863(W printf) Perl does not understand the given format conversion. See
1864L<perlfunc/sprintf>.
c635e13b 1865
7253e4e3 1866=item Invalid [] range "%s" in regex; marked by <-- HERE in m/%s/
6df41af2
GS
1867
1868(F) The range specified in a character class had a minimum character
7253e4e3
RK
1869greater than the maximum character. One possibility is that you forgot the
1870C<{}> from your ending C<\x{}> - C<\x> without the curly braces can go only
1871up to C<ff>. The <-- HERE shows in the regular expression about where the
1872problem was discovered. See L<perlre>.
6df41af2 1873
d1573ac7 1874=item Invalid range "%s" in transliteration operator
c2e66d9e
GS
1875
1876(F) The range specified in the tr/// or y/// operator had a minimum
1877character greater than the maximum character. See L<perlop>.
1878
09bef843
SB
1879=item Invalid separator character %s in attribute list
1880
0120eecf 1881(F) Something other than a colon or whitespace was seen between the
be771a83
GS
1882elements of an attribute list. If the previous attribute had a
1883parenthesised parameter list, perhaps that list was terminated too soon.
1884See L<attributes>.
09bef843 1885
b4581f09
JH
1886=item Invalid separator character %s in PerlIO layer specification %s
1887
1888(W layer) When pushing layers onto the Perl I/O system, something other than a
1889colon or whitespace was seen between the elements of a layer list.
1890If the previous attribute had a parenthesised parameter list, perhaps that
1891list was terminated too soon.
1892
49704364 1893=item Invalid type '%s' in %s
96e4d5b1 1894
49704364
WL
1895(F) The given character is not a valid pack or unpack type.
1896See L<perlfunc/pack>.
1897(W) The given character is not a valid pack or unpack type but used to be
75b44862 1898silently ignored.
96e4d5b1 1899
46314c13
JP
1900=item Invalid version format (multiple underscores)
1901
1902(F) Versions may contain at most a single underscore, which signals
1903that the version is a beta release. See L<version> for the allowed
1904version formats.
1905
1906=item Invalid version format (underscores before decimal)
1907
1908(F) Versions may not contain decimals after the optional underscore.
1909See L<version> for the allowed version formats.
1910
a0d0e21e
LW
1911=item ioctl is not implemented
1912
1913(F) Your machine apparently doesn't implement ioctl(), which is pretty
1914strange for a machine that supports C.
1915
c289d2f7
JH
1916=item ioctl() on unopened %s
1917
1918(W unopened) You tried ioctl() on a filehandle that was never opened.
1919Check you control flow and number of arguments.
1920
363c40c4
SB
1921=item IO layers (like "%s") unavailable
1922
1923(F) Your Perl has not been configured to have PerlIO, and therefore
1924you cannot use IO layers. To have PerlIO Perl must be configured
1925with 'useperlio'.
1926
80cbd5ad
JH
1927=item IO::Socket::atmark not implemented on this architecture
1928
1929(F) Your machine doesn't implement the sockatmark() functionality,
1930neither as a system call or an ioctl call (SIOCATMARK).
1931
b4581f09
JH
1932=item $* is no longer supported
1933
1934(D deprecated) The special variable C<$*>, deprecated in older perls, has
1935been removed as of 5.9.0 and is no longer supported. You should use the
1936C<//m> and C<//s> regexp modifiers instead.
1937
6ad11d81
JH
1938=item `%s' is not a code reference
1939
04a80ee0
RGS
1940(W overload) The second (fourth, sixth, ...) argument of overload::constant
1941needs to be a code reference. Either an anonymous subroutine, or a reference
6ad11d81
JH
1942to a subroutine.
1943
1944=item `%s' is not an overloadable type
1945
04a80ee0
RGS
1946(W overload) You tried to overload a constant type the overload package is
1947unaware of.
6ad11d81 1948
a0d0e21e
LW
1949=item junk on end of regexp
1950
1951(P) The regular expression parser is confused.
1952
1953=item Label not found for "last %s"
1954
be771a83
GS
1955(F) You named a loop to break out of, but you're not currently in a loop
1956of that name, not even if you count where you were called from. See
1957L<perlfunc/last>.
a0d0e21e
LW
1958
1959=item Label not found for "next %s"
1960
1961(F) You named a loop to continue, but you're not currently in a loop of
1962that name, not even if you count where you were called from. See
1963L<perlfunc/last>.
1964
1965=item Label not found for "redo %s"
1966
1967(F) You named a loop to restart, but you're not currently in a loop of
1968that name, not even if you count where you were called from. See
1969L<perlfunc/last>.
1970
85ab1d1d 1971=item leaving effective %s failed
5ff3f7a4 1972
85ab1d1d 1973(F) While under the C<use filetest> pragma, switching the real and
5ff3f7a4
GS
1974effective uids or gids failed.
1975
49704364
WL
1976=item length/code after end of string in unpack
1977
1978(F) While unpacking, the string buffer was alread used up when an unpack
1979length/code combination tried to obtain more data. This results in
1980an undefined value for the length. See L<perlfunc/pack>.
1981
69282e91 1982=item listen() on closed socket %s
a0d0e21e 1983
be771a83
GS
1984(W closed) You tried to do a listen on a closed socket. Did you forget
1985to check the return value of your socket() call? See
1986L<perlfunc/listen>.
a0d0e21e 1987
49704364 1988=item Lookbehind longer than %d not implemented in regex; marked by <-- HERE in m/%s/
b45f050a
JF
1989
1990(F) There is currently a limit on the length of string which lookbehind can
7253e4e3
RK
1991handle. This restriction may be eased in a future release. The <-- HERE
1992shows in the regular expression about where the problem was discovered.
2e50fd82 1993
2f7da168
RK
1994=item lstat() on filehandle %s
1995
1996(W io) You tried to do an lstat on a filehandle. What did you mean
1997by that? lstat() makes sense only on filenames. (Perl did a fstat()
1998instead on the filehandle.)
1999
96ebfdd7
RK
2000=item Lvalue subs returning %s not implemented yet
2001
2002(F) Due to limitations in the current implementation, array and hash
2003values cannot be returned in subroutines used in lvalue context. See
2004L<perlsub/"Lvalue subroutines">.
2005
49704364
WL
2006=item Malformed integer in [] in pack
2007
2008(F) Between the brackets enclosing a numeric repeat count only digits
2009are permitted. See L<perlfunc/pack>.
2010
2011=item Malformed integer in [] in unpack
2012
2013(F) Between the brackets enclosing a numeric repeat count only digits
2014are permitted. See L<perlfunc/pack>.
2015
6df41af2
GS
2016=item Malformed PERLLIB_PREFIX
2017
2018(F) An error peculiar to OS/2. PERLLIB_PREFIX should be of the form
2019
2020 prefix1;prefix2
2021
2022or
6df41af2
GS
2023 prefix1 prefix2
2024
be771a83
GS
2025with nonempty prefix1 and prefix2. If C<prefix1> is indeed a prefix of
2026a builtin library search path, prefix2 is substituted. The error may
2027appear if components are not found, or are too long. See
fecfaeb8 2028"PERLLIB_PREFIX" in L<perlos2>.
6df41af2 2029
2f758a16
ST
2030=item Malformed prototype for %s: %s
2031
d37a9538
ST
2032(F) You tried to use a function with a malformed prototype. The
2033syntax of function prototypes is given a brief compile-time check for
2034obvious errors like invalid characters. A more rigorous check is run
2035when the function is called.
2f758a16 2036
ba210ebe
JH
2037=item Malformed UTF-8 character (%s)
2038
2039Perl detected something that didn't comply with UTF-8 encoding rules.
2040
901b21bf
JH
2041One possible cause is that you read in data that you thought to be in
2042UTF-8 but it wasn't (it was for example legacy 8-bit data). Another
2043possibility is careless use of utf8::upgrade().
2044
dea0fc0b
JH
2045=item Malformed UTF-16 surrogate
2046
2047Perl thought it was reading UTF-16 encoded character data but while
2048doing it Perl met a malformed Unicode surrogate.
2049
49704364 2050=item %s matches null string many times in regex; marked by <-- HERE in m/%s/
6df41af2
GS
2051
2052(W regexp) The pattern you've specified would be an infinite loop if the
7253e4e3
RK
2053regular expression engine didn't specifically check for that. The <-- HERE
2054shows in the regular expression about where the problem was discovered.
2055See L<perlre>.
6df41af2 2056
25f58aea
PN
2057=item "%s" may clash with future reserved word
2058
2059(W) This warning may be due to running a perl5 script through a perl4
2060interpreter, especially if the word that is being warned about is
2061"use" or "my".
2062
49704364 2063=item % may not be used in pack
6df41af2
GS
2064
2065(F) You can't pack a string by supplying a checksum, because the
be771a83
GS
2066checksumming process loses information, and you can't go the other way.
2067See L<perlfunc/unpack>.
6df41af2 2068
a0d0e21e
LW
2069=item Method for operation %s not found in package %s during blessing
2070
2071(F) An attempt was made to specify an entry in an overloading table that
e7ea3e70 2072doesn't resolve to a valid subroutine. See L<overload>.
a0d0e21e 2073
3cdd684c
TP
2074=item Method %s not permitted
2075
2076See Server error.
2077
a0d0e21e
LW
2078=item Might be a runaway multi-line %s string starting on line %d
2079
2080(S) An advisory indicating that the previous error may have been caused
2081by a missing delimiter on a string or pattern, because it eventually
2082ended earlier on the current line.
2083
2084=item Misplaced _ in number
2085
d4ced10d
JH
2086(W syntax) An underscore (underbar) in a numeric constant did not
2087separate two digits.
a0d0e21e 2088
4a2d328f 2089=item Missing %sbrace%s on \N{}
423cee85 2090
4a2d328f 2091(F) Wrong syntax of character name literal C<\N{charname}> within
423cee85
JH
2092double-quotish context.
2093
a0d0e21e
LW
2094=item Missing comma after first argument to %s function
2095
2096(F) While certain functions allow you to specify a filehandle or an
2097"indirect object" before the argument list, this ain't one of them.
2098
06eaf0bc
GS
2099=item Missing command in piped open
2100
be771a83
GS
2101(W pipe) You used the C<open(FH, "| command")> or
2102C<open(FH, "command |")> construction, but the command was missing or
2103blank.
06eaf0bc 2104
961ce445
RGS
2105=item Missing control char name in \c
2106
2107(F) A double-quoted string ended with "\c", without the required control
2108character name.
2109
6df41af2
GS
2110=item Missing name in "my sub"
2111
be771a83
GS
2112(F) The reserved syntax for lexically scoped subroutines requires that
2113they have a name with which they can be found.
6df41af2
GS
2114
2115=item Missing $ on loop variable
2116
be771a83
GS
2117(F) Apparently you've been programming in B<csh> too much. Variables
2118are always mentioned with the $ in Perl, unlike in the shells, where it
2119can vary from one line to the next.
6df41af2 2120
cc507455 2121=item (Missing operator before %s?)
748a9306
LW
2122
2123(S) This is an educated guess made in conjunction with the message "%s
2124found where operator expected". Often the missing operator is a comma.
2125
ab13f0c7
JH
2126=item Missing right brace on %s
2127
2128(F) Missing right brace in C<\p{...}> or C<\P{...}>.
2129
d98d5fff 2130=item Missing right curly or square bracket
a0d0e21e 2131
be771a83
GS
2132(F) The lexer counted more opening curly or square brackets than closing
2133ones. As a general rule, you'll find it's missing near the place you
2134were last editing.
a0d0e21e 2135
6df41af2
GS
2136=item (Missing semicolon on previous line?)
2137
2138(S) This is an educated guess made in conjunction with the message "%s
2139found where operator expected". Don't automatically put a semicolon on
2140the previous line just because you saw this message.
2141
a0d0e21e
LW
2142=item Modification of a read-only value attempted
2143
2144(F) You tried, directly or indirectly, to change the value of a
5f05dabc 2145constant. You didn't, of course, try "2 = 1", because the compiler
a0d0e21e
LW
2146catches that. But an easy way to do the same thing is:
2147
2148 sub mod { $_[0] = 1 }
2149 mod(2);
2150
2151Another way is to assign to a substr() that's off the end of the string.
2152
c5674021
PDF
2153Yet another way is to assign to a C<foreach> loop I<VAR> when I<VAR>
2154is aliased to a constant in the look I<LIST>:
2155
2156 $x = 1;
2157 foreach my $n ($x, 2) {
2158 $n *= 2; # modifies the $x, but fails on attempt to modify the 2
64977eb6 2159 }
c5674021 2160
7a4340ed 2161=item Modification of non-creatable array value attempted, %s
a0d0e21e
LW
2162
2163(F) You tried to make an array value spring into existence, and the
2164subscript was probably negative, even counting from end of the array
2165backwards.
2166
7a4340ed 2167=item Modification of non-creatable hash value attempted, %s
a0d0e21e 2168
be771a83
GS
2169(P) You tried to make a hash value spring into existence, and it
2170couldn't be created for some peculiar reason.
a0d0e21e
LW
2171
2172=item Module name must be constant
2173
2174(F) Only a bare module name is allowed as the first argument to a "use".
2175
be98fb35 2176=item Module name required with -%c option
6df41af2 2177
be98fb35
GS
2178(F) The C<-M> or C<-m> options say that Perl should load some module, but
2179you omitted the name of the module. Consult L<perlrun> for full details
2180about C<-M> and C<-m>.
6df41af2 2181
ed9aa3b7
SG
2182=item More than one argument to open
2183
2184(F) The C<open> function has been asked to open multiple files. This
2185can happen if you are trying to open a pipe to a command that takes a
2186list of arguments, but have forgotten to specify a piped open mode.
2187See L<perlfunc/open> for details.
2188
a0d0e21e
LW
2189=item msg%s not implemented
2190
2191(F) You don't have System V message IPC on your system.
2192
2193=item Multidimensional syntax %s not supported
2194
75b44862
GS
2195(W syntax) Multidimensional arrays aren't written like C<$foo[1,2,3]>.
2196They're written like C<$foo[1][2][3]>, as in C.
8b1a09fc 2197
49704364 2198=item '/' must be followed by 'a*', 'A*' or 'Z*'
09bef843 2199
6df41af2 2200(F) You had a pack template indicating a counted-length string,
be771a83
GS
2201Currently the only things that can have their length counted are a*, A*
2202or Z*. See L<perlfunc/pack>.
6df41af2 2203
49704364 2204=item '/' must follow a numeric type in unpack
6df41af2 2205
49704364
WL
2206(F) You had an unpack template that contained a '/', but this did not
2207follow some unpack specification producing a numeric value.
2208See L<perlfunc/pack>.
6df41af2
GS
2209
2210=item "my sub" not yet implemented
2211
be771a83
GS
2212(F) Lexically scoped subroutines are not yet implemented. Don't try
2213that yet.
6df41af2
GS
2214
2215=item "my" variable %s can't be in a package
2216
be771a83
GS
2217(F) Lexically scoped variables aren't in a package, so it doesn't make
2218sense to try to declare one with a package qualifier on the front. Use
2219local() if you want to localize a package variable.
09bef843 2220
8b1a09fc 2221=item Name "%s::%s" used only once: possible typo
2222
e476b1b5 2223(W once) Typographical errors often show up as unique variable names.
be771a83
GS
2224If you had a good reason for having a unique name, then just mention it
2225again somehow to suppress the message. The C<our> declaration is
77ca0c92 2226provided for this purpose.
a0d0e21e 2227
64b374f4
FD
2228NOTE: This warning detects symbols that have been used only once so $c, @c,
2229%c, *c, &c, sub c{}, c(), and c (the filehandle or format) are considered
2230the same; if a program uses $c only once but also uses any of the others it
2231will not trigger this warning.
2232
49704364
WL
2233=item Negative '/' count in unpack
2234
2235(F) The length count obtained from a length/code unpack operation was
2236negative. See L<perlfunc/pack>.
2237
a0d0e21e
LW
2238=item Negative length
2239
be771a83
GS
2240(F) You tried to do a read/write/send/recv operation with a buffer
2241length that is less than 0. This is difficult to imagine.
a0d0e21e 2242
ed9aa3b7
SG
2243=item Negative offset to vec in lvalue context
2244
2245(F) When C<vec> is called in an lvalue context, the second argument must be
2246greater than or equal to zero.
2247
7253e4e3 2248=item Nested quantifiers in regex; marked by <-- HERE in m/%s/
a0d0e21e 2249
b45f050a 2250(F) You can't quantify a quantifier without intervening parentheses. So
7253e4e3 2251things like ** or +* or ?* are illegal. The <-- HERE shows in the regular
b45f050a 2252expression about where the problem was discovered.
a0d0e21e 2253
7253e4e3 2254Note that the minimal matching quantifiers, C<*?>, C<+?>, and
be771a83 2255C<??> appear to be nested quantifiers, but aren't. See L<perlre>.
a0d0e21e 2256
6df41af2 2257=item %s never introduced
a0d0e21e 2258
be771a83
GS
2259(S internal) The symbol in question was declared but somehow went out of
2260scope before it could possibly have been used.
a0d0e21e 2261
dca6e23f
RB
2262=item Newline in left-justified string for %s
2263
2264(W printf) There is a newline in a string to be left justified by
2265C<printf> or C<sprintf>.
2266
2267The padding spaces will appear after the newline, which is probably not
2268what you wanted. Usually you should remove the newline from the string
2269and put formatting characters in the C<sprintf> format.
2270
a0d0e21e
LW
2271=item No %s allowed while running setuid
2272
be771a83
GS
2273(F) Certain operations are deemed to be too insecure for a setuid or
2274setgid script to even be allowed to attempt. Generally speaking there
2275will be another way to do what you want that is, if not secure, at least
2276securable. See L<perlsec>.
a0d0e21e 2277
a0d0e21e
LW
2278=item No comma allowed after %s
2279
2280(F) A list operator that has a filehandle or "indirect object" is not
2281allowed to have a comma between that and the following arguments.
2282Otherwise it'd be just another one of the arguments.
2283
0a753a76 2284One possible cause for this is that you expected to have imported a
2285constant to your name space with B<use> or B<import> while no such
2286importing took place, it may for example be that your operating system
2287does not support that particular constant. Hopefully you did use an
2288explicit import list for the constants you expect to see, please see
2289L<perlfunc/use> and L<perlfunc/import>. While an explicit import list
2290would probably have caught this error earlier it naturally does not
2291remedy the fact that your operating system still does not support that
2292constant. Maybe you have a typo in the constants of the symbol import
2293list of B<use> or B<import> or in the constant name at the line where
2294this error was triggered?
2295
748a9306
LW
2296=item No command into which to pipe on command line
2297
be771a83
GS
2298(F) An error peculiar to VMS. Perl handles its own command line
2299redirection, and found a '|' at the end of the command line, so it
2300doesn't know where you want to pipe the output from this command.
748a9306 2301
a0d0e21e
LW
2302=item No DB::DB routine defined
2303
be771a83
GS
2304(F) The currently executing code was compiled with the B<-d> switch, but
2305for some reason the perl5db.pl file (or some facsimile thereof) didn't
2306define a routine to be called at the beginning of each statement. Which
2307is odd, because the file should have been required automatically, and
2308should have blown up the require if it didn't parse right.
a0d0e21e
LW
2309
2310=item No dbm on this machine
2311
2312(P) This is counted as an internal error, because every machine should
5f05dabc 2313supply dbm nowadays, because Perl comes with SDBM. See L<SDBM_File>.
a0d0e21e
LW
2314
2315=item No DBsub routine
2316
2317(F) The currently executing code was compiled with the B<-d> switch,
2318but for some reason the perl5db.pl file (or some facsimile thereof)
2319didn't define a DB::sub routine to be called at the beginning of each
2320ordinary subroutine call.
2321
96ebfdd7
RK
2322=item No B<-e> allowed in setuid scripts
2323
2324(F) A setuid script can't be specified by the user.
2325
c47ff5f1 2326=item No error file after 2> or 2>> on command line
748a9306 2327
be771a83
GS
2328(F) An error peculiar to VMS. Perl handles its own command line
2329redirection, and found a '2>' or a '2>>' on the command line, but can't
2330find the name of the file to which to write data destined for stderr.
748a9306 2331
49704364
WL
2332=item No group ending character '%c' found in template
2333
2334(F) A pack or unpack template has an opening '(' or '[' without its
2335matching counterpart. See L<perlfunc/pack>.
2336
c47ff5f1 2337=item No input file after < on command line
748a9306 2338
be771a83
GS
2339(F) An error peculiar to VMS. Perl handles its own command line
2340redirection, and found a '<' on the command line, but can't find the
2341name of the file from which to read data for stdin.
748a9306 2342
6df41af2
GS
2343=item No #! line
2344
2345(F) The setuid emulator requires that scripts have a well-formed #! line
2346even on machines that don't support the #! construct.
2347
2348=item "no" not allowed in expression
2349
be771a83
GS
2350(F) The "no" keyword is recognized and executed at compile time, and
2351returns no useful value. See L<perlmod>.
6df41af2 2352
c47ff5f1 2353=item No output file after > on command line
748a9306 2354
be771a83
GS
2355(F) An error peculiar to VMS. Perl handles its own command line
2356redirection, and found a lone '>' at the end of the command line, so it
2357doesn't know where you wanted to redirect stdout.
748a9306 2358
c47ff5f1 2359=item No output file after > or >> on command line
748a9306 2360
be771a83
GS
2361(F) An error peculiar to VMS. Perl handles its own command line
2362redirection, and found a '>' or a '>>' on the command line, but can't
2363find the name of the file to which to write data destined for stdout.
748a9306 2364
1ec3e8de
GS
2365=item No package name allowed for variable %s in "our"
2366
be771a83
GS
2367(F) Fully qualified variable names are not allowed in "our"
2368declarations, because that doesn't make much sense under existing
2369semantics. Such syntax is reserved for future extensions.
1ec3e8de 2370
a0d0e21e
LW
2371=item No Perl script found in input
2372
2373(F) You called C<perl -x>, but no line was found in the file beginning
2374with #! and containing the word "perl".
2375
2376=item No setregid available
2377
2378(F) Configure didn't find anything resembling the setregid() call for
2379your system.
2380
2381=item No setreuid available
2382
2383(F) Configure didn't find anything resembling the setreuid() call for
2384your system.
2385
a67e862a 2386=item No space allowed after -%c
a0d0e21e 2387
be771a83
GS
2388(F) The argument to the indicated command line switch must follow
2389immediately after the switch, without intervening spaces.
a0d0e21e 2390
6df41af2
GS
2391=item No %s specified for -%c
2392
2393(F) The indicated command line switch needs a mandatory argument, but
2394you haven't specified one.
2395
2c692339
RGS
2396=item No such class %s
2397
2398(F) You provided a class qualifier in a "my" or "our" declaration, but
2399this class doesn't exist at this point in your program.
2400
6df41af2
GS
2401=item No such pipe open
2402
2403(P) An error peculiar to VMS. The internal routine my_pclose() tried to
be771a83
GS
2404close a pipe which hadn't been opened. This should have been caught
2405earlier as an attempt to close an unopened filehandle.
6df41af2 2406
a0d0e21e
LW
2407=item No such signal: SIG%s
2408
be771a83
GS
2409(W signal) You specified a signal name as a subscript to %SIG that was
2410not recognized. Say C<kill -l> in your shell to see the valid signal
2411names on your system.
a0d0e21e
LW
2412
2413=item Not a CODE reference
2414
2415(F) Perl was trying to evaluate a reference to a code value (that is, a
2416subroutine), but found a reference to something else instead. You can
be771a83
GS
2417use the ref() function to find out what kind of ref it really was. See
2418also L<perlref>.
a0d0e21e
LW
2419
2420=item Not a format reference
2421
2422(F) I'm not sure how you managed to generate a reference to an anonymous
2423format, but this indicates you did, and that it didn't exist.
2424
2425=item Not a GLOB reference
2426
be771a83
GS
2427(F) Perl was trying to evaluate a reference to a "typeglob" (that is, a
2428symbol table entry that looks like C<*foo>), but found a reference to
2429something else instead. You can use the ref() function to find out what
2430kind of ref it really was. See L<perlref>.
a0d0e21e
LW
2431
2432=item Not a HASH reference
2433
be771a83
GS
2434(F) Perl was trying to evaluate a reference to a hash value, but found a
2435reference to something else instead. You can use the ref() function to
2436find out what kind of ref it really was. See L<perlref>.
a0d0e21e 2437
6df41af2
GS
2438=item Not an ARRAY reference
2439
be771a83
GS
2440(F) Perl was trying to evaluate a reference to an array value, but found
2441a reference to something else instead. You can use the ref() function
2442to find out what kind of ref it really was. See L<perlref>.
6df41af2 2443
a0d0e21e
LW
2444=item Not a perl script
2445
2446(F) The setuid emulator requires that scripts have a well-formed #! line
2447even on machines that don't support the #! construct. The line must
2448mention perl.
2449
2450=item Not a SCALAR reference
2451
be771a83
GS
2452(F) Perl was trying to evaluate a reference to a scalar value, but found
2453a reference to something else instead. You can use the ref() function
2454to find out what kind of ref it really was. See L<perlref>.
a0d0e21e
LW
2455
2456=item Not a subroutine reference
2457
2458(F) Perl was trying to evaluate a reference to a code value (that is, a
2459subroutine), but found a reference to something else instead. You can
be771a83
GS
2460use the ref() function to find out what kind of ref it really was. See
2461also L<perlref>.
a0d0e21e 2462
e7ea3e70 2463=item Not a subroutine reference in overload table
a0d0e21e
LW
2464
2465(F) An attempt was made to specify an entry in an overloading table that
8b1a09fc 2466doesn't somehow point to a valid subroutine. See L<overload>.
a0d0e21e 2467
a0d0e21e
LW
2468=item Not enough arguments for %s
2469
2470(F) The function requires more arguments than you specified.
2471
6df41af2
GS
2472=item Not enough format arguments
2473
be771a83
GS
2474(W syntax) A format specified more picture fields than the next line
2475supplied. See L<perlform>.
6df41af2
GS
2476
2477=item %s: not found
2478
be771a83
GS
2479(A) You've accidentally run your script through the Bourne shell instead
2480of Perl. Check the #! line, or manually feed your script into Perl
2481yourself.
6df41af2
GS
2482
2483=item no UTC offset information; assuming local time is UTC
a0d0e21e 2484
6df41af2
GS
2485(S) A warning peculiar to VMS. Perl was unable to find the local
2486timezone offset, so it's assuming that local system time is equivalent
be771a83
GS
2487to UTC. If it's not, define the logical name
2488F<SYS$TIMEZONE_DIFFERENTIAL> to translate to the number of seconds which
2489need to be added to UTC to get local time.
a0d0e21e
LW
2490
2491=item Null filename used
2492
be771a83
GS
2493(F) You can't require the null filename, especially because on many
2494machines that means the current directory! See L<perlfunc/require>.
a0d0e21e 2495
6df41af2
GS
2496=item NULL OP IN RUN
2497
be771a83
GS
2498(P debugging) Some internal routine called run() with a null opcode
2499pointer.
6df41af2 2500
55497cff 2501=item Null picture in formline
2502
2503(F) The first argument to formline must be a valid format picture
2504specification. It was found to be empty, which probably means you
2505supplied it an uninitialized value. See L<perlform>.
2506
a0d0e21e
LW
2507=item Null realloc
2508
2509(P) An attempt was made to realloc NULL.
2510
2511=item NULL regexp argument
2512
5f05dabc 2513(P) The internal pattern matching routines blew it big time.
a0d0e21e
LW
2514
2515=item NULL regexp parameter
2516
2517(P) The internal pattern matching routines are out of their gourd.
2518
fc36a67e 2519=item Number too long
2520
be771a83 2521(F) Perl limits the representation of decimal numbers in programs to
da75cd15 2522about 250 characters. You've exceeded that length. Future
be771a83
GS
2523versions of Perl are likely to eliminate this arbitrary limitation. In
2524the meantime, try using scientific notation (e.g. "1e6" instead of
2525"1_000_000").
fc36a67e 2526
6df41af2
GS
2527=item Octal number in vector unsupported
2528
be771a83
GS
2529(F) Numbers with a leading C<0> are not currently allowed in vectors.
2530The octal number interpretation of such numbers may be supported in a
2531future version.
6df41af2 2532
252aa082
JH
2533=item Octal number > 037777777777 non-portable
2534
75b44862 2535(W portable) The octal number you specified is larger than 2**32-1
be771a83
GS
2536(4294967295) and therefore non-portable between systems. See
2537L<perlport> for more on portability concerns.
252aa082
JH
2538
2539See also L<perlport> for writing portable code.
2540
6ad11d81
JH
2541=item Odd number of arguments for overload::constant
2542
04a80ee0
RGS
2543(W overload) The call to overload::constant contained an odd number of
2544arguments. The arguments should come in pairs.
6ad11d81 2545
b21befc1
MG
2546=item Odd number of elements in anonymous hash
2547
2548(W misc) You specified an odd number of elements to initialize a hash,
2549which is odd, because hashes come in key/value pairs.
2550
1930e939 2551=item Odd number of elements in hash assignment
a0d0e21e 2552
be771a83
GS
2553(W misc) You specified an odd number of elements to initialize a hash,
2554which is odd, because hashes come in key/value pairs.
a0d0e21e 2555
bbce6d69 2556=item Offset outside string
2557
2558(F) You tried to do a read/write/send/recv operation with an offset
be771a83
GS
2559pointing outside the buffer. This is difficult to imagine. The sole
2560exception to this is that C<sysread()>ing past the buffer will extend
2561the buffer and zero pad the new area.
bbce6d69 2562
c289d2f7 2563=item %s() on unopened %s
2dd78f96
JH
2564
2565(W unopened) An I/O operation was attempted on a filehandle that was
2566never initialized. You need to do an open(), a sysopen(), or a socket()
2567call, or call a constructor from the FileHandle package.
2568
96ebfdd7
RK
2569=item -%s on unopened filehandle %s
2570
2571(W unopened) You tried to invoke a file test operator on a filehandle
2572that isn't open. Check your control flow. See also L<perlfunc/-X>.
2573
a0d0e21e
LW
2574=item oops: oopsAV
2575
e476b1b5 2576(S internal) An internal warning that the grammar is screwed up.
a0d0e21e
LW
2577
2578=item oops: oopsHV
2579
e476b1b5 2580(S internal) An internal warning that the grammar is screwed up.
a0d0e21e 2581
56f7f34b 2582=item Operation `%s': no method found, %s
44a8e56a 2583
be771a83
GS
2584(F) An attempt was made to perform an overloaded operation for which no
2585handler was defined. While some handlers can be autogenerated in terms
2586of other handlers, there is no default handler for any operation, unless
2587C<fallback> overloading key is specified to be true. See L<overload>.
44a8e56a 2588
748a9306
LW
2589=item Operator or semicolon missing before %s
2590
be771a83
GS
2591(S ambiguous) You used a variable or subroutine call where the parser
2592was expecting an operator. The parser has assumed you really meant to
2593use an operator, but this is highly likely to be incorrect. For
2594example, if you say "*foo *foo" it will be interpreted as if you said
2595"*foo * 'foo'".
748a9306 2596
6df41af2
GS
2597=item "our" variable %s redeclared
2598
be771a83
GS
2599(W misc) You seem to have already declared the same global once before
2600in the current lexical scope.
6df41af2 2601
a80b8354
GS
2602=item Out of memory!
2603
2604(X) The malloc() function returned 0, indicating there was insufficient
be771a83
GS
2605remaining memory (or virtual memory) to satisfy the request. Perl has
2606no option but to exit immediately.
a80b8354 2607
19a52907
JH
2608At least in Unix you may be able to get past this by increasing your
2609process datasize limits: in csh/tcsh use C<limit> and
2610C<limit datasize n> (where C<n> is the number of kilobytes) to check
2611the current limits and change them, and in ksh/bash/zsh use C<ulimit -a>
2612and C<ulimit -d n>, respectively.
2613
6df41af2 2614=item Out of memory during "large" request for %s
a0d0e21e 2615
6df41af2
GS
2616(F) The malloc() function returned 0, indicating there was insufficient
2617remaining memory (or virtual memory) to satisfy the request. However,
be771a83
GS
2618the request was judged large enough (compile-time default is 64K), so a
2619possibility to shut down by trapping this error is granted.
a0d0e21e 2620
1b979e0a 2621=item Out of memory during request for %s
a0d0e21e 2622
be771a83
GS
2623(X|F) The malloc() function returned 0, indicating there was
2624insufficient remaining memory (or virtual memory) to satisfy the
2625request.
eff9c6e2
CS
2626
2627The request was judged to be small, so the possibility to trap it
2628depends on the way perl was compiled. By default it is not trappable.
be771a83
GS
2629However, if compiled for this, Perl may use the contents of C<$^M> as an
2630emergency pool after die()ing with this message. In this case the error
b022d2d2
IZ
2631is trappable I<once>, and the error message will include the line and file
2632where the failed request happened.
55497cff 2633
1b979e0a
IZ
2634=item Out of memory during ridiculously large request
2635
2636(F) You can't allocate more than 2^31+"small amount" bytes. This error
be771a83
GS
2637is most likely to be caused by a typo in the Perl program. e.g.,
2638C<$arr[time]> instead of C<$arr[$time]>.
1b979e0a 2639
6df41af2
GS
2640=item Out of memory for yacc stack
2641
be771a83
GS
2642(F) The yacc parser wanted to grow its stack so it could continue
2643parsing, but realloc() wouldn't give it more memory, virtual or
2644otherwise.
6df41af2 2645
49704364 2646=item '@' outside of string in unpack
6df41af2 2647
49704364 2648(F) You had a template that specified an absolute position outside
6df41af2
GS
2649the string being unpacked. See L<perlfunc/pack>.
2650
2651=item %s package attribute may clash with future reserved word: %s
2652
be771a83
GS
2653(W reserved) A lowercase attribute name was used that had a
2654package-specific handler. That name might have a meaning to Perl itself
2655some day, even though it doesn't yet. Perhaps you should use a
2656mixed-case attribute name, instead. See L<attributes>.
6df41af2 2657
96ebfdd7
RK
2658=item pack/unpack repeat count overflow
2659
2660(F) You can't specify a repeat count so large that it overflows your
2661signed integers. See L<perlfunc/pack>.
2662
a0d0e21e
LW
2663=item page overflow
2664
be771a83
GS
2665(W io) A single call to write() produced more lines than can fit on a
2666page. See L<perlform>.
a0d0e21e 2667
6df41af2
GS
2668=item panic: %s
2669
2670(P) An internal error.
2671
a0d0e21e
LW
2672=item panic: ck_grep
2673
2674(P) Failed an internal consistency check trying to compile a grep.
2675
2676=item panic: ck_split
2677
2678(P) Failed an internal consistency check trying to compile a split.
2679
2680=item panic: corrupt saved stack index
2681
be771a83
GS
2682(P) The savestack was requested to restore more localized values than
2683there are in the savestack.
a0d0e21e 2684
810b8aa5
GS
2685=item panic: del_backref
2686
2687(P) Failed an internal consistency check while trying to reset a weak
2688reference.
2689
7619c85e
RG
2690=item panic: Devel::DProf inconsistent subroutine return
2691
2692(P) Devel::DProf called a subroutine that exited using goto(LABEL),
2693last(LABEL) or next(LABEL). Leaving that way a subroutine called from
2694an XSUB will lead very probably to a crash of the interpreter. This is
2695a bug that will hopefully one day get fixed.
2696
a0d0e21e
LW
2697=item panic: die %s
2698
2699(P) We popped the context stack to an eval context, and then discovered
2700it wasn't an eval context.
2701
a0d0e21e
LW
2702=item panic: do_subst
2703
be771a83
GS
2704(P) The internal pp_subst() routine was called with invalid operational
2705data.
a0d0e21e 2706
2269b42e 2707=item panic: do_trans_%s
a0d0e21e 2708
2269b42e 2709(P) The internal do_trans routines were called with invalid operational
be771a83 2710data.
a0d0e21e 2711
c635e13b 2712=item panic: frexp
2713
2714(P) The library function frexp() failed, making printf("%f") impossible.
2715
a0d0e21e
LW
2716=item panic: goto
2717
2718(P) We popped the context stack to a context with the specified label,
2719and then discovered it wasn't a context we know how to do a goto in.
2720
2721=item panic: INTERPCASEMOD
2722
2723(P) The lexer got into a bad state at a case modifier.
2724
2725=item panic: INTERPCONCAT
2726
2727(P) The lexer got into a bad state parsing a string with brackets.
2728
e446cec8
IZ
2729=item panic: kid popen errno read
2730
2731(F) forked child returned an incomprehensible message about its errno.
2732
a0d0e21e
LW
2733=item panic: last
2734
2735(P) We popped the context stack to a block context, and then discovered
2736it wasn't a block context.
2737
2738=item panic: leave_scope clearsv
2739
be771a83
GS
2740(P) A writable lexical variable became read-only somehow within the
2741scope.
a0d0e21e
LW
2742
2743=item panic: leave_scope inconsistency
2744
2745(P) The savestack probably got out of sync. At least, there was an
2746invalid enum on the top of it.
2747
810b8aa5
GS
2748=item panic: magic_killbackrefs
2749
2750(P) Failed an internal consistency check while trying to reset all weak
2751references to an object.
2752
6df41af2
GS
2753=item panic: malloc
2754
2755(P) Something requested a negative number of bytes of malloc.
2756
a0d0e21e
LW
2757=item panic: mapstart
2758
2759(P) The compiler is screwed up with respect to the map() function.
2760
2761=item panic: null array
2762
2763(P) One of the internal array routines was passed a null AV pointer.
2764
2765=item panic: pad_alloc
2766
2767(P) The compiler got confused about which scratch pad it was allocating
2768and freeing temporaries and lexicals from.
2769
2770=item panic: pad_free curpad
2771
2772(P) The compiler got confused about which scratch pad it was allocating
2773and freeing temporaries and lexicals from.
2774
2775=item panic: pad_free po
2776
2777(P) An invalid scratch pad offset was detected internally.
2778
2779=item panic: pad_reset curpad
2780
2781(P) The compiler got confused about which scratch pad it was allocating
2782and freeing temporaries and lexicals from.
2783
2784=item panic: pad_sv po
2785
2786(P) An invalid scratch pad offset was detected internally.
2787
2788=item panic: pad_swipe curpad
2789
2790(P) The compiler got confused about which scratch pad it was allocating
2791and freeing temporaries and lexicals from.
2792
2793=item panic: pad_swipe po
2794
2795(P) An invalid scratch pad offset was detected internally.
2796
2797=item panic: pp_iter
2798
2799(P) The foreach iterator got called in a non-loop context frame.
2800
96ebfdd7
RK
2801=item panic: pp_match%s
2802
2803(P) The internal pp_match() routine was called with invalid operational
2804data.
2805
2269b42e
JH
2806=item panic: pp_split
2807
2808(P) Something terrible went wrong in setting up for the split.
2809
a0d0e21e
LW
2810=item panic: realloc
2811
2812(P) Something requested a negative number of bytes of realloc.
2813
2814=item panic: restartop
2815
2816(P) Some internal routine requested a goto (or something like it), and
2817didn't supply the destination.
2818
2819=item panic: return
2820
2821(P) We popped the context stack to a subroutine or eval context, and
2822then discovered it wasn't a subroutine or eval context.
2823
2824=item panic: scan_num
2825
2826(P) scan_num() got called on something that wasn't a number.
2827
2828=item panic: sv_insert
2829
2830(P) The sv_insert() routine was told to remove more string than there
2831was string.
2832
2833=item panic: top_env
2834
6224f72b 2835(P) The compiler attempted to do a goto, or something weird like that.
a0d0e21e 2836
dea0fc0b
JH
2837=item panic: utf16_to_utf8: odd bytelen
2838
2839(P) Something tried to call utf16_to_utf8 with an odd (as opposed
64977eb6 2840to even) byte length.
dea0fc0b 2841
2f7da168
RK
2842=item panic: yylex
2843
2844(P) The lexer got into a bad state while processing a case modifier.
2845
7b8d334a 2846=item Parentheses missing around "%s" list
a0d0e21e 2847
e476b1b5 2848(W parenthesis) You said something like
a0d0e21e
LW
2849
2850 my $foo, $bar = @_;
2851
2852when you meant
2853
2854 my ($foo, $bar) = @_;
2855
54884818 2856Remember that "my", "our", and "local" bind tighter than comma.
a0d0e21e 2857
96ebfdd7
RK
2858=item C<-p> destination: %s
2859
2860(F) An error occurred during the implicit output invoked by the C<-p>
2861command-line switch. (This output goes to STDOUT unless you've
2862redirected it with select().)
2863
2864=item (perhaps you forgot to load "%s"?)
2865
2866(F) This is an educated guess made in conjunction with the message
2867"Can't locate object method \"%s\" via package \"%s\"". It often means
2868that a method requires a package that has not been loaded.
2869
75b44862 2870=item Perl %s required--this is only version %s, stopped
a0d0e21e 2871
be771a83
GS
2872(F) The module in question uses features of a version of Perl more
2873recent than the currently running version. How long has it been since
2874you upgraded, anyway? See L<perlfunc/require>.
a0d0e21e 2875
6df41af2
GS
2876=item PERL_SH_DIR too long
2877
2878(F) An error peculiar to OS/2. PERL_SH_DIR is the directory to find the
fecfaeb8 2879C<sh>-shell in. See "PERL_SH_DIR" in L<perlos2>.
6df41af2 2880
96ebfdd7
RK
2881=item PERL_SIGNALS illegal: "%s"
2882
2883See L<perlrun/PERL_SIGNALS> for legal values.
2884
6df41af2
GS
2885=item perl: warning: Setting locale failed.
2886
2887(S) The whole warning message will look something like:
2888
2889 perl: warning: Setting locale failed.
2890 perl: warning: Please check that your locale settings:
2891 LC_ALL = "En_US",
2892 LANG = (unset)
2893 are supported and installed on your system.
2894 perl: warning: Falling back to the standard locale ("C").
2895
2896Exactly what were the failed locale settings varies. In the above the
2897settings were that the LC_ALL was "En_US" and the LANG had no value.
0ea6b70f
JH
2898This error means that Perl detected that you and/or your operating
2899system supplier and/or system administrator have set up the so-called
2900locale system but Perl could not use those settings. This was not
2901dead serious, fortunately: there is a "default locale" called "C" that
2902Perl can and will use, the script will be run. Before you really fix
2903the problem, however, you will get the same error message each time
2904you run Perl. How to really fix the problem can be found in
2905L<perllocale> section B<LOCALE PROBLEMS>.
6df41af2 2906
a0d0e21e
LW
2907=item Permission denied
2908
2909(F) The setuid emulator in suidperl decided you were up to no good.
2910
bd3fa61c 2911=item pid %x not a child
748a9306 2912
be771a83
GS
2913(W exec) A warning peculiar to VMS. Waitpid() was asked to wait for a
2914process which isn't a subprocess of the current process. While this is
2915fine from VMS' perspective, it's probably not what you intended.
748a9306 2916
49704364 2917=item 'P' must have an explicit size in unpack
3bf38418
WL
2918
2919(F) The unpack format P must have an explicit size, not "*".
2920
96ebfdd7
RK
2921=item B<-P> not allowed for setuid/setgid script
2922
2923(F) The script would have to be opened by the C preprocessor by name,
2924which provides a race condition that breaks security.
2925
2926=item POSIX class [:%s:] unknown in regex; marked by <-- HERE in m/%s/
2927
2928(F) The class in the character class [: :] syntax is unknown. The <-- HERE
2929shows in the regular expression about where the problem was discovered.
2930Note that the POSIX character classes do B<not> have the C<is> prefix
2931the corresponding C interfaces have: in other words, it's C<[[:print:]]>,
2932not C<isprint>. See L<perlre>.
2933
2934=item POSIX getpgrp can't take an argument
2935
2936(F) Your system has POSIX getpgrp(), which takes no argument, unlike
2937the BSD version, which takes a pid.
2938
49704364 2939=item POSIX syntax [%s] belongs inside character classes in regex; marked by <-- HERE in m/%s/
b45f050a 2940
9a0b3859 2941(W regexp) The character class constructs [: :], [= =], and [. .] go
7253e4e3
RK
2942I<inside> character classes, the [] are part of the construct, for example:
2943/[012[:alpha:]345]/. Note that [= =] and [. .] are not currently
2944implemented; they are simply placeholders for future extensions and will
2945cause fatal errors. The <-- HERE shows in the regular expression about
2946where the problem was discovered. See L<perlre>.
b45f050a 2947
49704364 2948=item POSIX syntax [. .] is reserved for future extensions in regex; marked by <-- HERE in m/%s/
b45f050a
JF
2949
2950(F regexp) Within regular expression character classes ([]) the syntax
7253e4e3
RK
2951beginning with "[." and ending with ".]" is reserved for future extensions.
2952If you need to represent those character sequences inside a regular
2953expression character class, just quote the square brackets with the
2954backslash: "\[." and ".\]". The <-- HERE shows in the regular expression
2955about where the problem was discovered. See L<perlre>.
b45f050a 2956
49704364 2957=item POSIX syntax [= =] is reserved for future extensions in regex; marked by <-- HERE in m/%s/
b45f050a 2958
7253e4e3
RK
2959(F) Within regular expression character classes ([]) the syntax beginning
2960with "[=" and ending with "=]" is reserved for future extensions. If you
2961need to represent those character sequences inside a regular expression
2962character class, just quote the square brackets with the backslash: "\[="
2963and "=\]". The <-- HERE shows in the regular expression about where the
2964problem was discovered. See L<perlre>.
b45f050a 2965
bbce6d69 2966=item Possible attempt to put comments in qw() list
2967
e476b1b5 2968(W qw) qw() lists contain items separated by whitespace; as with literal
75b44862 2969strings, comment characters are not ignored, but are instead treated as
be771a83
GS
2970literal data. (You may have used different delimiters than the
2971parentheses shown here; braces are also frequently used.)
bbce6d69 2972
774d564b 2973You probably wrote something like this:
2974
54310121 2975 @list = qw(
774d564b 2976 a # a comment
bbce6d69 2977 b # another comment
774d564b 2978 );
bbce6d69 2979
2980when you should have written this:
2981
774d564b 2982 @list = qw(
54310121 2983 a
2984 b
774d564b 2985 );
2986
2987If you really want comments, build your list the
2988old-fashioned way, with quotes and commas:
2989
2990 @list = (
2991 'a', # a comment
2992 'b', # another comment
2993 );
bbce6d69 2994
2995=item Possible attempt to separate words with commas
2996
be771a83
GS
2997(W qw) qw() lists contain items separated by whitespace; therefore
2998commas aren't needed to separate the items. (You may have used
2999different delimiters than the parentheses shown here; braces are also
3000frequently used.)
bbce6d69 3001
54310121 3002You probably wrote something like this:
bbce6d69 3003
774d564b 3004 qw! a, b, c !;
3005
3006which puts literal commas into some of the list items. Write it without
3007commas if you don't want them to appear in your data:
bbce6d69 3008
774d564b 3009 qw! a b c !;
bbce6d69 3010
a0d0e21e
LW
3011=item Possible memory corruption: %s overflowed 3rd argument
3012
3013(F) An ioctl() or fcntl() returned more than Perl was bargaining for.
3014Perl guesses a reasonable buffer size, but puts a sentinel byte at the
3015end of the buffer just in case. This sentinel byte got clobbered, and
3016Perl assumes that memory is now corrupted. See L<perlfunc/ioctl>.
3017
276b2a0c
RGS
3018=item Possible precedence problem on bitwise %c operator
3019
3020(W precedence) Your program uses a bitwise logical operator in conjunction
3021with a numeric comparison operator, like this :
3022
3023 if ($x & $y == 0) { ... }
3024
3025This expression is actually equivalent to C<$x & ($y == 0)>, due to the
3026higher precedence of C<==>. This is probably not what you want. (If you
96a925ab
YST
3027really meant to write this, disable the warning, or, better, put the
3028parentheses explicitly and write C<$x & ($y == 0)>).
276b2a0c 3029
18623440
PS
3030=item Possible unintended interpolation of %s in string
3031
3032(W ambiguous) You said something like `@foo' in a double-quoted string
32b0a12e
AMS
3033but there was no array C<@foo> in scope at the time. If you wanted a
3034literal @foo, then write it as \@foo; otherwise find out what happened
3035to the array you apparently lost track of.
18623440 3036
6df41af2
GS
3037=item Possible Y2K bug: %s
3038
3039(W y2k) You are concatenating the number 19 with another number, which
3040could be a potential Year 2000 problem.
3041
8cd79558
GS
3042=item pragma "attrs" is deprecated, use "sub NAME : ATTRS" instead
3043
a1063b2d 3044(D deprecated) You have written something like this:
8cd79558
GS
3045
3046 sub doit
3047 {
3048 use attrs qw(locked);
3049 }
3050
3051You should use the new declaration syntax instead.
3052
3053 sub doit : locked
3054 {
3055 ...
3056
3057The C<use attrs> pragma is now obsolete, and is only provided for
3058backward-compatibility. See L<perlsub/"Subroutine Attributes">.
3059
a0d0e21e
LW
3060=item Precedence problem: open %s should be open(%s)
3061
e476b1b5 3062(S precedence) The old irregular construct
cb1a09d0 3063
a0d0e21e
LW
3064 open FOO || die;
3065
3066is now misinterpreted as
3067
3068 open(FOO || die);
3069
be771a83
GS
3070because of the strict regularization of Perl 5's grammar into unary and
3071list operators. (The old open was a little of both.) You must put
3072parentheses around the filehandle, or use the new "or" operator instead
3073of "||".
a0d0e21e 3074
3cdd684c
TP
3075=item Premature end of script headers
3076
3077See Server error.
3078
6df41af2
GS
3079=item printf() on closed filehandle %s
3080
be771a83 3081(W closed) The filehandle you're writing to got itself closed sometime
c289d2f7 3082before now. Check your control flow.
6df41af2 3083
9a7dcd9c 3084=item print() on closed filehandle %s
a0d0e21e 3085
be771a83 3086(W closed) The filehandle you're printing on got itself closed sometime
c289d2f7 3087before now. Check your control flow.
a0d0e21e 3088
6df41af2 3089=item Process terminated by SIG%s
a0d0e21e 3090
6df41af2
GS
3091(W) This is a standard message issued by OS/2 applications, while *nix
3092applications die in silence. It is considered a feature of the OS/2
3093port. One can easily disable this by appropriate sighandlers, see
3094L<perlipc/"Signals">. See also "Process terminated by SIGTERM/SIGINT"
fecfaeb8 3095in L<perlos2>.
a0d0e21e 3096
3fe9a6f1 3097=item Prototype mismatch: %s vs %s
4633a7c4 3098
9a0b3859 3099(S prototype) The subroutine being declared or defined had previously been
be771a83 3100declared or defined with a different function prototype.
4633a7c4 3101
ed9aa3b7
SG
3102=item Prototype not terminated
3103
2a6fd447 3104(F) You've omitted the closing parenthesis in a function prototype
ed9aa3b7
SG
3105definition.
3106
96ebfdd7
RK
3107=item Quantifier follows nothing in regex; marked by <-- HERE in m/%s/
3108
3109(F) You started a regular expression with a quantifier. Backslash it if you
3110meant it literally. The <-- HERE shows in the regular expression about
3111where the problem was discovered. See L<perlre>.
3112
49704364 3113=item Quantifier in {,} bigger than %d in regex; marked by <-- HERE in m/%s/
9baa0206 3114
b45f050a 3115(F) There is currently a limit to the size of the min and max values of the
7253e4e3 3116{min,max} construct. The <-- HERE shows in the regular expression about where
b45f050a 3117the problem was discovered. See L<perlre>.
9baa0206 3118
49704364 3119=item Quantifier unexpected on zero-length expression; marked by <-- HERE in m/%s/
9baa0206 3120
b45f050a
JF
3121(W regexp) You applied a regular expression quantifier in a place where
3122it makes no sense, such as on a zero-width assertion. Try putting the
3123quantifier inside the assertion instead. For example, the way to match
3124"abc" provided that it is followed by three repetitions of "xyz" is
3125C</abc(?=(?:xyz){3})/>, not C</abc(?=xyz){3}/>.
9baa0206 3126
7253e4e3
RK
3127The <-- HERE shows in the regular expression about where the problem was
3128discovered.
3129
89ea2908
GA
3130=item Range iterator outside integer range
3131
3132(F) One (or both) of the numeric arguments to the range operator ".."
3133are outside the range which can be represented by integers internally.
be771a83
GS
3134One possible workaround is to force Perl to use magical string increment
3135by prepending "0" to your numbers.
89ea2908 3136
96ebfdd7
RK
3137=item readline() on closed filehandle %s
3138
3139(W closed) The filehandle you're reading from got itself closed sometime
3140before now. Check your control flow.
3141
b5fe5ca2
SR
3142=item read() on closed filehandle %s
3143
3144(W closed) You tried to read from a closed filehandle.
3145
3146=item read() on unopened filehandle %s
3147
3148(W unopened) You tried to read from a filehandle that was never opened.
3149
6df41af2
GS
3150=item Reallocation too large: %lx
3151
3152(F) You can't allocate more than 64K on an MS-DOS machine.
3153
4ad56ec9
IZ
3154=item realloc() of freed memory ignored
3155
be771a83
GS
3156(S malloc) An internal routine called realloc() on something that had
3157already been freed.
4ad56ec9 3158
a0d0e21e
LW
3159=item Recompile perl with B<-D>DEBUGGING to use B<-D> switch
3160
be771a83
GS
3161(F debugging) You can't use the B<-D> option unless the code to produce
3162the desired output is compiled into Perl, which entails some overhead,
a0d0e21e
LW
3163which is why it's currently left out of your copy.
3164
3e0ccd42 3165=item Recursive inheritance detected in package '%s'
a0d0e21e
LW
3166
3167(F) More than 100 levels of inheritance were used. Probably indicates
3168an unintended loop in your inheritance hierarchy.
3169
7a4340ed 3170=item Recursive inheritance detected while looking for method %s
3e0ccd42 3171
be771a83
GS
3172(F) More than 100 levels of inheritance were encountered while invoking
3173a method. Probably indicates an unintended loop in your inheritance
3174hierarchy.
3e0ccd42 3175
1930e939
TP
3176=item Reference found where even-sized list expected
3177
be771a83
GS
3178(W misc) You gave a single reference where Perl was expecting a list
3179with an even number of elements (for assignment to a hash). This usually
3180means that you used the anon hash constructor when you meant to use
3181parens. In any case, a hash requires key/value B<pairs>.
7b8d334a
GS
3182
3183 %hash = { one => 1, two => 2, }; # WRONG
3184 %hash = [ qw/ an anon array / ]; # WRONG
3185 %hash = ( one => 1, two => 2, ); # right
3186 %hash = qw( one 1 two 2 ); # also fine
3187
810b8aa5
GS
3188=item Reference is already weak
3189
e476b1b5 3190(W misc) You have attempted to weaken a reference that is already weak.
810b8aa5
GS
3191Doing so has no effect.
3192
a0d0e21e
LW
3193=item Reference miscount in sv_replace()
3194
be771a83
GS
3195(W internal) The internal sv_replace() function was handed a new SV with
3196a reference count of other than 1.
a0d0e21e 3197
49704364 3198=item Reference to nonexistent group in regex; marked by <-- HERE in m/%s/
b45f050a
JF
3199
3200(F) You used something like C<\7> in your regular expression, but there are
3201not at least seven sets of capturing parentheses in the expression. If you
3202wanted to have the character with value 7 inserted into the regular expression,
3203prepend a zero to make the number at least two digits: C<\07>
9baa0206 3204
7253e4e3 3205The <-- HERE shows in the regular expression about where the problem was
b45f050a 3206discovered.
9baa0206 3207
a0d0e21e
LW
3208=item regexp memory corruption
3209
3210(P) The regular expression engine got confused by what the regular
3211expression compiler gave it.
3212
b45f050a 3213=item Regexp out of space
a0d0e21e 3214
be771a83
GS
3215(P) A "can't happen" error, because safemalloc() should have caught it
3216earlier.
a0d0e21e 3217
a0d0e21e
LW
3218=item Reversed %s= operator
3219
be771a83
GS
3220(W syntax) You wrote your assignment operator backwards. The = must
3221always comes last, to avoid ambiguity with subsequent unary operators.
a0d0e21e
LW
3222
3223=item Runaway format
3224
3225(F) Your format contained the ~~ repeat-until-blank sequence, but it
3226produced 200 lines at once, and the 200th line looked exactly like the
3227199th line. Apparently you didn't arrange for the arguments to exhaust
3228themselves, either by using ^ instead of @ (for scalar variables), or by
3229shifting or popping (for array variables). See L<perlform>.
3230
96ebfdd7
RK
3231=item Scalars leaked: %d
3232
3233(P) Something went wrong in Perl's internal bookkeeping of scalars:
3234not all scalar variables were deallocated by the time Perl exited.
3235What this usually indicates is a memory leak, which is of course bad,
3236especially if the Perl program is intended to be long-running.
3237
a0d0e21e
LW
3238=item Scalar value @%s[%s] better written as $%s[%s]
3239
be771a83
GS
3240(W syntax) You've used an array slice (indicated by @) to select a
3241single element of an array. Generally it's better to ask for a scalar
3242value (indicated by $). The difference is that C<$foo[&bar]> always
3243behaves like a scalar, both when assigning to it and when evaluating its
3244argument, while C<@foo[&bar]> behaves like a list when you assign to it,
3245and provides a list context to its subscript, which can do weird things
3246if you're expecting only one subscript.
a0d0e21e 3247
748a9306 3248On the other hand, if you were actually hoping to treat the array
5f05dabc 3249element as a list, you need to look into how references work, because
748a9306
LW
3250Perl will not magically convert between scalars and lists for you. See
3251L<perlref>.
3252
a6006777 3253=item Scalar value @%s{%s} better written as $%s{%s}
3254
75b44862 3255(W syntax) You've used a hash slice (indicated by @) to select a single
be771a83
GS
3256element of a hash. Generally it's better to ask for a scalar value
3257(indicated by $). The difference is that C<$foo{&bar}> always behaves
3258like a scalar, both when assigning to it and when evaluating its
3259argument, while C<@foo{&bar}> behaves like a list when you assign to it,
3260and provides a list context to its subscript, which can do weird things
3261if you're expecting only one subscript.
3262
3263On the other hand, if you were actually hoping to treat the hash element
3264as a list, you need to look into how references work, because Perl will
3265not magically convert between scalars and lists for you. See
a6006777 3266L<perlref>.
3267
a0d0e21e
LW
3268=item Script is not setuid/setgid in suidperl
3269
54310121 3270(F) Oddly, the suidperl program was invoked on a script without a setuid
3271or setgid bit set. This doesn't make much sense.
a0d0e21e
LW
3272
3273=item Search pattern not terminated
3274
3275(F) The lexer couldn't find the final delimiter of a // or m{}
3276construct. Remember that bracketing delimiters count nesting level.
fb73857a 3277Missing the leading C<$> from a variable C<$m> may cause this error.
a0d0e21e 3278
0cb1bcd7 3279Note that since Perl 5.9.0 a // can also be the I<defined-or>
5d9c98cd
JH
3280construct, not just the empty search pattern. Therefore code written
3281in Perl 5.9.0 or later that uses the // as the I<defined-or> can be
3282misparsed by pre-5.9.0 Perls as a non-terminated search pattern.
3283
9ddeeac9 3284=item %sseek() on unopened filehandle
a0d0e21e 3285
be771a83
GS
3286(W unopened) You tried to use the seek() or sysseek() function on a
3287filehandle that was either never opened or has since been closed.
a0d0e21e
LW
3288
3289=item select not implemented
3290
3291(F) This machine doesn't implement the select() system call.
3292
ae21d580 3293=item Self-ties of arrays and hashes are not supported
68a4a7e4 3294
ae21d580
JH
3295(F) Self-ties are of arrays and hashes are not supported in
3296the current implementation.
68a4a7e4 3297
6df41af2 3298=item Semicolon seems to be missing
a0d0e21e 3299
75b44862
GS
3300(W semicolon) A nearby syntax error was probably caused by a missing
3301semicolon, or possibly some other missing operator, such as a comma.
a0d0e21e
LW
3302
3303=item semi-panic: attempt to dup freed string
3304
be771a83
GS
3305(S internal) The internal newSVsv() routine was called to duplicate a
3306scalar that had previously been marked as free.
a0d0e21e 3307
6df41af2 3308=item sem%s not implemented
a0d0e21e 3309
6df41af2 3310(F) You don't have System V semaphore IPC on your system.
a0d0e21e 3311
69282e91 3312=item send() on closed socket %s
a0d0e21e 3313
be771a83 3314(W closed) The socket you're sending to got itself closed sometime
c289d2f7 3315before now. Check your control flow.
a0d0e21e 3316
7253e4e3 3317=item Sequence (? incomplete in regex; marked by <-- HERE in m/%s/
7b8d334a 3318
7253e4e3 3319(F) A regular expression ended with an incomplete extension (?. The <-- HERE
b45f050a 3320shows in the regular expression about where the problem was discovered. See
be771a83 3321L<perlre>.
1b1626e4 3322
49704364 3323=item Sequence (?%s...) not implemented in regex; marked by <-- HERE in m/%s/
a0d0e21e 3324
b45f050a 3325(F) A proposed regular expression extension has the character reserved but
7253e4e3 3326has not yet been written. The <-- HERE shows in the regular expression about
b45f050a
JF
3327where the problem was discovered. See L<perlre>.
3328
49704364 3329=item Sequence (?%s...) not recognized in regex; marked by <-- HERE in m/%s/
a0d0e21e 3330
7253e4e3
RK
3331(F) You used a regular expression extension that doesn't make sense. The
3332<-- HERE shows in the regular expression about where the problem was
3333discovered. See L<perlre>.
a0d0e21e 3334
49704364 3335=item Sequence (?#... not terminated in regex; marked by <-- HERE in m/%s/
6df41af2
GS
3336
3337(F) A regular expression comment must be terminated by a closing
7253e4e3
RK
3338parenthesis. Embedded parentheses aren't allowed. The <-- HERE shows in
3339the regular expression about where the problem was discovered. See
3340L<perlre>.
6df41af2 3341
96ebfdd7
RK
3342=item Sequence (?{...}) not terminated or not {}-balanced in regex; marked by <-- HERE in m/%s/
3343
3344(F) If the contents of a (?{...}) clause contains braces, they must balance
3345for Perl to properly detect the end of the clause. The <-- HERE shows in
3346the regular expression about where the problem was discovered. See
3347L<perlre>.
3348
6df41af2
GS
3349=item 500 Server error
3350
3351See Server error.
3352
a5f75d66
AD
3353=item Server error
3354
3cdd684c 3355This is the error message generally seen in a browser window when trying
be771a83
GS
3356to run a CGI program (including SSI) over the web. The actual error text
3357varies widely from server to server. The most frequently-seen variants
3358are "500 Server error", "Method (something) not permitted", "Document
3359contains no data", "Premature end of script headers", and "Did not
3360produce a valid header".
9607fc9c 3361
3362B<This is a CGI error, not a Perl error>.
3363
be771a83
GS
3364You need to make sure your script is executable, is accessible by the
3365user CGI is running the script under (which is probably not the user
3366account you tested it under), does not rely on any environment variables
3367(like PATH) from the user it isn't running under, and isn't in a
3368location where the CGI server can't find it, basically, more or less.
3369Please see the following for more information:
9607fc9c 3370
06a5f41f
JH
3371 http://www.perl.org/CGI_MetaFAQ.html
3372 http://www.htmlhelp.org/faq/cgifaq.html
3373 http://www.w3.org/Security/Faq/
a5f75d66 3374
be94a901
GS
3375You should also look at L<perlfaq9>.
3376
a0d0e21e
LW
3377=item setegid() not implemented
3378
be771a83
GS
3379(F) You tried to assign to C<$)>, and your operating system doesn't
3380support the setegid() system call (or equivalent), or at least Configure
3381didn't think so.
a0d0e21e
LW
3382
3383=item seteuid() not implemented
3384
be771a83
GS
3385(F) You tried to assign to C<< $> >>, and your operating system doesn't
3386support the seteuid() system call (or equivalent), or at least Configure
3387didn't think so.
a0d0e21e 3388
81777298
GS
3389=item setpgrp can't take arguments
3390
be771a83
GS
3391(F) Your system has the setpgrp() from BSD 4.2, which takes no
3392arguments, unlike POSIX setpgid(), which takes a process ID and process
3393group ID.
81777298 3394
a0d0e21e