On Sep 21, 2013, at 11:02 AM, John E. Malmberg <malmb...@encompasserve.org> wrote:
> On 9/20/2013 8:05 PM, Craig A. Berry wrote: >> > >> On Sep 20, 2013, at 6:01 PM, John E. Malmberg > <malmb...@encompasserve.org> wrote: >> >>> After all, if you are going to always use Perl to invoke it, why >>> add the hack to make it work as a command file? >> >> Because you may not use Perl to invoke it. You may invoke it with >> DCL which will then invoke Perl. You can invoke it by putting it in the >> command tables, or by setting up a foreign command, or by placing it in >> a directory listed in DCL$PATH. Any and all of which can make "perldoc" >> run perl_root:[utils]perldoc.com as a command procedure (which then >> re-runs itself using Perl). That's about as close to having a shebang >> line as you're going to get on VMS. > > I would agree with all of that, except that this is what you get when you try > running it as a command procedure: > > LION> @perl_root:[utils]perldoc > You called the perldoc command with a name that I didn't recognize. Running it explicitly with "@" syntax is not one of the options I mentioned. >>> And even more curious, why add a hack to make look like it should > work as a command file with out actually making it work? >> >> Seems to be working just fine and as designed. > > Just printing an error message and exiting is how it was designed? It was designed to be run as a command, not but running it with "@". When you don't use it the way it was designed to work, it in fact (unsurprisingly) doesn't work. Most likely with enough effort it could be made to work that way as well, but it was never intended to, and I don't see the value of it. ________________________________________ Craig A. Berry mailto:craigbe...@mac.com "... getting out of a sonnet is much more difficult than getting in." Brad Leithauser
