Unable to get any programmes

[dinkypumpkin]

On 20/01/2012 18:54, Steve Foster wrote:
> And this also fails with -1 printed. So it seems I can't run any backtick commands! No luck yet on understanding why after a brief google.

Your test results suggest that Perl can't fire up the shell (cmd.exe) to 
handle external commands, though it's strange that backticks worked from 
the command line (as you reported in an earlier message), but not from 
inside a script.  You're not by chance using some custom shell are you? 
  If so, run:

perl -e "print $ENV{PERL5SHELL}"

from the command prompt and see if anything is printed.

My only other thought is to try your backticks test with the other 
version of Perl on your machine.  Open a command prompt somewhere other 
than C:\Program Files\get_iplayer and run perl from there.  Perhaps also 
do a test with `cmd.exe /x/d/c` to invoke the shell directly.  If your 
other Perl fails as well, then it would suggest some more fundamental 
problem with your machine, outside the Perl domain.  Not that that would 
be terribly helpful, of course.