Name

Perl::Syntax -- Syntax Check Perl files and strings

Summary

This module syntax checks Perl files and strings. It is identical to running perl -c ..., but output doesn't go by default to STDOUT.

You run his like this from a command line:

    $ perl -MPerl::Syntax perl-program.pl
    $ perl -MPerl::Syntax -e 'your perl code'

which is like:

    $ perl -c perl-program.pl 2>/dev/null
    $ perl -MPerl::Syntax -e 'your perl code' 2>/dev/null

Or from inside Perl:

     system($^X, '-M', 'Perl::Syntax', $perl_program);
     system("$^X -M Perl::Syntax $perl_program");
     # check $?

By default, no output is produced. You will get a zero return code if everything checks out or nonzero if there was a syntax error.

To capture output to a file, you can specify a file name by adding an equal sign after "Perl::Syntax" like this:

    perl -MPerl::Syntax=/tmp/output-file.txt perl-program.pl

or inside PerL:

     system($^X, '-M', 'Perl::Syntax=/tmp/outfile-file.txt', $perl_program);

File /tmp/output-file.txt will have either the messages Perl normally produces on STDERR:

    XXXX syntax OK

    syntax error at XXXX line DDDD ...
    ...

Examples

     use English;
     my @prefix = ($EXECUTABLE_NAME, '-MPerl::Syntax');

     # test this Perl code to see if it is syntactically correct;
     system(@prefix, __FILE__); 
     print "Yep, we're good" unless $? >> 8;

     # test of invalid Perl code: 
     system(@prefix, '-e', '$Incomplete + $Expression +'; 
     print "Try again" if $? >> 8;

     # Show capturing output
     system($EXECUTABLE_NAME, '-MPerl::Syntax=/tmp/Syntax.log', __FILE__);
     # results are in /tmp/Syntax.log

Bugs/Caveats

There doesn't seem to be much benefit here over using perl -c with STDERR redirected. What I really want is a kind of eval that just does the syntax checking.

Author

Rocky Bernstein

Copyright

This program is distributed WITHOUT ANY WARRANTY, including but not limited to the implied warranties of merchantability or fitness for a particular purpose.

The program is free software. You may distribute it and/or modify it under the terms of the GNU General Public License as published by the Free Software Foundation (either version 2 or any later version) and the Perl Artistic License as published by O'Reilly Media, Inc. Please open the files named gpl-2.0.txt and Artistic for a copy of these licenses.