Re: File::Path rmtree portability (works on OS X, fails on WinXP)

[Ken Williams]

On Sep 28, 2007, at 5:52 PM, Jim wrote:
# define build dir path
if ($runOS eq "win"){
        $buildDir = "\\\\.PSF\\builds\\$version";
} else {
        $buildDir = "/builds/$version";
}

# test for dir and remove if it exists
if ( -d $buildDir) {
           # using File::Path here for directory removal
            use File::Path;
            rmtree $buildDir,1,0;
}

Everything works as expected on OS X, but on WinXP, rmtree seems to  
fail with the following error...

        Can't call method "rmtree" without a package or object reference

The problem is because of a different version of perl, not rmtree()  
itself.  One version of perl is interpreting your code as

   $buildDir->rmtree, 1, 0;

and the other as you intended:

   rmtree( $buildDir, 1, 0 );

If you add the parens explicitly, the problem should go away.

 -Ken