I think, when you use system(), that you're expecting something it's not going to give you. I found this out trying to use grep. I said my $Value = system("grep -l somevalue somefile") and the return was always 0. I found, though, that instead of using system, use the '`' character: my $Value = `grep -l somevalue somefile` and now it works find. So, in your case, I would write
$text .= `unzip $myfile1 doc.txt`; Sean -----Original Message----- From: Bill Akins [mailto:[EMAIL PROTECTED]] Sent: Thursday, September 26, 2002 1:34 PM To: [EMAIL PROTECTED] Subject: Read a file directly from system call? Hi All, I need to read in a file from a system call. I need to extract a file (doc.txt) from a zip file ($myfile1) and read it directly in from a pipe instead of writing to disk, then opening the file. My system call is: system ("unzip $myfile1 doc.txt"); which works fine to extract the file to disk. I would like the contents of doc.txt to be stored in/appended to a var named $text. I have tried: $text .= system("unzip $myfile1 doc.txt"); $text .= (system("unzip $myfile1 doc.txt")); $text .= "system("unzip $myfile1 doc.txt")"; $text .= [system("unzip $myfile1 doc.txt")]; and just about every variation I can think of. Of course none of these returned the expected results, and $text -> system("unzip $myfile1 doc.txt"); which would only work if it's a pm I also tried variations on: open (MYFILES, (system("unzip $myfile1 doc.txt"))); Any clues? Thanx! Please reply directly and to list. Bill Akins, CNE Sr. OSA Emory Healthcare (404) 712-2879 - Office 12674 - PIC [EMAIL PROTECTED] -- To unsubscribe, e-mail: [EMAIL PROTECTED] For additional commands, e-mail: [EMAIL PROTECTED] -- To unsubscribe, e-mail: [EMAIL PROTECTED] For additional commands, e-mail: [EMAIL PROTECTED]