Question

I can’t seem to figure out why I’m getting this error when trying to run my .pl script.

Here is the script:

# mini script for creating diff files in a single directory

# directory of patch files
$patchDir = "c:\oc\Patch Files";

if ($#ARGV != 1 && $#ARGV != 2)
{
    print "Usage: diff <file name> [-s]\n";
    print "Example:  \n";
    print "   |Diff relative to Index (staged)|  :  diff MOM00123456_1.patch \n";
    print "   |Diff Staged|                      :  diff MOM00123456_1.patch -s \n";
    exit;
}

$fileName = $ARGV[0];

if ($#ARGV == 2)
    $stagedArg = $ARGV[1];

if ($stagedArg)
    if ($stagedArg == "-s" || $stagedArg == "-S")
        system("git diff --staged --full-index > $fileName $patchDir");
    else
    {
        print "Unknown argument:  $stagedArg\n";
        exit;
    }
else
    system("git diff --full-index > $fileName $patchDir");

Test:

diff.pl test.patch -s

Output:

Scalar found where operator expected at C:\utils\diff.pl line 18, near

")

$stagedArg"

(Missing operator before $stagedArg?) syntax error at C:\utils\diff.pl line 18, near ")

$stagedArg " syntax error at C:\utils\diff.pl line 21, near ")

if" Execution of C:\utils\diff.pl aborted due to compilation errors.

Execution of C:\utils\diff.pl aborted due to compilation errors.

Can someone shed some light?

Answer 1

Perl if syntax is:

if (condition) {
    statements;
}

You can’t omit the curly braces.

---

You might find use diagnostics; useful. Given a simple test script:

use strict;
use warnings;
use diagnostics;
if (1) 
    print 1;

We get:

syntax error at - line 5, near ") 
    print"
Execution of - aborted due to compilation errors (#1)

(F) Probably means you had a syntax error. Common reasons include:

• A keyword is misspelled.
• A semicolon is missing.
• A comma is missing.
• An opening or closing parenthesis is missing.
• An opening or closing brace is missing.
• A closing quote is missing.

Often there will be another error message associated with the syntax
error giving more information. (Sometimes it helps to turn on -w.)
The error message itself often tells you where it was in the line when
it decided to give up. Sometimes the actual error is several tokens
before this, because Perl is good at understanding random input.
Occasionally the line number may be misleading, and once in a blue moon
the only way to figure out what’s triggering the error is to call
perl -c repeatedly, chopping away half the program each time to see
if the error went away. Sort of the cybernetic version of 20 questions.

Uncaught exception from user code:
    syntax error at - line 5, near ") 
        print"
    Execution of - aborted due to compilation errors.