NAME File::fgets - Read either one line or X characters from a file SYNOPSIS use File::fgets; open my $fh, $file; # Read either one line or the first 10 characters, which ever comes first my $line = fgets($fh, 10); DESCRIPTION An implementation of the C fgets() function. fgets my $string = fgets($fh, $limit); Reads either one line or at most $limit bytes from the $fh. Returns undef at end of file. NOTE: unlike C's fgets, this will read $limit characters not $limit - 1. Perl doesn't have to leave room for a null byte. EXAMPLE The following example demonstrates using fgets() to read in at most 5 characters at a time. use File::fgets; open my $write_fh, ">", $file; print $write_fh <<END; this is an example of use END close $write_fh; open my $fh, "<", $file; while( my $string = fgets($fh, 5) ) { $string =~ s{\n}{\\n}; # make newlines show up print "--$string--\n"; } The result will be: --this -- --is\n-- --an ex-- --ample-- --\n-- --of us-- --e\n-- NOTES This is implemented as a wrapper around the C fgets() function and is extremely efficient UNLESS the filehandle does not have an underlying fileno. For example, if its given a tied filehandle. Then it falls back to a Perl implementation. LICENSE Copyright 2010 by Michael G Schwern <schwern@pobox.com>. This program is free software; you can redistribute it and/or modify it under the same terms as Perl itself. See http://www.perl.com/perl/misc/Artistic.html Send bugs, feedback, ideas and suggestions via https://rt.cpan.org/Public/Dist/Display.html?Name=File-fgets or <bugs-File-fgets@rt.cpan.org> The latest version of this software can be found at http://github.com/schwern/File-fgets SEE ALSO File::GetLineMaxLength