Perl: Running two processes at once.

I am writing a perl script and at one point I would like to run two executables at once. If I do two system calls then I have to wait until the first process finishes to start the second. Is there a way around this?

Here's the sub I use: [code=xml]# -------------------------------------- # Usage: $child_pid = fork_exec( \%control, $command; @arguments ); # Purpose: Fork and exec the command # Parameters: \%control -- optional control hash ref # -nohup -- non-zero means parent won't wait for child completion # -system -- non-zero means use system if cannot fork # -quiet -- non-zero means close STD... file handles # $command -- system command # @arguments -- optional list of arguments for command # Returns: $child_pid -- or undef if failure # sub fork_exec { my %control = (); if( my $ref = ref( $_[0] ) ){ if( $ref eq 'HASH' ){ %control = %{ shift @_ }; } } my $command = shift @_; my @arguments = @_; my $child_pid = fork(); unless( defined $child_pid ){ if( $control{-system} ){ system( "nohup $command @arguments &" ); } return; } unless( $child_pid ){ # child if( $control{-quiet} ){ close STDIN; close STDOUT; close STDERR; open STDERR, '>', '/dev/null'; } $SIG{HUP} = 'IGNORE' if $control{-nohup}; exec { $command } $command, @arguments or do { if( $control{-system} ){ system( "nohup $command @arguments &" ); } return; } } # parent return $child_pid; } [/code]