Lock File

[toniax]

I just want to say thanks to everyone . I am learning alot

Hello Everyone I use this snippet of code for creating a lock file. Does a better way exist to do this?
Much Thanks in advanced

 $stop = 0;
   while ($stop == 0) {
    if (-e "the.lock") {
        
        sleep(1);
    }
    else {
    
    
    open (FIL,">the.lock");
    close FIL;
    }    

more code

unlink("the.lock");

$stop = 1;