http://www.perlmonks.org?node_id=902233


in reply to System path

As suggested previously, try "files\\pdftotext.exe". IIRC the windows console doesn't accept / in paths to executables (it does accept it in the path of a file to be opened, don't ask why). Anyway, this means you need to use \, and then you need to escape it with another \ for perl's sake.