Excuse me? Who are you to determine what is and isn't "idiomatic"? And that you would try this kind of thing about perl of all languages is just shocking. What's saddest is that it's the lack of this kind of absurdist pursuit of robustness and purity is one of the things that has always best defined the perl community.

Broadly, your argument seems to be that spawning processes in the external environment[1] (which, admittedly, is inherently nonportable) is a Bad Thing in perl, and that we shouldn't do it. When I rephrase it like that, does it sound as poo-flinging crazy to you as it does to me?

[1] Let's be honest: a working "cat" is pretty much the single most portable thing you can put between the backticks. If you won't allow this, what will you permit?