# Win32, open3 and fork

**URL:** <https://www.ruby-forum.com/t/win32-open3-and-fork/98592>\
**Category:** Ruby\
**Created:** [July 16, 2006, 4:56pm UTC](https://www.ruby-forum.com/t/win32-open3-and-fork/98592 "2006-07-16T16:56:13Z")\
**Posts on this page:** 2\
**Page:** 1

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**Author:** ![unknown](https://www.ruby-forum.com/letter_avatar_proxy/v4/letter/u/4bbf92/32.png) [@unknown](https://www.ruby-forum.com/u/unknown)\
**Post date:** [July 16, 2006, 4:56pm UTC](https://www.ruby-forum.com/t/win32-open3-and-fork/98592/1 "2006-07-16T16:56:13Z")

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Dear all,

I am trying to use open3 on Windows XP (one-click installer).  
I get the following error message:

c:/ruby/lib/ruby/1.8/open3.rb:20:in `fork': the fork() function is unimplemented on this machine (NotImplementedError) from c:/ruby/lib/ruby/1.8/open3.rb:20:in`popen3’

On an earlier post to this error by somebody else about a year or so  
ago,  
there was a recommendation to install win32-process. I have done that  
but I  
keep getting this error.

Thank you for your help!

Best regards,

Axel

---

<div class="post-metadata">

**Author:** ![unknown](https://www.ruby-forum.com/letter_avatar_proxy/v4/letter/u/4bbf92/32.png) [@unknown](https://www.ruby-forum.com/u/unknown)\
**Post date:** [July 19, 2006, 6:07am UTC](https://www.ruby-forum.com/t/win32-open3-and-fork/98592/2 "2006-07-19T06:07:47Z")

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removed\_email\_address@domain.invalid wrote:

> there was a recommendation to install win32-process. I have done that but I  
> keep getting this error.
> 
> Thank you for your help!
> 
> Best regards,
> 
> Axel

The open3 library that’s included as part of Ruby’s standard library  
will not work on MS Windows. You’ll need to install win32-open3,  
available on the RAA or RubyForge.

Regards,

Dan