I'm having difficulty passing variables to threads. I've recently compiled 5.8.7 with threads enabled and I am using the new ithreads. When running code as follows:

use Thread qw(async);

async {
while(1) {
print 1;
}
};

while (1) {
print 2;
}

The code works as expected and prints both 1's and 2's. But whenever I try to use a parent's variables in children processes I run into problems. For example from the camel book:

use Thread qw(async);
use Thread::Queue;

my $Q = Thread::Queue->new();
async {
while (defined($datum = $Q->dequeue)) {
print $datum;
}
};

$Q->enqueue(12);
$Q->enqueue("A");

while(1) {
print 1;
}

12 and A are never printed, just 1; And if I try printing $Q from both inside and outside the async block, they reference to different objects. I was under the impression, and I believe the O'Reilly book is to, that children have direct access to var
iables that are created in the parents before the thread is initiated. Am I wrong in this assumption? Is there a compiler flag that I missed to allow this kind of variable scope? If this code is wrong any insights on how to access parent process objects from within threads would be greatly appreciated.

I'm using linux (kernel 2.6.11). I'm not sure what other information about my system configuration could pertain to this problem. Please ask if more info is needed.

Thanks in advance for any help given.