--- /dev/null	Thu Jan 01 00:00:00 1970 +0000
+++ b/build-aux/inplace_edit.pl	Sun Jul 01 21:29:09 2018 -0700
@@ -0,0 +1,33 @@
+#!/usr/bin/perl -w
+
+################################################################################
+## File: inplace_edit.pl
+## Usage: perl inplace_edit.pl 'PERL_CODE' file1 [file2] [...]
+## Purpose: Run snippet of PERL_CODE on each line in a file and replace
+## existing line with the results of running the code.
+## This replaces perl -i -pe 'PERL_CODE' file1 [file2] ...
+## due to a problem in Perl 5.28 which restricts the number of files
+################################################################################
+
+## Create Perl code from first argument (-e CODE)
+eval "sub per_line_code { $ARGV[0]; }";
+shift @ARGV;
+
+## Loop over each file
+foreach $fname (@ARGV)
+{
+  rename ($fname, "$fname.$$") or die "Rename failed:$fname:$!"; 
+  open (my $FHI, "<", "$fname.$$") or die "Open failed:$fname.$$:$!";  
+  open (my $FHO, ">", "$fname") or die "Open failed:$fname:$!";  
+
+  ## Loop over each line
+  while (<$FHI>)
+  {
+    per_line_code ();
+    print $FHO $_;      
+  }
+
+  close ($FHI);
+  close ($FHO);
+  unlink "$fname.$$" or die "Delete failed:$fname.$$:$!";
+}

--- a/doc/interpreter/module.mk	Mon Jul 02 12:21:32 2018 -0700
+++ b/doc/interpreter/module.mk	Sun Jul 01 21:29:09 2018 -0700
@@ -300,7 +300,7 @@
 	 --css-ref=octave.css \
 	 -o $(OCTAVE_HTML_TMP_DIR) `test -f '%reldir%/octave.texi' || echo '$(abs_top_srcdir)/'`%reldir%/octave.texi; \
 	then \
-	  $(PERL) -i -pe 's|(?<=</a>): ||g' $(OCTAVE_HTML_TMP_DIR)/* && \
+	  $(PERL) $(srcdir)/build-aux/inplace_edit.pl 's|(?<=</a>): ||g' $(OCTAVE_HTML_TMP_DIR)/* && \
 	  rm -rf $(OCTAVE_HTML_DIR) && \
 	  mv $(OCTAVE_HTML_TMP_DIR) $(OCTAVE_HTML_DIR) && \
 	  touch $@; \