Change the perlbug address to perl.org since it's more forgiving.
[p5sagit/p5-mst-13.2.git] / INSTALL
CommitLineData
8e07c86e 1=head1 NAME
2
3Install - Build and Installation guide for perl5.
4
5=head1 SYNOPSIS
6
3ce0d271 7First, make sure you are installing an up-to-date version of Perl. If
8you didn't get your Perl source from CPAN, check the latest version at
16dc217a 9<URL:http://www.cpan.org/src/>.
3ce0d271 10
c42e3e15 11The basic steps to build and install perl5 on a Unix system
12with all the defaults are:
8e07c86e 13
dc45a647 14 rm -f config.sh Policy.sh
491517e0 15 sh Configure -de
8e07c86e 16 make
17 make test
18 make install
36477c24 19
aa689395 20 # You may also wish to add these:
21 (cd /usr/include && h2ph *.h sys/*.h)
3e3baf6d 22 (installhtml --help)
aa689395 23 (cd pod && make tex && <process the latex files>)
8e07c86e 24
25Each of these is explained in further detail below.
26
491517e0 27The above commands will install Perl to /usr/local or /opt, depending
28on the platform. If that's not okay with you, use
29
30 rm -f config.sh Policy.sh
31 sh Configure
32 make
33 make test
34 make install
35
7beaa944 36For information on non-Unix systems, see the section on
37L<"Porting information"> below.
7f678428 38
8d74ce1c 39If you have problems, corrections, or questions, please see
40L<"Reporting Problems"> below.
41
7beaa944 42For information on what's new in this release, see the
43pod/perldelta.pod file. For more detailed information about specific
44changes, see the Changes file.
c3edaffb 45
1ec51d55 46=head1 DESCRIPTION
edb1cbcb 47
c3edaffb 48This document is written in pod format as an easy way to indicate its
49structure. The pod format is described in pod/perlpod.pod, but you can
1ec51d55 50read it as is with any pager or editor. Headings and items are marked
51by lines beginning with '='. The other mark-up used is
52
53 B<text> embolden text, used for switches, programs or commands
54 C<code> literal code
55 L<name> A link (cross reference) to name
56
c42e3e15 57Although most of the defaults are probably fine for most users,
58you should probably at least skim through this entire document before
1ec51d55 59proceeding.
c3edaffb 60
eed2e782 61If you're building Perl on a non-Unix system, you should also read
62the README file specific to your operating system, since this may
63provide additional or different instructions for building Perl.
64
203c3eec 65If there is a hint file for your system (in the hints/ directory) you
66should also read that hint file for specific information for your
694a7e45 67system. (Unixware users should use the svr4.sh hint file.) If
68there is a README file for your platform, then you should read
69that too. Additional information is in the Porting/ directory.
203c3eec 70
c42e3e15 71=head1 WARNING: This version requires an extra step to build old extensions.
72
735.005_53 and later releases do not export unadorned
74global symbols anymore. This means you may need to build older
75extensions that have not been updated for the new naming convention
76with:
77
78 perl Makefile.PL POLLUTE=1
79
80Alternatively, you can enable CPP symbol pollution wholesale by
81building perl itself with:
82
83 sh Configure -Accflags=-DPERL_POLLUTE
84
85pod/perldelta.pod contains more details about this.
86
1b1c1ae2 87=head1 WARNING: This version may not be binary compatible with Perl 5.005.
88
89Using the default Configure options for building perl should get you
90a perl that will be binary compatible with the 5.005 release.
693762b4 91
1b1c1ae2 92However, if you run Configure with any custom options, such as
93-Dusethreads, -Dusemultiplicity, -Dusemymalloc, -Ubincompat5005 etc.,
94the resulting perl will not be binary compatible. Under these
95circumstances, if you have dynamically loaded extensions that were
96built under perl 5.005, you will need to rebuild and reinstall all
97those extensions to use them with 5.6.
98
99Pure perl modules without XS or C code should continue to work fine
100without reinstallation. See the discussions below on
101L<"Coexistence with earlier versions of perl5"> and
102L<"Upgrading from 5.005 to 5.6"> for more details.
693762b4 103
104The standard extensions supplied with Perl will be handled automatically.
105
1b1c1ae2 106On a related issue, old modules may possibly be affected by the
693762b4 107changes in the Perl language in the current release. Please see
e02fdbd2 108pod/perldelta.pod (and pod/perl500Xdelta.pod) for a description of
c42e3e15 109what's changed. See your installed copy of the perllocal.pod
d6baa268 110file for a (possibly incomplete) list of locally installed modules.
111Also see CPAN::autobundle for one way to make a "bundle" of your
112currently installed modules.
693762b4 113
5effff0b 114=head1 WARNING: This version requires a compiler that supports ANSI C.
115
16dc217a 116Most C compilers are now ANSI-compliant. However, a few current
117computers are delivered with an older C compiler expressly for
118rebuilding the system kernel, or for some other historical reason.
119Alternatively, you may have an old machine which was shipped before
120ANSI compliance became widespread. Such compilers are not suitable
121for building Perl.
122
123If you find that your default C compiler is not ANSI-capable, but you
124know that an ANSI-capable compiler is installed on your system, you
125can tell F<Configure> to use the correct compiler by means of the
126C<-Dcc=> command-line option -- see L<"gcc">.
127
128If do not have an ANSI-capable compiler there are several avenues open
129to you:
130
131=over 4
132
133=item *
134
135You may try obtaining GCC, available from GNU mirrors worldwide,
136listed at <URL:http://www.gnu.org/order/ftp.html>. If, rather than
137building gcc from source code, you locate a binary version configured
138for your platform, be sure that it is compiled for the version of the
139operating system that you are using.
140
141=item *
142
143You may purchase a commercial ANSI C compiler from your system
144supplier or elsewhere. (Or your organization may already have
145licensed such software -- ask your colleagues to find out how to
146access it.) If there is a README file for your system in the Perl
147distribution (for example, F<README.hpux>), it may contain advice on
148suitable compilers.
149
150=item *
151
d6baa268 152Another alternative may be to use a tool like ansi2knr to convert the
5effff0b 153sources back to K&R style, but there is no guarantee this route will get
154you anywhere, since the prototypes are not the only ANSI features used
d6baa268 155in the Perl sources. ansi2knr is usually found as part of the freely
156available Ghostscript distribution. Another similar tool is
157unprotoize, distributed with GCC. Since unprotoize requires GCC to
5effff0b 158run, you may have to run it on a platform where GCC is available, and move
159the sources back to the platform without GCC.
160
161If you succeed in automatically converting the sources to a K&R compatible
162form, be sure to email perlbug@perl.com to let us know the steps you
163followed. This will enable us to officially support this option.
164
16dc217a 165=back
166
df41b452 167Although Perl can be compiled using a C++ compiler, the Configure script
168does not work with some C++ compilers.
169
aa689395 170=head1 Space Requirements
eed2e782 171
c42e3e15 172The complete perl5 source tree takes up about 20 MB of disk space.
173After completing make, it takes up roughly 30 MB, though the actual
d6baa268 174total is likely to be quite system-dependent. The installation
c42e3e15 175directories need something on the order of 20 MB, though again that
1ec51d55 176value is system-dependent.
8e07c86e 177
aa689395 178=head1 Start with a Fresh Distribution
8e07c86e 179
edb1cbcb 180If you have built perl before, you should clean out the build directory
181with the command
182
dc45a647 183 make distclean
184
185or
186
edb1cbcb 187 make realclean
c3edaffb 188
dc45a647 189The only difference between the two is that make distclean also removes
190your old config.sh and Policy.sh files.
191
192The results of a Configure run are stored in the config.sh and Policy.sh
193files. If you are upgrading from a previous version of perl, or if you
194change systems or compilers or make other significant changes, or if
195you are experiencing difficulties building perl, you should probably
d6baa268 196not re-use your old config.sh. Simply remove it
8e07c86e 197
d6baa268 198 rm -f config.sh
4633a7c4 199
e57fd563 200If you wish to use your old config.sh, be especially attentive to the
201version and architecture-specific questions and answers. For example,
202the default directory for architecture-dependent library modules
203includes the version name. By default, Configure will reuse your old
204name (e.g. /opt/perl/lib/i86pc-solaris/5.003) even if you're running
205Configure for a different version, e.g. 5.004. Yes, Configure should
206probably check and correct for this, but it doesn't, presently.
207Similarly, if you used a shared libperl.so (see below) with version
208numbers, you will probably want to adjust them as well.
209
d6baa268 210Also, be careful to check your architecture name. For example, some
211Linux distributions use i386, while others may use i486. If you build
212it yourself, Configure uses the output of the arch command, which
213might be i586 or i686 instead. If you pick up a precompiled binary, or
214compile extensions on different systems, they might not all agree on
215the architecture name.
e57fd563 216
217In short, if you wish to use your old config.sh, I recommend running
218Configure interactively rather than blindly accepting the defaults.
8e07c86e 219
d6baa268 220If your reason to reuse your old config.sh is to save your particular
221installation choices, then you can probably achieve the same effect by
222using the Policy.sh file. See the section on L<"Site-wide Policy
223settings"> below. If you wish to start with a fresh distribution, you
224also need to remove any old Policy.sh files you may have with
225
226 rm -f Policy.sh
dc45a647 227
aa689395 228=head1 Run Configure
8e07c86e 229
230Configure will figure out various things about your system. Some
231things Configure will figure out for itself, other things it will ask
d6baa268 232you about. To accept the default, just press RETURN. The default is
233almost always okay. It is normal for some things to be "NOT found",
234since Configure often searches for many different ways of performing
235the same function.
236
237At any Configure prompt, you can type &-d and Configure will use the
238defaults from then on.
8e07c86e 239
240After it runs, Configure will perform variable substitution on all the
1ec51d55 241*.SH files and offer to run make depend.
8e07c86e 242
1b1c1ae2 243=head2 Altering config.sh variables for C compiler switches etc.
244
245For most users, all of the Configure defaults are fine. Configure
246also has several convenient options which are all described below.
247However, if Configure doesn't have an option to do what you want,
248you can change Configure variables after the platform hints have been
249run, by using Configure's -A switch. For example, here's how to add
250a couple of extra flags to C compiler invocations:
251
252 sh Configure -Accflags="-DPERL_Y2KWARN -DPERL_POLLUTE_MALLOC"
253
254For more help on Configure switches, run:
255
256 sh Configure -h
257
d6baa268 258=head2 Common Configure options
259
fb73857a 260Configure supports a number of useful options. Run B<Configure -h> to
261get a listing. See the Porting/Glossary file for a complete list of
262Configure variables you can set and their definitions.
263
d6baa268 264=over 4
265
266=item gcc
267
268To compile with gcc you should run
8e07c86e 269
270 sh Configure -Dcc=gcc
271
272This is the preferred way to specify gcc (or another alternative
273compiler) so that the hints files can set appropriate defaults.
274
d6baa268 275=item Installation prefix
4633a7c4 276
8e07c86e 277By default, for most systems, perl will be installed in
8d74ce1c 278/usr/local/{bin, lib, man}. (See L<"Installation Directories">
279and L<"Coexistence with earlier versions of perl5"> below for
280further details.)
281
282You can specify a different 'prefix' for the default installation
283directory, when Configure prompts you or by using the Configure command
284line option -Dprefix='/some/directory', e.g.
8e07c86e 285
25f94b33 286 sh Configure -Dprefix=/opt/perl
4633a7c4 287
d6baa268 288If your prefix contains the string "perl", then the suggested
289directory structure is simplified. For example, if you use
290prefix=/opt/perl, then Configure will suggest /opt/perl/lib instead of
291/opt/perl/lib/perl5/. Again, see L<"Installation Directories"> below
292for more details.
8e07c86e 293
8d74ce1c 294NOTE: You must not specify an installation directory that is the same
295as or below your perl source directory. If you do, installperl will
296attempt infinite recursion.
84902520 297
d6baa268 298=item /usr/bin/perl
299
300It may seem obvious, but Perl is useful only when users can easily
301find it. It's often a good idea to have both /usr/bin/perl and
dd64f1c3 302/usr/local/bin/perl be symlinks to the actual binary. Be especially
d6baa268 303careful, however, not to overwrite a version of perl supplied by your
304vendor unless you are sure you know what you are doing.
305
306By default, Configure will arrange for /usr/bin/perl to be linked to
307the current version of perl. You can turn off that behavior by running
308
309 Configure -Uinstallusrbinperl
310
311or by answering 'no' to the appropriate Configure prompt.
312
313In any case, system administrators are strongly encouraged to
dd64f1c3 314put (symlinks to) perl and its accompanying utilities, such as perldoc,
4682965a 315into a directory typically found along a user's PATH, or in another
316obvious and convenient place.
317
d6baa268 318=item Overriding an old config.sh
04d420f9 319
d6baa268 320If you want to use your old config.sh but override some of the items
321with command line options, you need to use B<Configure -O>.
322
323=back
8e07c86e 324
203c3eec 325If you are willing to accept all the defaults, and you want terse
326output, you can run
327
328 sh Configure -des
329
330For my Solaris system, I usually use
331
332 sh Configure -Dprefix=/opt/perl -Doptimize='-xpentium -xO4' -des
333
46bb10fb 334=head2 GNU-style configure
335
1ec51d55 336If you prefer the GNU-style configure command line interface, you can
dc45a647 337use the supplied configure.gnu command, e.g.
46bb10fb 338
693762b4 339 CC=gcc ./configure.gnu
46bb10fb 340
dc45a647 341The configure.gnu script emulates a few of the more common configure
46bb10fb 342options. Try
343
693762b4 344 ./configure.gnu --help
46bb10fb 345
346for a listing.
347
d6baa268 348Cross compiling and compiling in a different directory are not supported.
46bb10fb 349
dc45a647 350(The file is called configure.gnu to avoid problems on systems
693762b4 351that would not distinguish the files "Configure" and "configure".)
46bb10fb 352
aa689395 353=head2 Installation Directories
4633a7c4 354
355The installation directories can all be changed by answering the
356appropriate questions in Configure. For convenience, all the
357installation questions are near the beginning of Configure.
d6baa268 358Further, there are a number of additions to the installation
359directories since 5.005, so reusing your old config.sh may not
360be sufficient to put everything where you want it.
4633a7c4 361
7beaa944 362I highly recommend running Configure interactively to be sure it puts
363everything where you want it. At any point during the Configure
d6baa268 364process, you can answer a question with &-d and Configure will use
365the defaults from then on.
366
367The defaults are intended to be reasonable and sensible for most
368people building from sources. Those who build and distribute binary
369distributions or who export perl to a range of systems will probably
370need to alter them. If you are content to just accept the defaults,
371you can safely skip the next section.
372
373The directories set up by Configure fall into three broad categories.
374
375=over 4
376
377=item Directories for the perl distribution
378
c42e3e15 379By default, Configure will use the following directories for 5.6.0.
d6baa268 380$version is the full perl version number, including subversion, e.g.
0a08c020 3815.6.0 or 5.6.1, and $archname is a string like sun4-sunos,
d6baa268 382determined by Configure. The full definitions of all Configure
383variables are in the file Porting/Glossary.
384
385 Configure variable Default value
386 $prefix /usr/local
387 $bin $prefix/bin
388 $scriptdir $prefix/bin
389 $privlib $prefix/lib/perl5/$version
390 $archlib $prefix/lib/perl5/$version/$archname
391 $man1dir $prefix/man/man1
392 $man3dir $prefix/man/man3
393 $html1dir (none)
394 $html3dir (none)
395
396Actually, Configure recognizes the SVR3-style
397/usr/local/man/l_man/man1 directories, if present, and uses those
398instead. Also, if $prefix contains the string "perl", the library
399directories are simplified as described below. For simplicity, only
400the common style is shown here.
401
402=item Directories for site-specific add-on files
403
404After perl is installed, you may later wish to add modules (e.g. from
405CPAN) or scripts. Configure will set up the following directories to
c42e3e15 406be used for installing those add-on modules and scripts.
d6baa268 407
408 Configure variable Default value
409 $siteprefix $prefix
410 $sitebin $siteprefix/bin
49c10eea 411 $sitescript $siteprefix/bin
273cf8d1 412 $sitelib $siteprefix/lib/perl5/site_perl/$version
413 $sitearch $siteprefix/lib/perl5/site_perl/$version/$archname
49c10eea 414 $siteman1 $siteprefix/man/man1
415 $siteman3 $siteprefix/man/man3
416 $sitehtml1 (none)
417 $sitehtml3 (none)
d6baa268 418
419By default, ExtUtils::MakeMaker will install architecture-independent
273cf8d1 420modules into $sitelib and architecture-dependent modules into $sitearch.
d6baa268 421
49cb0e56 422NOTE: As of 5.6.0, ExtUtils::MakeMaker will use $sitelib and $sitearch,
423but will not use the other site-specific directories. Volunteers to
424fix this are needed.
425
d6baa268 426=item Directories for vendor-supplied add-on files
427
428Lastly, if you are building a binary distribution of perl for
429distribution, Configure can optionally set up the following directories
430for you to use to distribute add-on modules.
431
432 Configure variable Default value
433 $vendorprefix (none)
434 (The next ones are set only if vendorprefix is set.)
435 $vendorbin $vendorprefix/bin
49c10eea 436 $vendorscript $vendorprefix/bin
273cf8d1 437 $vendorlib $vendorprefix/lib/perl5/vendor_perl/$version
438 $vendorarch $vendorprefix/lib/perl5/vendor_perl/$version/$archname
49c10eea 439 $vendorman1 $vendorprefix/man/man1
440 $vendorman3 $vendorprefix/man/man3
441 $vendorhtml1 (none)
442 $vendorhtml3 (none)
d6baa268 443
444These are normally empty, but may be set as needed. For example,
445a vendor might choose the following settings:
446
447 $prefix /usr/bin
448 $siteprefix /usr/local/bin
449 $vendorprefix /usr/bin
450
451This would have the effect of setting the following:
452
453 $bin /usr/bin
454 $scriptdir /usr/bin
455 $privlib /usr/lib/perl5/$version
456 $archlib /usr/lib/perl5/$version/$archname
457 $man1dir /usr/man/man1
458 $man3dir /usr/man/man3
459
460 $sitebin /usr/local/bin
49c10eea 461 $sitescript /usr/local/bin
273cf8d1 462 $sitelib /usr/local/lib/perl5/site_perl/$version
463 $sitearch /usr/local/lib/perl5/site_perl/$version/$archname
49c10eea 464 $siteman1 /usr/local/man/man1
465 $siteman3 /usr/local/man/man3
d6baa268 466
49c10eea 467 $vendorbin /usr/bin
468 $vendorscript /usr/bin
273cf8d1 469 $vendorlib /usr/lib/perl5/vendor_perl/$version
470 $vendorarch /usr/lib/perl5/vendor_perl/$version/$archname
49c10eea 471 $vendorman1 /usr/man/man1
472 $vendorman3 /usr/man/man3
d6baa268 473
474Note how in this example, the vendor-supplied directories are in the
475/usr hierarchy, while the directories reserved for the end-user are in
273cf8d1 476the /usr/local hierarchy.
477
49cb0e56 478NOTE: As of 5.6.0, ExtUtils::MakeMaker does not use these directories.
479Volunteers to fix this are needed.
480
273cf8d1 481The entire installed library hierarchy is installed in locations with
482version numbers, keeping the installations of different versions distinct.
483However, later installations of Perl can still be configured to search the
484installed libraries corresponding to compatible earlier versions.
485See L<"Coexistence with earlier versions of perl5"> below for more details
486on how Perl can be made to search older version directories.
d6baa268 487
488Of course you may use these directories however you see fit. For
489example, you may wish to use $siteprefix for site-specific files that
490are stored locally on your own disk and use $vendorprefix for
491site-specific files that are stored elsewhere on your organization's
492network. One way to do that would be something like
493
494 sh Configure -Dsiteprefix=/usr/local -Dvendorprefix=/usr/share/perl
495
496=item otherlibdirs
497
498As a final catch-all, Configure also offers an $otherlibdirs
499variable. This variable contains a colon-separated list of additional
3b777bb4 500directories to add to @INC. By default, it will be empty.
501Perl will search these directories (including architecture and
502version-specific subdirectories) for add-on modules and extensions.
d6baa268 503
504=item Man Pages
1ec51d55 505
d6baa268 506In versions 5.005_57 and earlier, the default was to store module man
507pages in a version-specific directory, such as
508/usr/local/lib/perl5/$version/man/man3. The default for 5.005_58 and
509after is /usr/local/man/man3 so that most users can find the man pages
510without resetting MANPATH.
4633a7c4 511
d6baa268 512You can continue to use the old default from the command line with
4633a7c4 513
0a08c020 514 sh Configure -Dman3dir=/usr/local/lib/perl5/5.6.0/man/man3
8d74ce1c 515
d6baa268 516Some users also prefer to use a .3pm suffix. You can do that with
517
518 sh Configure -Dman3ext=3pm
519
520Again, these are just the defaults, and can be changed as you run
521Configure.
522
523=item HTML pages
524
525As of perl5.005_57, the standard perl installation does not do
526anything with HTML documentation, but that may change in the future.
527Further, some add-on modules may wish to install HTML documents. The
528html Configure variables listed above are provided if you wish to
529specify where such documents should be placed. The default is "none",
530but will likely eventually change to something useful based on user
531feedback.
8d74ce1c 532
d6baa268 533=back
8d74ce1c 534
3a6175e1 535Some users prefer to append a "/share" to $privlib and $sitelib
536to emphasize that those directories can be shared among different
537architectures.
4633a7c4 538
8d74ce1c 539Note that these are just the defaults. You can actually structure the
540directories any way you like. They don't even have to be on the same
541filesystem.
542
543Further details about the installation directories, maintenance and
544development subversions, and about supporting multiple versions are
545discussed in L<"Coexistence with earlier versions of perl5"> below.
546
547If you specify a prefix that contains the string "perl", then the
d6baa268 548library directory structure is slightly simplified. Instead of
549suggesting $prefix/lib/perl5/, Configure will suggest $prefix/lib.
8d74ce1c 550
d6baa268 551Thus, for example, if you Configure with
0a08c020 552-Dprefix=/opt/perl, then the default library directories for 5.6.0 are
3a6175e1 553
d6baa268 554 Configure variable Default value
0a08c020 555 $privlib /opt/perl/lib/5.6.0
556 $archlib /opt/perl/lib/5.6.0/$archname
557 $sitelib /opt/perl/lib/site_perl/5.6.0
558 $sitearch /opt/perl/lib/site_perl/5.6.0/$archname
4633a7c4 559
aa689395 560=head2 Changing the installation directory
561
562Configure distinguishes between the directory in which perl (and its
563associated files) should be installed and the directory in which it
564will eventually reside. For most sites, these two are the same; for
565sites that use AFS, this distinction is handled automatically.
1ec51d55 566However, sites that use software such as depot to manage software
d6baa268 567packages, or users building binary packages for distribution may also
568wish to install perl into a different directory and use that
569management software to move perl to its final destination. This
570section describes how to do that.
aa689395 571
0dcb58f4 572Suppose you want to install perl under the /tmp/perl5 directory. You
d6baa268 573could edit config.sh and change all the install* variables to point to
574/tmp/perl5 instead of /usr/local, or you could simply use the
575following command line:
576
577 sh Configure -Dinstallprefix=/tmp/perl5
578
579(replace /tmp/perl5 by a directory of your choice).
aa689395 580
693762b4 581Beware, though, that if you go to try to install new add-on
d6baa268 582modules, they too will get installed in under '/tmp/perl5' if you
693762b4 583follow this example. The next section shows one way of dealing with
584that problem.
585
aa689395 586=head2 Creating an installable tar archive
587
588If you need to install perl on many identical systems, it is
589convenient to compile it once and create an archive that can be
d6c1b5d3 590installed on multiple systems. Suppose, for example, that you want to
591create an archive that can be installed in /opt/perl.
592Here's one way to do that:
aa689395 593
d6baa268 594 # Set up to install perl into a different directory,
aa689395 595 # e.g. /tmp/perl5 (see previous part).
d6baa268 596 sh Configure -Dinstallprefix=/tmp/perl5 -Dprefix=/opt/perl -des
aa689395 597 make
598 make test
d6c1b5d3 599 make install # This will install everything into /tmp/perl5.
aa689395 600 cd /tmp/perl5
d6c1b5d3 601 # Edit $archlib/Config.pm and $archlib/.packlist to change all the
fb73857a 602 # install* variables back to reflect where everything will
d6c1b5d3 603 # really be installed. (That is, change /tmp/perl5 to /opt/perl
604 # everywhere in those files.)
605 # Check the scripts in $scriptdir to make sure they have the correct
bfb7748a 606 # #!/wherever/perl line.
aa689395 607 tar cvf ../perl5-archive.tar .
608 # Then, on each machine where you want to install perl,
d6c1b5d3 609 cd /opt/perl # Or wherever you specified as $prefix
aa689395 610 tar xvf perl5-archive.tar
611
dc45a647 612=head2 Site-wide Policy settings
693762b4 613
614After Configure runs, it stores a number of common site-wide "policy"
615answers (such as installation directories and the local perl contact
616person) in the Policy.sh file. If you want to build perl on another
617system using the same policy defaults, simply copy the Policy.sh file
618to the new system and Configure will use it along with the appropriate
619hint file for your system.
620
dc45a647 621Alternatively, if you wish to change some or all of those policy
622answers, you should
623
624 rm -f Policy.sh
625
626to ensure that Configure doesn't re-use them.
627
628Further information is in the Policy_sh.SH file itself.
629
8d74ce1c 630If the generated Policy.sh file is unsuitable, you may freely edit it
631to contain any valid shell commands. It will be run just after the
632platform-specific hints files.
633
c42e3e15 634Note: Since the directory hierarchy for 5.6.0 contains a number of
d6baa268 635new vendor* and site* entries, your Policy.sh file will probably not
636set them to your desired values. I encourage you to run Configure
637interactively to be sure it puts things where you want them.
638
aa689395 639=head2 Configure-time Options
640
641There are several different ways to Configure and build perl for your
642system. For most users, the defaults are sensible and will work.
643Some users, however, may wish to further customize perl. Here are
644some of the main things you can change.
645
693762b4 646=head2 Threads
aa689395 647
d6baa268 648On some platforms, perl5.005 and later can be compiled with
649experimental support for threads. To enable this, read the file
650README.threads, and then try:
f7542a9d 651
693762b4 652 sh Configure -Dusethreads
aa689395 653
693762b4 654Currently, you need to specify -Dusethreads on the Configure command
655line so that the hint files can make appropriate adjustments.
656
657The default is to compile without thread support.
3fe9a6f1 658
aaacdc8b 659As of v5.5.64, perl has two different internal threads implementations.
660The 5.005 version (5005threads) and an interpreter-based implementation
661(ithreads) with one interpreter per thread. By default, Configure selects
662ithreads if -Dusethreads is specified. However, you can select the old
6635005threads behavior instead by either
664
665 sh Configure -Dusethreads -Duse5005threads
666
667or by
668 sh Configure -Dusethreads -Uuseithreads
669
670Eventually (by perl v5.6.0) this internal confusion ought to disappear,
671and these options may disappear as well.
672
9d5a2765 673=head2 64 bit support.
674
675If your platform does not have 64 bits natively, but can simulate them with
676compiler flags and/or C<long long> or C<int64_t>, you can build a perl that
677uses 64 bits.
678
679There are actually two modes of 64-bitness: the first one is achieved
680using Configure -Duse64bitint and the second one using Configure
681-Duse64bitall. The difference is that the first one is minimal and
682the second one maximal. The first works in more places than the second.
683
684The C<use64bitint> does only as much as is required to get 64-bit
685integers into Perl (this may mean, for example, using "long longs")
686while your memory may still be limited to 2 gigabytes (because your
687pointers could still be 32-bit). Note that the name C<64bitint> does
688not imply that your C compiler will be using 64-bit C<int>s (it might,
689but it doesn't have to): the C<use64bitint> means that you will be
690able to have 64 bits wide scalar values.
691
692The C<use64bitall> goes all the way by attempting to switch also
693integers (if it can), longs (and pointers) to being 64-bit. This may
694create an even more binary incompatible Perl than -Duse64bitint: the
695resulting executable may not run at all in a 32-bit box, or you may
696have to reboot/reconfigure/rebuild your operating system to be 64-bit
697aware.
698
699Natively 64-bit systems like Alpha and Cray need neither -Duse64bitint
700nor -Duse64bitall.
701
702 NOTE: 64-bit support is still experimental on most platforms.
703 Existing support only covers the LP64 data model. In particular, the
704 LLP64 data model is not yet supported. 64-bit libraries and system
705 APIs on many platforms have not stabilized--your mileage may vary.
706
707=head2 Long doubles
708
709In some systems you may be able to use long doubles to enhance the
710range and precision of your double precision floating point numbers
711(that is, Perl's numbers). Use Configure -Duselongdouble to enable
712this support (if it is available).
713
714=head2 "more bits"
715
716You can "Configure -Dusemorebits" to turn on both the 64-bit support
717and the long double support.
718
46bb10fb 719=head2 Selecting File IO mechanisms
720
721Previous versions of perl used the standard IO mechanisms as defined in
1ec51d55 722stdio.h. Versions 5.003_02 and later of perl allow alternate IO
46bb10fb 723mechanisms via a "PerlIO" abstraction, but the stdio mechanism is still
724the default and is the only supported mechanism.
725
726This PerlIO abstraction can be enabled either on the Configure command
727line with
728
729 sh Configure -Duseperlio
730
731or interactively at the appropriate Configure prompt.
732
733If you choose to use the PerlIO abstraction layer, there are two
734(experimental) possibilities for the underlying IO calls. These have been
735tested to some extent on some platforms, but are not guaranteed to work
736everywhere.
737
738=over 4
739
740=item 1.
741
1ec51d55 742AT&T's "sfio". This has superior performance to stdio.h in many
aa689395 743cases, and is extensible by the use of "discipline" modules. Sfio
46bb10fb 744currently only builds on a subset of the UNIX platforms perl supports.
745Because the data structures are completely different from stdio, perl
746extension modules or external libraries may not work. This
747configuration exists to allow these issues to be worked on.
748
749This option requires the 'sfio' package to have been built and installed.
bfb7748a 750A (fairly old) version of sfio is in CPAN.
46bb10fb 751
752You select this option by
753
754 sh Configure -Duseperlio -Dusesfio
755
756If you have already selected -Duseperlio, and if Configure detects
757that you have sfio, then sfio will be the default suggested by
758Configure.
759
d6baa268 760Note: On some systems, sfio's iffe configuration script fails to
761detect that you have an atexit function (or equivalent). Apparently,
762this is a problem at least for some versions of Linux and SunOS 4.
763Configure should detect this problem and warn you about problems with
764_exit vs. exit. If you have this problem, the fix is to go back to
765your sfio sources and correct iffe's guess about atexit.
33e6ee5f 766
767There also might be a more recent release of Sfio that fixes your
768problem.
769
46bb10fb 770=item 2.
771
772Normal stdio IO, but with all IO going through calls to the PerlIO
773abstraction layer. This configuration can be used to check that perl and
774extension modules have been correctly converted to use the PerlIO
775abstraction.
776
777This configuration should work on all platforms (but might not).
778
aa689395 779You select this option via:
46bb10fb 780
781 sh Configure -Duseperlio -Uusesfio
782
783If you have already selected -Duseperlio, and if Configure does not
784detect sfio, then this will be the default suggested by Configure.
785
786=back
787
d6baa268 788=head2 Dynamic Loading
789
790By default, Configure will compile perl to use dynamic loading if
791your system supports it. If you want to force perl to be compiled
792statically, you can either choose this when Configure prompts you or
793you can use the Configure command line option -Uusedl.
794
aa689395 795=head2 Building a shared libperl.so Perl library
c3edaffb 796
797Currently, for most systems, the main perl executable is built by
798linking the "perl library" libperl.a with perlmain.o, your static
799extensions (usually just DynaLoader.a) and various extra libraries,
800such as -lm.
801
9d67150a 802On some systems that support dynamic loading, it may be possible to
803replace libperl.a with a shared libperl.so. If you anticipate building
c3edaffb 804several different perl binaries (e.g. by embedding libperl into
805different programs, or by using the optional compiler extension), then
9d67150a 806you might wish to build a shared libperl.so so that all your binaries
c3edaffb 807can share the same library.
808
809The disadvantages are that there may be a significant performance
9d67150a 810penalty associated with the shared libperl.so, and that the overall
aa689395 811mechanism is still rather fragile with respect to different versions
c3edaffb 812and upgrades.
813
814In terms of performance, on my test system (Solaris 2.5_x86) the perl
9d67150a 815test suite took roughly 15% longer to run with the shared libperl.so.
c3edaffb 816Your system and typical applications may well give quite different
817results.
818
819The default name for the shared library is typically something like
a6006777 820libperl.so.3.2 (for Perl 5.003_02) or libperl.so.302 or simply
9d67150a 821libperl.so. Configure tries to guess a sensible naming convention
c3edaffb 822based on your C library name. Since the library gets installed in a
823version-specific architecture-dependent directory, the exact name
824isn't very important anyway, as long as your linker is happy.
825
826For some systems (mostly SVR4), building a shared libperl is required
827for dynamic loading to work, and hence is already the default.
828
829You can elect to build a shared libperl by
830
831 sh Configure -Duseshrplib
832
2bf2710f 833To build a shared libperl, the environment variable controlling shared
834library search (LD_LIBRARY_PATH in most systems, DYLD_LIBRARY_PATH for
f556e5b9 835NeXTSTEP/OPENSTEP/Darwin, LIBRARY_PATH for BeOS, SHLIB_PATH for
4fabb596 836HP-UX, LIBPATH for AIX, PATH for Cygwin) must be set up to include
2bf2710f 837the Perl build directory because that's where the shared libperl will
d6baa268 838be created. Configure arranges makefile to have the correct shared
2bf2710f 839library search settings.
840
841However, there are some special cases where manually setting the
842shared library path might be required. For example, if you want to run
843something like the following with the newly-built but not-yet-installed
844./perl:
845
846 cd t; ./perl misc/failing_test.t
847or
848 ./perl -Ilib ~/my_mission_critical_test
849
850then you need to set up the shared library path explicitly.
851You can do this with
c3edaffb 852
853 LD_LIBRARY_PATH=`pwd`:$LD_LIBRARY_PATH; export LD_LIBRARY_PATH
854
855for Bourne-style shells, or
856
857 setenv LD_LIBRARY_PATH `pwd`
858
2bf2710f 859for Csh-style shells. (This procedure may also be needed if for some
d6baa268 860unexpected reason Configure fails to set up makefile correctly.)
2bf2710f 861
862You can often recognize failures to build/use a shared libperl from error
863messages complaining about a missing libperl.so (or libperl.sl in HP-UX),
864for example:
86518126:./miniperl: /sbin/loader: Fatal Error: cannot map libperl.so
c3edaffb 866
9d67150a 867There is also an potential problem with the shared perl library if you
868want to have more than one "flavor" of the same version of perl (e.g.
869with and without -DDEBUGGING). For example, suppose you build and
a6006777 870install a standard Perl 5.004 with a shared library. Then, suppose you
871try to build Perl 5.004 with -DDEBUGGING enabled, but everything else
9d67150a 872the same, including all the installation directories. How can you
873ensure that your newly built perl will link with your newly built
7f678428 874libperl.so.4 rather with the installed libperl.so.4? The answer is
9d67150a 875that you might not be able to. The installation directory is encoded
56c6f531 876in the perl binary with the LD_RUN_PATH environment variable (or
877equivalent ld command-line option). On Solaris, you can override that
7beaa944 878with LD_LIBRARY_PATH; on Linux you can't. On Digital Unix, you can
0dcb58f4 879override LD_LIBRARY_PATH by setting the _RLD_ROOT environment variable
7beaa944 880to point to the perl build directory.
9d67150a 881
882The only reliable answer is that you should specify a different
883directory for the architecture-dependent library for your -DDEBUGGING
fb73857a 884version of perl. You can do this by changing all the *archlib*
d6baa268 885variables in config.sh to point to your new architecture-dependent library.
9d67150a 886
55479bb6 887=head2 Malloc Issues
888
d6baa268 889Perl relies heavily on malloc(3) to grow data structures as needed,
890so perl's performance can be noticeably affected by the performance of
891the malloc function on your system. The perl source is shipped with a
892version of malloc that has been optimized for the typical requests from
893perl, so there's a chance that it may be both faster and use less memory
894than your system malloc.
55479bb6 895
d6baa268 896However, if your system already has an excellent malloc, or if you are
897experiencing difficulties with extensions that use third-party libraries
898that call malloc, then you should probably use your system's malloc.
899(Or, you might wish to explore the malloc flags discussed below.)
c3edaffb 900
aa689395 901=over 4
902
d6baa268 903=item Using the system malloc
2ae324a7 904
d6baa268 905To build without perl's malloc, you can use the Configure command
aa689395 906
d6baa268 907 sh Configure -Uusemymalloc
aa689395 908
d6baa268 909or you can answer 'n' at the appropriate interactive Configure prompt.
aa689395 910
86058a2d 911=item -DPERL_POLLUTE_MALLOC
912
b2a6d19e 913NOTE: This flag is enabled automatically on some platforms if you
914asked for binary compatibility with version 5.005, or if you just
915run Configure to accept all the defaults on those platforms. You
916can refuse the automatic binary compatibility flags wholesale by
917running:
918
919 sh Configure -Ubincompat5005
920
921or by answering 'n' at the appropriate prompt.
922
d6baa268 923Perl's malloc family of functions are called Perl_malloc(),
b2a6d19e 924Perl_realloc(), Perl_calloc() and Perl_mfree(). When this flag is
925not enabled, the names do not clash with the system versions of
926these functions.
d6baa268 927
b2a6d19e 928If enabled, Perl's malloc family of functions will have the same
d6baa268 929names as the system versions. This may be sometimes required when you
930have libraries that like to free() data that may have been allocated
931by Perl_malloc() and vice versa.
86058a2d 932
d6baa268 933Note that enabling this option may sometimes lead to duplicate symbols
934from the linker for malloc et al. In such cases, the system probably
935does not allow its malloc functions to be fully replaced with custom
936versions.
86058a2d 937
aa689395 938=back
939
3bf462b8 940=head2 Building a debugging perl
941
942You can run perl scripts under the perl debugger at any time with
3fe9a6f1 943B<perl -d your_script>. If, however, you want to debug perl itself,
3bf462b8 944you probably want to do
945
946 sh Configure -Doptimize='-g'
947
203c3eec 948This will do two independent things: First, it will force compilation
949to use cc -g so that you can use your system's debugger on the
950executable. (Note: Your system may actually require something like
d6baa268 951cc -g2. Check your man pages for cc(1) and also any hint file for
952your system.) Second, it will add -DDEBUGGING to your ccflags
953variable in config.sh so that you can use B<perl -D> to access perl's
954internal state. (Note: Configure will only add -DDEBUGGING by default
955if you are not reusing your old config.sh. If you want to reuse your
956old config.sh, then you can just edit it and change the optimize and
957ccflags variables by hand and then propagate your changes as shown in
958L<"Propagating your changes to config.sh"> below.)
203c3eec 959
960You can actually specify -g and -DDEBUGGING independently, but usually
961it's convenient to have both.
3bf462b8 962
963If you are using a shared libperl, see the warnings about multiple
964versions of perl under L<Building a shared libperl.so Perl library>.
965
8d74ce1c 966=head2 Extensions
967
968By default, Configure will offer to build every extension which appears
969to be supported. For example, Configure will offer to build GDBM_File
970only if it is able to find the gdbm library. (See examples below.)
971B, DynaLoader, Fcntl, IO, and attrs are always built by default.
972Configure does not contain code to test for POSIX compliance, so POSIX
973is always built by default as well. If you wish to skip POSIX, you can
974set the Configure variable useposix=false either in a hint file or from
975the Configure command line. Similarly, the Opcode extension is always
976built by default, but you can skip it by setting the Configure variable
977useopcode=false either in a hint file for from the command line.
978
c42e3e15 979If you unpack any additional extensions in the ext/ directory before
980running Configure, then Configure will offer to build those additional
981extensions as well. Most users probably shouldn't have to do this --
982it is usually easier to build additional extensions later after perl
983has been installed. However, if you wish to have those additional
984extensions statically linked into the perl binary, then this offers a
985convenient way to do that in one step. (It is not necessary, however;
986you can build and install extensions just fine even if you don't have
987dynamic loading. See lib/ExtUtils/MakeMaker.pm for more details.)
988
989You can learn more about each of the supplied extensions by consulting the
8d74ce1c 990documentation in the individual .pm modules, located under the
991ext/ subdirectory.
992
993Even if you do not have dynamic loading, you must still build the
994DynaLoader extension; you should just build the stub dl_none.xs
995version. (Configure will suggest this as the default.)
996
997In summary, here are the Configure command-line variables you can set
998to turn off each extension:
999
1000 B (Always included by default)
1001 DB_File i_db
1002 DynaLoader (Must always be included as a static extension)
1003 Fcntl (Always included by default)
1004 GDBM_File i_gdbm
1005 IO (Always included by default)
1006 NDBM_File i_ndbm
1007 ODBM_File i_dbm
1008 POSIX useposix
1009 SDBM_File (Always included by default)
1010 Opcode useopcode
1011 Socket d_socket
a2dab6bc 1012 Threads use5005threads
8d74ce1c 1013 attrs (Always included by default)
1014
1015Thus to skip the NDBM_File extension, you can use
1016
1017 sh Configure -Ui_ndbm
1018
1019Again, this is taken care of automatically if you don't have the ndbm
1020library.
1021
1022Of course, you may always run Configure interactively and select only
1023the extensions you want.
1024
1025Note: The DB_File module will only work with version 1.x of Berkeley
1026DB or newer releases of version 2. Configure will automatically detect
1027this for you and refuse to try to build DB_File with earlier
1028releases of version 2.
1029
1030If you re-use your old config.sh but change your system (e.g. by
1031adding libgdbm) Configure will still offer your old choices of extensions
1032for the default answer, but it will also point out the discrepancy to
1033you.
1034
1035Finally, if you have dynamic loading (most modern Unix systems do)
1036remember that these extensions do not increase the size of your perl
1037executable, nor do they impact start-up time, so you probably might as
1038well build all the ones that will work on your system.
1039
1040=head2 Including locally-installed libraries
1041
1042Perl5 comes with interfaces to number of database extensions, including
1043dbm, ndbm, gdbm, and Berkeley db. For each extension, if
1044Configure can find the appropriate header files and libraries, it will
1045automatically include that extension. The gdbm and db libraries
1046are not included with perl. See the library documentation for
1047how to obtain the libraries.
1048
d6baa268 1049If your database header (.h) files are not in a directory normally
1050searched by your C compiler, then you will need to include the
1051appropriate -I/your/directory option when prompted by Configure. If
1052your database library (.a) files are not in a directory normally
1053searched by your C compiler and linker, then you will need to include
1054the appropriate -L/your/directory option when prompted by Configure.
1055See the examples below.
8d74ce1c 1056
1057=head2 Examples
1058
1059=over 4
1060
1061=item gdbm in /usr/local
1062
1063Suppose you have gdbm and want Configure to find it and build the
d6baa268 1064GDBM_File extension. This example assumes you have gdbm.h
8d74ce1c 1065installed in /usr/local/include/gdbm.h and libgdbm.a installed in
1066/usr/local/lib/libgdbm.a. Configure should figure all the
1067necessary steps out automatically.
1068
1069Specifically, when Configure prompts you for flags for
1070your C compiler, you should include -I/usr/local/include.
1071
1072When Configure prompts you for linker flags, you should include
1073-L/usr/local/lib.
1074
1075If you are using dynamic loading, then when Configure prompts you for
1076linker flags for dynamic loading, you should again include
1077-L/usr/local/lib.
1078
d6baa268 1079Again, this should all happen automatically. This should also work if
1080you have gdbm installed in any of (/usr/local, /opt/local, /usr/gnu,
1081/opt/gnu, /usr/GNU, or /opt/GNU).
8d74ce1c 1082
1083=item gdbm in /usr/you
1084
1085Suppose you have gdbm installed in some place other than /usr/local/,
1086but you still want Configure to find it. To be specific, assume you
1087have /usr/you/include/gdbm.h and /usr/you/lib/libgdbm.a. You
1088still have to add -I/usr/you/include to cc flags, but you have to take
1089an extra step to help Configure find libgdbm.a. Specifically, when
1090Configure prompts you for library directories, you have to add
1091/usr/you/lib to the list.
1092
1093It is possible to specify this from the command line too (all on one
1094line):
1095
d6baa268 1096 sh Configure -de \
8d74ce1c 1097 -Dlocincpth="/usr/you/include" \
1098 -Dloclibpth="/usr/you/lib"
1099
1100locincpth is a space-separated list of include directories to search.
1101Configure will automatically add the appropriate -I directives.
1102
1103loclibpth is a space-separated list of library directories to search.
1104Configure will automatically add the appropriate -L directives. If
1105you have some libraries under /usr/local/ and others under
1106/usr/you, then you have to include both, namely
1107
d6baa268 1108 sh Configure -de \
8d74ce1c 1109 -Dlocincpth="/usr/you/include /usr/local/include" \
1110 -Dloclibpth="/usr/you/lib /usr/local/lib"
1111
1112=back
1113
8e07c86e 1114=head2 What if it doesn't work?
1115
8d74ce1c 1116If you run into problems, try some of the following ideas.
1117If none of them help, then see L<"Reporting Problems"> below.
1118
8e07c86e 1119=over 4
1120
25f94b33 1121=item Running Configure Interactively
1122
1123If Configure runs into trouble, remember that you can always run
1124Configure interactively so that you can check (and correct) its
1125guesses.
1126
1127All the installation questions have been moved to the top, so you don't
aa689395 1128have to wait for them. Once you've handled them (and your C compiler and
1ec51d55 1129flags) you can type &-d at the next Configure prompt and Configure
25f94b33 1130will use the defaults from then on.
1131
1132If you find yourself trying obscure command line incantations and
1133config.over tricks, I recommend you run Configure interactively
1134instead. You'll probably save yourself time in the long run.
1135
aa689395 1136=item Hint files
8e07c86e 1137
1138The perl distribution includes a number of system-specific hints files
1139in the hints/ directory. If one of them matches your system, Configure
1140will offer to use that hint file.
1141
1142Several of the hint files contain additional important information.
f5b3b617 1143If you have any problems, it is a good idea to read the relevant hint file
1144for further information. See hints/solaris_2.sh for an extensive example.
1145More information about writing good hints is in the hints/README.hints
1146file.
8e07c86e 1147
edb1cbcb 1148=item *** WHOA THERE!!! ***
1149
1150Occasionally, Configure makes a wrong guess. For example, on SunOS
11514.1.3, Configure incorrectly concludes that tzname[] is in the
1152standard C library. The hint file is set up to correct for this. You
1153will see a message:
1154
1155 *** WHOA THERE!!! ***
1156 The recommended value for $d_tzname on this machine was "undef"!
1157 Keep the recommended value? [y]
1158
1159You should always keep the recommended value unless, after reading the
1160relevant section of the hint file, you are sure you want to try
1161overriding it.
1162
1163If you are re-using an old config.sh, the word "previous" will be
1164used instead of "recommended". Again, you will almost always want
1165to keep the previous value, unless you have changed something on your
1166system.
1167
1168For example, suppose you have added libgdbm.a to your system
1169and you decide to reconfigure perl to use GDBM_File. When you run
1170Configure again, you will need to add -lgdbm to the list of libraries.
bfb7748a 1171Now, Configure will find your gdbm include file and library and will
1172issue a message:
edb1cbcb 1173
1174 *** WHOA THERE!!! ***
1175 The previous value for $i_gdbm on this machine was "undef"!
1176 Keep the previous value? [y]
1177
1ec51d55 1178In this case, you do not want to keep the previous value, so you
c3edaffb 1179should answer 'n'. (You'll also have to manually add GDBM_File to
edb1cbcb 1180the list of dynamic extensions to build.)
1181
8e07c86e 1182=item Changing Compilers
1183
1184If you change compilers or make other significant changes, you should
1ec51d55 1185probably not re-use your old config.sh. Simply remove it or
8e07c86e 1186rename it, e.g. mv config.sh config.sh.old. Then rerun Configure
1187with the options you want to use.
1188
1ec51d55 1189This is a common source of problems. If you change from cc to
1190gcc, you should almost always remove your old config.sh.
8e07c86e 1191
c3edaffb 1192=item Propagating your changes to config.sh
8e07c86e 1193
1ec51d55 1194If you make any changes to config.sh, you should propagate
1195them to all the .SH files by running
1196
1197 sh Configure -S
1198
1199You will then have to rebuild by running
9d67150a 1200
1201 make depend
1202 make
8e07c86e 1203
1204=item config.over
1205
1206You can also supply a shell script config.over to over-ride Configure's
1207guesses. It will get loaded up at the very end, just before config.sh
1208is created. You have to be careful with this, however, as Configure
d6baa268 1209does no checking that your changes make sense.
8e07c86e 1210
1211=item config.h
1212
1ec51d55 1213Many of the system dependencies are contained in config.h.
1214Configure builds config.h by running the config_h.SH script.
1215The values for the variables are taken from config.sh.
8e07c86e 1216
1ec51d55 1217If there are any problems, you can edit config.h directly. Beware,
1218though, that the next time you run Configure, your changes will be
8e07c86e 1219lost.
1220
1221=item cflags
1222
1223If you have any additional changes to make to the C compiler command
1ec51d55 1224line, they can be made in cflags.SH. For instance, to turn off the
1225optimizer on toke.c, find the line in the switch structure for
1226toke.c and put the command optimize='-g' before the ;; . You
1227can also edit cflags directly, but beware that your changes will be
1228lost the next time you run Configure.
8e07c86e 1229
f5b3b617 1230To explore various ways of changing ccflags from within a hint file,
1231see the file hints/README.hints.
1232
1233To change the C flags for all the files, edit config.sh and change either
1234$ccflags or $optimize, and then re-run
1ec51d55 1235
1236 sh Configure -S
1237 make depend
8e07c86e 1238
aa689395 1239=item No sh
8e07c86e 1240
c42e3e15 1241If you don't have sh, you'll have to copy the sample file
1242Porting/config.sh to config.sh and edit your config.sh to reflect your
1243system's peculiarities. See Porting/pumpkin.pod for more information.
8e07c86e 1244You'll probably also have to extensively modify the extension building
1245mechanism.
1246
d6baa268 1247=item Environment variable clashes
1248
1249Configure uses a CONFIG variable that is reported to cause trouble on
1250ReliantUnix 5.44. If your system sets this variable, you can try
1251unsetting it before you run Configure. Configure should eventually
1252be fixed to avoid polluting the namespace of the environment.
1253
1254=item Digital UNIX/Tru64 UNIX and BIN_SH
1255
1256In Digital UNIX/Tru64 UNIX, Configure might abort with
1257
1258Build a threading Perl? [n]
1259Configure[2437]: Syntax error at line 1 : `config.sh' is not expected.
1260
1261This indicates that Configure is being run with a broken Korn shell
1262(even though you think you are using a Bourne shell by using
1263"sh Configure" or "./Configure"). The Korn shell bug has been reported
1264to Compaq as of February 1999 but in the meanwhile, the reason ksh is
1265being used is that you have the environment variable BIN_SH set to
1266'xpg4'. This causes /bin/sh to delegate its duties to /bin/posix/sh
1267(a ksh). Unset the environment variable and rerun Configure.
1268
1269=item HP-UX 11, pthreads, and libgdbm
1270
1271If you are running Configure with -Dusethreads in HP-UX 11, be warned
1272that POSIX threads and libgdbm (the GNU dbm library) compiled before
1273HP-UX 11 do not mix. This will cause a basic test run by Configure to
1274fail
1275
1276Pthread internal error: message: __libc_reinit() failed, file: ../pthreads/pthread.c, line: 1096
1277Return Pointer is 0xc082bf33
1278sh: 5345 Quit(coredump)
1279
1280and Configure will give up. The cure is to recompile and install
1281libgdbm under HP-UX 11.
1282
c3edaffb 1283=item Porting information
1284
2ae324a7 1285Specific information for the OS/2, Plan9, VMS and Win32 ports is in the
1ec51d55 1286corresponding README files and subdirectories. Additional information,
1287including a glossary of all those config.sh variables, is in the Porting
c42e3e15 1288subdirectory. Especially Porting/Glossary should come in handy.
c3edaffb 1289
7f678428 1290Ports for other systems may also be available. You should check out
1ec51d55 1291http://www.perl.com/CPAN/ports for current information on ports to
7f678428 1292various other operating systems.
1293
491517e0 1294If you plan to port Perl to a new architecture study carefully the
1295section titled "Philosophical Issues in Patching and Porting Perl"
1296in the file Porting/pumpkin.pod and the file Porting/patching.pod.
1297Study also how other non-UNIX ports have solved problems.
1298
8e07c86e 1299=back
1300
1301=head1 make depend
1302
bfb7748a 1303This will look for all the includes. The output is stored in makefile.
1304The only difference between Makefile and makefile is the dependencies at
1305the bottom of makefile. If you have to make any changes, you should edit
1306makefile, not Makefile since the Unix make command reads makefile first.
1307(On non-Unix systems, the output may be stored in a different file.
1308Check the value of $firstmakefile in your config.sh if in doubt.)
8e07c86e 1309
1310Configure will offer to do this step for you, so it isn't listed
1311explicitly above.
1312
1313=head1 make
1314
1315This will attempt to make perl in the current directory.
1316
8d74ce1c 1317=head2 What if it doesn't work?
1318
8e07c86e 1319If you can't compile successfully, try some of the following ideas.
7f678428 1320If none of them help, and careful reading of the error message and
8d74ce1c 1321the relevant manual pages on your system doesn't help,
1322then see L<"Reporting Problems"> below.
8e07c86e 1323
1324=over 4
1325
1ec51d55 1326=item hints
8e07c86e 1327
1328If you used a hint file, try reading the comments in the hint file
1329for further tips and information.
1330
1ec51d55 1331=item extensions
8e07c86e 1332
1ec51d55 1333If you can successfully build miniperl, but the process crashes
c3edaffb 1334during the building of extensions, you should run
1335
3a6175e1 1336 make minitest
c3edaffb 1337
1338to test your version of miniperl.
1339
e57fd563 1340=item locale
1341
bfb7748a 1342If you have any locale-related environment variables set, try unsetting
1343them. I have some reports that some versions of IRIX hang while
1344running B<./miniperl configpm> with locales other than the C locale.
1345See the discussion under L<"make test"> below about locales and the
1346whole L<"Locale problems"> section in the file pod/perllocale.pod.
3e6e419a 1347The latter is especially useful if you see something like this
1348
1349 perl: warning: Setting locale failed.
1350 perl: warning: Please check that your locale settings:
1351 LC_ALL = "En_US",
1352 LANG = (unset)
1353 are supported and installed on your system.
1354 perl: warning: Falling back to the standard locale ("C").
1355
1356at Perl startup.
e57fd563 1357
7f678428 1358=item varargs
c3edaffb 1359
1360If you get varargs problems with gcc, be sure that gcc is installed
bfb7748a 1361correctly and that you are not passing -I/usr/include to gcc. When using
1362gcc, you should probably have i_stdarg='define' and i_varargs='undef'
1363in config.sh. The problem is usually solved by running fixincludes
1364correctly. If you do change config.sh, don't forget to propagate
1365your changes (see L<"Propagating your changes to config.sh"> below).
7f678428 1366See also the L<"vsprintf"> item below.
c3edaffb 1367
bfb7748a 1368=item util.c
c3edaffb 1369
1370If you get error messages such as the following (the exact line
bfb7748a 1371numbers and function name may vary in different versions of perl):
c3edaffb 1372
bfb7748a 1373 util.c: In function `Perl_form':
1374 util.c:1107: number of arguments doesn't match prototype
1375 proto.h:125: prototype declaration
c3edaffb 1376
1377it might well be a symptom of the gcc "varargs problem". See the
7f678428 1378previous L<"varargs"> item.
c3edaffb 1379
9d67150a 1380=item Solaris and SunOS dynamic loading
c3edaffb 1381
1382If you have problems with dynamic loading using gcc on SunOS or
1383Solaris, and you are using GNU as and GNU ld, you may need to add
1ec51d55 1384-B/bin/ (for SunOS) or -B/usr/ccs/bin/ (for Solaris) to your
c3edaffb 1385$ccflags, $ldflags, and $lddlflags so that the system's versions of as
6877a1cf 1386and ld are used. Note that the trailing '/' is required.
1387Alternatively, you can use the GCC_EXEC_PREFIX
c3edaffb 1388environment variable to ensure that Sun's as and ld are used. Consult
1ec51d55 1389your gcc documentation for further information on the -B option and
c3edaffb 1390the GCC_EXEC_PREFIX variable.
1391
7beaa944 1392One convenient way to ensure you are not using GNU as and ld is to
1393invoke Configure with
1394
1395 sh Configure -Dcc='gcc -B/usr/ccs/bin/'
1396
1397for Solaris systems. For a SunOS system, you must use -B/bin/
1398instead.
1399
84902520 1400Alternatively, recent versions of GNU ld reportedly work if you
1401include C<-Wl,-export-dynamic> in the ccdlflags variable in
1402config.sh.
1403
9d67150a 1404=item ld.so.1: ./perl: fatal: relocation error:
1405
1406If you get this message on SunOS or Solaris, and you're using gcc,
7f678428 1407it's probably the GNU as or GNU ld problem in the previous item
1408L<"Solaris and SunOS dynamic loading">.
9d67150a 1409
1ec51d55 1410=item LD_LIBRARY_PATH
c3edaffb 1411
1412If you run into dynamic loading problems, check your setting of
aa689395 1413the LD_LIBRARY_PATH environment variable. If you're creating a static
1414Perl library (libperl.a rather than libperl.so) it should build
c3edaffb 1415fine with LD_LIBRARY_PATH unset, though that may depend on details
1416of your local set-up.
1417
1418=item dlopen: stub interception failed
1419
1420The primary cause of the 'dlopen: stub interception failed' message is
1421that the LD_LIBRARY_PATH environment variable includes a directory
1422which is a symlink to /usr/lib (such as /lib).
1423
aa689395 1424The reason this causes a problem is quite subtle. The file libdl.so.1.0
c3edaffb 1425actually *only* contains functions which generate 'stub interception
1426failed' errors! The runtime linker intercepts links to
1427"/usr/lib/libdl.so.1.0" and links in internal implementation of those
1428functions instead. [Thanks to Tim Bunce for this explanation.]
1429
aa689395 1430=item nm extraction
c3edaffb 1431
1432If Configure seems to be having trouble finding library functions,
1433try not using nm extraction. You can do this from the command line
1434with
1435
1436 sh Configure -Uusenm
1437
1438or by answering the nm extraction question interactively.
1ec51d55 1439If you have previously run Configure, you should not reuse your old
c3edaffb 1440config.sh.
1441
bfb7748a 1442=item umask not found
1443
1444If the build processes encounters errors relating to umask(), the problem
1445is probably that Configure couldn't find your umask() system call.
1446Check your config.sh. You should have d_umask='define'. If you don't,
1447this is probably the L<"nm extraction"> problem discussed above. Also,
1448try reading the hints file for your system for further information.
1449
7f678428 1450=item vsprintf
c3edaffb 1451
1452If you run into problems with vsprintf in compiling util.c, the
1453problem is probably that Configure failed to detect your system's
1454version of vsprintf(). Check whether your system has vprintf().
1455(Virtually all modern Unix systems do.) Then, check the variable
1456d_vprintf in config.sh. If your system has vprintf, it should be:
1457
1458 d_vprintf='define'
1459
1460If Configure guessed wrong, it is likely that Configure guessed wrong
bfb7748a 1461on a number of other common functions too. This is probably
1462the L<"nm extraction"> problem discussed above.
c3edaffb 1463
3fe9a6f1 1464=item do_aspawn
1465
1466If you run into problems relating to do_aspawn or do_spawn, the
1467problem is probably that Configure failed to detect your system's
bfb7748a 1468fork() function. Follow the procedure in the previous item
1469on L<"nm extraction">.
3fe9a6f1 1470
84902520 1471=item __inet_* errors
1472
1473If you receive unresolved symbol errors during Perl build and/or test
1474referring to __inet_* symbols, check to see whether BIND 8.1 is
1475installed. It installs a /usr/local/include/arpa/inet.h that refers to
1476these symbols. Versions of BIND later than 8.1 do not install inet.h
1477in that location and avoid the errors. You should probably update to a
1478newer version of BIND. If you can't, you can either link with the
1479updated resolver library provided with BIND 8.1 or rename
1480/usr/local/bin/arpa/inet.h during the Perl build and test process to
1481avoid the problem.
1482
d6baa268 1483=item #error "No DATAMODEL_NATIVE specified"
1484
1485This is a common error when trying to build perl on Solaris 2.6 with a
1486gcc installation from Solaris 2.5 or 2.5.1. The Solaris header files
1487changed, so you need to update your gcc installation. You can either
1488rerun the fixincludes script from gcc or take the opportunity to
1489update your gcc installation.
1490
aa689395 1491=item Optimizer
c3edaffb 1492
9d67150a 1493If you can't compile successfully, try turning off your compiler's
aa689395 1494optimizer. Edit config.sh and change the line
9d67150a 1495
1496 optimize='-O'
1497
bfb7748a 1498to
9d67150a 1499
1500 optimize=' '
1501
1502then propagate your changes with B<sh Configure -S> and rebuild
1503with B<make depend; make>.
1504
1ec51d55 1505=item CRIPPLED_CC
9d67150a 1506
1b1c1ae2 1507If you still can't compile successfully, try:
1508
1509 sh Configure -Accflags=-DCRIPPLED_CC
1510
1511This flag simplifies some complicated expressions for compilers that get
1512indigestion easily. (Just because you get no errors doesn't mean it
1513compiled right!)
9d67150a 1514
1515=item Missing functions
1516
1517If you have missing routines, you probably need to add some library or
1518other, or you need to undefine some feature that Configure thought was
1519there but is defective or incomplete. Look through config.h for
bfb7748a 1520likely suspects. If Configure guessed wrong on a number of functions,
1521you might have the L<"nm extraction"> problem discussed above.
8e07c86e 1522
1ec51d55 1523=item toke.c
8e07c86e 1524
1ec51d55 1525Some compilers will not compile or optimize the larger files (such as
1526toke.c) without some extra switches to use larger jump offsets or
1527allocate larger internal tables. You can customize the switches for
1528each file in cflags. It's okay to insert rules for specific files into
1529makefile since a default rule only takes effect in the absence of a
8e07c86e 1530specific rule.
1531
7f678428 1532=item Missing dbmclose
8e07c86e 1533
c3edaffb 1534SCO prior to 3.2.4 may be missing dbmclose(). An upgrade to 3.2.4
1535that includes libdbm.nfs (which includes dbmclose()) may be available.
8e07c86e 1536
f3d9a6ba 1537=item Note (probably harmless): No library found for -lsomething
7f678428 1538
1539If you see such a message during the building of an extension, but
1540the extension passes its tests anyway (see L<"make test"> below),
1541then don't worry about the warning message. The extension
1542Makefile.PL goes looking for various libraries needed on various
aa689395 1543systems; few systems will need all the possible libraries listed.
7f678428 1544For example, a system may have -lcposix or -lposix, but it's
1545unlikely to have both, so most users will see warnings for the one
f3d9a6ba 1546they don't have. The phrase 'probably harmless' is intended to
1547reassure you that nothing unusual is happening, and the build
1548process is continuing.
7f678428 1549
1550On the other hand, if you are building GDBM_File and you get the
1551message
1552
f3d9a6ba 1553 Note (probably harmless): No library found for -lgdbm
7f678428 1554
1555then it's likely you're going to run into trouble somewhere along
1556the line, since it's hard to see how you can use the GDBM_File
1557extension without the -lgdbm library.
1558
1559It is true that, in principle, Configure could have figured all of
1560this out, but Configure and the extension building process are not
1561quite that tightly coordinated.
1562
aa689395 1563=item sh: ar: not found
1564
1565This is a message from your shell telling you that the command 'ar'
1566was not found. You need to check your PATH environment variable to
1567make sure that it includes the directory with the 'ar' command. This
1ec51d55 1568is a common problem on Solaris, where 'ar' is in the /usr/ccs/bin
aa689395 1569directory.
1570
1571=item db-recno failure on tests 51, 53 and 55
1572
1573Old versions of the DB library (including the DB library which comes
1574with FreeBSD 2.1) had broken handling of recno databases with modified
1575bval settings. Upgrade your DB library or OS.
1576
6087ac44 1577=item Bad arg length for semctl, is XX, should be ZZZ
1578
1579If you get this error message from the lib/ipc_sysv test, your System
1580V IPC may be broken. The XX typically is 20, and that is what ZZZ
1581also should be. Consider upgrading your OS, or reconfiguring your OS
1582to include the System V semaphores.
1583
220f3621 1584=item lib/ipc_sysv........semget: No space left on device
1585
1586Either your account or the whole system has run out of semaphores. Or
1587both. Either list the semaphores with "ipcs" and remove the unneeded
1588ones (which ones these are depends on your system and applications)
1589with "ipcrm -s SEMAPHORE_ID_HERE" or configure more semaphores to your
1590system.
1591
d6baa268 1592=item GNU binutils
1593
1594If you mix GNU binutils (nm, ld, ar) with equivalent vendor-supplied
1595tools you may be in for some trouble. For example creating archives
1596with an old GNU 'ar' and then using a new current vendor-supplied 'ld'
1597may lead into linking problems. Either recompile your GNU binutils
1598under your current operating system release, or modify your PATH not
1599to include the GNU utils before running Configure, or specify the
1600vendor-supplied utilities explicitly to Configure, for example by
1601Configure -Dar=/bin/ar.
1602
16dc217a 1603=item THIS PACKAGE SEEMS TO BE INCOMPLETE
1604
1605The F<Configure> program has not been able to find all the files which
1606make up the complete Perl distribution. You may have a damaged source
1607archive file (in which case you may also have seen messages such as
1608C<gzip: stdin: unexpected end of file> and C<tar: Unexpected EOF on
1609archive file>), or you may have obtained a structurally-sound but
1610incomplete archive. In either case, try downloading again from the
1611official site named at the start of this document. If you do find
1612that any site is carrying a corrupted or incomplete source code
1613archive, please report it to the site's maintainer.
1614
1615This message can also be a symptom of using (say) a GNU tar compiled
1616for SunOS4 on Solaris. When you run SunOS4 binaries on Solaris the
1617run-time system magically alters pathnames matching m#lib/locale# - so
1618when tar tries to create lib/locale.pm a differently-named file gets
1619created instead.
1620
1621You may find the file under its assumed name and be able to rename it
1622back. Or use Sun's tar to do the extract.
1623
1624=item invalid token: ##
1625
1626You are using a non-ANSI-compliant C compiler. See L<WARNING: This
1627version requires a compiler that supports ANSI C>.
1628
1629=item lib/locale.pm: No such file or directory
1630
1631See L<THIS PACKAGE SEEMS TO BE INCOMPLETE>.
1632
1ec51d55 1633=item Miscellaneous
8e07c86e 1634
1635Some additional things that have been reported for either perl4 or perl5:
1636
1637Genix may need to use libc rather than libc_s, or #undef VARARGS.
1638
1639NCR Tower 32 (OS 2.01.01) may need -W2,-Sl,2000 and #undef MKDIR.
1640
1ec51d55 1641UTS may need one or more of -DCRIPPLED_CC, -K or -g, and undef LSTAT.
8e07c86e 1642
220f3621 1643FreeBSD can fail the lib/ipc_sysv.t test if SysV IPC has not been
1644configured to the kernel. Perl tries to detect this, though, and
1645you will get a message telling what to do.
6087ac44 1646
8e07c86e 1647If you get syntax errors on '(', try -DCRIPPLED_CC.
1648
1649Machines with half-implemented dbm routines will need to #undef I_ODBM
1650
d6baa268 1651HP-UX 11 Y2K patch "Y2K-1100 B.11.00.B0125 HP-UX Core OS Year 2000
1652Patch Bundle" has been reported to break the io/fs test #18 which
1653tests whether utime() can change timestamps. The Y2K patch seems to
1654break utime() so that over NFS the timestamps do not get changed
1655(on local filesystems utime() still works).
1656
8e07c86e 1657=back
1658
1659=head1 make test
1660
d6baa268 1661This will run the regression tests on the perl you just made. If
1662'make test' doesn't say "All tests successful" then something went
1663wrong. See the file t/README in the t subdirectory.
84902520 1664
84902520 1665Note that you can't run the tests in background if this disables
fb73857a 1666opening of /dev/tty. You can use 'make test-notty' in that case but
1667a few tty tests will be skipped.
c3edaffb 1668
c4f23d77 1669=head2 What if make test doesn't work?
1670
1ec51d55 1671If make test bombs out, just cd to the t directory and run ./TEST
1672by hand to see if it makes any difference. If individual tests
c3edaffb 1673bomb, you can run them by hand, e.g.,
8e07c86e 1674
1675 ./perl op/groups.t
1676
aa689395 1677Another way to get more detailed information about failed tests and
1ec51d55 1678individual subtests is to cd to the t directory and run
aa689395 1679
1680 ./perl harness
1681
fb73857a 1682(this assumes that most basic tests succeed, since harness uses
aa689395 1683complicated constructs).
1684
fb73857a 1685You should also read the individual tests to see if there are any helpful
c3edaffb 1686comments that apply to your system.
1687
c4f23d77 1688=over 4
1689
1690=item locale
1691
1ec51d55 1692Note: One possible reason for errors is that some external programs
c07a80fd 1693may be broken due to the combination of your environment and the way
3fe9a6f1 1694B<make test> exercises them. For example, this may happen if you have
1ec51d55 1695one or more of these environment variables set: LC_ALL LC_CTYPE
1696LC_COLLATE LANG. In some versions of UNIX, the non-English locales
e57fd563 1697are known to cause programs to exhibit mysterious errors.
1698
1699If you have any of the above environment variables set, please try
aa689395 1700
1701 setenv LC_ALL C
1702
1703(for C shell) or
1704
1705 LC_ALL=C;export LC_ALL
1706
1ec51d55 1707for Bourne or Korn shell) from the command line and then retry
1708make test. If the tests then succeed, you may have a broken program that
aa689395 1709is confusing the testing. Please run the troublesome test by hand as
e57fd563 1710shown above and see whether you can locate the program. Look for
1ec51d55 1711things like: exec, `backquoted command`, system, open("|...") or
1712open("...|"). All these mean that Perl is trying to run some
e57fd563 1713external program.
eed2e782 1714
c4f23d77 1715=item Out of memory
1716
1717On some systems, particularly those with smaller amounts of RAM, some
1718of the tests in t/op/pat.t may fail with an "Out of memory" message.
7970f296 1719For example, on my SparcStation IPC with 12 MB of RAM, in perl5.5.670,
1720test 85 will fail if run under either t/TEST or t/harness.
c4f23d77 1721
1722Try stopping other jobs on the system and then running the test by itself:
1723
1724 cd t; ./perl op/pat.t
1725
1726to see if you have any better luck. If your perl still fails this
1727test, it does not necessarily mean you have a broken perl. This test
1728tries to exercise the regular expression subsystem quite thoroughly,
1729and may well be far more demanding than your normal usage.
1730
c4f23d77 1731=back
1732
8e07c86e 1733=head1 make install
1734
1735This will put perl into the public directory you specified to
1ec51d55 1736Configure; by default this is /usr/local/bin. It will also try
8e07c86e 1737to put the man pages in a reasonable place. It will not nroff the man
aa689395 1738pages, however. You may need to be root to run B<make install>. If you
8e07c86e 1739are not root, you must own the directories in question and you should
1740ignore any messages about chown not working.
1741
dd64f1c3 1742=head2 Installing perl under different names
1743
1744If you want to install perl under a name other than "perl" (for example,
1745when installing perl with special features enabled, such as debugging),
1746indicate the alternate name on the "make install" line, such as:
1747
1748 make install PERLNAME=myperl
1749
beb13193 1750You can separately change the base used for versioned names (like
1751"perl5.005") by setting PERLNAME_VERBASE, like
1752
1753 make install PERLNAME=perl5 PERLNAME_VERBASE=perl
1754
1755This can be useful if you have to install perl as "perl5" (due to an
1756ancient version in /usr/bin supplied by your vendor, eg). Without this
1757the versioned binary would be called "perl55.005".
1758
dd64f1c3 1759=head2 Installed files
1760
8e07c86e 1761If you want to see exactly what will happen without installing
1762anything, you can run
4633a7c4 1763
8e07c86e 1764 ./perl installperl -n
1765 ./perl installman -n
1766
1ec51d55 1767make install will install the following:
8e07c86e 1768
1769 perl,
1770 perl5.nnn where nnn is the current release number. This
1771 will be a link to perl.
1772 suidperl,
1773 sperl5.nnn If you requested setuid emulation.
1774 a2p awk-to-perl translator
1775 cppstdin This is used by perl -P, if your cc -E can't
1776 read from stdin.
1777 c2ph, pstruct Scripts for handling C structures in header files.
1778 s2p sed-to-perl translator
1779 find2perl find-to-perl translator
aa689395 1780 h2ph Extract constants and simple macros from C headers
8e07c86e 1781 h2xs Converts C .h header files to Perl extensions.
24b3df7f 1782 perlbug Tool to report bugs in Perl.
8e07c86e 1783 perldoc Tool to read perl's pod documentation.
aa689395 1784 pl2pm Convert Perl 4 .pl files to Perl 5 .pm modules
8e07c86e 1785 pod2html, Converters from perl's pod documentation format
aa689395 1786 pod2latex, to other useful formats.
1787 pod2man, and
1788 pod2text
1789 splain Describe Perl warnings and errors
95667ae4 1790 dprofpp Perl code profile post-processor
8e07c86e 1791
1792 library files in $privlib and $archlib specified to
1793 Configure, usually under /usr/local/lib/perl5/.
d6baa268 1794 man pages in $man1dir, usually /usr/local/man/man1.
1795 module man
1796 pages in $man3dir, usually /usr/local/man/man3.
8e07c86e 1797 pod/*.pod in $privlib/pod/.
1798
d6baa268 1799Installperl will also create the directories listed above
1800in L<"Installation Directories">.
4633a7c4 1801
56c6f531 1802Perl's *.h header files and the libperl.a library are also installed
d6baa268 1803under $archlib so that any user may later build new modules, run the
56c6f531 1804optional Perl compiler, or embed the perl interpreter into another
1805program even if the Perl source is no longer available.
8e07c86e 1806
aa689395 1807=head1 Coexistence with earlier versions of perl5
4633a7c4 1808
693762b4 1809In general, you can usually safely upgrade from one version of Perl (e.g.
18105.004_04) to another similar version (e.g. 5.004_05) without re-compiling
1811all of your add-on extensions. You can also safely leave the old version
1812around in case the new version causes you problems for some reason.
1813For example, if you want to be sure that your script continues to run
dc45a647 1814with 5.004_04, simply replace the '#!/usr/local/bin/perl' line at the
693762b4 1815top of the script with the particular version you want to run, e.g.
1816#!/usr/local/bin/perl5.00404.
1817
693762b4 1818Most extensions will probably not need to be recompiled to use
1819with a newer version of perl. Here is how it is supposed to work.
1820(These examples assume you accept all the Configure defaults.)
1821
d6baa268 1822Suppose you already have version 5.005_03 installed. The directories
1823searched by 5.005_03 are
1824
1825 /usr/local/lib/perl5/5.00503/$archname
1826 /usr/local/lib/perl5/5.00503
1827 /usr/local/lib/perl5/site_perl/5.005/$archname
1828 /usr/local/lib/perl5/site_perl/5.005
1829
0a08c020 1830Beginning with 5.6.0 the version number in the site libraries are
1831fully versioned. Now, suppose you install version 5.6.0. The directories
1832searched by version 5.6.0 will be
d6baa268 1833
0a08c020 1834 /usr/local/lib/perl5/5.6.0/$archname
1835 /usr/local/lib/perl5/5.6.0
1836 /usr/local/lib/perl5/site_perl/5.6.0/$archname
1837 /usr/local/lib/perl5/site_perl/5.6.0
d6baa268 1838
1839 /usr/local/lib/perl5/site_perl/5.005/$archname
1840 /usr/local/lib/perl5/site_perl/5.005
c42e3e15 1841 /usr/local/lib/perl5/site_perl/
bfb7748a 1842
c42e3e15 1843Notice the last three entries -- Perl understands the default structure
d6baa268 1844of the $sitelib directories and will look back in older, compatible
1845directories. This way, modules installed under 5.005_03 will continue
0a08c020 1846to be usable by 5.005_03 but will also accessible to 5.6.0. Further,
d6baa268 1847suppose that you upgrade a module to one which requires features
0a08c020 1848present only in 5.6.0. That new module will get installed into
1849/usr/local/lib/perl5/site_perl/5.6.0 and will be available to 5.6.0,
d6baa268 1850but will not interfere with the 5.005_03 version.
bfb7748a 1851
c42e3e15 1852The last entry, /usr/local/lib/perl5/site_perl/, is there so that
18535.6.0 will look for 5.004-era pure perl modules.
d6baa268 1854
0a08c020 1855Lastly, suppose you now install version 5.6.1, which we'll assume is
1856binary compatible with 5.6.0 and 5.005. The directories searched
1857by 5.6.1 (if you don't change the Configure defaults) will be:
d6baa268 1858
265f5c4a 1859 /usr/local/lib/perl5/5.6.1/$archname
1860 /usr/local/lib/perl5/5.6.1
0a08c020 1861 /usr/local/lib/perl5/site_perl/5.6.1/$archname
1862 /usr/local/lib/perl5/site_perl/5.6.1
1863
1864 /usr/local/lib/perl5/site_perl/5.6.0/$archname
1865 /usr/local/lib/perl5/site_perl/5.6.0
d6baa268 1866
1867 /usr/local/lib/perl5/site_perl/5.005/$archname
1868 /usr/local/lib/perl5/site_perl/5.005
1869 /usr/local/lib/perl5/site_perl/
bfb7748a 1870
0a08c020 1871Assuming the users in your site are still actively using perl 5.6.0 and
18725.005 after you installed 5.6.1, you can continue to install add-on
1873extensions using any of perl 5.6.1, 5.6.0, or 5.005. The installations
1874of these different versions remain distinct, but remember that the newer
1875versions of perl are automatically set up to search the site libraries of
1876the older ones. This means that installing a new extension with 5.005
1877will make it visible to all three versions. Later, if you install the
1878same extension using, say, perl 5.6.1, it will override the 5.005-installed
1879version, but only for perl 5.6.1.
1880
1881This way, you can choose to share compatible extensions, but also upgrade
1882to a newer version of an extension that may be incompatible with earlier
1883versions, without breaking the earlier versions' installations.
693762b4 1884
1885=head2 Maintaining completely separate versions
4633a7c4 1886
1ec51d55 1887Many users prefer to keep all versions of perl in completely
d6baa268 1888separate directories. This guarantees that an update to one version
0a08c020 1889won't interfere with another version. (The defaults guarantee this for
1890libraries after 5.6.0, but not for executables. TODO?) One convenient
1891way to do this is by using a separate prefix for each version, such as
d52d4e46 1892
46bb10fb 1893 sh Configure -Dprefix=/opt/perl5.004
d52d4e46 1894
46bb10fb 1895and adding /opt/perl5.004/bin to the shell PATH variable. Such users
d52d4e46 1896may also wish to add a symbolic link /usr/local/bin/perl so that
1897scripts can still start with #!/usr/local/bin/perl.
1898
693762b4 1899Others might share a common directory for maintenance sub-versions
1900(e.g. 5.004 for all 5.004_0x versions), but change directory with
1901each major version.
1902
6877a1cf 1903If you are installing a development subversion, you probably ought to
1904seriously consider using a separate directory, since development
1905subversions may not have all the compatibility wrinkles ironed out
1906yet.
1907
0a08c020 1908=head2 Upgrading from 5.005 to 5.6.0
693762b4 1909
c42e3e15 1910Most extensions built and installed with versions of perl
1911prior to 5.005_50 will not need to be recompiled to be used with
19125.6.0. If you find you do need to rebuild an extension with 5.6.0,
1913you may safely do so without disturbing the 5.005 installation.
1914(See L<"Coexistence with earlier versions of perl5"> above.)
1915
1916See your installed copy of the perllocal.pod file for a (possibly
1917incomplete) list of locally installed modules. Note that you want
1918perllocal.pod not perllocale.pod for installed module information.
693762b4 1919
8e07c86e 1920=head1 Coexistence with perl4
1921
1922You can safely install perl5 even if you want to keep perl4 around.
1923
1ec51d55 1924By default, the perl5 libraries go into /usr/local/lib/perl5/, so
1925they don't override the perl4 libraries in /usr/local/lib/perl/.
8e07c86e 1926
1927In your /usr/local/bin directory, you should have a binary named
1ec51d55 1928perl4.036. That will not be touched by the perl5 installation
8e07c86e 1929process. Most perl4 scripts should run just fine under perl5.
1930However, if you have any scripts that require perl4, you can replace
d6baa268 1931the #! line at the top of them by #!/usr/local/bin/perl4.036 (or
1932whatever the appropriate pathname is). See pod/perltrap.pod for
1933possible problems running perl4 scripts under perl5.
8e07c86e 1934
aa689395 1935=head1 cd /usr/include; h2ph *.h sys/*.h
1936
d6baa268 1937Some perl scripts need to be able to obtain information from the
1938system header files. This command will convert the most commonly used
1ec51d55 1939header files in /usr/include into files that can be easily interpreted
d6baa268 1940by perl. These files will be placed in the architecture-dependent
1941library ($archlib) directory you specified to Configure.
aa689395 1942
d6baa268 1943Note: Due to differences in the C and perl languages, the conversion
1944of the header files is not perfect. You will probably have to
1945hand-edit some of the converted files to get them to parse correctly.
1946For example, h2ph breaks spectacularly on type casting and certain
1947structures.
aa689395 1948
fb73857a 1949=head1 installhtml --help
aa689395 1950
3e3baf6d 1951Some sites may wish to make perl documentation available in HTML
1952format. The installhtml utility can be used to convert pod
fb73857a 1953documentation into linked HTML files and install them.
aa689395 1954
d6baa268 1955Currently, the supplied ./installhtml script does not make use of the
1956html Configure variables. This should be fixed in a future release.
1957
fb73857a 1958The following command-line is an example of one used to convert
3e3baf6d 1959perl documentation:
aa689395 1960
3e3baf6d 1961 ./installhtml \
1962 --podroot=. \
1963 --podpath=lib:ext:pod:vms \
1964 --recurse \
1965 --htmldir=/perl/nmanual \
1966 --htmlroot=/perl/nmanual \
1967 --splithead=pod/perlipc \
1968 --splititem=pod/perlfunc \
1969 --libpods=perlfunc:perlguts:perlvar:perlrun:perlop \
1970 --verbose
1971
1972See the documentation in installhtml for more details. It can take
1973many minutes to execute a large installation and you should expect to
1974see warnings like "no title", "unexpected directive" and "cannot
1975resolve" as the files are processed. We are aware of these problems
1976(and would welcome patches for them).
aa689395 1977
fb73857a 1978You may find it helpful to run installhtml twice. That should reduce
1979the number of "cannot resolve" warnings.
1980
aa689395 1981=head1 cd pod && make tex && (process the latex files)
1982
1983Some sites may also wish to make the documentation in the pod/ directory
1984available in TeX format. Type
1985
1986 (cd pod && make tex && <process the latex files>)
1987
1988=head1 Reporting Problems
1989
bfb7748a 1990If you have difficulty building perl, and none of the advice in this file
1991helps, and careful reading of the error message and the relevant manual
1992pages on your system doesn't help either, then you should send a message
1993to either the comp.lang.perl.misc newsgroup or to perlbug@perl.com with
1994an accurate description of your problem.
aa689395 1995
bfb7748a 1996Please include the output of the ./myconfig shell script that comes with
1997the distribution. Alternatively, you can use the perlbug program that
1998comes with the perl distribution, but you need to have perl compiled
1999before you can use it. (If you have not installed it yet, you need to
f5b3b617 2000run C<./perl -Ilib utils/perlbug> instead of a plain C<perlbug>.)
aa689395 2001
694a7e45 2002Please try to make your message brief but clear. Trim out unnecessary
2003information. Do not include large files (such as config.sh or a complete
2004Configure or make log) unless absolutely necessary. Do not include a
2005complete transcript of your build session. Just include the failing
d6baa268 2006commands, the relevant error messages, and whatever preceding commands
694a7e45 2007are necessary to give the appropriate context. Plain text should
2008usually be sufficient--fancy attachments or encodings may actually
2009reduce the number of people who read your message. Your message
2010will get relayed to over 400 subscribers around the world so please
2011try to keep it brief but clear.
aa689395 2012
8e07c86e 2013=head1 DOCUMENTATION
2014
bfb7748a 2015Read the manual entries before running perl. The main documentation
2016is in the pod/ subdirectory and should have been installed during the
8e07c86e 2017build process. Type B<man perl> to get started. Alternatively, you
bfb7748a 2018can type B<perldoc perl> to use the supplied perldoc script. This is
2019sometimes useful for finding things in the library modules.
8e07c86e 2020
1ec51d55 2021Under UNIX, you can produce a documentation book in postscript form,
bfb7748a 2022along with its table of contents, by going to the pod/ subdirectory and
2023running (either):
34a2a22e 2024
2025 ./roffitall -groff # If you have GNU groff installed
aa689395 2026 ./roffitall -psroff # If you have psroff
34a2a22e 2027
2028This will leave you with two postscript files ready to be printed.
aa689395 2029(You may need to fix the roffitall command to use your local troff
2030set-up.)
34a2a22e 2031
bfb7748a 2032Note that you must have performed the installation already before running
2033the above, since the script collects the installed files to generate
2034the documentation.
34a2a22e 2035
8e07c86e 2036=head1 AUTHOR
2037
bfb7748a 2038Original author: Andy Dougherty doughera@lafayette.edu , borrowing very
2039heavily from the original README by Larry Wall, with lots of helpful
2040feedback and additions from the perl5-porters@perl.org folks.
fb73857a 2041
f5b3b617 2042If you have problems, corrections, or questions, please see
2043L<"Reporting Problems"> above.
2044
2045=head1 REDISTRIBUTION
2046
2047This document is part of the Perl package and may be distributed under
d6baa268 2048the same terms as perl itself, with the following additional request:
f5b3b617 2049If you are distributing a modified version of perl (perhaps as part of
d6baa268 2050a larger package) please B<do> modify these installation instructions
2051and the contact information to match your distribution.
8e07c86e 2052
a5f75d66 2053=head1 LAST MODIFIED
24b3df7f 2054
d6baa268 2055$Id: INSTALL,v 1.58 1999/07/23 14:43:00 doughera Exp $