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1 | If you read this file _as_is_, just ignore the funny characters you |
2 | see. It is written in the POD format (see perlpod manpage) which is |
3 | specially designed to be readable as is. |
4 | |
5 | =head1 NAME |
6 | |
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7 | perlos2 - Perl under OS/2, DOS, Win0.3*, Win0.95 and WinNT. |
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8 | |
9 | =head1 SYNOPSIS |
10 | |
11 | One can read this document in the following formats: |
12 | |
13 | man perlos2 |
14 | view perl perlos2 |
15 | explorer perlos2.html |
16 | info perlos2 |
17 | |
18 | to list some (not all may be available simultaneously), or it may |
19 | be read I<as is>: either as F<README.os2>, or F<pod/perlos2.pod>. |
20 | |
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21 | To read the F<.INF> version of documentation (B<very> recommended) |
22 | outside of OS/2, one needs an IBM's reader (may be available on IBM |
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23 | ftp sites (?) (URL anyone?)) or shipped with PC DOS 7.0 and IBM's |
24 | Visual Age C++ 3.5. |
25 | |
26 | A copy of a Win* viewer is contained in the "Just add OS/2 Warp" package |
27 | |
28 | ftp://ftp.software.ibm.com/ps/products/os2/tools/jaow/jaow.zip |
29 | |
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30 | in F<?:\JUST_ADD\view.exe>. This gives one an access to EMX's |
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31 | F<.INF> docs as well (text form is available in F</emx/doc> in |
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32 | EMX's distribution). |
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33 | |
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34 | =cut |
35 | |
36 | Contents |
37 | |
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38 | perlos2 - Perl under OS/2, DOS, Win0.3*, Win0.95 and WinNT. |
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39 | |
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40 | NAME |
41 | SYNOPSIS |
42 | DESCRIPTION |
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43 | - Target |
44 | - Other OSes |
45 | - Prerequisites |
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46 | - Starting Perl programs under OS/2 (and DOS and...) |
47 | - Starting OS/2 (and DOS) programs under Perl |
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48 | Frequently asked questions |
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49 | - I cannot run external programs |
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50 | - I cannot embed perl into my program, or use perl.dll from my program. |
51 | - `` and pipe-open do not work under DOS. |
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52 | - Cannot start find.exe "pattern" file |
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53 | INSTALLATION |
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54 | - Automatic binary installation |
55 | - Manual binary installation |
56 | - Warning |
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57 | Accessing documentation |
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58 | - OS/2 .INF file |
59 | - Plain text |
60 | - Manpages |
61 | - HTML |
62 | - GNU info files |
63 | - .PDF files |
64 | - LaTeX docs |
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65 | BUILD |
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66 | - Prerequisites |
67 | - Getting perl source |
68 | - Application of the patches |
69 | - Hand-editing |
70 | - Making |
71 | - Testing |
72 | - Installing the built perl |
73 | - a.out-style build |
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74 | Build FAQ |
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75 | - Some / became \ in pdksh. |
76 | - 'errno' - unresolved external |
77 | - Problems with tr |
78 | - Some problem (forget which ;-) |
79 | - Library ... not found |
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80 | - Segfault in make |
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81 | Specific (mis)features of EMX port |
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82 | - setpriority, getpriority |
83 | - system() |
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84 | - extproc on the first line |
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85 | - Additional modules: |
86 | - Prebuilt methods: |
87 | - Misfeatures |
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88 | - Modifications |
89 | Perl flavors |
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90 | - perl.exe |
91 | - perl_.exe |
92 | - perl__.exe |
93 | - perl___.exe |
94 | - Why strange names? |
95 | - Why dynamic linking? |
96 | - Why chimera build? |
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97 | ENVIRONMENT |
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98 | - PERLLIB_PREFIX |
99 | - PERL_BADLANG |
100 | - PERL_BADFREE |
101 | - PERL_SH_DIR |
102 | - TMP or TEMP |
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103 | Evolution |
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104 | - Priorities |
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105 | - DLL name mangling |
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106 | - Threading |
107 | - Calls to external programs |
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108 | - Memory allocation |
109 | AUTHOR |
110 | SEE ALSO |
111 | |
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112 | =head1 DESCRIPTION |
113 | |
114 | =head2 Target |
115 | |
116 | The target is to make OS/2 the best supported platform for |
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117 | using/building/developing Perl and I<Perl applications>, as well as |
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118 | make Perl the best language to use under OS/2. The secondary target is |
119 | to try to make this work under DOS and Win* as well (but not B<too> hard). |
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120 | |
121 | The current state is quite close to this target. Known limitations: |
122 | |
123 | =over 5 |
124 | |
125 | =item * |
126 | |
127 | Some *nix programs use fork() a lot, but currently fork() is not |
128 | supported after I<use>ing dynamically loaded extensions. |
129 | |
130 | =item * |
131 | |
132 | You need a separate perl executable F<perl__.exe> (see L<perl__.exe>) |
133 | to use PM code in your application (like the forthcoming Perl/Tk). |
134 | |
135 | =item * |
136 | |
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137 | There is no simple way to access WPS objects. The only way I know |
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138 | is via C<OS2::REXX> extension (see L<OS2::REXX>), and we do not have access to |
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139 | convenience methods of Object-REXX. (Is it possible at all? I know |
140 | of no Object-REXX API.) |
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141 | |
142 | =back |
143 | |
144 | Please keep this list up-to-date by informing me about other items. |
145 | |
146 | =head2 Other OSes |
147 | |
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148 | Since OS/2 port of perl uses a remarkable EMX environment, it can |
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149 | run (and build extensions, and - possibly - be build itself) under any |
150 | environment which can run EMX. The current list is DOS, |
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151 | DOS-inside-OS/2, Win0.3*, Win0.95 and WinNT. Out of many perl flavors, |
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152 | only one works, see L<"perl_.exe">. |
153 | |
154 | Note that not all features of Perl are available under these |
155 | environments. This depends on the features the I<extender> - most |
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156 | probably RSX - decided to implement. |
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157 | |
158 | Cf. L<Prerequisites>. |
159 | |
160 | =head2 Prerequisites |
161 | |
162 | =over 6 |
163 | |
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164 | =item EMX |
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165 | |
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166 | EMX runtime is required (may be substituted by RSX). Note that |
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167 | it is possible to make F<perl_.exe> to run under DOS without any |
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168 | external support by binding F<emx.exe>/F<rsx.exe> to it, see L<emxbind>. Note |
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169 | that under DOS for best results one should use RSX runtime, which |
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170 | has much more functions working (like C<fork>, C<popen> and so on). In |
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171 | fact RSX is required if there is no VCPI present. Note the |
172 | RSX requires DPMI. |
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173 | |
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174 | Only the latest runtime is supported, currently C<0.9c>. Perl may run |
175 | under earlier versions of EMX, but this is not tested. |
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176 | |
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177 | One can get different parts of EMX from, say |
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178 | |
179 | ftp://ftp.cdrom.com/pub/os2/emx0.9c/ |
180 | ftp://hobbes.nmsu.edu/os2/unix/gnu/ |
181 | |
182 | The runtime component should have the name F<emxrt.zip>. |
183 | |
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184 | B<NOTE>. It is enough to have F<emx.exe>/F<rsx.exe> on your path. One |
185 | does not need to specify them explicitly (though this |
186 | |
187 | emx perl_.exe -de 0 |
188 | |
189 | will work as well.) |
190 | |
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191 | =item RSX |
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192 | |
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193 | To run Perl on DPMI platforms one needs RSX runtime. This is |
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194 | needed under DOS-inside-OS/2, Win0.3*, Win0.95 and WinNT (see |
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195 | L<"Other OSes">). RSX would not work with VCPI |
196 | only, as EMX would, it requires DMPI. |
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197 | |
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198 | Having RSX and the latest F<sh.exe> one gets a fully functional |
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199 | B<*nix>-ish environment under DOS, say, C<fork>, C<``> and |
200 | pipe-C<open> work. In fact, MakeMaker works (for static build), so one |
201 | can have Perl development environment under DOS. |
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202 | |
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203 | One can get RSX from, say |
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204 | |
205 | ftp://ftp.cdrom.com/pub/os2/emx0.9c/contrib |
206 | ftp://ftp.uni-bielefeld.de/pub/systems/msdos/misc |
207 | |
208 | Contact the author on C<rainer@mathematik.uni-bielefeld.de>. |
209 | |
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210 | The latest F<sh.exe> with DOS hooks is available at |
211 | |
212 | ftp://ftp.math.ohio-state.edu/pub/users/ilya/os2/sh_dos.exe |
213 | |
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214 | =item HPFS |
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215 | |
216 | Perl does not care about file systems, but to install the whole perl |
217 | library intact one needs a file system which supports long file names. |
218 | |
219 | Note that if you do not plan to build the perl itself, it may be |
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220 | possible to fool EMX to truncate file names. This is not supported, |
221 | read EMX docs to see how to do it. |
222 | |
223 | =item pdksh |
224 | |
225 | To start external programs with complicated command lines (like with |
226 | pipes in between, and/or quoting of arguments), Perl uses an external |
227 | shell. With EMX port such shell should be named <sh.exe>, and located |
228 | either in the wired-in-during-compile locations (usually F<F:/bin>), |
229 | or in configurable location (see L<"PERL_SH_DIR">). |
230 | |
231 | For best results use EMX pdksh. The soon-to-be-available standard |
232 | binary (5.2.12?) runs under DOS (with L<RSX>) as well, meanwhile use |
233 | the binary from |
234 | |
235 | ftp://ftp.math.ohio-state.edu/pub/users/ilya/os2/sh_dos.exe |
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236 | |
237 | =back |
238 | |
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239 | =head2 Starting Perl programs under OS/2 (and DOS and...) |
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240 | |
241 | Start your Perl program F<foo.pl> with arguments C<arg1 arg2 arg3> the |
242 | same way as on any other platform, by |
243 | |
244 | perl foo.pl arg1 arg2 arg3 |
245 | |
246 | If you want to specify perl options C<-my_opts> to the perl itself (as |
247 | opposed to to your program), use |
248 | |
249 | perl -my_opts foo.pl arg1 arg2 arg3 |
250 | |
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251 | Alternately, if you use OS/2-ish shell, like CMD or 4os2, put |
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252 | the following at the start of your perl script: |
253 | |
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254 | extproc perl -S -my_opts |
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255 | |
256 | rename your program to F<foo.cmd>, and start it by typing |
257 | |
258 | foo arg1 arg2 arg3 |
259 | |
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260 | Note that because of stupid OS/2 limitations the full path of the perl |
261 | script is not available when you use C<extproc>, thus you are forced to |
262 | use C<-S> perl switch, and your script should be on path. As a plus |
263 | side, if you know a full path to your script, you may still start it |
264 | with |
265 | |
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266 | perl ../../blah/foo.cmd arg1 arg2 arg3 |
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267 | |
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268 | (note that the argument C<-my_opts> is taken care of by the C<extproc> line |
269 | in your script, see L<C<extproc> on the first line>). |
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270 | |
271 | To understand what the above I<magic> does, read perl docs about C<-S> |
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272 | switch - see L<perlrun>, and cmdref about C<extproc>: |
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273 | |
274 | view perl perlrun |
275 | man perlrun |
276 | view cmdref extproc |
277 | help extproc |
278 | |
279 | or whatever method you prefer. |
280 | |
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281 | There are also endless possibilities to use I<executable extensions> of |
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282 | 4os2, I<associations> of WPS and so on... However, if you use |
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283 | *nixish shell (like F<sh.exe> supplied in the binary distribution), |
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284 | you need to follow the syntax specified in L<perlrun/"Switches">. |
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285 | |
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286 | =head2 Starting OS/2 (and DOS) programs under Perl |
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287 | |
288 | This is what system() (see L<perlfunc/system>), C<``> (see |
289 | L<perlop/"I/O Operators">), and I<open pipe> (see L<perlfunc/open>) |
290 | are for. (Avoid exec() (see L<perlfunc/exec>) unless you know what you |
291 | do). |
292 | |
293 | Note however that to use some of these operators you need to have a |
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294 | sh-syntax shell installed (see L<"Pdksh">, |
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295 | L<"Frequently asked questions">), and perl should be able to find it |
296 | (see L<"PERL_SH_DIR">). |
297 | |
298 | The only cases when the shell is not used is the multi-argument |
299 | system() (see L<perlfunc/system>)/exec() (see L<perlfunc/exec>), and |
300 | one-argument version thereof without redirection and shell |
301 | meta-characters. |
302 | |
303 | =head1 Frequently asked questions |
304 | |
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305 | =head2 I cannot run external programs |
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306 | |
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307 | =over 4 |
308 | |
309 | =item |
310 | |
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311 | Did you run your programs with C<-w> switch? See |
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312 | L<Starting OS/2 (and DOS) programs under Perl>. |
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313 | |
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314 | =item |
315 | |
316 | Do you try to run I<internal> shell commands, like C<`copy a b`> |
317 | (internal for F<cmd.exe>), or C<`glob a*b`> (internal for ksh)? You |
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318 | need to specify your shell explicitly, like C<`cmd /c copy a b`>, |
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319 | since Perl cannot deduce which commands are internal to your shell. |
320 | |
321 | =back |
322 | |
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323 | =head2 I cannot embed perl into my program, or use F<perl.dll> from my |
324 | program. |
325 | |
326 | =over 4 |
327 | |
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328 | =item Is your program EMX-compiled with C<-Zmt -Zcrtdll>? |
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329 | |
330 | If not, you need to build a stand-alone DLL for perl. Contact me, I |
331 | did it once. Sockets would not work, as a lot of other stuff. |
332 | |
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333 | =item Did you use L<ExtUtils::Embed>? |
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334 | |
335 | I had reports it does not work. Somebody would need to fix it. |
336 | |
337 | =back |
338 | |
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339 | =head2 C<``> and pipe-C<open> do not work under DOS. |
340 | |
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341 | This may a variant of just L<"I cannot run external programs">, or a |
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342 | deeper problem. Basically: you I<need> RSX (see L<"Prerequisites">) |
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343 | for these commands to work, and you may need a port of F<sh.exe> which |
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344 | understands command arguments. One of such ports is listed in |
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345 | L<"Prerequisites"> under RSX. Do not forget to set variable |
346 | C<L<"PERL_SH_DIR">> as well. |
347 | |
348 | DPMI is required for RSX. |
349 | |
350 | =head2 Cannot start C<find.exe "pattern" file> |
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351 | |
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352 | Use one of |
353 | |
354 | system 'cmd', '/c', 'find "pattern" file'; |
355 | `cmd /c 'find "pattern" file'` |
356 | |
357 | This would start F<find.exe> via F<cmd.exe> via C<sh.exe> via |
358 | C<perl.exe>, but this is a price to pay if you want to use |
359 | non-conforming program. In fact F<find.exe> cannot be started at all |
360 | using C library API only. Otherwise the following command-lines were |
361 | equivalent: |
362 | |
363 | find "pattern" file |
364 | find pattern file |
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365 | |
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366 | =head1 INSTALLATION |
367 | |
368 | =head2 Automatic binary installation |
369 | |
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370 | The most convenient way of installing perl is via perl installer |
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371 | F<install.exe>. Just follow the instructions, and 99% of the |
372 | installation blues would go away. |
373 | |
374 | Note however, that you need to have F<unzip.exe> on your path, and |
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375 | EMX environment I<running>. The latter means that if you just |
376 | installed EMX, and made all the needed changes to F<Config.sys>, |
377 | you may need to reboot in between. Check EMX runtime by running |
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378 | |
379 | emxrev |
380 | |
381 | A folder is created on your desktop which contains some useful |
382 | objects. |
383 | |
384 | B<Things not taken care of by automatic binary installation:> |
385 | |
386 | =over 15 |
387 | |
388 | =item C<PERL_BADLANG> |
389 | |
390 | may be needed if you change your codepage I<after> perl installation, |
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391 | and the new value is not supported by EMX. See L<"PERL_BADLANG">. |
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392 | |
393 | =item C<PERL_BADFREE> |
394 | |
395 | see L<"PERL_BADFREE">. |
396 | |
397 | =item F<Config.pm> |
398 | |
399 | This file resides somewhere deep in the location you installed your |
400 | perl library, find it out by |
401 | |
402 | perl -MConfig -le "print $INC{'Config.pm'}" |
403 | |
404 | While most important values in this file I<are> updated by the binary |
405 | installer, some of them may need to be hand-edited. I know no such |
406 | data, please keep me informed if you find one. |
407 | |
408 | =back |
409 | |
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410 | B<NOTE>. Because of a typo the binary installer of 5.00305 |
411 | would install a variable C<PERL_SHPATH> into F<Config.sys>. Please |
412 | remove this variable and put C<L<PERL_SH_DIR>> instead. |
413 | |
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414 | =head2 Manual binary installation |
415 | |
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416 | As of version 5.00305, OS/2 perl binary distribution comes split |
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417 | into 11 components. Unfortunately, to enable configurable binary |
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418 | installation, the file paths in the zip files are not absolute, but |
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419 | relative to some directory. |
420 | |
421 | Note that the extraction with the stored paths is still necessary |
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422 | (default with unzip, specify C<-d> to pkunzip). However, you |
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423 | need to know where to extract the files. You need also to manually |
424 | change entries in F<Config.sys> to reflect where did you put the |
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425 | files. Note that if you have some primitive unzipper (like |
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426 | pkunzip), you may get a lot of warnings/errors during |
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427 | unzipping. Upgrade to C<(w)unzip>. |
a56dbb1c |
428 | |
429 | Below is the sample of what to do to reproduce the configuration on my |
430 | machine: |
431 | |
432 | =over 3 |
433 | |
434 | =item Perl VIO and PM executables (dynamically linked) |
435 | |
436 | unzip perl_exc.zip *.exe *.ico -d f:/emx.add/bin |
437 | unzip perl_exc.zip *.dll -d f:/emx.add/dll |
438 | |
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439 | (have the directories with C<*.exe> on PATH, and C<*.dll> on |
440 | LIBPATH); |
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441 | |
442 | =item Perl_ VIO executable (statically linked) |
443 | |
444 | unzip perl_aou.zip -d f:/emx.add/bin |
445 | |
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446 | (have the directory on PATH); |
a56dbb1c |
447 | |
448 | =item Executables for Perl utilities |
449 | |
450 | unzip perl_utl.zip -d f:/emx.add/bin |
451 | |
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452 | (have the directory on PATH); |
a56dbb1c |
453 | |
454 | =item Main Perl library |
455 | |
456 | unzip perl_mlb.zip -d f:/perllib/lib |
457 | |
458 | If this directory is preserved, you do not need to change |
459 | anything. However, for perl to find it if it is changed, you need to |
460 | C<set PERLLIB_PREFIX> in F<Config.sys>, see L<"PERLLIB_PREFIX">. |
461 | |
462 | =item Additional Perl modules |
463 | |
464 | unzip perl_ste.zip -d f:/perllib/lib/site_perl |
465 | |
466 | If you do not change this directory, do nothing. Otherwise put this |
467 | directory and subdirectory F<./os2> in C<PERLLIB> or C<PERL5LIB> |
468 | variable. Do not use C<PERL5LIB> unless you have it set already. See |
469 | L<perl/"ENVIRONMENT">. |
470 | |
471 | =item Tools to compile Perl modules |
472 | |
473 | unzip perl_blb.zip -d f:/perllib/lib |
474 | |
475 | If this directory is preserved, you do not need to change |
476 | anything. However, for perl to find it if it is changed, you need to |
477 | C<set PERLLIB_PREFIX> in F<Config.sys>, see L<"PERLLIB_PREFIX">. |
478 | |
479 | =item Manpages for Perl and utilities |
480 | |
481 | unzip perl_man.zip -d f:/perllib/man |
482 | |
483 | This directory should better be on C<MANPATH>. You need to have a |
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484 | working man to access these files. |
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485 | |
486 | =item Manpages for Perl modules |
487 | |
488 | unzip perl_mam.zip -d f:/perllib/man |
489 | |
490 | This directory should better be on C<MANPATH>. You need to have a |
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491 | working man to access these files. |
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492 | |
493 | =item Source for Perl documentation |
494 | |
495 | unzip perl_pod.zip -d f:/perllib/lib |
496 | |
497 | This is used by by C<perldoc> program (see L<perldoc>), and may be used to |
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498 | generate HTML documentation usable by WWW browsers, and |
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499 | documentation in zillions of other formats: C<info>, C<LaTeX>, |
500 | C<Acrobat>, C<FrameMaker> and so on. |
501 | |
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502 | =item Perl manual in F<.INF> format |
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503 | |
504 | unzip perl_inf.zip -d d:/os2/book |
505 | |
506 | This directory should better be on C<BOOKSHELF>. |
507 | |
508 | =item Pdksh |
509 | |
510 | unzip perl_sh.zip -d f:/bin |
511 | |
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512 | This is used by perl to run external commands which explicitly |
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513 | require shell, like the commands using I<redirection> and I<shell |
514 | metacharacters>. It is also used instead of explicit F</bin/sh>. |
515 | |
516 | Set C<PERL_SH_DIR> (see L<"PERL_SH_DIR">) if you move F<sh.exe> from |
517 | the above location. |
518 | |
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519 | B<Note.> It may be possible to use some other sh-compatible shell |
a56dbb1c |
520 | (I<not tested>). |
521 | |
522 | =back |
523 | |
524 | After you installed the components you needed and updated the |
525 | F<Config.sys> correspondingly, you need to hand-edit |
526 | F<Config.pm>. This file resides somewhere deep in the location you |
527 | installed your perl library, find it out by |
528 | |
529 | perl -MConfig -le "print $INC{'Config.pm'}" |
530 | |
531 | You need to correct all the entries which look like file paths (they |
532 | currently start with C<f:/>). |
533 | |
534 | =head2 B<Warning> |
535 | |
536 | The automatic and manual perl installation leave precompiled paths |
537 | inside perl executables. While these paths are overwriteable (see |
538 | L<"PERLLIB_PREFIX">, L<"PERL_SH_DIR">), one may get better results by |
539 | binary editing of paths inside the executables/DLLs. |
540 | |
541 | =head1 Accessing documentation |
542 | |
543 | Depending on how you built/installed perl you may have (otherwise |
544 | identical) Perl documentation in the following formats: |
545 | |
546 | =head2 OS/2 F<.INF> file |
547 | |
aa689395 |
548 | Most probably the most convenient form. Under OS/2 view it as |
a56dbb1c |
549 | |
550 | view perl |
551 | view perl perlfunc |
552 | view perl less |
553 | view perl ExtUtils::MakeMaker |
554 | |
555 | (currently the last two may hit a wrong location, but this may improve |
aa689395 |
556 | soon). Under Win* see L<"SYNOPSIS">. |
a56dbb1c |
557 | |
558 | If you want to build the docs yourself, and have I<OS/2 toolkit>, run |
559 | |
560 | pod2ipf > perl.ipf |
561 | |
562 | in F</perllib/lib/pod> directory, then |
563 | |
564 | ipfc /inf perl.ipf |
565 | |
566 | (Expect a lot of errors during the both steps.) Now move it on your |
567 | BOOKSHELF path. |
568 | |
569 | =head2 Plain text |
570 | |
571 | If you have perl documentation in the source form, perl utilities |
aa689395 |
572 | installed, and GNU groff installed, you may use |
a56dbb1c |
573 | |
574 | perldoc perlfunc |
575 | perldoc less |
576 | perldoc ExtUtils::MakeMaker |
577 | |
72ea3524 |
578 | to access the perl documentation in the text form (note that you may get |
a56dbb1c |
579 | better results using perl manpages). |
580 | |
581 | Alternately, try running pod2text on F<.pod> files. |
582 | |
583 | =head2 Manpages |
584 | |
aa689395 |
585 | If you have man installed on your system, and you installed perl |
a56dbb1c |
586 | manpages, use something like this: |
5243f9ae |
587 | |
5243f9ae |
588 | man perlfunc |
589 | man 3 less |
590 | man ExtUtils.MakeMaker |
5243f9ae |
591 | |
a56dbb1c |
592 | to access documentation for different components of Perl. Start with |
593 | |
594 | man perl |
595 | |
596 | Note that dot (F<.>) is used as a package separator for documentation |
597 | for packages, and as usual, sometimes you need to give the section - C<3> |
598 | above - to avoid shadowing by the I<less(1) manpage>. |
599 | |
600 | Make sure that the directory B<above> the directory with manpages is |
601 | on our C<MANPATH>, like this |
602 | |
603 | set MANPATH=c:/man;f:/perllib/man |
604 | |
aa689395 |
605 | =head2 HTML |
a56dbb1c |
606 | |
607 | If you have some WWW browser available, installed the Perl |
608 | documentation in the source form, and Perl utilities, you can build |
aa689395 |
609 | HTML docs. Cd to directory with F<.pod> files, and do like this |
a56dbb1c |
610 | |
611 | cd f:/perllib/lib/pod |
5243f9ae |
612 | pod2html |
5243f9ae |
613 | |
a56dbb1c |
614 | After this you can direct your browser the file F<perl.html> in this |
615 | directory, and go ahead with reading docs, like this: |
5243f9ae |
616 | |
a56dbb1c |
617 | explore file:///f:/perllib/lib/pod/perl.html |
5243f9ae |
618 | |
aa689395 |
619 | Alternatively you may be able to get these docs prebuilt from CPAN. |
5243f9ae |
620 | |
aa689395 |
621 | =head2 GNU C<info> files |
bb14ff96 |
622 | |
aa689395 |
623 | Users of Emacs would appreciate it very much, especially with |
a56dbb1c |
624 | C<CPerl> mode loaded. You need to get latest C<pod2info> from C<CPAN>, |
625 | or, alternately, prebuilt info pages. |
615d1a09 |
626 | |
a56dbb1c |
627 | =head2 F<.PDF> files |
628 | |
629 | for C<Acrobat> are available on CPAN (for slightly old version of |
630 | perl). |
631 | |
632 | =head2 C<LaTeX> docs |
633 | |
634 | can be constructed using C<pod2latex>. |
635 | |
636 | =head1 BUILD |
637 | |
638 | Here we discuss how to build Perl under OS/2. There is an alternative |
639 | (but maybe older) view on L<http://www.shadow.net/~troc/os2perl.html>. |
640 | |
641 | =head2 Prerequisites |
642 | |
aa689395 |
643 | You need to have the latest EMX development environment, the full |
644 | GNU tool suite (gawk renamed to awk, and GNU F<find.exe> |
a56dbb1c |
645 | earlier on path than the OS/2 F<find.exe>, same with F<sort.exe>, to |
646 | check use |
647 | |
648 | find --version |
649 | sort --version |
650 | |
651 | ). You need the latest version of F<pdksh> installed as F<sh.exe>. |
652 | |
653 | Possible locations to get this from are |
654 | |
655 | ftp://hobbes.nmsu.edu/os2/unix/gnu/ |
656 | ftp://ftp.cdrom.com/pub/os2/unix/ |
657 | ftp://ftp.cdrom.com/pub/os2/dev32/ |
658 | ftp://ftp.cdrom.com/pub/os2/emx0.9c/ |
659 | |
660 | |
661 | Make sure that no copies or perl are currently running. Later steps |
662 | of the build may fail since an older version of perl.dll loaded into |
663 | memory may be found. |
664 | |
665 | Also make sure that you have F</tmp> directory on the current drive, |
666 | and F<.> directory in your C<LIBPATH>. One may try to correct the |
667 | latter condition by |
668 | |
669 | set BEGINLIBPATH . |
670 | |
671 | if you use something like F<CMD.EXE> or latest versions of F<4os2.exe>. |
672 | |
aa689395 |
673 | Make sure your gcc is good for C<-Zomf> linking: run C<omflibs> |
a56dbb1c |
674 | script in F</emx/lib> directory. |
675 | |
aa689395 |
676 | Check that you have link386 installed. It comes standard with OS/2, |
a56dbb1c |
677 | but may be not installed due to customization. If typing |
678 | |
679 | link386 |
680 | |
681 | shows you do not have it, do I<Selective install>, and choose C<Link |
72ea3524 |
682 | object modules> in I<Optional system utilities/More>. If you get into |
aa689395 |
683 | link386, press C<Ctrl-C>. |
a56dbb1c |
684 | |
685 | =head2 Getting perl source |
686 | |
72ea3524 |
687 | You need to fetch the latest perl source (including developers |
a56dbb1c |
688 | releases). With some probability it is located in |
689 | |
690 | http://www.perl.com/CPAN/src/5.0 |
691 | http://www.perl.com/CPAN/src/5.0/unsupported |
692 | |
693 | If not, you may need to dig in the indices to find it in the directory |
694 | of the current maintainer. |
695 | |
72ea3524 |
696 | Quick cycle of developers release may break the OS/2 build time to |
a56dbb1c |
697 | time, looking into |
698 | |
699 | http://www.perl.com/CPAN/ports/os2/ilyaz/ |
700 | |
701 | may indicate the latest release which was publicly released by the |
702 | maintainer. Note that the release may include some additional patches |
703 | to apply to the current source of perl. |
704 | |
705 | Extract it like this |
706 | |
707 | tar vzxf perl5.00409.tar.gz |
708 | |
709 | You may see a message about errors while extracting F<Configure>. This is |
710 | because there is a conflict with a similarly-named file F<configure>. |
711 | |
a56dbb1c |
712 | Change to the directory of extraction. |
713 | |
714 | =head2 Application of the patches |
715 | |
716 | You need to apply the patches in F<./os2/diff.*> and |
717 | F<./os2/POSIX.mkfifo> like this: |
718 | |
719 | gnupatch -p0 < os2\POSIX.mkfifo |
df3ef7a9 |
720 | gnupatch -p0 < os2\diff.configure |
a56dbb1c |
721 | |
722 | You may also need to apply the patches supplied with the binary |
723 | distribution of perl. |
724 | |
aa689395 |
725 | Note also that the F<db.lib> and F<db.a> from the EMX distribution |
a56dbb1c |
726 | are not suitable for multi-threaded compile (note that currently perl |
aa689395 |
727 | is not multithread-safe, but is compiled as multithreaded for |
728 | compatibility with XFree86-OS/2). Get a corrected one from |
a56dbb1c |
729 | |
730 | ftp://ftp.math.ohio-state.edu/pub/users/ilya/os2/db_mt.zip |
731 | |
732 | =head2 Hand-editing |
733 | |
734 | You may look into the file F<./hints/os2.sh> and correct anything |
735 | wrong you find there. I do not expect it is needed anywhere. |
615d1a09 |
736 | |
a56dbb1c |
737 | =head2 Making |
615d1a09 |
738 | |
a56dbb1c |
739 | sh Configure -des -D prefix=f:/perllib |
615d1a09 |
740 | |
aa689395 |
741 | C<prefix> means: where to install the resulting perl library. Giving |
a56dbb1c |
742 | correct prefix you may avoid the need to specify C<PERLLIB_PREFIX>, |
743 | see L<"PERLLIB_PREFIX">. |
5243f9ae |
744 | |
a56dbb1c |
745 | I<Ignore the message about missing C<ln>, and about C<-c> option to |
aa689395 |
746 | tr>. In fact if you can trace where the latter spurious warning |
a56dbb1c |
747 | comes from, please inform me. |
615d1a09 |
748 | |
a56dbb1c |
749 | Now |
5243f9ae |
750 | |
a56dbb1c |
751 | make |
5243f9ae |
752 | |
a56dbb1c |
753 | At some moment the built may die, reporting a I<version mismatch> or |
754 | I<unable to run F<perl>>. This means that most of the build has been |
755 | finished, and it is the time to move the constructed F<perl.dll> to |
aa689395 |
756 | some I<absolute> location in LIBPATH. After this is done the build |
757 | should finish without a lot of fuss. I<One can avoid the interruption |
758 | if one has the correct prebuilt version of F<perl.dll> on LIBPATH, but |
759 | probably this is not needed anymore, since F<miniperl.exe> is linked |
760 | statically now.> |
615d1a09 |
761 | |
a56dbb1c |
762 | Warnings which are safe to ignore: I<mkfifo() redefined> inside |
763 | F<POSIX.c>. |
615d1a09 |
764 | |
a56dbb1c |
765 | =head2 Testing |
766 | |
767 | Now run |
768 | |
769 | make test |
770 | |
72ea3524 |
771 | Some tests (4..6) should fail. Some perl invocations should end in a |
a56dbb1c |
772 | segfault (system error C<SYS3175>). To get finer error reports, |
773 | |
774 | cd t |
aa689395 |
775 | perl harness |
a56dbb1c |
776 | |
777 | The report you get may look like |
778 | |
779 | Failed Test Status Wstat Total Fail Failed List of failed |
780 | --------------------------------------------------------------- |
781 | io/fs.t 26 11 42.31% 2-5, 7-11, 18, 25 |
782 | lib/io_pipe.t 3 768 6 ?? % ?? |
783 | lib/io_sock.t 3 768 5 ?? % ?? |
784 | op/stat.t 56 5 8.93% 3-4, 20, 35, 39 |
72ea3524 |
785 | Failed 4/140 test scripts, 97.14% okay. 27/2937 subtests failed, 99.08% okay. |
a56dbb1c |
786 | |
787 | Note that using `make test' target two more tests may fail: C<op/exec:1> |
aa689395 |
788 | because of (mis)feature of pdksh, and C<lib/posix:15>, which checks |
55497cff |
789 | that the buffers are not flushed on C<_exit> (this is a bug in the test |
790 | which assumes that tty output is buffered). |
a56dbb1c |
791 | |
aa689395 |
792 | I submitted a patch to EMX which makes it possible to fork() with EMX |
72ea3524 |
793 | dynamic libraries loaded, which makes F<lib/io*> tests pass. This means |
794 | that soon the number of failing tests may decrease yet more. |
795 | |
df3ef7a9 |
796 | However, the test F<lib/io_udp.t> is disabled, since it never terminates, I |
797 | do not know why. Comments/fixes welcome. |
72ea3524 |
798 | |
a56dbb1c |
799 | The reasons for failed tests are: |
800 | |
801 | =over 8 |
802 | |
803 | =item F<io/fs.t> |
804 | |
805 | Checks I<file system> operations. Tests: |
806 | |
807 | =over 10 |
808 | |
809 | =item 2-5, 7-11 |
810 | |
811 | Check C<link()> and C<inode count> - nonesuch under OS/2. |
812 | |
813 | =item 18 |
814 | |
815 | Checks C<atime> and C<mtime> of C<stat()> - I could not understand this test. |
816 | |
817 | =item 25 |
818 | |
819 | Checks C<truncate()> on a filehandle just opened for write - I do not |
820 | know why this should or should not work. |
821 | |
822 | =back |
823 | |
824 | =item F<lib/io_pipe.t> |
825 | |
aa689395 |
826 | Checks C<IO::Pipe> module. Some feature of EMX - test fork()s with |
a56dbb1c |
827 | dynamic extension loaded - unsupported now. |
828 | |
829 | =item F<lib/io_sock.t> |
830 | |
aa689395 |
831 | Checks C<IO::Socket> module. Some feature of EMX - test fork()s |
a56dbb1c |
832 | with dynamic extension loaded - unsupported now. |
833 | |
834 | =item F<op/stat.t> |
835 | |
836 | Checks C<stat()>. Tests: |
837 | |
838 | =over 4 |
839 | |
840 | =item 3 |
841 | |
842 | Checks C<inode count> - nonesuch under OS/2. |
843 | |
844 | =item 4 |
845 | |
846 | Checks C<mtime> and C<ctime> of C<stat()> - I could not understand this test. |
847 | |
848 | =item 20 |
849 | |
850 | Checks C<-x> - determined by the file extension only under OS/2. |
851 | |
852 | =item 35 |
853 | |
854 | Needs F</usr/bin>. |
855 | |
856 | =item 39 |
857 | |
858 | Checks C<-t> of F</dev/null>. Should not fail! |
859 | |
860 | =back |
861 | |
862 | =back |
863 | |
864 | In addition to errors, you should get a lot of warnings. |
865 | |
866 | =over 4 |
867 | |
868 | =item A lot of `bad free' |
869 | |
870 | in databases related to Berkeley DB. This is a confirmed bug of |
871 | DB. You may disable this warnings, see L<"PERL_BADFREE">. |
872 | |
873 | =item Process terminated by SIGTERM/SIGINT |
874 | |
875 | This is a standard message issued by OS/2 applications. *nix |
876 | applications die in silence. It is considered a feature. One can |
877 | easily disable this by appropriate sighandlers. |
878 | |
879 | However the test engine bleeds these message to screen in unexpected |
880 | moments. Two messages of this kind I<should> be present during |
881 | testing. |
882 | |
883 | =item F<*/sh.exe>: ln: not found |
884 | |
885 | =item C<ls>: /dev: No such file or directory |
886 | |
887 | The last two should be self-explanatory. The test suite discovers that |
888 | the system it runs on is not I<that much> *nixish. |
889 | |
890 | =back |
615d1a09 |
891 | |
892 | A lot of `bad free'... in databases, bug in DB confirmed on other |
5243f9ae |
893 | platforms. You may disable it by setting PERL_BADFREE environment variable |
a56dbb1c |
894 | to 1. |
615d1a09 |
895 | |
a56dbb1c |
896 | =head2 Installing the built perl |
615d1a09 |
897 | |
a56dbb1c |
898 | Run |
615d1a09 |
899 | |
a56dbb1c |
900 | make install |
615d1a09 |
901 | |
a56dbb1c |
902 | It would put the generated files into needed locations. Manually put |
903 | F<perl.exe>, F<perl__.exe> and F<perl___.exe> to a location on your |
aa689395 |
904 | PATH, F<perl.dll> to a location on your LIBPATH. |
615d1a09 |
905 | |
a56dbb1c |
906 | Run |
615d1a09 |
907 | |
a56dbb1c |
908 | make cmdscripts INSTALLCMDDIR=d:/ir/on/path |
615d1a09 |
909 | |
a56dbb1c |
910 | to convert perl utilities to F<.cmd> files and put them on |
aa689395 |
911 | PATH. You need to put F<.EXE>-utilities on path manually. They are |
a56dbb1c |
912 | installed in C<$prefix/bin>, here C<$prefix> is what you gave to |
913 | F<Configure>, see L<Making>. |
914 | |
915 | =head2 C<a.out>-style build |
916 | |
917 | Proceed as above, but make F<perl_.exe> (see L<"perl_.exe">) by |
918 | |
919 | make perl_ |
920 | |
921 | test and install by |
922 | |
923 | make aout_test |
924 | make aout_install |
925 | |
aa689395 |
926 | Manually put F<perl_.exe> to a location on your PATH. |
a56dbb1c |
927 | |
928 | Since C<perl_> has the extensions prebuilt, it does not suffer from |
72ea3524 |
929 | the I<dynamic extensions + fork()> syndrome, thus the failing tests |
a56dbb1c |
930 | look like |
931 | |
932 | Failed Test Status Wstat Total Fail Failed List of failed |
933 | --------------------------------------------------------------- |
934 | io/fs.t 26 11 42.31% 2-5, 7-11, 18, 25 |
935 | op/stat.t 56 5 8.93% 3-4, 20, 35, 39 |
936 | Failed 2/118 test scripts, 98.31% okay. 16/2445 subtests failed, 99.35% okay. |
937 | |
938 | B<Note.> The build process for C<perl_> I<does not know> about all the |
939 | dependencies, so you should make sure that anything is up-to-date, |
940 | say, by doing |
941 | |
942 | make perl.dll |
943 | |
944 | first. |
945 | |
946 | =head1 Build FAQ |
947 | |
948 | =head2 Some C</> became C<\> in pdksh. |
949 | |
950 | You have a very old pdksh. See L<Prerequisites>. |
951 | |
952 | =head2 C<'errno'> - unresolved external |
953 | |
954 | You do not have MT-safe F<db.lib>. See L<Prerequisites>. |
955 | |
aa689395 |
956 | =head2 Problems with tr |
a56dbb1c |
957 | |
aa689395 |
958 | reported with very old version of tr. |
a56dbb1c |
959 | |
960 | =head2 Some problem (forget which ;-) |
961 | |
aa689395 |
962 | You have an older version of F<perl.dll> on your LIBPATH, which |
a56dbb1c |
963 | broke the build of extensions. |
964 | |
965 | =head2 Library ... not found |
966 | |
967 | You did not run C<omflibs>. See L<Prerequisites>. |
968 | |
969 | =head2 Segfault in make |
970 | |
aa689395 |
971 | You use an old version of GNU make. See L<Prerequisites>. |
a56dbb1c |
972 | |
973 | =head1 Specific (mis)features of OS/2 port |
974 | |
975 | =head2 C<setpriority>, C<getpriority> |
976 | |
977 | Note that these functions are compatible with *nix, not with the older |
978 | ports of '94 - 95. The priorities are absolute, go from 32 to -95, |
72ea3524 |
979 | lower is quicker. 0 is the default priority. |
a56dbb1c |
980 | |
981 | =head2 C<system()> |
982 | |
983 | Multi-argument form of C<system()> allows an additional numeric |
984 | argument. The meaning of this argument is described in |
985 | L<OS2::Process>. |
986 | |
aa689395 |
987 | =head2 C<extproc> on the first line |
988 | |
989 | If the first chars of a script are C<"extproc ">, this line is treated |
990 | as C<#!>-line, thus all the switches on this line are processed (twice |
991 | if script was started via cmd.exe). |
992 | |
a56dbb1c |
993 | =head2 Additional modules: |
615d1a09 |
994 | |
a56dbb1c |
995 | L<OS2::Process>, L<OS2::REXX>, L<OS2::PrfDB>, L<OS2::ExtAttr>. This |
996 | modules provide access to additional numeric argument for C<system>, |
997 | to DLLs having functions with REXX signature and to REXX runtime, to |
998 | OS/2 databases in the F<.INI> format, and to Extended Attributes. |
615d1a09 |
999 | |
72ea3524 |
1000 | Two additional extensions by Andreas Kaiser, C<OS2::UPM>, and |
a56dbb1c |
1001 | C<OS2::FTP>, are included into my ftp directory, mirrored on CPAN. |
615d1a09 |
1002 | |
a56dbb1c |
1003 | =head2 Prebuilt methods: |
615d1a09 |
1004 | |
a56dbb1c |
1005 | =over 4 |
615d1a09 |
1006 | |
a56dbb1c |
1007 | =item C<File::Copy::syscopy> |
615d1a09 |
1008 | |
a56dbb1c |
1009 | used by C<File::Copy::copy>, see L<File::Copy/copy>. |
615d1a09 |
1010 | |
a56dbb1c |
1011 | =item C<DynaLoader::mod2fname> |
615d1a09 |
1012 | |
72ea3524 |
1013 | used by C<DynaLoader> for DLL name mangling. |
615d1a09 |
1014 | |
a56dbb1c |
1015 | =item C<Cwd::current_drive()> |
615d1a09 |
1016 | |
a56dbb1c |
1017 | Self explanatory. |
615d1a09 |
1018 | |
a56dbb1c |
1019 | =item C<Cwd::sys_chdir(name)> |
615d1a09 |
1020 | |
a56dbb1c |
1021 | leaves drive as it is. |
615d1a09 |
1022 | |
a56dbb1c |
1023 | =item C<Cwd::change_drive(name)> |
615d1a09 |
1024 | |
615d1a09 |
1025 | |
a56dbb1c |
1026 | =item C<Cwd::sys_is_absolute(name)> |
615d1a09 |
1027 | |
a56dbb1c |
1028 | means has drive letter and is_rooted. |
615d1a09 |
1029 | |
a56dbb1c |
1030 | =item C<Cwd::sys_is_rooted(name)> |
615d1a09 |
1031 | |
a56dbb1c |
1032 | means has leading C<[/\\]> (maybe after a drive-letter:). |
615d1a09 |
1033 | |
a56dbb1c |
1034 | =item C<Cwd::sys_is_relative(name)> |
615d1a09 |
1035 | |
a56dbb1c |
1036 | means changes with current dir. |
615d1a09 |
1037 | |
a56dbb1c |
1038 | =item C<Cwd::sys_cwd(name)> |
615d1a09 |
1039 | |
aa689395 |
1040 | Interface to cwd from EMX. Used by C<Cwd::cwd>. |
615d1a09 |
1041 | |
a56dbb1c |
1042 | =item C<Cwd::sys_abspath(name, dir)> |
615d1a09 |
1043 | |
a56dbb1c |
1044 | Really really odious function to implement. Returns absolute name of |
1045 | file which would have C<name> if CWD were C<dir>. C<Dir> defaults to the |
1046 | current dir. |
615d1a09 |
1047 | |
a56dbb1c |
1048 | =item C<Cwd::extLibpath([type]) |
615d1a09 |
1049 | |
a56dbb1c |
1050 | Get current value of extended library search path. If C<type> is |
1051 | present and I<true>, works with END_LIBPATH, otherwise with |
1052 | C<BEGIN_LIBPATH>. |
615d1a09 |
1053 | |
a56dbb1c |
1054 | =item C<Cwd::extLibpath_set( path [, type ] )> |
615d1a09 |
1055 | |
a56dbb1c |
1056 | Set current value of extended library search path. If C<type> is |
1057 | present and I<true>, works with END_LIBPATH, otherwise with |
1058 | C<BEGIN_LIBPATH>. |
615d1a09 |
1059 | |
a56dbb1c |
1060 | =back |
615d1a09 |
1061 | |
a56dbb1c |
1062 | (Note that some of these may be moved to different libraries - |
1063 | eventually). |
615d1a09 |
1064 | |
615d1a09 |
1065 | |
a56dbb1c |
1066 | =head2 Misfeatures |
615d1a09 |
1067 | |
a56dbb1c |
1068 | =over 4 |
615d1a09 |
1069 | |
a56dbb1c |
1070 | =item |
615d1a09 |
1071 | |
aa689395 |
1072 | Since <flock> is present in EMX, but is not functional, the same is |
55497cff |
1073 | true for perl. Here is the list of things which may be "broken" on |
1074 | EMX (from EMX docs): |
1075 | |
1076 | - The functions recvmsg(), sendmsg(), and socketpair() are not |
1077 | implemented. |
1078 | - sock_init() is not required and not implemented. |
1079 | - flock() is not yet implemented (dummy function). |
1080 | - kill: |
1081 | Special treatment of PID=0, PID=1 and PID=-1 is not implemented. |
1082 | - waitpid: |
1083 | WUNTRACED |
1084 | Not implemented. |
1085 | waitpid() is not implemented for negative values of PID. |
1086 | |
1087 | Note that C<kill -9> does not work with the current version of EMX. |
615d1a09 |
1088 | |
a56dbb1c |
1089 | =item |
615d1a09 |
1090 | |
72ea3524 |
1091 | Since F<sh.exe> is used for globing (see L<perlfunc/glob>), the bugs |
a56dbb1c |
1092 | of F<sh.exe> plague perl as well. |
615d1a09 |
1093 | |
a56dbb1c |
1094 | In particular, uppercase letters do not work in C<[...]>-patterns with |
aa689395 |
1095 | the current pdksh. |
615d1a09 |
1096 | |
a56dbb1c |
1097 | =back |
615d1a09 |
1098 | |
55497cff |
1099 | =head2 Modifications |
1100 | |
1101 | Perl modifies some standard C library calls in the following ways: |
1102 | |
1103 | =over 9 |
1104 | |
1105 | =item C<popen> |
1106 | |
72ea3524 |
1107 | C<my_popen> uses F<sh.exe> if shell is required, cf. L<"PERL_SH_DIR">. |
55497cff |
1108 | |
1109 | =item C<tmpnam> |
1110 | |
1111 | is created using C<TMP> or C<TEMP> environment variable, via |
1112 | C<tempnam>. |
1113 | |
1114 | =item C<tmpfile> |
1115 | |
72ea3524 |
1116 | If the current directory is not writable, file is created using modified |
55497cff |
1117 | C<tmpnam>, so there may be a race condition. |
1118 | |
1119 | =item C<ctermid> |
1120 | |
1121 | a dummy implementation. |
1122 | |
1123 | =item C<stat> |
1124 | |
1125 | C<os2_stat> special-cases F</dev/tty> and F</dev/con>. |
1126 | |
1127 | =back |
1128 | |
a56dbb1c |
1129 | =head1 Perl flavors |
615d1a09 |
1130 | |
72ea3524 |
1131 | Because of idiosyncrasies of OS/2 one cannot have all the eggs in the |
aa689395 |
1132 | same basket (though EMX environment tries hard to overcome this |
a56dbb1c |
1133 | limitations, so the situation may somehow improve). There are 4 |
1134 | executables for Perl provided by the distribution: |
615d1a09 |
1135 | |
a56dbb1c |
1136 | =head2 F<perl.exe> |
615d1a09 |
1137 | |
a56dbb1c |
1138 | The main workhorse. This is a chimera executable: it is compiled as an |
1139 | C<a.out>-style executable, but is linked with C<omf>-style dynamic |
aa689395 |
1140 | library F<perl.dll>, and with dynamic CRT DLL. This executable is a |
1141 | VIO application. |
a56dbb1c |
1142 | |
1143 | It can load perl dynamic extensions, and it can fork(). Unfortunately, |
aa689395 |
1144 | with the current version of EMX it cannot fork() with dynamic |
1145 | extensions loaded (may be fixed by patches to EMX). |
a56dbb1c |
1146 | |
1147 | B<Note.> Keep in mind that fork() is needed to open a pipe to yourself. |
1148 | |
1149 | =head2 F<perl_.exe> |
1150 | |
1151 | This is a statically linked C<a.out>-style executable. It can fork(), |
1152 | but cannot load dynamic Perl extensions. The supplied executable has a |
1153 | lot of extensions prebuilt, thus there are situations when it can |
1154 | perform tasks not possible using F<perl.exe>, like fork()ing when |
aa689395 |
1155 | having some standard extension loaded. This executable is a VIO |
a56dbb1c |
1156 | application. |
1157 | |
1158 | B<Note.> A better behaviour could be obtained from C<perl.exe> if it |
1159 | were statically linked with standard I<Perl extensions>, but |
aa689395 |
1160 | dynamically linked with the I<Perl DLL> and CRT DLL. Then it would |
a56dbb1c |
1161 | be able to fork() with standard extensions, I<and> would be able to |
1162 | dynamically load arbitrary extensions. Some changes to Makefiles and |
1163 | hint files should be necessary to achieve this. |
1164 | |
1165 | I<This is also the only executable with does not require OS/2.> The |
1166 | friends locked into C<M$> world would appreciate the fact that this |
72ea3524 |
1167 | executable runs under DOS, Win0.3*, Win0.95 and WinNT with an |
a56dbb1c |
1168 | appropriate extender. See L<"Other OSes">. |
1169 | |
1170 | =head2 F<perl__.exe> |
1171 | |
aa689395 |
1172 | This is the same executable as F<perl___.exe>, but it is a PM |
a56dbb1c |
1173 | application. |
1174 | |
aa689395 |
1175 | B<Note.> Usually STDIN, STDERR, and STDOUT of a PM |
a56dbb1c |
1176 | application are redirected to C<nul>. However, it is possible to see |
1177 | them if you start C<perl__.exe> from a PM program which emulates a |
aa689395 |
1178 | console window, like I<Shell mode> of Emacs or EPM. Thus it I<is |
a56dbb1c |
1179 | possible> to use Perl debugger (see L<perldebug>) to debug your PM |
1180 | application. |
1181 | |
aa689395 |
1182 | This flavor is required if you load extensions which use PM, like |
a56dbb1c |
1183 | the forthcoming C<Perl/Tk>. |
1184 | |
1185 | =head2 F<perl___.exe> |
1186 | |
1187 | This is an C<omf>-style executable which is dynamically linked to |
aa689395 |
1188 | F<perl.dll> and CRT DLL. I know no advantages of this executable |
a56dbb1c |
1189 | over C<perl.exe>, but it cannot fork() at all. Well, one advantage is |
1190 | that the build process is not so convoluted as with C<perl.exe>. |
1191 | |
aa689395 |
1192 | It is a VIO application. |
a56dbb1c |
1193 | |
1194 | =head2 Why strange names? |
1195 | |
1196 | Since Perl processes the C<#!>-line (cf. |
1197 | L<perlrun/DESCRIPTION>, L<perlrun/Switches>, |
1198 | L<perldiag/"Not a perl script">, |
1199 | L<perldiag/"No Perl script found in input">), it should know when a |
1200 | program I<is a Perl>. There is some naming convention which allows |
1201 | Perl to distinguish correct lines from wrong ones. The above names are |
72ea3524 |
1202 | almost the only names allowed by this convention which do not contain |
a56dbb1c |
1203 | digits (which have absolutely different semantics). |
1204 | |
1205 | =head2 Why dynamic linking? |
1206 | |
1207 | Well, having several executables dynamically linked to the same huge |
1208 | library has its advantages, but this would not substantiate the |
1209 | additional work to make it compile. The reason is stupid-but-quick |
1210 | "hard" dynamic linking used by OS/2. |
1211 | |
72ea3524 |
1212 | The address tables of DLLs are patched only once, when they are |
1213 | loaded. The addresses of entry points into DLLs are guaranteed to be |
a56dbb1c |
1214 | the same for all programs which use the same DLL, which reduces the |
1215 | amount of runtime patching - once DLL is loaded, its code is |
1216 | read-only. |
1217 | |
1218 | While this allows some performance advantages, this makes life |
72ea3524 |
1219 | terrible for developers, since the above scheme makes it impossible |
a56dbb1c |
1220 | for a DLL to be resolved to a symbol in the .EXE file, since this |
1221 | would need a DLL to have different relocations tables for the |
1222 | executables which use it. |
1223 | |
1224 | However, a Perl extension is forced to use some symbols from the perl |
1225 | executable, say to know how to find the arguments provided on the perl |
1226 | internal evaluation stack. The solution is that the main code of |
1227 | interpreter should be contained in a DLL, and the F<.EXE> file just loads |
1228 | this DLL into memory and supplies command-arguments. |
1229 | |
72ea3524 |
1230 | This I<greatly> increases the load time for the application (as well as |
a56dbb1c |
1231 | the number of problems during compilation). Since interpreter is in a DLL, |
aa689395 |
1232 | the CRT is basically forced to reside in a DLL as well (otherwise |
1233 | extensions would not be able to use CRT). |
a56dbb1c |
1234 | |
1235 | =head2 Why chimera build? |
1236 | |
aa689395 |
1237 | Current EMX environment does not allow DLLs compiled using Unixish |
a56dbb1c |
1238 | C<a.out> format to export symbols for data. This forces C<omf>-style |
1239 | compile of F<perl.dll>. |
1240 | |
aa689395 |
1241 | Current EMX environment does not allow F<.EXE> files compiled in |
a56dbb1c |
1242 | C<omf> format to fork(). fork() is needed for exactly three Perl |
1243 | operations: |
1244 | |
1245 | =over 4 |
1246 | |
1247 | =item explicit fork() |
1248 | |
1249 | in the script, and |
1250 | |
1251 | =item open FH, "|-" |
1252 | |
1253 | =item open FH, "-|" |
1254 | |
1255 | opening pipes to itself. |
1256 | |
1257 | =back |
1258 | |
1259 | While these operations are not questions of life and death, a lot of |
1260 | useful scripts use them. This forces C<a.out>-style compile of |
1261 | F<perl.exe>. |
1262 | |
1263 | |
1264 | =head1 ENVIRONMENT |
1265 | |
aa689395 |
1266 | Here we list environment variables with are either OS/2- and DOS- and |
1267 | Win*-specific, or are more important under OS/2 than under other OSes. |
a56dbb1c |
1268 | |
1269 | =head2 C<PERLLIB_PREFIX> |
1270 | |
aa689395 |
1271 | Specific for EMX port. Should have the form |
a56dbb1c |
1272 | |
1273 | path1;path2 |
1274 | |
1275 | or |
1276 | |
1277 | path1 path2 |
1278 | |
1279 | If the beginning of some prebuilt path matches F<path1>, it is |
1280 | substituted with F<path2>. |
1281 | |
1282 | Should be used if the perl library is moved from the default |
1283 | location in preference to C<PERL(5)LIB>, since this would not leave wrong |
1284 | entries in <@INC>. |
1285 | |
1286 | =head2 C<PERL_BADLANG> |
1287 | |
1288 | If 1, perl ignores setlocale() failing. May be useful with some |
1289 | strange I<locale>s. |
1290 | |
1291 | =head2 C<PERL_BADFREE> |
1292 | |
1293 | If 1, perl would not warn of in case of unwarranted free(). May be |
1294 | useful in conjunction with the module DB_File, since Berkeley DB |
1295 | memory handling code is buggy. |
1296 | |
1297 | =head2 C<PERL_SH_DIR> |
1298 | |
aa689395 |
1299 | Specific for EMX port. Gives the directory part of the location for |
a56dbb1c |
1300 | F<sh.exe>. |
1301 | |
1302 | =head2 C<TMP> or C<TEMP> |
1303 | |
aa689395 |
1304 | Specific for EMX port. Used as storage place for temporary files, most |
a56dbb1c |
1305 | notably C<-e> scripts. |
1306 | |
1307 | =head1 Evolution |
1308 | |
1309 | Here we list major changes which could make you by surprise. |
1310 | |
1311 | =head2 Priorities |
1312 | |
1313 | C<setpriority> and C<getpriority> are not compatible with earlier |
1314 | ports by Andreas Kaiser. See C<"setpriority, getpriority">. |
1315 | |
72ea3524 |
1316 | =head2 DLL name mangling |
a56dbb1c |
1317 | |
1318 | With the release 5.003_01 the dynamically loadable libraries |
1319 | should be rebuilt. In particular, DLLs are now created with the names |
1320 | which contain a checksum, thus allowing workaround for OS/2 scheme of |
1321 | caching DLLs. |
1322 | |
1323 | =head2 Threading |
1324 | |
aa689395 |
1325 | As of release 5.003_01 perl is linked to multithreaded CRT |
a56dbb1c |
1326 | DLL. Perl itself is not multithread-safe, as is not perl |
1327 | malloc(). However, extensions may use multiple thread on their own |
1328 | risk. |
1329 | |
aa689395 |
1330 | Needed to compile C<Perl/Tk> for XFree86-OS/2 out-of-the-box. |
a56dbb1c |
1331 | |
1332 | =head2 Calls to external programs |
1333 | |
1334 | Due to a popular demand the perl external program calling has been |
72ea3524 |
1335 | changed wrt Andreas Kaiser's port. I<If> perl needs to call an |
a56dbb1c |
1336 | external program I<via shell>, the F<f:/bin/sh.exe> will be called, or |
1337 | whatever is the override, see L<"PERL_SH_DIR">. |
1338 | |
1339 | Thus means that you need to get some copy of a F<sh.exe> as well (I |
1340 | use one from pdksh). The drive F: above is set up automatically during |
1341 | the build to a correct value on the builder machine, but is |
1342 | overridable at runtime, |
1343 | |
1344 | B<Reasons:> a consensus on C<perl5-porters> was that perl should use |
1345 | one non-overridable shell per platform. The obvious choices for OS/2 |
1346 | are F<cmd.exe> and F<sh.exe>. Having perl build itself would be impossible |
1347 | with F<cmd.exe> as a shell, thus I picked up C<sh.exe>. Thus assures almost |
aa689395 |
1348 | 100% compatibility with the scripts coming from *nix. As an added benefit |
1349 | this works as well under DOS if you use DOS-enabled port of pdksh |
1350 | (see L<"Prerequisites">). |
a56dbb1c |
1351 | |
aa689395 |
1352 | B<Disadvantages:> currently F<sh.exe> of pdksh calls external programs |
a56dbb1c |
1353 | via fork()/exec(), and there is I<no> functioning exec() on |
1354 | OS/2. exec() is emulated by EMX by asyncroneous call while the caller |
72ea3524 |
1355 | waits for child completion (to pretend that the C<pid> did not change). This |
a56dbb1c |
1356 | means that 1 I<extra> copy of F<sh.exe> is made active via fork()/exec(), |
1357 | which may lead to some resources taken from the system (even if we do |
1358 | not count extra work needed for fork()ing). |
1359 | |
72ea3524 |
1360 | Note that this a lesser issue now when we do not spawn F<sh.exe> |
1361 | unless needed (metachars found). |
1362 | |
1363 | One can always start F<cmd.exe> explicitly via |
a56dbb1c |
1364 | |
1365 | system 'cmd', '/c', 'mycmd', 'arg1', 'arg2', ... |
1366 | |
72ea3524 |
1367 | If you need to use F<cmd.exe>, and do not want to hand-edit thousands of your |
a56dbb1c |
1368 | scripts, the long-term solution proposed on p5-p is to have a directive |
1369 | |
1370 | use OS2::Cmd; |
1371 | |
1372 | which will override system(), exec(), C<``>, and |
1373 | C<open(,'...|')>. With current perl you may override only system(), |
1374 | readpipe() - the explicit version of C<``>, and maybe exec(). The code |
1375 | will substitute the one-argument call to system() by |
1376 | C<CORE::system('cmd.exe', '/c', shift)>. |
1377 | |
1378 | If you have some working code for C<OS2::Cmd>, please send it to me, |
1379 | I will include it into distribution. I have no need for such a module, so |
1380 | cannot test it. |
1381 | |
df3ef7a9 |
1382 | =head2 Memory allocation |
1383 | |
1384 | Perl uses its own malloc() under OS/2 - interpreters are usually malloc-bound |
1385 | for speed, but perl is not, since its malloc is lightning-fast. |
1386 | Unfortunately, it is also quite frivolous with memory usage as well. |
1387 | |
1388 | Since kitchen-top machines are usually low on memory, perl is compiled with |
1389 | all the possible memory-saving options. This probably makes perl's |
1390 | malloc() as greedy with memory as the neighbor's malloc(), but still |
1391 | much quickier. Note that this is true only for a "typical" usage, |
1392 | it is possible that the perl malloc will be worse for some very special usage. |
1393 | |
1394 | Combination of perl's malloc() and rigid DLL name resolution creates |
1395 | a special problem with library functions which expect their return value to |
1396 | be free()d by system's free(). To facilitate extensions which need to call |
1397 | such functions, system memory-allocation functions are still available with |
1398 | the prefix C<emx_> added. (Currently only DLL perl has this, it should |
1399 | propagate to F<perl_.exe> shortly.) |
1400 | |
a56dbb1c |
1401 | =cut |
1402 | |
1403 | OS/2 extensions |
1404 | ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ |
72ea3524 |
1405 | I include 3 extensions by Andreas Kaiser, OS2::REXX, OS2::UPM, and OS2::FTP, |
a56dbb1c |
1406 | into my ftp directory, mirrored on CPAN. I made |
1407 | some minor changes needed to compile them by standard tools. I cannot |
1408 | test UPM and FTP, so I will appreciate your feedback. Other extensions |
1409 | there are OS2::ExtAttr, OS2::PrfDB for tied access to EAs and .INI |
1410 | files - and maybe some other extensions at the time you read it. |
1411 | |
1412 | Note that OS2 perl defines 2 pseudo-extension functions |
aa689395 |
1413 | OS2::Copy::copy and DynaLoader::mod2fname (many more now, see |
1414 | L<Prebuilt methods>). |
a56dbb1c |
1415 | |
1416 | The -R switch of older perl is deprecated. If you need to call a REXX code |
1417 | which needs access to variables, include the call into a REXX compartment |
1418 | created by |
1419 | REXX_call {...block...}; |
1420 | |
1421 | Two new functions are supported by REXX code, |
1422 | REXX_eval 'string'; |
1423 | REXX_eval_with 'string', REXX_function_name => \&perl_sub_reference; |
1424 | |
1425 | If you have some other extensions you want to share, send the code to |
1426 | me. At least two are available: tied access to EA's, and tied access |
1427 | to system databases. |
615d1a09 |
1428 | |
a56dbb1c |
1429 | =head1 AUTHOR |
615d1a09 |
1430 | |
a56dbb1c |
1431 | Ilya Zakharevich, ilya@math.ohio-state.edu |
615d1a09 |
1432 | |
a56dbb1c |
1433 | =head1 SEE ALSO |
615d1a09 |
1434 | |
a56dbb1c |
1435 | perl(1). |
615d1a09 |
1436 | |
a56dbb1c |
1437 | =cut |
615d1a09 |
1438 | |