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