1 [This is an unsupported, pre-release version of Perl 5.0.]
5 Copyright (c) 1989,1990,1991,1992,1993,1994 Larry Wall
8 This program is free software; you can redistribute it and/or modify
9 it under the terms of either:
11 a) the GNU General Public License as published by the Free
12 Software Foundation; either version 1, or (at your option) any
15 b) the "Artistic License" which comes with this Kit.
17 This program is distributed in the hope that it will be useful,
18 but WITHOUT ANY WARRANTY; without even the implied warranty of
19 MERCHANTABILITY or FITNESS FOR A PARTICULAR PURPOSE. See either
20 the GNU General Public License or the Artistic License for more details.
22 You should have received a copy of the Artistic License with this
23 Kit, in the file named "Artistic". If not, I'll be glad to provide one.
25 You should also have received a copy of the GNU General Public License
26 along with this program; if not, write to the Free Software
27 Foundation, Inc., 675 Mass Ave, Cambridge, MA 02139, USA.
29 For those of you that choose to use the GNU General Public License,
30 my interpretation of the GNU General Public License is that no Perl
31 script falls under the terms of the GPL unless you explicitly put
32 said script under the terms of the GPL yourself. Furthermore, any
33 object code linked with uperl.o does not automatically fall under the
34 terms of the GPL, provided such object code only adds definitions
35 of subroutines and variables, and does not otherwise impair the
36 resulting interpreter from executing any standard Perl script. I
37 consider linking in C subroutines in this manner to be the moral
38 equivalent of defining subroutines in the Perl language itself. You
39 may sell such an object file as proprietary provided that you provide
40 or offer to provide the Perl source, as specified by the GNU General
41 Public License. (This is merely an alternate way of specifying input
42 to the program.) You may also sell a binary produced by the dumping of
43 a running Perl script that belongs to you, provided that you provide or
44 offer to provide the Perl source as specified by the GPL. (The
45 fact that a Perl interpreter and your code are in the same binary file
46 is, in this case, a form of mere aggregation.) This is my interpretation
47 of the GPL. If you still have concerns or difficulties understanding
48 my intent, feel free to contact me. Of course, the Artistic License
49 spells all this out for your protection, so you may prefer to use that.
51 --------------------------------------------------------------------------
53 Perl is a language that combines some of the features of C, sed, awk
54 and shell. See the manual page for more hype. There are also two Nutshell
55 Handbooks published by O'Reilly & Assoc. See pod/perlbook.pod
58 Please read all the directions below before you proceed any further, and
59 then follow them carefully.
61 After you have unpacked your kit, you should have all the files listed
66 1) Run Configure. This will figure out various things about your
67 system. Some things Configure will figure out for itself, other
68 things it will ask you about. If the test scripts and programs
69 run ok, the defaults will usually be right. It will then proceed to
70 make config.h, config.sh, and Makefile. You may have to explicitly
71 say sh Configure to ensure that Configure is run under sh.
72 If you're a hotshot, run Configure -d to take all the defaults and
73 then edit config.sh to patch up any flaws and run Configure -S.
75 Configure supports a number of useful options. Run Configure -h
76 to get a listing. To compile with gcc, for example, you can run
77 Configure -Dcc=gcc, or answer 'gcc' at the cc prompt. If you
78 change compilers or make other significant changes, you should
79 probably _not_ re-use your old config.sh.
81 By default, perl will be installed in /usr/local/{bin, lib, man}.
82 You can specify a different prefix for the default installation
83 directory, when Configure prompts you or by using something like
84 Configure -Dprefix=/whatever.
86 You can also supply a file config.over to over-ride Configure's
87 guesses. It will get loaded up at the very end, just before
90 You might possibly have to trim # comments from the front of Configure
91 if your sh doesn't handle them, but all other # comments will be taken
94 (If you don't have sh, you'll have to copy the sample file config.H to
95 config.h and edit the config.h to reflect your system's peculiarities.)
97 2) Glance through config.h to make sure system dependencies are correct.
98 Most of them should have been taken care of by running the Configure script.
100 If you have any additional changes to make to the C definitions, they
101 can be done in cflags.SH. For instance, to turn off the optimizer
102 on toke.c, find the line in the switch structure for toke.c and
103 put the command optimize='-g' before the ;;. To change the C flags
104 for all the files, edit config.sh and change either $ccflags or $optimize.
108 This will look for all the includes and modify Makefile accordingly.
109 Configure will offer to do this for you.
113 This will attempt to make perl in the current directory.
115 If you can't compile successfully, try adding a -DCRIPPLED_CC flag.
116 (Just because you get no errors doesn't mean it compiled right!)
117 This simplifies some complicated expressions for compilers that
118 get indigestion easily. If that has no effect, try turning off
119 optimization. If you have missing routines, you probably need to
120 add some library or other, or you need to undefine some feature that
121 Configure thought was there but is defective or incomplete.
123 Some compilers will not compile or optimize the larger files without
124 some extra switches to use larger jump offsets or allocate larger
125 internal tables. You can customize the switches for each file in
126 cflags.SH. It's okay to insert rules for specific files into
127 Makefile.SH, since a default rule only takes effect in the
128 absence of a specific rule.
130 Many of the following hints are now done automatically by Configure.
131 Some of the hints here were for Perl 4, and are probably obsolete.
132 They're left here for the moment just to give you some ideas for
133 what to try if you're having trouble.
135 AIX/RT may need a -a switch and -DCRIPPLED_CC.
136 Ultrix 3.[01] on MIPS needs to undefine WAITPID--the system call is busted.
137 MIPS machines may need to undef d_volatile.
138 MIPS machines may need to turn off -O on some files.
139 Some MIPS machines may need to undefine CASTNEGFLOAT.
140 Genix may need to use libc rather than libc_s, or #undef VARARGS.
141 NCR Tower 32 (OS 2.01.01) may need -W2,-Sl,2000 and #undef MKDIR.
142 A/UX may appear to work with -O -B/usr/lib/big/ optimizer flags.
143 A/UX may need -lposix to find rewinddir.
144 A/UX may need -ZP -DPOSIX, and -g if big cc is used.
145 UTS may need one or more of -DCRIPPLED_CC, -K or -g, and undef LSTAT.
146 If you get syntax errors on '(', try -DCRIPPLED_CC.
147 Machines with half-implemented dbm routines will need to #undef I_ODBM
148 SCO prior to 3.2.4 may be missing dbmclose(). An upgrade to 3.2.4
149 that includes libdbm.nfs (which includes dbmclose()) may be available.
150 If you get duplicates upon linking for malloc et al, say -DHIDEMYMALLOC.
151 If you get duplicate function definitions (a perl function has the
152 same name as another function on your system) try -DEMBED.
153 If you get varags problems with gcc, be sure that gcc is installed
154 correctly. When using gcc, you should probably have i_stdarg='define'
155 and i_varags='undef' in config.sh.
159 This will run the regression tests on the perl you just made.
160 If it doesn't say "All tests successful" then something went wrong.
161 See the README in the t subdirectory. Note that you can't run it
162 in background if this disables opening of /dev/tty. If "make test"
163 bombs out, just cd to the t directory and run TEST by hand to see if
164 it makes any difference. If individual tests bomb, you can run
165 them by hand, e.g., ./perl op/groups.t
169 This will put perl into a public directory (such as /usr/local/bin).
170 It will also try to put the man pages in a reasonable place. It will not
171 nroff the man page, however. You may need to be root to do this. If
172 you are not root, you must own the directories in question and you should
173 ignore any messages about chown not working.
175 make install will also install the following:
177 perl5.nnn where nnn is the current release number. This
178 will be a link to perl.
180 sperl5.nnn If you requested setuid emulation.
181 a2p awk-to-perl translator
182 cppstdin This is used by perl -P, if your cc -E can't
184 c2ph, pstruct Scripts for handling C structures in header files.
185 s2p sed-to-perl translator
186 find2perl find-to-perl translator
187 h2xs Converts C .h header files to Perl extensions.
189 library files in $privlib and $archlib specified to
190 Configure, usually under /usr/local/lib/perl5/.
191 man pages in the location specified to Configure, usually
192 something like /usr/local/man/man1.
194 Perl's *.h header files and the libperl.a library are also
195 installed under $archlib so that you may later build new
196 extensions even if the Perl source is no longer available.
198 make install may also offer to install perl in a "standard" location.
200 Most of the documentation in the pod/ directory is also available
202 cd pod; make html; cd ..
203 to generate the html versions.
205 7) Read the manual entries before running perl.
207 8) IMPORTANT! Help save the world! Communicate any problems and suggested
208 patches to me, lwall@netlabs.com (Larry Wall), so we can
209 keep the world in sync. If you have a problem, there's someone else
210 out there who either has had or will have the same problem.
212 If possible, send in patches such that the patch program will apply them.
213 Context diffs are the best, then normal diffs. Don't send ed scripts--
214 I've probably changed my copy since the version you have. It's also
215 helpful if you send the output of "uname -a".
217 Watch for perl patches in comp.lang.perl. Patches will generally be
218 in a form usable by the patch program. If you are just now bringing up
219 perl and aren't sure how many patches there are, write to me and I'll
220 send any you don't have. Your current patch level is shown in patchlevel.h.
223 Just a personal note: I want you to know that I create nice things like this
224 because it pleases the Author of my story. If this bothers you, then your
225 notion of Authorship needs some revision. But you can use perl anyway. :-)