1 Last revised: 14-Dec-1995 by Charles Bailey bailey@genetics.upenn.edu
3 The VMS port of Perl is still under development. At this time, the Perl
4 binaries built under VMS handle internal operations properly, for the most
5 part, as well as most of the system calls which have close equivalents under
6 VMS. There are still some incompatibilities in process handling (e.g the
7 fork/exec model for creating subprocesses doesn't do what you might expect
8 under Unix), and there remain some file handling differences from Unix. Over
9 the longer term, we'll try to get many of the useful VMS system services
10 integrated as well, depending on time and people available. Of course, if
11 you'd like to add something yourself, or join the porting team, we'd love to
14 The current sources and build procedures have been tested on a VAX using VAXC
15 and on an AXP using DECC. If you run into problems with other compilers,
18 Note to DECC users: Some early versions of the DECCRTL contained a few bugs
19 which affect Perl performance:
20 - Newlines are lost on I/O through pipes, causing lines to run together.
21 This shows up as RMS RTB errors when reading from a pipe. You can
22 work around this by having one process write data to a file, and
23 then having the other read the file, instead of the pipe. This is
24 fixed in version 4 of DECC.
25 - The modf() routine returns a non-integral value for some values above
26 INT_MAX; the Perl "int" operator will return a non-integral value in
27 these cases. This is fixed in version 4 of DECC.
28 - On the AXP, if SYSNAM privilege is enabled, the CRTL chdir() routine
29 changes the process default device and directory permanently, even
30 though the call specified that the change should not persist after
31 Perl exited. This is fixed by DEC CSC patch AXPACRT04_061.
33 * Other software required
35 At the moment, in addition to basic VMS, you'll need two things:
36 - a C compiler: VAXC, DECC, or gcc for the VAX; DECC for the AXP
37 - a make tool: DEC's MMS (version 2.6 or later) or the free analog MMK
38 (available from ftp.spc.edu), or a standard make utility (e.g. GNU make,
39 also available from ftp.spc.edu).
40 In addition, you may include socket support if you have an IP stack running
41 on your system. See the topic "Socket support" for more information.
45 Perl includes a number of IP socket routines among its builtin functions,
46 which are available if you choose to compile Perl with socket support. Since
47 IP networking is an optional addition to VMS, there are several different IP
48 stacks available, so it's difficult to automate the process of building Perl
49 with socket support in a way which will work on all systems.
51 By default, Perl is built without IP socket support. If you define the macro
52 SOCKET when invoking MMS, however, socket support will be included. As
53 distributed, Perl for VMS includes support for the SOCKETSHR socket library,
54 which is layered on MadGoat software's vendor-independent NETLIB interface.
55 This provides support for all socket calls used by Perl except the
56 [g|s]etnet*() routines, which are replaced for the moment by stubs which
57 generate a fatal error if a Perl script attempts to call one of these routines.
58 Both SOCKETSHR and NETLIB are available from MadGoat ftp sites, such as
59 ftp.spc.edu or ftp.wku.edu.
61 You can link Perl directly to your TCP/IP stack's library, *as long as* it
62 supplies shims for stdio routines which will properly handle both sockets and
63 normal file descriptors. This is necessary because Perl does not distinguish
64 between the two, and will try to make normal stdio calls such as read() and
65 getc() on socket file descriptors. If you'd like to link Perl directly to
66 your IP stack, then make the following changes:
67 - In Descrip.MMS, locate the section beginning with .ifdef SOCKET, and
68 change the SOCKLIB macro so that it translates to the filespec of your
69 IP stack's socket library. This will be added to the RTL options file.
70 - Edit the file SockAdapt.H in the [.VMS] subdirectory so that it
71 includes the Socket.H, In.H, Inet.H, NetDb.H, and, if necessary,
72 Errno.H header files for your IP stack, or so that it declares the
73 standard TCP/IP constants and data structures appropriately. (See
74 the distributed copy of SockAdapt.H for a collection of the structures
75 needed by Perl itself, and [.ext.Socket]Socket.xs for a list of the
76 constants used by the Socket extension, if you elect to built it.)
77 You should also define any logical names necessary for your C compiler
78 to find these files before invoking MM[KS] to build Perl.
79 - Edit the file SockAdapt.C in the [.VMS] subdirectory so that it
80 contains routines which substitute for any IP library routines
81 required by Perl which your IP stack does not provide. This may
82 require a little trial and error; we'll try to compile a complete
83 list soon of socket routines required by Perl.
86 * Building Perl under VMS
88 Since you're reading this, presumably you've unpacked the Perl distribution
89 into its directory tree, in which you will find a [.vms] subdirectory below
90 the directory in which this file is found. If this isn't the case, then you'll
91 need to unpack the distribution properly, or manually edit Descrip.MMS or
92 the VMS Makefile to alter directory paths as necessary. (I'd advise using the
93 `normal' directory tree, at least for the first time through.) This
94 subdirectory contains several files, among which are the following:
95 Config.VMS - A template Config.H set up for VMS.
96 Descrip.MMS - The MMS/MMK dependency file for building Perl
97 GenConfig.Pl - A Perl script to generate Config.SH retrospectively
98 from Config.VMS, since the Configure shell script which
99 normally generates Config.SH doesn't run under VMS.
100 GenOpt.Com - A little DCL procedure used to write some linker options
101 files, since not all make utilities can do this easily.
102 Gen_ShrFls.Pl - A Perl script which generates linker options files and
103 MACRO declarations for PerlShr.Exe.
104 Makefile - The make dependency file for building Perl
105 MMS2Make.Pl - A Perl script used to generate Makefile from Descrip.MMS
106 PerlVMS.pod - Documentation for VMS-specific behavior of Perl
107 Perly_[CH].VMS - Versions of the byacc output from Perl's grammar,
108 modified to include VMS-specific C compiler options
109 SockAdapt.[CH] - C source code used to integrate VMS TCP/IP support
110 Test.Com - DCL driver for Perl regression tests
111 VMSish.H - C header file containing VMS-specific definitions
112 VMS.C - C source code for VMS-specific routines
113 VMS_Yfix.Pl - Perl script to convert Perly.[CH] to Perly_[CH].VMS
114 WriteMain.Pl - Perl script to generate Perlmain.C
115 The [.Ext...] directories contain VMS-specific extensions distributed with
116 Perl. There may also be other files in [.VMS...] pertaining to features under
117 development; for the most part, you can ignore them.
119 Config.VMS and Decrip.MMS/Makefile are set up to build a version of Perl which
120 includes all features known to work when this release was assembled. If you
121 have code at your site which would support additional features (e.g. emulation
122 of Unix system calls), feel free to make the appropriate changes to these
123 files. (Note: Do not use or edit config.h in the main Perl source directory;
124 it is superseded by the current Config.VMS during the build.) You may also
125 wish to make site-specific changes to Descrip.MMS or Makefile to reflect local
126 conventions for naming of files, etc.
128 There are several pieces of system-specific information which become part of
129 the Perl Config extension. Under VMS, the data for Config are generated by the
130 script GenConfig.Pl in the [.VMS] subdirectory. It tries to ascertain the
131 necessary information from various files, or from the system itself, and
132 generally does the right thing. There is a list of hard-coded values at the
133 end of this script which specifies items that are correct for most VMS systems,
134 but may be incorrect for you, if your site is set up in an unusual fashion. If
135 you're familiar with Perl's Config extension, feel free to edit these values as
136 necessary. If this doesn't mean much to you, don't worry -- the information is
137 probably correct, and even if it's not, none of these parameters affect your
138 ability to build or run Perl. You'll only get the wrong answer if you ask for
139 it specifically from Config.
141 Examine the information at the beginning of Descrip.MMS for information about
142 specifying alternate C compilers or building a version of Perl with debugging
143 support. For instance, if you want to use DECC, you'll need to include the
144 /macro="decc=1" qualifier to MMS (If you're using make, these options are not
145 supported.) If you're on an AXP system, define the macro __AXP__ (MMK does
146 this for you), and DECC will automatically be selected.
148 To start the build, set default to the main source directory. Since
149 Descrip.MMS assumes that VMS commands have their usual meaning, and makes use
150 of command-line macros, you may want to be certain that you haven't defined DCL
151 symbols which would interfere with the build. Then, if you are using MMS or
153 $ MMS/Descrip=[.VMS] ! or MMK
154 (N.B. If you are using MMS, you must use version 2.6 or later; a bug in
155 earlier versions produces malformed cc command lines.) If you are using a
157 $ Make -f [.VMS]Makefile
158 Note that the Makefile doesn't support conditional compilation, is
159 set up to use VAXC on a VAX, and does not include socket support. You can
160 either edit the Makefile by hand, using Descrip.MMS as a guide, or use the
161 Makefile to build Miniperl.Exe, and then run the Perl script MMS2Make.pl,
162 found in the [.VMS] subdirectory, to generate a new Makefile with the options
163 appropriate to your site.
165 Note for sites using DECC: A bug in some early versions of the DECC RTL on the
166 AXP causes newlines to be lost when writing to a pipe. This causes
167 Gen_ShrFls.pl to fail, since it can't read the preprocessor output to identify
168 global variables and routines. A different bug in the DECC preprocessor itself
169 for some patched versions of DECC 4.0 on the VAX also makes it impossible for
170 Gen_ShrFls.pl to parse the preprocessor output. In either case, the problem is
171 generally manifested as missing global symbols when linking PerlShr.Exe or
172 Perl.Exe. You can work around this problem by defining the macro
173 DECC_PIPES_BROKEN when you invoke MMS or MMK.
175 This will build the following files:
176 Miniperl.Exe - a stand-alone version of without any extensions.
177 Miniperl has all the intrinsic capabilities of Perl,
178 but cannot make use of the DynaLoader or any
179 extensions which use XS code.
180 PerlShr.Exe - a shareable image containing most of Perl's internal
181 routines and global variables. Perl.Exe is linked to
182 this image, as are all dynamic extensions, so everyone's
183 using the same set of global variables and routines.
184 Perl.Exe - the main Perl executable image. It's contains the
185 main() routine, plus code for any statically linked
187 PerlShr_Attr.Opt - A linker options file which specifies psect attributes
188 matching those in PerlShr.Exe. It should be used when
189 linking images against PerlShr.Exe
190 PerlShr_Bld.Opt - A linker options file which specifies various things
191 used to build PerlShr.Exe. It should be used when
192 rebuilding PerlShr.Exe via MakeMaker-produced
193 Descrip.MMS files for static extensions.
194 [.Lib]Config.pm - the Perl extension which saves configuration information
195 about Perl and your system.
196 [.Lib]DynaLoader.pm - The Perl extension which performs dynamic linking of
197 shareable images for extensions.
198 Several subdirectories under [.Lib] containing preprocessed files or
200 There are, of course, a number of other files created for use during the build.
201 Once you've got the binaries built, you may wish to `build' the `tidy' or
202 `clean' targets to remove extra files.
205 * Installing Perl once it's built
207 Once the build is complete, you'll need to do the following:
208 - Put PerlShr.Exe in a common directory, and make it world-readable.
209 If you place it in a location other than Sys$Share, you'll need to
210 define the logical name PerlShr to point to the image.
211 - Put Perl.Exe in a common directory, and make it world-executable.
212 - Define a foreign command to invoke Perl, using a statement like
213 $ Perl == "$dev:[dir]Perl.Exe"
214 - Create a world-readable directory tree for Perl library modules,
215 scripts, and what-have-you, and define PERL_ROOT as a rooted logical
216 name pointing to the top of this tree (i.e. if your Perl files were
217 going to live in DKA1:[Util.Perl5...], then you should
218 $ Define/Translation=Concealed Perl_Root DKA1:[Util.Perl5.]
219 (Be careful to follow the rules for rooted logical names; in particular,
220 remember that a rooted logical name cannot have as its device portion
221 another rooted logical name - you've got to supply the actual device name
222 and directory path to the root directory.)
223 - Place the files from the [.lib...] directory tree in the distribution
224 package into a [.lib...] directory tree off the root directory described
226 - Most of the Perl documentation lives in the [.pod] subdirectory, and
227 is written in a simple markup format which can be easily read. In this
228 directory as well are pod2man and pod2html translators to reformat the
229 docs for common display engines; a pod2hlp translator is under development.
230 Information on Perl can also be gleaned from the files in the [.doc]
231 subdirectory (internals documents and summaries of changes), and from
232 the test scripts in the [.t...] subdirectories. For this reason,
233 you may wish to copy these subtrees into directories under Perl_Root.
237 * For more information
239 If you're interested in more information on Perl in general, consult the Usenet
240 newsgroups comp.lang.perl.announce and comp.lang.perl.misc. The FAQ for these
241 groups provides pointers to other online sources of information, as well as
242 books describing Perl in depth.
244 If you're interested in up-to-date information on Perl development and
245 internals, you might want to subscribe to the perl5-porters mailing list. You
246 can do this by sending a message to perl5-porters-request@nicoh.com, containing
248 subscribe perl5-porters
249 This is a moderately high-volume list at the moment (25-50 messages/day).
251 If you're interested in ongoing information about the VMS port, you can
252 subscribe to the VMSperl mailing list by sending a request to
253 bailey@genetics.upenn.edu (it's to a human, not a list server - this is a small
254 operation at the moment). And, as always, we welcome any help or code you'd
255 like to offer - you can send mail to bailey@genetics.upenn.edu or directly to
256 the VMSperl list at vmsperl@genetics.upenn.edu.
258 Finally, if you'd like to try out the latest changes to VMS Perl, you can
259 retrieve a test distribution kit by anonymous ftp from genetics.upenn.edu, in
260 the file [.perl5]perl5_ppp_yymmddx.zip, where "ppp" is the current Perl
261 patchlevel, and "yymmddx" is a sequence number indicating the date that
262 particular kit was assembled. In order to make retrieval convenient, this
263 kit is also available by the name Perl5_VMSTest.Zip. These test kits contain
264 "unofficial" patches from the perl5-porters group, test patches for important
265 bugs, and VMS-specific fixes and improvements which have occurred since the
266 last Perl release. Most of these changes will be incorporated in the next
267 release of Perl, but until Larry Wall's looked at them and said they're OK,
268 none of them should be considered official.
270 Good luck using Perl. Please let us know how it works for you - we can't
271 guarantee that we'll be able to fix bugs quickly, but we'll try, and we'd
272 certainly like to know they're out there.
277 There are, of course, far too many people involved in the porting and testing
278 of Perl to mention everyone who deserves it, so please forgive us if we've
279 missed someone. That said, special thanks are due to the following:
280 Tim Adye <T.J.Adye@rl.ac.uk>
281 for the VMS emulations of getpw*()
282 David Denholm <denholm@conmat.phys.soton.ac.uk>
283 for extensive testing and provision of pipe and SocketShr code,
284 Mark Pizzolato <mark@infocomm.com>
285 for the getredirection() code
286 Rich Salz <rsalz@bbn.com>
287 for readdir() and related routines
288 Denis Haskin <DWH@epub.ziff.com>
289 for work on a pod-to-hlp translator for the Perl documentation
290 Richard Dyson <dyson@blaze.physics.uiowa.edu> and
291 Kent Covert <kacovert@miavx1.acs.muohio.edu>
292 for additional testing on the AXP.
293 and to the entire VMSperl group for useful advice and suggestions. In addition
294 the perl5-porters, especially Andy Dougherty <doughera@lafcol.lafayette.edu>
295 and Tim Bunce <Tim.Bunce@ig.co.uk>, deserve credit for their creativity and
296 willingness to work with the VMS newcomers. Finally, the greatest debt of
297 gratitude is due to Larry Wall <lwall@netlabs.com>, for having the ideas which
298 have made our sleepless nights possible.
projects / p5sagit/p5-mst-13.2.git / blob