3 # This module doesn't do much of anything itself, it inherits from the
4 # modules that do the real work. The only real thing it has to do is
5 # figure out which OS-specific module to pull in. Many of the
6 # OS-specific modules don't do anything either - most of the work is
7 # done in Module::Build::Base.
12 use File::Basename ();
14 use Module::Build::Base;
16 use vars qw($VERSION @ISA);
17 @ISA = qw(Module::Build::Base);
19 $VERSION = eval $VERSION;
21 # Okay, this is the brute-force method of finding out what kind of
22 # platform we're on. I don't know of a systematic way. These values
23 # came from the latest (bleadperl) perlport.pod.
74 # Inserts the given module into the @ISA hierarchy between
75 # Module::Build and its immediate parent
76 sub _interpose_module {
77 my ($self, $mod) = @_;
83 while (@{"${top_class}::ISA"}) {
84 last if ${"${top_class}::ISA"}[0] eq $ISA[0];
85 $top_class = ${"${top_class}::ISA"}[0];
88 @{"${top_class}::ISA"} = @ISA;
92 if (grep {-e File::Spec->catfile($_, qw(Module Build Platform), $^O) . '.pm'} @INC) {
93 __PACKAGE__->_interpose_module("Module::Build::Platform::$^O");
95 } elsif (exists $OSTYPES{$^O}) {
96 __PACKAGE__->_interpose_module("Module::Build::Platform::$OSTYPES{$^O}");
99 warn "Unknown OS type '$^O' - using default settings\n";
102 sub os_type { $OSTYPES{$^O} }
104 sub is_vmsish { return ((os_type() || '') eq 'VMS') }
105 sub is_windowsish { return ((os_type() || '') eq 'Windows') }
106 sub is_unixish { return ((os_type() || '') eq 'Unix') }
115 Module::Build - Build and install Perl modules
120 Standard process for building & installing modules:
127 Or, if you're on a platform (like DOS or Windows) that doesn't require
128 the "./" notation, you can do this:
138 C<Module::Build> is a system for building, testing, and installing
139 Perl modules. It is meant to be an alternative to
140 C<ExtUtils::MakeMaker>. Developers may alter the behavior of the
141 module through subclassing in a much more straightforward way than
142 with C<MakeMaker>. It also does not require a C<make> on your system
143 - most of the C<Module::Build> code is pure-perl and written in a very
144 cross-platform way. In fact, you don't even need a shell, so even
145 platforms like MacOS (traditional) can use it fairly easily. Its only
146 prerequisites are modules that are included with perl 5.6.0, and it
147 works fine on perl 5.005 if you can install a few additional modules.
149 See L<"MOTIVATIONS"> for more comparisons between C<ExtUtils::MakeMaker>
150 and C<Module::Build>.
152 To install C<Module::Build>, and any other module that uses
153 C<Module::Build> for its installation process, do the following:
155 perl Build.PL # 'Build.PL' script creates the 'Build' script
156 ./Build # Need ./ to ensure we're using this "Build" script
157 ./Build test # and not another one that happens to be in the PATH
160 This illustrates initial configuration and the running of three
161 'actions'. In this case the actions run are 'build' (the default
162 action), 'test', and 'install'. Other actions defined so far include:
170 distcheck pure_install
180 install versioninstall
184 You can run the 'help' action for a complete list of actions.
187 =head1 GUIDE TO DOCUMENTATION
189 The documentation for C<Module::Build> is broken up into three sections:
193 =item General Usage (L<Module::Build>)
195 This is the document you are currently reading. It describes basic
196 usage and background information. Its main purpose is to assist the
197 user who wants to learn how to invoke and control C<Module::Build>
198 scripts at the command line.
200 =item Authoring Reference (L<Module::Build::Authoring>)
202 This document describes the structure and organization of
203 C<Module::Build>, and the relevant concepts needed by authors who are
204 writing F<Build.PL> scripts for a distribution or controlling
205 C<Module::Build> processes programmatically.
207 =item API Reference (L<Module::Build::API>)
209 This is a reference to the C<Module::Build> API.
211 =item Cookbook (L<Module::Build::Cookbook>)
213 This document demonstrates how to accomplish many common tasks. It
214 covers general command line usage and authoring of F<Build.PL>
215 scripts. Includes working examples.
222 There are some general principles at work here. First, each task when
223 building a module is called an "action". These actions are listed
224 above; they correspond to the building, testing, installing,
225 packaging, etc., tasks.
227 Second, arguments are processed in a very systematic way. Arguments
228 are always key=value pairs. They may be specified at C<perl Build.PL>
229 time (i.e. C<perl Build.PL destdir=/my/secret/place>), in which case
230 their values last for the lifetime of the C<Build> script. They may
231 also be specified when executing a particular action (i.e.
232 C<Build test verbose=1>), in which case their values last only for the
233 lifetime of that command. Per-action command line parameters take
234 precedence over parameters specified at C<perl Build.PL> time.
236 The build process also relies heavily on the C<Config.pm> module.
237 If the user wishes to override any of the
238 values in C<Config.pm>, she may specify them like so:
240 perl Build.PL --config cc=gcc --config ld=gcc
242 The following build actions are provided by default.
250 If you run the C<Build> script without any arguments, it runs the
251 C<build> action, which in turn runs the C<code> and C<docs> actions.
253 This is analogous to the MakeMaker 'make all' target.
259 This action will clean up any files that the build process may have
260 created, including the C<blib/> directory (but not including the
261 C<_build/> directory and the C<Build> script itself).
267 This action builds your codebase.
269 By default it just creates a C<blib/> directory and copies any C<.pm>
270 and C<.pod> files from your C<lib/> directory into the C<blib/>
271 directory. It also compiles any C<.xs> files from C<lib/> and places
272 them in C<blib/>. Of course, you need a working C compiler (probably
273 the same one that built perl itself) for the compilation to work
276 The C<code> action also runs any C<.PL> files in your F<lib/>
277 directory. Typically these create other files, named the same but
278 without the C<.PL> ending. For example, a file F<lib/Foo/Bar.pm.PL>
279 could create the file F<lib/Foo/Bar.pm>. The C<.PL> files are
280 processed first, so any C<.pm> files (or other kinds that we deal
281 with) will get copied correctly.
293 This action will compare the files about to be installed with their
294 installed counterparts. For .pm and .pod files, a diff will be shown
295 (this currently requires a 'diff' program to be in your PATH). For
296 other files like compiled binary files, we simply report whether they
299 A C<flags> parameter may be passed to the action, which will be passed
300 to the 'diff' program. Consult your 'diff' documentation for the
301 parameters it will accept - a good one is C<-u>:
303 ./Build diff flags=-u
309 This action is helpful for module authors who want to package up their
310 module for source distribution through a medium like CPAN. It will create a
311 tarball of the files listed in F<MANIFEST> and compress the tarball using
314 By default, this action will use the external C<tar> and C<gzip>
315 executables on Unix-like platforms, and the C<Archive::Tar> module
316 elsewhere. However, you can force it to use whatever executable you
317 want by supplying an explicit C<tar> (and optional C<gzip>) parameter:
319 ./Build dist --tar C:\path\to\tar.exe --gzip C:\path\to\zip.exe
325 Reports which files are in the build directory but not in the
326 F<MANIFEST> file, and vice versa. (See L<manifest> for details.)
332 Performs the 'realclean' action and then the 'distcheck' action.
338 Creates a "distribution directory" named C<$dist_name-$dist_version>
339 (if that directory already exists, it will be removed first), then
340 copies all the files listed in the F<MANIFEST> file to that directory.
341 This directory is what the distribution tarball is created from.
347 Creates the F<META.yml> file that describes the distribution.
349 F<META.yml> is a file containing various bits of "metadata" about the
350 distribution. The metadata includes the distribution name, version,
351 abstract, prerequisites, license, and various other data about the
352 distribution. This file is created as F<META.yml> in YAML format.
353 It is recommended that the C<YAML> module be installed to create it.
354 If the C<YAML> module is not installed, an internal module supplied
355 with Module::Build will be used to write the META.yml file, and this
356 will most likely be fine.
358 F<META.yml> file must also be listed in F<MANIFEST> - if it's not, a
359 warning will be issued.
361 The current version of the F<META.yml> specification can be found at
362 L<http://module-build.sourceforge.net/META-spec-current.html>
368 Uses C<Module::Signature> to create a SIGNATURE file for your
369 distribution, and adds the SIGNATURE file to the distribution's
376 Performs the 'distdir' action, then switches into that directory and
377 runs a C<perl Build.PL>, followed by the 'build' and 'test' actions in
384 This will generate documentation (e.g. Unix man pages and html
385 documents) for any installable items under B<blib/> that
386 contain POD. If there are no C<bindoc> or C<libdoc> installation
387 targets defined (as will be the case on systems that don't support
388 Unix manpages) no action is taken for manpages. If there are no
389 C<binhtml> or C<libhtml> installation targets defined no action is
390 taken for html documents.
396 This is just like the C<install> action, but it won't actually do
397 anything, it will just report what it I<would> have done if you had
398 actually run the C<install> action.
404 This action will simply print out a message that is meant to help you
405 use the build process. It will show you a list of available build
408 With an optional argument specifying an action name (e.g. C<Build help
409 test>), the 'help' action will show you any POD documentation it can
410 find for that action.
416 This will generate HTML documentation for any binary or library files
417 under B<blib/> that contain POD. The HTML documentation will only be
418 installed if the install paths can be determined from values in
419 C<Config.pm>. You can also supply or override install paths on the
420 command line by specifying C<install_path> values for the C<binhtml>
421 and/or C<libhtml> installation targets.
427 This action will use C<ExtUtils::Install> to install the files from
428 C<blib/> into the system. See L<"INSTALL PATHS">
429 for details about how Module::Build determines where to install
430 things, and how to influence this process.
432 If you want the installation process to look around in C<@INC> for
433 other versions of the stuff you're installing and try to delete it,
434 you can use the C<uninst> parameter, which tells C<ExtUtils::Install> to
437 ./Build install uninst=1
439 This can be a good idea, as it helps prevent multiple versions of a
440 module from being present on your system, which can be a confusing
447 This is an action intended for use by module authors, not people
448 installing modules. It will bring the F<MANIFEST> up to date with the
449 files currently present in the distribution. You may use a
450 F<MANIFEST.SKIP> file to exclude certain files or directories from
451 inclusion in the F<MANIFEST>. F<MANIFEST.SKIP> should contain a bunch
452 of regular expressions, one per line. If a file in the distribution
453 directory matches any of the regular expressions, it won't be included
456 The following is a reasonable F<MANIFEST.SKIP> starting point, you can
457 add your own stuff to it:
467 See the L<distcheck> and L<skipcheck> actions if you want to find out
468 what the C<manifest> action would do, without actually doing anything.
474 This will generate man pages for any binary or library files under
475 B<blib/> that contain POD. The man pages will only be installed if the
476 install paths can be determined from values in C<Config.pm>. You can
477 also supply or override install paths by specifying there values on
478 the command line with the C<bindoc> and C<libdoc> installation
485 Generates a PAR binary distribution for use with L<PAR> or L<PAR::Dist>.
487 It requires that the PAR::Dist module (version 0.17 and up) is
488 installed on your system.
494 Build a PPD file for your distribution.
496 This action takes an optional argument C<codebase> which is used in
497 the generated ppd file to specify the (usually relative) URL of the
498 distribution. By default, this value is the distribution name without
499 any path information.
503 ./Build ppd --codebase "MSWin32-x86-multi-thread/Module-Build-0.21.tar.gz"
509 Generates a PPM binary distribution and a PPD description file. This
510 action also invokes the 'ppd' action, so it can accept the same
511 C<codebase> argument described under that action.
513 This uses the same mechanism as the C<dist> action to tar & zip its
514 output, so you can supply C<tar> and/or C<gzip> parameters to affect
521 This action prints out a Perl data structure of all prerequsites and the versions
522 required. The output can be loaded again using C<eval()>. This can be useful for
523 external tools that wish to query a Build script for prerequisites.
529 This action prints out a list of all prerequisites, the versions required, and
530 the versions actually installed. This can be useful for reviewing the
531 configuration of your system prior to a build, or when compiling data to send
538 This action is identical to the C<install> action. In the future,
539 though, when C<install> starts writing to the file
540 F<$(INSTALLARCHLIB)/perllocal.pod>, C<pure_install> won't, and that
541 will be the only difference between them.
547 This action is just like the C<clean> action, but also removes the
548 C<_build> directory and the C<Build> script. If you run the
549 C<realclean> action, you are essentially starting over, so you will
550 have to re-create the C<Build> script again.
556 This is just like the C<test> action, but doesn't actually build the
557 distribution first, and doesn't add F<blib/> to the load path, and
558 therefore will test against a I<previously> installed version of the
559 distribution. This can be used to verify that a certain installed
560 distribution still works, or to see whether newer versions of a
561 distribution still pass the old regression tests, and so on.
567 Reports which files are skipped due to the entries in the
568 F<MANIFEST.SKIP> file (See L<manifest> for details)
574 This will use C<Test::Harness> or C<TAP::Harness> to run any regression
575 tests and report their results. Tests can be defined in the standard
576 places: a file called C<test.pl> in the top-level directory, or several
577 files ending with C<.t> in a C<t/> directory.
579 If you want tests to be 'verbose', i.e. show details of test execution
580 rather than just summary information, pass the argument C<verbose=1>.
582 If you want to run tests under the perl debugger, pass the argument
585 If you want to have Module::Build find test files with different file
586 name extensions, pass the C<test_file_exts> argument with an array
587 of extensions, such as C<[qw( .t .s .z )]>.
589 If you want test to be run by C<TAP::Harness>, rather than C<Test::Harness>,
590 pass the argument C<tap_harness_args> as an array reference of arguments to
591 pass to the TAP::Harness constructor.
593 In addition, if a file called C<visual.pl> exists in the top-level
594 directory, this file will be executed as a Perl script and its output
595 will be shown to the user. This is a good place to put speed tests or
596 other tests that don't use the C<Test::Harness> format for output.
598 To override the choice of tests to run, you may pass a C<test_files>
599 argument whose value is a whitespace-separated list of test scripts to
600 run. This is especially useful in development, when you only want to
601 run a single test to see whether you've squashed a certain bug yet:
603 ./Build test --test_files t/something_failing.t
605 You may also pass several C<test_files> arguments separately:
607 ./Build test --test_files t/one.t --test_files t/two.t
609 or use a C<glob()>-style pattern:
611 ./Build test --test_files 't/01-*.t'
617 [Note: the 'testall' action and the code snippets below are currently
619 L<"http://www.nntp.perl.org/group/perl.module.build/2007/03/msg584.html"> ]
621 Runs the C<test> action plus each of the C<test$type> actions defined by
622 the keys of the C<test_types> parameter.
624 Currently, you need to define the ACTION_test$type method yourself and
625 enumerate them in the test_types parameter.
627 my $mb = Module::Build->subclass(
629 sub ACTION_testspecial { shift->generic_test(type => 'special'); }
630 sub ACTION_testauthor { shift->generic_test(type => 'author'); }
636 author => ['.at', '.pt' ],
644 Runs the C<test> action using C<Devel::Cover>, generating a
645 code-coverage report showing which parts of the code were actually
646 exercised during the tests.
648 To pass options to C<Devel::Cover>, set the C<$DEVEL_COVER_OPTIONS>
649 environment variable:
651 DEVEL_COVER_OPTIONS=-ignore,Build ./Build testcover
657 This is a synonym for the 'test' action with the C<debugger=1>
664 This checks all the files described in the C<docs> action and
665 produces C<Test::Harness>-style output. If you are a module author,
666 this is useful to run before creating a new release.
668 =item testpodcoverage
672 This checks the pod coverage of the distribution and
673 produces C<Test::Harness>-style output. If you are a module author,
674 this is useful to run before creating a new release.
680 ** Note: since C<only.pm> is so new, and since we just recently added
681 support for it here too, this feature is to be considered
684 If you have the C<only.pm> module installed on your system, you can
685 use this action to install a module into the version-specific library
686 trees. This means that you can have several versions of the same
687 module installed and C<use> a specific one like this:
689 use only MyModule => 0.55;
691 To override the default installation libraries in C<only::config>,
692 specify the C<versionlib> parameter when you run the C<Build.PL> script:
694 perl Build.PL --versionlib /my/version/place/
696 To override which version the module is installed as, specify the
697 C<versionlib> parameter when you run the C<Build.PL> script:
699 perl Build.PL --version 0.50
701 See the C<only.pm> documentation for more information on
702 version-specific installs.
709 =head2 Command Line Options
711 The following options can be used during any invocation of C<Build.PL>
712 or the Build script, during any action. For information on other
713 options specific to an action, see the documentation for the
716 NOTE: There is some preliminary support for options to use the more
717 familiar long option style. Most options can be preceded with the
718 C<--> long option prefix, and the underscores changed to dashes
719 (e.g. --use-rcfile). Additionally, the argument to boolean options is
720 optional, and boolean options can be negated by prefixing them with
721 'no' or 'no-' (e.g. --noverbose or --no-verbose).
727 Suppress informative messages on output.
731 Load the F<~/.modulebuildrc> option file. This option can be set to
732 false to prevent the custom resource file from being loaded.
736 Display extra information about the Build on output.
738 =item allow_mb_mismatch
740 Suppresses the check upon startup that the version of Module::Build
741 we're now running under is the same version that was initially invoked
742 when building the distribution (i.e. when the C<Build.PL> script was
743 first run). Use with caution.
748 =head2 Default Options File (F<.modulebuildrc>)
752 When Module::Build starts up, it will look first for a file,
753 F<$ENV{HOME}/.modulebuildrc>. If it's not found there, it will look
754 in the the F<.modulebuildrc> file in the directories referred to by
755 the environment variables C<HOMEDRIVE> + C<HOMEDIR>, C<USERPROFILE>,
756 C<APPDATA>, C<WINDIR>, C<SYS$LOGIN>. If the file exists, the options
757 specified there will be used as defaults, as if they were typed on the
758 command line. The defaults can be overridden by specifying new values
761 The action name must come at the beginning of the line, followed by any
762 amount of whitespace and then the options. Options are given the same
763 as they would be on the command line. They can be separated by any
764 amount of whitespace, including newlines, as long there is whitespace at
765 the beginning of each continued line. Anything following a hash mark (C<#>)
766 is considered a comment, and is stripped before parsing. If more than
767 one line begins with the same action name, those lines are merged into
770 Besides the regular actions, there are two special pseudo-actions: the
771 key C<*> (asterisk) denotes any global options that should be applied
772 to all actions, and the key 'Build_PL' specifies options to be applied
773 when you invoke C<perl Build.PL>.
775 * verbose=1 # global options
777 install --install_base /home/ken
778 --install_path html=/home/ken/docs/html
780 If you wish to locate your resource file in a different location, you
781 can set the environment variable 'MODULEBUILDRC' to the complete
782 absolute path of the file containing your options.
789 When you invoke Module::Build's C<build> action, it needs to figure
790 out where to install things. The nutshell version of how this works
791 is that default installation locations are determined from
792 F<Config.pm>, and they may be overridden by using the C<install_path>
793 parameter. An C<install_base> parameter lets you specify an
794 alternative installation root like F</home/foo>, and a C<destdir> lets
795 you specify a temporary installation directory like F</tmp/install> in
796 case you want to create bundled-up installable packages.
798 Natively, Module::Build provides default installation locations for
799 the following types of installable items:
805 Usually pure-Perl module files ending in F<.pm>.
809 "Architecture-dependent" module files, usually produced by compiling
810 XS, Inline, or similar code.
814 Programs written in pure Perl. In order to improve reuse, try to make
815 these as small as possible - put the code into modules whenever
820 "Architecture-dependent" executable programs, i.e. compiled C code or
821 something. Pretty rare to see this in a perl distribution, but it
826 Documentation for the stuff in C<script> and C<bin>. Usually
827 generated from the POD in those files. Under Unix, these are manual
828 pages belonging to the 'man1' category.
832 Documentation for the stuff in C<lib> and C<arch>. This is usually
833 generated from the POD in F<.pm> files. Under Unix, these are manual
834 pages belonging to the 'man3' category.
838 This is the same as C<bindoc> above, but applies to html documents.
842 This is the same as C<bindoc> above, but applies to html documents.
846 Four other parameters let you control various aspects of how
847 installation paths are determined:
853 The default destinations for these installable things come from
854 entries in your system's C<Config.pm>. You can select from three
855 different sets of default locations by setting the C<installdirs>
856 parameter as follows:
858 'installdirs' set to:
861 uses the following defaults from Config.pm:
863 lib => installprivlib installsitelib installvendorlib
864 arch => installarchlib installsitearch installvendorarch
865 script => installscript installsitebin installvendorbin
866 bin => installbin installsitebin installvendorbin
867 bindoc => installman1dir installsiteman1dir installvendorman1dir
868 libdoc => installman3dir installsiteman3dir installvendorman3dir
869 binhtml => installhtml1dir installsitehtml1dir installvendorhtml1dir [*]
870 libhtml => installhtml3dir installsitehtml3dir installvendorhtml3dir [*]
872 * Under some OS (eg. MSWin32) the destination for html documents is
873 determined by the C<Config.pm> entry C<installhtmldir>.
875 The default value of C<installdirs> is "site". If you're creating
876 vendor distributions of module packages, you may want to do something
879 perl Build.PL --installdirs vendor
883 ./Build install --installdirs vendor
885 If you're installing an updated version of a module that was included
886 with perl itself (i.e. a "core module"), then you may set
887 C<installdirs> to "core" to overwrite the module in its present
890 (Note that the 'script' line is different from MakeMaker -
891 unfortunately there's no such thing as "installsitescript" or
892 "installvendorscript" entry in C<Config.pm>, so we use the
893 "installsitebin" and "installvendorbin" entries to at least get the
894 general location right. In the future, if C<Config.pm> adds some more
895 appropriate entries, we'll start using those.)
899 Once the defaults have been set, you can override them.
901 On the command line, that would look like this:
903 perl Build.PL --install_path lib=/foo/lib --install_path arch=/foo/lib/arch
907 ./Build install --install_path lib=/foo/lib --install_path arch=/foo/lib/arch
911 You can also set the whole bunch of installation paths by supplying the
912 C<install_base> parameter to point to a directory on your system. For
913 instance, if you set C<install_base> to "/home/ken" on a Linux
914 system, you'll install as follows:
916 lib => /home/ken/lib/perl5
917 arch => /home/ken/lib/perl5/i386-linux
918 script => /home/ken/bin
920 bindoc => /home/ken/man/man1
921 libdoc => /home/ken/man/man3
922 binhtml => /home/ken/html
923 libhtml => /home/ken/html
925 Note that this is I<different> from how MakeMaker's C<PREFIX>
926 parameter works. C<install_base> just gives you a default layout under the
927 directory you specify, which may have little to do with the
928 C<installdirs=site> layout.
930 The exact layout under the directory you specify may vary by system -
931 we try to do the "sensible" thing on each platform.
935 If you want to install everything into a temporary directory first
936 (for instance, if you want to create a directory tree that a package
937 manager like C<rpm> or C<dpkg> could create a package from), you can
938 use the C<destdir> parameter:
940 perl Build.PL --destdir /tmp/foo
944 ./Build install --destdir /tmp/foo
946 This will effectively install to "/tmp/foo/$sitelib",
947 "/tmp/foo/$sitearch", and the like, except that it will use
948 C<File::Spec> to make the pathnames work correctly on whatever
949 platform you're installing on.
953 Provided for compatibility with ExtUtils::MakeMaker's PREFIX argument.
954 C<prefix> should be used when you wish Module::Build to install your
955 modules, documentation and scripts in the same place
956 ExtUtils::MakeMaker does.
958 The following are equivalent.
960 perl Build.PL --prefix /tmp/foo
961 perl Makefile.PL PREFIX=/tmp/foo
963 Because of the very complex nature of the prefixification logic, the
964 behavior of PREFIX in MakeMaker has changed subtly over time.
965 Module::Build's --prefix logic is equivalent to the PREFIX logic found
966 in ExtUtils::MakeMaker 6.30.
968 If you do not need to retain compatibility with ExtUtils::MakeMaker or
969 are starting a fresh Perl installation we recommand you use
970 C<install_base> instead (and C<INSTALL_BASE> in ExtUtils::MakeMaker).
971 See L<Module::Build::Cookbook/Instaling in the same location as
972 ExtUtils::MakeMaker> for further information.
980 There are several reasons I wanted to start over, and not just fix
981 what I didn't like about MakeMaker:
987 I don't like the core idea of MakeMaker, namely that C<make> should be
988 involved in the build process. Here are my reasons:
994 When a person is installing a Perl module, what can you assume about
995 their environment? Can you assume they have C<make>? No, but you can
996 assume they have some version of Perl.
1000 When a person is writing a Perl module for intended distribution, can
1001 you assume that they know how to build a Makefile, so they can
1002 customize their build process? No, but you can assume they know Perl,
1003 and could customize that way.
1007 For years, these things have been a barrier to people getting the
1008 build/install process to do what they want.
1012 There are several architectural decisions in MakeMaker that make it
1013 very difficult to customize its behavior. For instance, when using
1014 MakeMaker you do C<use ExtUtils::MakeMaker>, but the object created in
1015 C<WriteMakefile()> is actually blessed into a package name that's
1016 created on the fly, so you can't simply subclass
1017 C<ExtUtils::MakeMaker>. There is a workaround C<MY> package that lets
1018 you override certain MakeMaker methods, but only certain explicitly
1019 preselected (by MakeMaker) methods can be overridden. Also, the method
1020 of customization is very crude: you have to modify a string containing
1021 the Makefile text for the particular target. Since these strings
1022 aren't documented, and I<can't> be documented (they take on different
1023 values depending on the platform, version of perl, version of
1024 MakeMaker, etc.), you have no guarantee that your modifications will
1025 work on someone else's machine or after an upgrade of MakeMaker or
1030 It is risky to make major changes to MakeMaker, since it does so many
1031 things, is so important, and generally works. C<Module::Build> is an
1032 entirely separate package so that I can work on it all I want, without
1033 worrying about backward compatibility.
1037 Finally, Perl is said to be a language for system administration.
1038 Could it really be the case that Perl isn't up to the task of building
1039 and installing software? Even if that software is a bunch of stupid
1040 little C<.pm> files that just need to be copied from one place to
1041 another? My sense was that we could design a system to accomplish
1042 this in a flexible, extensible, and friendly manner. Or die trying.
1049 The current method of relying on time stamps to determine whether a
1050 derived file is out of date isn't likely to scale well, since it
1051 requires tracing all dependencies backward, it runs into problems on
1052 NFS, and it's just generally flimsy. It would be better to use an MD5
1053 signature or the like, if available. See C<cons> for an example.
1055 - append to perllocal.pod
1056 - add a 'plugin' functionality
1061 Ken Williams <kwilliams@cpan.org>
1063 Development questions, bug reports, and patches should be sent to the
1064 Module-Build mailing list at <module-build@perl.org>.
1066 Bug reports are also welcome at
1067 <http://rt.cpan.org/NoAuth/Bugs.html?Dist=Module-Build>.
1069 The latest development version is available from the Subversion
1070 repository at <https://svn.perl.org/modules/Module-Build/trunk/>
1075 Copyright (c) 2001-2006 Ken Williams. All rights reserved.
1077 This library is free software; you can redistribute it and/or
1078 modify it under the same terms as Perl itself.
1083 perl(1), L<Module::Build::Cookbook>, L<Module::Build::Authoring>,
1084 L<Module::Build::API>, L<ExtUtils::MakeMaker>, L<YAML>
1086 F<META.yml> Specification:
1087 L<http://module-build.sourceforge.net/META-spec-current.html>
1089 L<http://www.dsmit.com/cons/>
1091 L<http://search.cpan.org/dist/PerlBuildSystem/>