3 perldelta - what's new for perl5.005
7 This document describes differences between the 5.004 release and this one.
9 =head1 About the new versioning system
11 Perl is now developed on two tracks: a maintenance track that makes
12 small, safe updates to released production versions with emphasis on
13 compatibility; and a development track that pursues more aggressive
14 evolution. Maintenance releases (which should be considered production
15 quality) have subversion numbers that run from C<1> to C<49>, and
16 development releases (which should be considered "alpha" quality) run
19 Perl 5.005 is the combined product of the new dual-track development
22 =head1 Incompatible Changes
24 =head2 WARNING: This version is not binary compatible with Perl 5.004.
26 Starting with Perl 5.004_50 there were many deep and far-reaching changes
27 to the language internals. If you have dynamically loaded extensions
28 that you built under perl 5.003 or 5.004, you can continue to use them
29 with 5.004, but you will need to rebuild and reinstall those extensions
30 to use them 5.005. See L<INSTALL> for detailed instructions on how to
33 =head2 Default installation structure has changed
35 The new Configure defaults are designed to allow a smooth upgrade from
36 5.004 to 5.005, but you should read L<INSTALL> for a detailed
37 discussion of the changes in order to adapt them to your system.
39 =head2 Perl Source Compatibility
41 When none of the experimental features are enabled, there should be
42 very few user-visible Perl source compatibility issues.
44 If threads are enabled, then some caveats apply. C<@_> and C<$_> become
45 lexical variables. The effect of this should be largely transparent to
46 the user, but there are some boundary conditions under which user will
47 need to be aware of the issues. For example, C<local(@_)> results in
48 a "Can't localize lexical variable @_ ..." message. This may be enabled
51 Some new keywords have been introduced. These are generally expected to
52 have very little impact on compatibility. See L<New C<INIT> keyword>,
53 L<New C<lock> keyword>, and L<New C<qr//> operator>.
55 Certain barewords are now reserved. Use of these will provoke a warning
56 if you have asked for them with the C<-w> switch.
57 See L<C<our> is now a reserved word>.
59 =head2 C Source Compatibility
61 There have been a large number of changes in the internals to support
62 the new features in this release.
66 =item Core sources now require ANSI C compiler
68 An ANSI C compiler is now B<required> to build perl. See F<INSTALL>.
70 =item All Perl global variables must now be referenced with an explicit prefix
72 All Perl global variables that are visible for use by extensions now
73 have a C<PL_> prefix. New extensions should C<not> refer to perl globals
74 by their unqualified names. To preserve sanity, we provide limited
75 backward compatibility for globals that are being widely used like
76 C<sv_undef> and C<na> (which should now be written as C<PL_sv_undef>,
79 If you find that your XS extension does not compile anymore because a
80 perl global is not visible, try adding a C<PL_> prefix to the global
83 It is strongly recommended that all functions in the Perl API that don't
84 begin with C<perl> be referenced with a C<Perl_> prefix. The bare function
85 names without the C<Perl_> prefix are supported with macros, but this
86 support may cease in a future release.
88 See L<perlguts/API LISTING>.
90 =item Enabling threads has source compatibility issues
92 Perl built with threading enabled requires extensions to use the new
93 C<dTHR> macro to initialize the handle to access per-thread data.
94 If you see a compiler error that talks about the variable C<thr> not
95 being declared (when building a module that has XS code), you need
96 to add C<dTHR;> at the beginning of the block that elicited the error.
98 The API function C<perl_get_sv("@",FALSE)> should be used instead of
99 directly accessing perl globals as C<GvSV(errgv)>. The API call is
100 backward compatible with existing perls and provides source compatibility
101 with threading is enabled.
103 See L<API Changes for more information>.
107 =head2 Binary Compatibility
109 This version is NOT binary compatible with older versions. All extensions
110 will need to be recompiled. Further binaries built with threads enabled
111 are incompatible with binaries built without. This should largely be
112 transparent to the user, as all binary incompatible configurations have
113 their own unique architecture name, and extension binaries get installed at
114 unique locations. This allows coexistence of several configurations in
115 the same directory hierarchy. See F<INSTALL>.
117 =head2 Security fixes may affect compatibility
119 A few taint leaks and taint omissions have been corrected. This may lead
120 to "failure" of scripts that used to work with older versions. Compiling
121 with -DINCOMPLETE_TAINTS provides a perl with minimal amounts of changes
122 to the tainting behavior. But note that the resulting perl will have
125 Oneliners with the C<-e> switch do not create temporary files anymore.
127 =head2 Relaxed new mandatory warnings introduced in 5.004
129 Many new warnings that were introduced in 5.004 have been made
130 optional. Some of these warnings are still present, but perl's new
131 features make them less often a problem. See L<New Diagnostics>.
135 Perl has a new Social Contract for contributors. See F<Porting/Contract>.
137 The license included in much of the Perl documentation has changed.
138 See L<perl> and the individual perl man pages listed therein.
145 WARNING: Threading is considered an B<experimental> feature. Details of the
146 implementation may change without notice. There are known limitations
147 and some bugs. These are expected to be fixed in future versions.
149 See L<README.threads>.
153 WARNING: The Compiler and related tools are considered B<experimental>.
154 Features may change without notice, and there are known limitations
155 and bugs. Since the compiler is fully external to perl, the default
156 configuration will build and install it.
158 The Compiler produces three different types of transformations of a
159 perl program. The C backend generates C code that captures perl's state
160 just before execution begins. It eliminates the compile-time overheads
161 of the regular perl interpreter, but the run-time performance remains
162 comparatively the same. The CC backend generates optimized C code
163 equivivalent to the code path at run-time. The CC backend has greater
164 potential for big optimizations, but only a few optimizations are
165 implemented currently. The Bytecode backend generates a platform
166 independent bytecode representation of the interpreter's state
167 just before execution. Thus, the Bytecode back end also eliminates
168 much of the compilation overhead of the interpreter.
170 The compiler comes with several valuable utilities.
172 C<B::Lint> is an experimental module to detect and warn about suspicious
173 code, especially the cases that the C<-w> switch does not detect.
175 C<B::Deparse> can be used to demystify perl code, and understand
176 how perl optimizes certain constructs.
178 C<B::Xref> generates cross reference reports of all definition and use
179 of variables, subroutines and formats in a program.
181 C<B::Showlex> show the lexical variables used by a subroutine or file
184 C<perlcc> is a simple frontend for compiling perl.
186 See C<ext/B/README>, L<B>, and the respective compiler modules.
188 =head2 Regular Expressions
190 Perl's regular expression engine has been seriously overhauled, and
191 many new constructs are supported. Several bugs have been fixed.
193 Here is an itemized summary:
197 =item Many new and improved optimizations
199 Changes in the RE engine:
201 Unneeded nodes removed;
202 Substrings merged together;
203 New types of nodes to process (SUBEXPR)* and similar expressions
204 quickly, used if the SUBEXPR has no side effects and matches
205 strings of the same length;
206 better optimizations by lookup for constant substrings;
207 Better search for constants substrings anchored by $ ;
209 Changes in Perl code using RE engine:
211 more optimizations to s/longer/short/;
212 study() was not working;
213 /blah/ may be optimized to an analogue of index() if $& $` $' not seen;
214 Unneeded copying of matched-against string removed;
215 Only matched part of the string is copying if $` $' were not seen;
219 Note that only the major bug fixes are listed here. See F<Changes> for others.
221 Backtracking might not restore start of $3.
222 No feedback if max count for * or + on "complex" subexpression
223 was reached, similarly (but at compile time) for {3,34567}
224 Primitive restrictions on max count introduced to decrease a
225 possibility of a segfault;
226 (ZERO-LENGTH)* could segfault;
227 (ZERO-LENGTH)* was prohibited;
228 Long RE were not allowed;
229 /RE/g could skip matches at the same position after a
232 =item New regular expression constructs
234 The following new syntax elements are supported:
241 (?(COND)YES_RE|NO_RE)
245 =item New operator for precompiled regular expressions
247 See L<New C<qr//> operator>.
249 =item Other improvements
251 better debugging output (possibly with colors), even from non-debugging Perl;
252 RE engine code now looks like C, not like assembler;
253 behaviour of RE modifiable by `use re' directive;
254 Improved documentation;
255 Test suite significantly extended;
256 Syntax [:^upper:] etc., reserved inside character classes;
258 =item Incompatible changes
260 (?i) localized inside enclosing group;
261 $( is not interpolated into RE any more;
262 /RE/g may match at the same position (with non-zero length)
263 after a zero-length match (bug fix).
267 See L<perlre> and L<perlop>.
269 =head2 Improved malloc()
271 See banner at the beginning of C<malloc.c> for details.
273 =head2 Quicksort is internally implemented
275 Perl now contains its own highly optimized qsort() routine. The new qsort()
276 is resistant to inconsistent comparison functions, so Perl's C<sort()> will
277 not provoke coredumps any more when given poorly written sort subroutines.
278 (Some C library C<qsort()>s that were being used before used to have this
279 problem.) In our testing, the new C<qsort()> required the minimal number
280 of pair-wise compares on average, among all known C<qsort()> implementations.
282 See C<perlfunc/sort>.
284 =head2 Reliable signals
286 Perl's signal handling is susceptible to random crashes, because signals
287 arrive asynchronously, and the Perl runtime is not reentrant at arbitrary
290 However, one experimental implementation of reliable signals is available
291 when threads are enabled. See C<Thread::Signal>. Also see F<INSTALL> for
292 how to build a Perl capable of threads.
294 =head2 Reliable stack pointers
296 The internals now reallocate the perl stack only at predictable times.
297 In particular, magic calls never trigger reallocations of the stack,
298 because all reentrancy of the runtime is handled using a "stack of stacks".
299 This should improve reliability of cached stack pointers in the internals
302 =head2 Behavior of local() on array and hash elements is now well-defined
304 See L<perlsub/"Temporary Values via local()">.
306 =head2 C<%!> is transparently tied to the L<Errno> module
308 See L<perlvar>, and L<Errno>.
310 =head2 Pseudo-hashes are supported
314 =head2 C<EXPR foreach EXPR> is supported
318 =head2 Keywords can be globally overridden
322 =head2 C<$^E> is meaningful on Win32
326 =head2 C<foreach (1..1000000)> optimized
328 C<foreach (1..1000000)> is now optimized into a counting loop. It does
329 not try to allocate a 1000000-size list anymore.
331 =head2 C<Foo::> can be used as implicitly quoted package name
333 Barewords caused unintuitive behavior when a subroutine with the same
334 name as a package happened to be defined. Thus, C<new Foo @args>,
335 use the result of the call to C<Foo()> instead of C<Foo> being treated
336 as a literal. The recommended way to write barewords in the indirect
337 object slot is C<new Foo:: @args>. Note that the method C<new()> is
338 called with a first argument of C<Foo>, not C<Foo::> when you do that.
340 =head2 C<exists $Foo::{Bar::}> tests existence of a package
342 It was impossible to test for the existence of a package without
343 actually creating it before. Now C<exists $Foo::{Bar::}> can be
344 used to test if the C<Foo::Bar> namespace has been created.
346 =head2 Better locale support
350 =head2 Experimental support for 64-bit platforms
352 Perl5 has always had 64-bit support on systems with 64-bit longs.
353 Starting with 5.005, the beginnings of experimental support for systems
354 with 32-bit long and 64-bit 'long long' integers has been added.
355 If you add -DUSE_LONG_LONG to your ccflags in config.sh (or manually
356 define it in perl.h) then perl will be built with 'long long' support.
357 There will be many compiler warnings, and the resultant perl may not
358 work on all systems. There are many other issues related to
359 third-party extensions and libraries. This option exists to allow
360 people to work on those issues.
362 =head2 prototype() returns useful results on builtins
364 See L<perlfunc/prototype>.
366 =head2 Extended support for exception handling
368 C<die()> now accepts a reference value, and C<$@> gets set to that
369 value in exception traps. This makes it possible to propagate
370 exception objects. This is an undocumented B<experimental> feature.
372 =head2 Re-blessing in DESTROY() supported for chaining DESTROY() methods
374 See L<perlobj/Destructors>.
376 =head2 All C<printf> format conversions are handled internally
378 See L<perlfunc/printf>.
380 =head2 New C<INIT> keyword
382 C<INIT> subs are like C<BEGIN> and C<END>, but they get run just before
383 the perl runtime begins execution. e.g., the Perl Compiler makes use of
384 C<INIT> blocks to initialize and resolve pointers to XSUBs.
386 =head2 New C<lock> keyword
388 The C<lock> keyword is the fundamental synchronization primitive
389 in threaded perl. When threads are not enabled, it is currently a noop.
391 To minimize impact on source compatibility this keyword is "weak", i.e., any
392 user-defined subroutine of the same name overrides it, unless a C<use Thread>
395 =head2 New C<qr//> operator
397 The C<qr//> operator, which is syntactically similar to the other quote-like
398 operators, is used to create precompiled regular expressions. This compiled
399 form can now be explicitly passed around in variables, and interpolated in
400 other regular expressions. See L<perlop>.
402 =head2 C<our> is now a reserved word
404 Calling a subroutine with the name C<our> will now provoke a warning when
405 using the C<-w> switch.
407 =head2 Tied arrays are now fully supported
411 =head2 Tied handles support is better
413 Several missing hooks have been added. There is also a new base class for
414 TIEARRAY implementations. See L<Tie::Array>.
416 =head2 4th argument to substr
418 substr() can now both return and replace in one operation. The optional
419 4th argument is the replacement string. See L<perlfunc/substr>.
421 =head2 Negative LENGTH argument to splice
423 Splice() with a negative LENGTH argument now work similar to what the
424 LENGTH did for substr(). Previously a negative LENGTH was treated as
425 0. See L<perlfunc/splice>.
427 =head2 Magic lvalues are now more magical
429 When you say something like C<substr($x, 5) = "hi">, the scalar returned
430 by substr() is special, in that any modifications to it affect $x.
431 (This is called a 'magic lvalue' because an 'lvalue' is something on
432 the left side of an assignment.) Normally, this is exactly what you
433 would expect to happen, but Perl uses the same magic if you use substr(),
434 pos(), or vec() in a context where they might be modified, like taking
435 a reference with C<\> or as an argument to a sub that modifies C<@_>.
436 In previous versions, this 'magic' only went one way, but now changes
437 to the scalar the magic refers to ($x in the above example) affect the
438 magic lvalue too. For instance, this code now acts differently:
445 printit(substr($x, 0, 5));
447 In previous versions, this would print "hello", but it now prints "g'bye".
449 =head2 E<lt>E<gt> now reads in records
451 If C<$/> is a referenence to an integer, or a scalar that holds an integer,
452 E<lt>E<gt> will read in records instead of lines. For more info, see
455 =head1 Supported Platforms
457 Configure has many incremental improvements. Site-wide policy for building
458 perl can now be made persistent, via Policy.sh. Configure also records
459 the command-line arguments used in F<config.sh>.
463 BeOS is now supported. See L<README.beos>.
465 DOS is now supported under the DJGPP tools. See L<README.dos>.
467 MPE/iX is now supported. See L<README.mpeix>.
469 =head2 Changes in existing support
471 Win32 support has been vastly enhanced. Support for Perl Object, a C++
472 encapsulation of Perl. GCC and EGCS are now supported on Win32.
473 See F<README.win32>, aka L<perlwin32>.
475 VMS configuration system has been rewritten. See L<README.vms>.
477 The hints files for most Unix platforms have seen incremental improvements.
479 =head1 Modules and Pragmata
487 Perl compiler and tools. See L<B>.
491 A module to pretty print Perl data. See L<Data::Dumper>.
495 A module to look up errors more conveniently. See L<Errno>.
499 A portable API for file operations.
501 =item ExtUtils::Installed
503 Query and manage installed modules.
505 =item ExtUtils::Packlist
507 Manipulate .packlist files.
511 Make functions/builtins succeed or die.
515 Constants and other support infrastructure for System V IPC operations
520 A framework for writing testsuites.
524 Base class for tied arrays.
528 Base class for tied handles.
532 Perl thread creation, manipulation, and support.
536 Set subroutine attributes.
540 Compile-time class fields.
544 Various pragmata to control behavior of regular expressions.
548 =head2 Changes in existing modules
554 CGI has been updated to version 2.42.
558 POSIX now has its own platform-specific hints files.
562 DB_File supports version 2.x of Berkeley DB. See C<ext/DB_File/Changes>.
566 MakeMaker now supports writing empty makefiles, provides a way to
567 specify that site umask() policy should be honored. There is also
568 better support for manipulation of .packlist files, and getting
569 information about installed modules.
571 Extensions that have both architecture-dependent and
572 architecture-independent files are now always installed completely in
573 the architecture-dependent locations. Previously, the shareable parts
574 were shared both across architectures and across perl versions and were
575 therefore liable to be overwritten with newer versions that might have
576 subtle incompatibilities.
580 See <perlmodinstall> and L<CPAN>.
584 Cwd::cwd is faster on most platforms.
592 =head1 Utility Changes
594 h2ph and related utilities have been vastly overhauled.
596 perlcc, a new experimental front end for the compiler is available.
598 The crude GNU configure emulator is now called configure.gnu.
600 =head1 Documentation Changes
602 Config.pm now has a glossary of variables.
604 F<Porting/patching.pod> has detailed instructions on how to create and
605 submit patches for perl.
607 L<perlport> specifies guidelines on how to write portably.
609 L<perlmodinstall> describes how to fetch and install modules from C<CPAN>
612 Some more Perl traps are documented now. See L<perltrap>.
614 =head1 New Diagnostics
618 =item Ambiguous call resolved as CORE::%s(), qualify as such or use &
620 (W) A subroutine you have declared has the same name as a Perl keyword,
621 and you have used the name without qualification for calling one or the
622 other. Perl decided to call the builtin because the subroutine is
625 To force interpretation as a subroutine call, either put an ampersand
626 before the subroutine name, or qualify the name with its package.
627 Alternatively, you can import the subroutine (or pretend that it's
628 imported with the C<use subs> pragma).
630 To silently interpret it as the Perl operator, use the C<CORE::> prefix
631 on the operator (e.g. C<CORE::log($x)>) or by declaring the subroutine
632 to be an object method (see L<attrs>).
634 =item Bad index while coercing array into hash
636 (F) The index looked up in the hash found as the 0'th element of a
637 pseudo-hash is not legal. Index values must be at 1 or greater.
640 =item Bareword "%s" refers to nonexistent package
642 (W) You used a qualified bareword of the form C<Foo::>, but
643 the compiler saw no other uses of that namespace before that point.
644 Perhaps you need to predeclare a package?
646 =item Can't call method "%s" on an undefined value
648 (F) You used the syntax of a method call, but the slot filled by the
649 object reference or package name contains an undefined value.
650 Something like this will reproduce the error:
653 process $BADREF 1,2,3;
654 $BADREF->process(1,2,3);
656 =item Can't coerce array into hash
658 (F) You used an array where a hash was expected, but the array has no
659 information on how to map from keys to array indices. You can do that
660 only with arrays that have a hash reference at index 0.
662 =item Can't goto subroutine from an eval-string
664 (F) The "goto subroutine" call can't be used to jump out of an eval "string".
665 (You can use it to jump out of an eval {BLOCK}, but you probably don't want to.)
667 =item Can't localize pseudo-hash element
669 (F) You said something like C<local $ar-E<gt>{'key'}>, where $ar is
670 a reference to a pseudo-hash. That hasn't been implemented yet, but
671 you can get a similar effect by localizing the corresponding array
672 element directly -- C<local $ar-E<gt>[$ar-E<gt>[0]{'key'}]>.
674 =item Can't use %%! because Errno.pm is not available
676 (F) The first time the %! hash is used, perl automatically loads the
677 Errno.pm module. The Errno module is expected to tie the %! hash to
678 provide symbolic names for C<$!> errno values.
680 =item Cannot find an opnumber for "%s"
682 (F) A string of a form C<CORE::word> was given to prototype(), but
683 there is no builtin with the name C<word>.
685 =item Character class syntax [. .] is reserved for future extensions
687 (W) Within regular expression character classes ([]) the syntax beginning
688 with "[." and ending with ".]" is reserved for future extensions.
689 If you need to represent those character sequences inside a regular
690 expression character class, just quote the square brackets with the
691 backslash: "\[." and ".\]".
693 =item Character class syntax [: :] is reserved for future extensions
695 (W) Within regular expression character classes ([]) the syntax beginning
696 with "[:" and ending with ":]" is reserved for future extensions.
697 If you need to represent those character sequences inside a regular
698 expression character class, just quote the square brackets with the
699 backslash: "\[:" and ":\]".
701 =item Character class syntax [= =] is reserved for future extensions
703 (W) Within regular expression character classes ([]) the syntax
704 beginning with "[=" and ending with "=]" is reserved for future extensions.
705 If you need to represent those character sequences inside a regular
706 expression character class, just quote the square brackets with the
707 backslash: "\[=" and "=\]".
709 =item %s: Eval-group in insecure regular expression
711 (F) Perl detected tainted data when trying to compile a regular expression
712 that contains the C<(?{ ... })> zero-width assertion, which is unsafe.
713 See L<perlre/(?{ code })>, and L<perlsec>.
715 =item %s: Eval-group not allowed, use re 'eval'
717 (F) A regular expression contained the C<(?{ ... })> zero-width assertion,
718 but that construct is only allowed when the C<use re 'eval'> pragma is
719 in effect. See L<perlre/(?{ code })>.
721 =item %s: Eval-group not allowed at run time
723 (F) Perl tried to compile a regular expression containing the C<(?{ ... })>
724 zero-width assertion at run time, as it would when the pattern contains
725 interpolated values. Since that is a security risk, it is not allowed.
726 If you insist, you may still do this by explicitly building the pattern
727 from an interpolated string at run time and using that in an eval().
728 See L<perlre/(?{ code })>.
730 =item Explicit blessing to '' (assuming package main)
732 (W) You are blessing a reference to a zero length string. This has
733 the effect of blessing the reference into the package main. This is
734 usually not what you want. Consider providing a default target
735 package, e.g. bless($ref, $p or 'MyPackage');
737 =item Illegal hex digit ignored
739 (W) You may have tried to use a character other than 0 - 9 or A - F in a
740 hexadecimal number. Interpretation of the hexadecimal number stopped
741 before the illegal character.
743 =item No such array field
745 (F) You tried to access an array as a hash, but the field name used is
746 not defined. The hash at index 0 should map all valid field names to
747 array indices for that to work.
749 =item No such field "%s" in variable %s of type %s
751 (F) You tried to access a field of a typed variable where the type
752 does not know about the field name. The field names are looked up in
753 the %FIELDS hash in the type package at compile time. The %FIELDS hash
754 is usually set up with the 'fields' pragma.
756 =item Out of memory during ridiculously large request
758 (F) You can't allocate more than 2^31+"small amount" bytes. This error
759 is most likely to be caused by a typo in the Perl program. e.g., C<$arr[time]>
760 instead of C<$arr[$time]>.
762 =item Range iterator outside integer range
764 (F) One (or both) of the numeric arguments to the range operator ".."
765 are outside the range which can be represented by integers internally.
766 One possible workaround is to force Perl to use magical string
767 increment by prepending "0" to your numbers.
769 =item Recursive inheritance detected while looking for method '%s' in package '%s'
771 (F) More than 100 levels of inheritance were encountered while invoking a
772 method. Probably indicates an unintended loop in your inheritance hierarchy.
774 =item Reference found where even-sized list expected
776 (W) You gave a single reference where Perl was expecting a list with
777 an even number of elements (for assignment to a hash). This
778 usually means that you used the anon hash constructor when you meant
779 to use parens. In any case, a hash requires key/value B<pairs>.
781 %hash = { one => 1, two => 2, }; # WRONG
782 %hash = [ qw/ an anon array / ]; # WRONG
783 %hash = ( one => 1, two => 2, ); # right
784 %hash = qw( one 1 two 2 ); # also fine
786 =item Undefined value assigned to typeglob
788 (W) An undefined value was assigned to a typeglob, a la C<*foo = undef>.
789 This does nothing. It's possible that you really mean C<undef *foo>.
791 =item Use of reserved word "%s" is deprecated
793 (D) The indicated bareword is a reserved word. Future versions of perl
794 may use it as a keyword, so you're better off either explicitly quoting
795 the word in a manner appropriate for its context of use, or using a
796 different name altogether. The warning can be suppressed for subroutine
797 names by either adding a C<&> prefix, or using a package qualifier,
798 e.g. C<&our()>, or C<Foo::our()>.
800 =item perl: warning: Setting locale failed.
802 (S) The whole warning message will look something like:
804 perl: warning: Setting locale failed.
805 perl: warning: Please check that your locale settings:
808 are supported and installed on your system.
809 perl: warning: Falling back to the standard locale ("C").
811 Exactly what were the failed locale settings varies. In the above the
812 settings were that the LC_ALL was "En_US" and the LANG had no value.
813 This error means that Perl detected that you and/or your system
814 administrator have set up the so-called variable system but Perl could
815 not use those settings. This was not dead serious, fortunately: there
816 is a "default locale" called "C" that Perl can and will use, the
817 script will be run. Before you really fix the problem, however, you
818 will get the same error message each time you run Perl. How to really
819 fix the problem can be found in L<perllocale> section B<LOCALE PROBLEMS>.
824 =head1 Obsolete Diagnostics
830 (F) The mktemp() routine failed for some reason while trying to process
831 a B<-e> switch. Maybe your /tmp partition is full, or clobbered.
833 =item Can't write to temp file for B<-e>: %s
835 (F) The write routine failed for some reason while trying to process
836 a B<-e> switch. Maybe your /tmp partition is full, or clobbered.
838 =item Cannot open temporary file
840 (F) The create routine failed for some reason while trying to process
841 a B<-e> switch. Maybe your /tmp partition is full, or clobbered.
847 If you find what you think is a bug, you might check the headers of
848 recently posted articles in the comp.lang.perl.misc newsgroup.
849 There may also be information at http://www.perl.com/perl/, the Perl
852 If you believe you have an unreported bug, please run the B<perlbug>
853 program included with your release. Make sure you trim your bug down
854 to a tiny but sufficient test case. Your bug report, along with the
855 output of C<perl -V>, will be sent off to <F<perlbug@perl.com>> to be
856 analysed by the Perl porting team.
860 The F<Changes> file for exhaustive details on what changed.
862 The F<INSTALL> file for how to build Perl.
864 The F<README> file for general stuff.
866 The F<Artistic> and F<Copying> files for copyright information.
870 Written by Gurusamy Sarathy <F<gsar@umich.edu>>, with many contributions
871 from The Perl Porters.
873 Send omissions or corrections to <F<perlbug@perl.com>>.