3 perlfaq2 - Obtaining and Learning about Perl ($Revision: 1.25 $, $Date: 1998/08/05 11:47:25 $)
7 This section of the FAQ answers questions about where to find
8 source and documentation for Perl, support, and
11 =head2 What machines support Perl? Where do I get it?
13 The standard release of Perl (the one maintained by the perl
14 development team) is distributed only in source code form. You
15 can find this at http://www.perl.com/CPAN/src/latest.tar.gz, which
16 in standard Internet format (a gzipped archive in POSIX tar format).
18 Perl builds and runs on a bewildering number of platforms. Virtually
19 all known and current Unix derivatives are supported (Perl's native
20 platform), as are proprietary systems like VMS, DOS, OS/2, Windows,
21 QNX, BeOS, and the Amiga. There are also the beginnings of support
24 Binary distributions for some proprietary platforms, including
25 Apple systems can be found http://www.perl.com/CPAN/ports/ directory.
26 Because these are not part of the standard distribution, they may
27 and in fact do differ from the base Perl port in a variety of ways.
28 You'll have to check their respective release notes to see just
29 what the differences are. These differences can be either positive
30 (e.g. extensions for the features of the particular platform that
31 are not supported in the source release of perl) or negative (e.g.
32 might be based upon a less current source release of perl).
34 A useful FAQ for Win32 Perl users is
35 http://www.endcontsw.com/people/evangelo/Perl_for_Win32_FAQ.html
37 =head2 How can I get a binary version of Perl?
39 If you don't have a C compiler because for whatever reasons your
40 vendor did not include one with your system, the best thing to do is
41 grab a binary version of gcc from the net and use that to compile perl
42 with. CPAN only has binaries for systems that are terribly hard to
43 get free compilers for, not for Unix systems.
45 Your first stop should be http://www.perl.com/CPAN/ports to see what
46 information is already available. A simple installation guide for
47 MS-DOS is available at http://www.cs.ruu.nl/~piet/perl5dos.html , and
48 similarly for Windows 3.1 at http://www.cs.ruu.nl/~piet/perlwin3.html
51 =head2 I don't have a C compiler on my system. How can I compile perl?
53 Since you don't have a C compiler, you're doomed and your vendor
54 should be sacrificed to the Sun gods. But that doesn't help you.
56 What you need to do is get a binary version of gcc for your system
57 first. Consult the Usenet FAQs for your operating system for
58 information on where to get such a binary version.
60 =head2 I copied the Perl binary from one machine to another, but scripts don't work.
62 That's probably because you forgot libraries, or library paths differ.
63 You really should build the whole distribution on the machine it will
64 eventually live on, and then type C<make install>. Most other
65 approaches are doomed to failure.
67 One simple way to check that things are in the right place is to print out
68 the hard-coded @INC which perl is looking for.
70 perl -e 'print join("\n",@INC)'
72 If this command lists any paths which don't exist on your system, then you
73 may need to move the appropriate libraries to these locations, or create
74 symlinks, aliases, or shortcuts appropriately.
76 You might also want to check out L<perlfaq8/"How do I keep my own
77 module/library directory?">.
79 =head2 I grabbed the sources and tried to compile but gdbm/dynamic loading/malloc/linking/... failed. How do I make it work?
81 Read the F<INSTALL> file, which is part of the source distribution.
82 It describes in detail how to cope with most idiosyncracies that the
83 Configure script can't work around for any given system or
86 =head2 What modules and extensions are available for Perl? What is CPAN? What does CPAN/src/... mean?
88 CPAN stands for Comprehensive Perl Archive Network, a huge archive
89 replicated on dozens of machines all over the world. CPAN contains
90 source code, non-native ports, documentation, scripts, and many
91 third-party modules and extensions, designed for everything from
92 commercial database interfaces to keyboard/screen control to web
93 walking and CGI scripts. The master machine for CPAN is
94 ftp://ftp.funet.fi/pub/languages/perl/CPAN/, but you can use the
95 address http://www.perl.com/CPAN/CPAN.html to fetch a copy from a
96 "site near you". See http://www.perl.com/CPAN (without a slash at the
97 end) for how this process works.
99 CPAN/path/... is a naming convention for files available on CPAN
100 sites. CPAN indicates the base directory of a CPAN mirror, and the
101 rest of the path is the path from that directory to the file. For
102 instance, if you're using ftp://ftp.funet.fi/pub/languages/perl/CPAN
103 as your CPAN site, the file CPAN/misc/japh file is downloadable as
104 ftp://ftp.funet.fi/pub/languages/perl/CPAN/misc/japh .
106 Considering that there are hundreds of existing modules in the
107 archive, one probably exists to do nearly anything you can think of.
108 Current categories under CPAN/modules/by-category/ include perl core
109 modules; development support; operating system interfaces; networking,
110 devices, and interprocess communication; data type utilities; database
111 interfaces; user interfaces; interfaces to other languages; filenames,
112 file systems, and file locking; internationalization and locale; world
113 wide web support; server and daemon utilities; archiving and
114 compression; image manipulation; mail and news; control flow
115 utilities; filehandle and I/O; Microsoft Windows modules; and
116 miscellaneous modules.
118 =head2 Is there an ISO or ANSI certified version of Perl?
120 Certainly not. Larry expects that he'll be certified before Perl is.
122 =head2 Where can I get information on Perl?
124 The complete Perl documentation is available with the perl distribution.
125 If you have perl installed locally, you probably have the documentation
126 installed as well: type C<man perl> if you're on a system resembling Unix.
127 This will lead you to other important man pages, including how to set your
128 $MANPATH. If you're not on a Unix system, access to the documentation
129 will be different; for example, it might be only in HTML format. But all
130 proper perl installations have fully-accessible documentation.
132 You might also try C<perldoc perl> in case your system doesn't
133 have a proper man command, or it's been misinstalled. If that doesn't
134 work, try looking in /usr/local/lib/perl5/pod for documentation.
136 If all else fails, consult the CPAN/doc directory, which contains the
137 complete documentation in various formats, including native pod,
138 troff, html, and plain text. There's also a web page at
139 http://www.perl.com/perl/info/documentation.html that might help.
141 Many good books have been written about Perl -- see the section below
144 =head2 What are the Perl newsgroups on USENET? Where do I post questions?
146 The now defunct comp.lang.perl newsgroup has been superseded by the
149 comp.lang.perl.announce Moderated announcement group
150 comp.lang.perl.misc Very busy group about Perl in general
151 comp.lang.perl.moderated Moderated discussion group
152 comp.lang.perl.modules Use and development of Perl modules
153 comp.lang.perl.tk Using Tk (and X) from Perl
155 comp.infosystems.www.authoring.cgi Writing CGI scripts for the Web.
157 Actually, the moderated group hasn't passed yet, but we're
158 keeping our fingers crossed.
160 There is also USENET gateway to the mailing list used by the crack
161 Perl development team (perl5-porters) at
162 news://news.perl.com/perl.porters-gw/ .
164 =head2 Where should I post source code?
166 You should post source code to whichever group is most appropriate,
167 but feel free to cross-post to comp.lang.perl.misc. If you want to
168 cross-post to alt.sources, please make sure it follows their posting
169 standards, including setting the Followup-To header line to NOT
170 include alt.sources; see their FAQ for details.
172 If you're just looking for software, first use Alta Vista, Deja News, and
173 search CPAN. This is faster and more productive than just posting
178 A number of books on Perl and/or CGI programming are available. A few of
179 these are good, some are ok, but many aren't worth your money. Tom
180 Christiansen maintains a list of these books, some with extensive
181 reviews, at http://www.perl.com/perl/critiques/index.html.
183 The incontestably definitive reference book on Perl, written by
184 the creator of Perl, is now in its second edition:
186 Programming Perl (the "Camel Book"):
187 Authors: Larry Wall, Tom Christiansen, and Randal Schwartz
188 ISBN 1-56592-149-6 (English)
189 ISBN 4-89052-384-7 (Japanese)
190 URL: http://www.oreilly.com/catalog/pperl2/
191 (French, German, Italian, and Hungarian translations also
194 The companion volume to the Camel containing thousands
195 of real-world examples, mini-tutorials, and complete programs
196 (first premiering at the 1998 Perl Conference), is:
198 The Perl Cookbook (the "Ram Book"):
199 Authors: Tom Christiansen and Nathan Torkington,
200 with Foreword by Larry Wall
202 URL: http://perl.oreilly.com/cookbook/
204 If you're already a hard-core systems programmer, then the Camel Book
205 might suffice for you to learn Perl from. But if you're not, check
208 Learning Perl (the "Llama Book"):
209 Authors: Randal Schwartz and Tom Christiansen
210 with Foreword by Larry Wall
212 URL: http://www.oreilly.com/catalog/lperl2/
214 Despite the picture at the URL above, the second edition of "Llama
215 Book" really has a blue cover, and is updated for the 5.004 release
216 of Perl. Various foreign language editions are available, including
217 I<Learning Perl on Win32 Systems> (the Gecko Book).
219 If you're not an accidental programmer, but a more serious and possibly
220 even degreed computer scientist who doesn't need as much hand-holding as
221 we try to provide in the Llama or its defurred cousin the Gecko, please
222 check out the delightful book, I<Perl: The Programmer's Companion>,
223 written by Nigel Chapman.
225 You can order O'Reilly books directly from O'Reilly & Associates,
226 1-800-998-9938. Local/overseas is 1-707-829-0515. If you can
227 locate an O'Reilly order form, you can also fax to 1-707-829-0104.
228 See http://www.ora.com/ on the Web.
230 What follows is a list of the books that the FAQ authors found personally
231 useful. Your mileage may (but, we hope, probably won't) vary.
233 Recommended books on (or muchly on) Perl follow; those marked with
234 a star may be ordered from O'Reilly.
241 by Larry Wall, Tom Christiansen, and Randal L. Schwartz
243 *Perl 5 Desktop Reference
248 *Learning Perl [2nd edition]
249 by Randal L. Schwartz and Tom Christiansen
250 with foreword by Larry Wall
252 *Learning Perl on Win32 Systems
253 by Randal L. Schwartz, Erik Olson, and Tom Christiansen,
254 with foreword by Larry Wall
256 Perl: The Programmer's Companion
262 MacPerl: Power and Ease
263 by Vicki Brown and Chris Nandor, foreword by Matthias Neeracher
268 by Tom Christiansen and Nathan Torkington
269 with foreword by Larry Wall
271 Perl5 Interactive Course [2nd edition]
274 *Advanced Perl Programming
277 Effective Perl Programming
282 *Mastering Regular Expressions
285 How to Set up and Maintain a World Wide Web Site [2nd edition]
290 =head2 Perl in Magazines
292 The first and only periodical devoted to All Things Perl, I<The
293 Perl Journal> contains tutorials, demonstrations, case studies,
294 announcements, contests, and much more. TPJ has columns on web
295 development, databases, Win32 Perl, graphical programming, regular
296 expressions, and networking, and sponsors the Obfuscated Perl
297 Contest. It is published quarterly under the gentle hand of its
298 editor, Jon Orwant. See http://www.tpj.com/ or send mail to
299 subscriptions@tpj.com.
301 Beyond this, magazines that frequently carry high-quality articles
302 on Perl are I<Web Techniques> (see http://www.webtechniques.com/),
303 I<Performance Computing> (http://www.performance-computing.com/), and Usenix's
304 newsletter/magazine to its members, I<login:>, at http://www.usenix.org/.
305 Randal's Web Technique's columns are available on the web at
306 http://www.stonehenge.com/merlyn/WebTechniques/.
308 =head2 Perl on the Net: FTP and WWW Access
310 To get the best (and possibly cheapest) performance, pick a site from
311 the list below and use it to grab the complete list of mirror sites.
312 From there you can find the quickest site for you. Remember, the
313 following list is I<not> the complete list of CPAN mirrors.
315 http://www.perl.com/CPAN (redirects to another mirror)
316 http://www.perl.org/CPAN
317 ftp://ftp.funet.fi/pub/languages/perl/CPAN/
318 http://www.cs.ruu.nl/pub/PERL/CPAN/
319 ftp://ftp.cs.colorado.edu/pub/perl/CPAN/
321 =head2 What mailing lists are there for perl?
323 Most of the major modules (tk, CGI, libwww-perl) have their own
324 mailing lists. Consult the documentation that came with the module for
325 subscription information. The following are a list of mailing lists
326 related to perl itself.
328 If you subscribe to a mailing list, it behooves you to know how to
329 unsubscribe from it. Strident pleas to the list itself to get you off
330 will not be favorably received.
336 There is a mailing list for discussing Macintosh Perl. Contact
337 "mac-perl-request@iis.ee.ethz.ch".
339 Also see Matthias Neeracher's (the creator and maintainer of MacPerl)
340 webpage at http://www.iis.ee.ethz.ch/~neeri/macintosh/perl.html for
341 many links to interesting MacPerl sites, and the applications/MPW
346 The core development team have a mailing list for discussing fixes and
347 changes to the language. Send mail to
348 "perl5-porters-request@perl.org" with help in the body of the message
349 for information on subscribing.
353 This list is used to discuss issues involving Win32 Perl 5 (Windows NT
354 and Win95). Subscribe by mailing ListManager@ActiveWare.com with the
357 subscribe Perl-Win32-Users
359 The list software, also written in perl, will automatically determine
360 your address, and subscribe you automatically. To unsubscribe, mail
361 the following in the message body to the same address like so:
363 unsubscribe Perl-Win32-Users
365 You can also check http://www.activeware.com/ and select "Mailing Lists"
366 to join or leave this list.
370 Discussion related to archiving of perl materials, particularly the
371 Comprehensive Perl Archive Network (CPAN). Subscribe by emailing
372 majordomo@cis.ufl.edu:
374 subscribe perl-packrats
376 The list software, also written in perl, will automatically determine
377 your address, and subscribe you automatically. To unsubscribe, simple
378 prepend the same command with an "un", and mail to the same address
381 unsubscribe perl-packrats
385 =head2 Archives of comp.lang.perl.misc
387 Have you tried Deja News or Alta Vista?
389 ftp.cis.ufl.edu:/pub/perl/comp.lang.perl.*/monthly has an almost
390 complete collection dating back to 12/89 (missing 08/91 through
391 12/93). They are kept as one large file for each month.
393 You'll probably want more a sophisticated query and retrieval mechanism
394 than a file listing, preferably one that allows you to retrieve
395 articles using a fast-access indices, keyed on at least author, date,
396 subject, thread (as in "trn") and probably keywords. The best
397 solution the FAQ authors know of is the MH pick command, but it is
398 very slow to select on 18000 articles.
400 If you have, or know where can be found, the missing sections, please
401 let perlfaq-suggestions@perl.com know.
403 =head2 Where can I buy a commercial version of Perl?
405 In a sense, Perl already I<is> commercial software: It has a licence
406 that you can grab and carefully read to your manager. It is
407 distributed in releases and comes in well-defined packages. There is a
408 very large user community and an extensive literature. The
409 comp.lang.perl.* newsgroups and several of the mailing lists provide
410 free answers to your questions in near real-time. Perl has
411 traditionally been supported by Larry, dozens of software designers
412 and developers, and thousands of programmers, all working for free
413 to create a useful thing to make life better for everyone.
415 However, these answers may not suffice for managers who require a
416 purchase order from a company whom they can sue should anything go
417 wrong. Or maybe they need very serious hand-holding and contractual
418 obligations. Shrink-wrapped CDs with perl on them are available from
419 several sources if that will help.
421 Or you can purchase a real support contract. Although Cygnus historically
422 provided this service, they no longer sell support contracts for Perl.
423 Instead, the Paul Ingram Group will be taking up the slack through The
424 Perl Clinic. The following is a commercial from them:
426 "Do you need professional support for Perl and/or Oraperl? Do you need
427 a support contract with defined levels of service? Do you want to pay
428 only for what you need?
430 "The Paul Ingram Group has provided quality software development and
431 support services to some of the world's largest corporations for ten
432 years. We are now offering the same quality support services for Perl
433 at The Perl Clinic. This service is led by Tim Bunce, an active perl
434 porter since 1994 and well known as the author and maintainer of the
435 DBI, DBD::Oracle, and Oraperl modules and author/co-maintainer of The
436 Perl 5 Module List. We also offer Oracle users support for Perl5
437 Oraperl and related modules (which Oracle is planning to ship as part
438 of Oracle Web Server 3). 20% of the profit from our Perl support work
439 will be donated to The Perl Institute."
441 For more information, contact the The Perl Clinic:
445 Web: http://www.perl.co.uk/
446 Email: perl-support-info@perl.co.uk or Tim.Bunce@ig.co.uk
448 See also www.perl.com for updates on training and support.
450 =head2 Where do I send bug reports?
452 If you are reporting a bug in the perl interpreter or the modules
453 shipped with perl, use the I<perlbug> program in the perl distribution or
454 mail your report to perlbug@perl.com.
456 If you are posting a bug with a non-standard port (see the answer to
457 "What platforms is Perl available for?"), a binary distribution, or a
458 non-standard module (such as Tk, CGI, etc), then please see the
459 documentation that came with it to determine the correct place to post
462 Read the perlbug(1) man page (perl5.004 or later) for more information.
464 =head2 What is perl.com? perl.org? The Perl Institute?
466 The perl.com domain is managed by Tom Christiansen, who created it as a
467 public service long before perl.org came about. Despite the name, it's a
468 pretty non-commercial site meant to be a clearinghouse for information
469 about all things Perlian, accepting no paid advertisements, bouncy
470 happy gifs, or silly java applets on its pages. The Perl Home Page at
471 http://www.perl.com/ is currently hosted on a T3 line courtesy of Songline
472 Systems, a software-oriented subsidiary of O'Reilly and Associates.
474 perl.org is the official vehicle for The Perl Institute. The motto of
475 TPI is "helping people help Perl help people" (or something like
476 that). It's a non-profit organization supporting development,
477 documentation, and dissemination of perl.
479 =head2 How do I learn about object-oriented Perl programming?
481 L<perltoot> (distributed with 5.004 or later) is a good place to start.
482 Also, L<perlobj>, L<perlref>, and L<perlmod> are useful references,
483 while L<perlbot> has some excellent tips and tricks.
485 =head1 AUTHOR AND COPYRIGHT
487 Copyright (c) 1997, 1998 Tom Christiansen and Nathan Torkington.
490 When included as an integrated part of the Standard Distribution
491 of Perl or of its documentation (printed or otherwise), this works is
492 covered under Perl's Artistic Licence. For separate distributions of
493 all or part of this FAQ outside of that, see L<perlfaq>.
495 Irrespective of its distribution, all code examples here are public
496 domain. You are permitted and encouraged to use this code and any
497 derivatives thereof in your own programs for fun or for profit as you
498 see fit. A simple comment in the code giving credit to the FAQ would
499 be courteous but is not required.