For information on non-Unix systems, see the section on
L<"Porting information"> below.
+If you have problems, corrections, or questions, please see
+L<"Reporting Problems"> below.
+
For information on what's new in this release, see the
pod/perldelta.pod file. For more detailed information about specific
changes, see the Changes file.
+IMPORTANT NOTE: 5.005_53 and later releases do not export unadorned
+global symbols anymore. This means most CPAN modules probably won't
+build under this release without adding '-DPERL_POLLUTE' to ccflags
+in config.sh. This is not the default because we want the modules
+to get fixed *before* the 5.006 release. pod/perldelta.pod contains
+additional notes about this.
+
=head1 DESCRIPTION
This document is written in pod format as an easy way to indicate its
If there is a hint file for your system (in the hints/ directory) you
should also read that hint file for specific information for your
-system. (Unixware users should use the svr4.sh hint file.)
-
-=head1 NOTE: This version is not binary compatible with Perl 5.004.
+system. (Unixware users should use the svr4.sh hint file.) If
+there is a README file for your platform, then you should read
+that too. Additional information is in the Porting/ directory.
-For Perl 5.004 it was possible to be binary compatible with 5.003.
-Starting from Perl 5.004_50 this is no longer possible because there were
-many deep and far-reaching changes to the language internals.
+=head1 WARNING: This version is not binary compatible with Perl 5.004.
-If you have dynamically loaded extensions that you built under perl
-5.003 or 5.004 and the so-called 'bincompat3' mode (the default mode)
-and that you wish to continue to use with perl 5.005, you may need to
-reinstall the extensions. If you wish to continue to support both 5.004
-and 5.005 on your system, you will have to move the 5.004 extensions
-over to the 5.004 architecture-dependent library. See the discussion
-below on L<"Coexistence with earlier versions of perl5.">
+Starting with Perl 5.004_50 there were many deep and far-reaching changes
+to the language internals. If you have dynamically loaded extensions
+that you built under perl 5.003 or 5.004, you can continue to use them
+with 5.004, but you will need to rebuild and reinstall those extensions
+to use them 5.005. See the discussions below on
+L<"Coexistence with earlier versions of perl5"> and
+L<"Upgrading from 5.004 to 5.005"> for more details.
The standard extensions supplied with Perl will be handled automatically.
In a related issue, old extensions may possibly be affected by the
changes in the Perl language in the current release. Please see
-pod/perldelta.pod for a description of what's changed.
+pod/perldelta.pod (and pod/perl500Xdelta.pod) for a description of
+what's changed.
+
+=head1 WARNING: This version requires a compiler that supports ANSI C.
+
+If you find that your C compiler is not ANSI-capable, try obtaining
+GCC, available from GNU mirrors worldwide (e.g. ftp://ftp.gnu.org/pub/gnu).
+Another alternative may be to use a tool like C<ansi2knr> to convert the
+sources back to K&R style, but there is no guarantee this route will get
+you anywhere, since the prototypes are not the only ANSI features used
+in the Perl sources. C<ansi2knr> is usually found as part of the freely
+available C<Ghostscript> distribution. Another similar tool is
+C<unprotoize>, distributed with GCC. Since C<unprotoize> requires GCC to
+run, you may have to run it on a platform where GCC is available, and move
+the sources back to the platform without GCC.
+
+If you succeed in automatically converting the sources to a K&R compatible
+form, be sure to email perlbug@perl.com to let us know the steps you
+followed. This will enable us to officially support this option.
=head1 Space Requirements
-The complete perl5 source tree takes up about 10 MB of disk space. The
+The complete perl5 source tree takes up about 15 MB of disk space. The
complete tree after completing make takes roughly 20 MB, though the
actual total is likely to be quite system-dependent. The installation
-directories need something on the order of 10 MB, though again that
+directories need something on the order of 15 MB, though again that
value is system-dependent.
=head1 Start with a Fresh Distribution
numbers, you will probably want to adjust them as well.
Also, be careful to check your architecture name. Some Linux systems
-(such as Debian) use i386, while others may use i486 or i586. If you
-pick up a precompiled binary, it might not use the same name.
+(such as Debian) use i386, while others may use i486, i586, or i686.
+If you pick up a precompiled binary, it might not use the same name.
In short, if you wish to use your old config.sh, I recommend running
Configure interactively rather than blindly accepting the defaults.
Configure will figure out various things about your system. Some
things Configure will figure out for itself, other things it will ask
you about. To accept the default, just press RETURN. The default
-is almost always ok. At any Configure prompt, you can type &-d
+is almost always okay. At any Configure prompt, you can type &-d
and Configure will use the defaults from then on.
After it runs, Configure will perform variable substitution on all the
with command line options, you need to use B<Configure -O>.
By default, for most systems, perl will be installed in
-/usr/local/{bin, lib, man}. You can specify a different 'prefix' for
-the default installation directory, when Configure prompts you or by
-using the Configure command line option -Dprefix='/some/directory',
-e.g.
+/usr/local/{bin, lib, man}. (See L<"Installation Directories">
+and L<"Coexistence with earlier versions of perl5"> below for
+further details.)
+
+You can specify a different 'prefix' for the default installation
+directory, when Configure prompts you or by using the Configure command
+line option -Dprefix='/some/directory', e.g.
sh Configure -Dprefix=/opt/perl
then Configure will suggest /opt/perl/lib instead of
/opt/perl/lib/perl5/.
-NOTE: You must not specify an installation directory that is below
-your perl source directory. If you do, installperl will attempt
-infinite recursion.
+NOTE: You must not specify an installation directory that is the same
+as or below your perl source directory. If you do, installperl will
+attempt infinite recursion.
+
+It may seem obvious to say, but Perl is useful only when users can
+easily find it. It's often a good idea to have both /usr/bin/perl and
+/usr/local/bin/perl be symlinks to the actual binary. Be especially
+careful, however, of overwriting a version of perl supplied by your
+vendor. In any case, system administrators are strongly encouraged to
+put (symlinks to) perl and its accompanying utilities, such as perldoc,
+into a directory typically found along a user's PATH, or in another
+obvious and convenient place.
+
+You can use "Configure -Uinstallusrbinperl" which causes installperl
+to skip installing perl also as /usr/bin/perl.
By default, Configure will compile perl to use dynamic loading if
your system supports it. If you want to force perl to be compiled
(The file is called configure.gnu to avoid problems on systems
that would not distinguish the files "Configure" and "configure".)
-=head2 Extensions
-
-By default, Configure will offer to build every extension which appears
-to be supported. For example, Configure will offer to build GDBM_File
-only if it is able to find the gdbm library. (See examples below.)
-B, DynaLoader, Fcntl, IO, and attrs are always built by default.
-Configure does not contain code to test for POSIX compliance, so POSIX
-is always built by default as well. If you wish to skip POSIX, you can
-set the Configure variable useposix=false either in a hint file or from
-the Configure command line. Similarly, the Opcode extension is always
-built by default, but you can skip it by setting the Configure variable
-useopcode=false either in a hint file for from the command line.
-
-You can learn more about each of these extensions by consulting the
-documentation in the individual .pm modules, located under the
-ext/ subdirectory.
-
-Even if you do not have dynamic loading, you must still build the
-DynaLoader extension; you should just build the stub dl_none.xs
-version. (Configure will suggest this as the default.)
+=head2 Installation Directories
-In summary, here are the Configure command-line variables you can set
-to turn off each extension:
+The installation directories can all be changed by answering the
+appropriate questions in Configure. For convenience, all the
+installation questions are near the beginning of Configure.
- B (Always included by default)
- DB_File i_db
- DynaLoader (Must always be included as a static extension)
- Fcntl (Always included by default)
- GDBM_File i_gdbm
- IO (Always included by default)
- NDBM_File i_ndbm
- ODBM_File i_dbm
- POSIX useposix
- SDBM_File (Always included by default)
- Opcode useopcode
- Socket d_socket
- Threads usethreads
- attrs (Always included by default)
+I highly recommend running Configure interactively to be sure it puts
+everything where you want it. At any point during the Configure
+process, you can answer a question with &-d and Configure
+will use the defaults from then on.
-Thus to skip the NDBM_File extension, you can use
+By default, Configure will use the following directories for library files
+for 5.005 (archname is a string like sun4-sunos, determined by Configure).
- sh Configure -Ui_ndbm
+ Configure variable Default value
+ $archlib /usr/local/lib/perl5/5.005/archname
+ $privlib /usr/local/lib/perl5/5.005
+ $sitearch /usr/local/lib/perl5/site_perl/5.005/archname
+ $sitelib /usr/local/lib/perl5/site_perl/5.005
-Again, this is taken care of automatically if you don't have the ndbm
-library.
+ $man1dir /usr/local/man/man1
+ $man3dir /usr/local/lib/perl5/man/man3
-Of course, you may always run Configure interactively and select only
-the extensions you want.
+The perl executable will search the libraries in the order given
+above.
-Note: The DB_File module will only work with version 1.x of Berkeley
-DB or newer releases of version 2. Configure will automatically detect
-this for you and refuse to try to build DB_File with version 2.
+The directories under site_perl are empty, but are intended to be used
+for installing local or site-wide extensions. Perl will automatically
+look in these directories.
-If you re-use your old config.sh but change your system (e.g. by
-adding libgdbm) Configure will still offer your old choices of extensions
-for the default answer, but it will also point out the discrepancy to
-you.
+Some users prefer to append a "/share" to $privlib and $sitelib
+to emphasize that those directories can be shared among different
+architectures.
-Finally, if you have dynamic loading (most modern Unix systems do)
-remember that these extensions do not increase the size of your perl
-executable, nor do they impact start-up time, so you probably might as
-well build all the ones that will work on your system.
+Note that these are just the defaults. You can actually structure the
+directories any way you like. They don't even have to be on the same
+filesystem.
-=head2 Including locally-installed libraries
+Further details about the installation directories, maintenance and
+development subversions, and about supporting multiple versions are
+discussed in L<"Coexistence with earlier versions of perl5"> below.
-Perl5 comes with interfaces to number of database extensions, including
-dbm, ndbm, gdbm, and Berkeley db. For each extension, if
-Configure can find the appropriate header files and libraries, it will
-automatically include that extension. The gdbm and db libraries
-are not included with perl. See the library documentation for
-how to obtain the libraries.
+If you specify a prefix that contains the string "perl", then the
+directory structure is simplified. For example, if you Configure with
+-Dprefix=/opt/perl, then the defaults for 5.005 are
-Note: If your database header (.h) files are not in a
-directory normally searched by your C compiler, then you will need to
-include the appropriate -I/your/directory option when prompted by
-Configure. If your database library (.a) files are not in a directory
-normally searched by your C compiler and linker, then you will need to
-include the appropriate -L/your/directory option when prompted by
-Configure. See the examples below.
+ Configure variable Default value
+ $archlib /opt/perl/lib/5.005/archname
+ $privlib /opt/perl/lib/5.005
+ $sitearch /opt/perl/lib/site_perl/5.005/archname
+ $sitelib /opt/perl/lib/site_perl/5.005
-=head2 Examples
+ $man1dir /opt/perl/man/man1
+ $man3dir /opt/perl/man/man3
=over 4
-=item gdbm in /usr/local
-
-Suppose you have gdbm and want Configure to find it and build the
-GDBM_File extension. This examples assumes you have gdbm.h
-installed in /usr/local/include/gdbm.h and libgdbm.a installed in
-/usr/local/lib/libgdbm.a. Configure should figure all the
-necessary steps out automatically.
-
-Specifically, when Configure prompts you for flags for
-your C compiler, you should include -I/usr/local/include.
-
-When Configure prompts you for linker flags, you should include
--L/usr/local/lib.
-
-If you are using dynamic loading, then when Configure prompts you for
-linker flags for dynamic loading, you should again include
--L/usr/local/lib.
-
-Again, this should all happen automatically. If you want to accept the
-defaults for all the questions and have Configure print out only terse
-messages, then you can just run
-
- sh Configure -des
-
-and Configure should include the GDBM_File extension automatically.
-
-This should actually work if you have gdbm installed in any of
-(/usr/local, /opt/local, /usr/gnu, /opt/gnu, /usr/GNU, or /opt/GNU).
-
-=item gdbm in /usr/you
-
-Suppose you have gdbm installed in some place other than /usr/local/,
-but you still want Configure to find it. To be specific, assume you
-have /usr/you/include/gdbm.h and /usr/you/lib/libgdbm.a. You
-still have to add -I/usr/you/include to cc flags, but you have to take
-an extra step to help Configure find libgdbm.a. Specifically, when
-Configure prompts you for library directories, you have to add
-/usr/you/lib to the list.
-
-It is possible to specify this from the command line too (all on one
-line):
-
- sh Configure -des \
- -Dlocincpth="/usr/you/include" \
- -Dloclibpth="/usr/you/lib"
-
-locincpth is a space-separated list of include directories to search.
-Configure will automatically add the appropriate -I directives.
-
-loclibpth is a space-separated list of library directories to search.
-Configure will automatically add the appropriate -L directives. If
-you have some libraries under /usr/local/ and others under
-/usr/you, then you have to include both, namely
-
- sh Configure -des \
- -Dlocincpth="/usr/you/include /usr/local/include" \
- -Dloclibpth="/usr/you/lib /usr/local/lib"
+=item Man Pages
-=back
+By default, Configure will use the following directories for manual pages:
-=head2 Installation Directories
-
-The installation directories can all be changed by answering the
-appropriate questions in Configure. For convenience, all the
-installation questions are near the beginning of Configure.
-
-I highly recommend running Configure interactively to be sure it puts
-everything where you want it. At any point during the Configure
-process, you can answer a question with &-d and Configure
-will use the defaults from then on.
-
-By default, Configure uses the following directories for
-library files (archname is a string like sun4-sunos, determined
-by Configure)
-
- /usr/local/lib/perl5/archname/5.004
- /usr/local/lib/perl5/
- /usr/local/lib/perl5/site_perl/archname
- /usr/local/lib/perl5/site_perl
-
-and the following directories for manual pages:
-
- /usr/local/man/man1
- /usr/local/lib/perl5/man/man3
+ Configure variable Default value
+ $man1dir /usr/local/man/man1
+ $man3dir /usr/local/lib/perl5/man/man3
(Actually, Configure recognizes the SVR3-style
/usr/local/man/l_man/man1 directories, if present, and uses those
sh Configure -Dman3ext=3pm
-If you specify a prefix that contains the string "perl", then the
-directory structure is simplified. For example, if you Configure with
--Dprefix=/opt/perl, then the defaults are
-
- /opt/perl/lib/archname/5.004
- /opt/perl/lib
- /opt/perl/lib/site_perl/archname
- /opt/perl/lib/site_perl
-
- /opt/perl/man/man1
- /opt/perl/man/man3
-
-The perl executable will search the libraries in the order given
-above.
-
-The directories site_perl and site_perl/archname are empty, but are
-intended to be used for installing local or site-wide extensions. Perl
-will automatically look in these directories.
-
-In order to support using things like #!/usr/local/bin/perl5.004 after
-a later version is released, architecture-dependent libraries are
-stored in a version-specific directory, such as
-/usr/local/lib/perl5/archname/5.004/.
+=back
Again, these are just the defaults, and can be changed as you run
Configure.
If you need to install perl on many identical systems, it is
convenient to compile it once and create an archive that can be
-installed on multiple systems. Here's one way to do that:
+installed on multiple systems. Suppose, for example, that you want to
+create an archive that can be installed in /opt/perl.
+Here's one way to do that:
# Set up config.over to install perl into a different directory,
# e.g. /tmp/perl5 (see previous part).
- sh Configure -des
+ sh Configure -Dprefix=/opt/perl -des
make
make test
- make install
+ make install # This will install everything into /tmp/perl5.
cd /tmp/perl5
- # Edit lib/<archname>/<version>/Config.pm to change all the
+ # Edit $archlib/Config.pm and $archlib/.packlist to change all the
# install* variables back to reflect where everything will
- # really be installed.
+ # really be installed. (That is, change /tmp/perl5 to /opt/perl
+ # everywhere in those files.)
+ # Check the scripts in $scriptdir to make sure they have the correct
+ # #!/wherever/perl line.
tar cvf ../perl5-archive.tar .
# Then, on each machine where you want to install perl,
- cd /usr/local # Or wherever you specified as $prefix
+ cd /opt/perl # Or wherever you specified as $prefix
tar xvf perl5-archive.tar
=head2 Site-wide Policy settings
Further information is in the Policy_sh.SH file itself.
+If the generated Policy.sh file is unsuitable, you may freely edit it
+to contain any valid shell commands. It will be run just after the
+platform-specific hints files.
+
=head2 Configure-time Options
There are several different ways to Configure and build perl for your
Some users, however, may wish to further customize perl. Here are
some of the main things you can change.
-=head2 Installing perl under different names
-
-If you want to install perl under a name other than "perl" (for example,
-when installing perl with special features enabled, such as debugging),
-indicate the alternate name on the "make install" line, such as:
-
- make install PERLNAME=myperl
-
=head2 Threads
-On some platforms, perl5.005 can be compiled to use threads. To
-enable this, read the file README.threads, and then try
+On some platforms, perl5.005 can be compiled with experimental support
+for threads. To enable this, read the file README.threads, and then
+try:
sh Configure -Dusethreads
configuration exists to allow these issues to be worked on.
This option requires the 'sfio' package to have been built and installed.
-A (fairly old) version of sfio is in CPAN, and work is in progress to make
-it more easily buildable by adding Configure support.
+A (fairly old) version of sfio is in CPAN.
You select this option by
fi
If you have this problem, the fix is to go back to your sfio sources
-and correct iffe's guess about atexit (or whatever is appropriate for
-your platform.)
+and correct iffe's guess about atexit.
There also might be a more recent release of Sfio that fixes your
problem.
sh Configure -Duseshrplib
-To actually build perl, you must add the current working directory to your
-LD_LIBRARY_PATH environment variable before running make. You can do
-this with
+To build a shared libperl, the environment variable controlling shared
+library search (LD_LIBRARY_PATH in most systems, DYLD_LIBRARY_PATH for
+NeXTSTEP/OPENSTEP, LIBRARY_PATH for BeOS) must be set up to include
+the Perl build directory because that's where the shared libperl will
+be created. Configure arranges Makefile to have the correct shared
+library search settings.
+
+However, there are some special cases where manually setting the
+shared library path might be required. For example, if you want to run
+something like the following with the newly-built but not-yet-installed
+./perl:
+
+ cd t; ./perl misc/failing_test.t
+or
+ ./perl -Ilib ~/my_mission_critical_test
+
+then you need to set up the shared library path explicitly.
+You can do this with
LD_LIBRARY_PATH=`pwd`:$LD_LIBRARY_PATH; export LD_LIBRARY_PATH
setenv LD_LIBRARY_PATH `pwd`
-for Csh-style shells. You *MUST* do this before running make.
-Folks running NeXT OPENSTEP must substitute DYLD_LIBRARY_PATH for
-LD_LIBRARY_PATH above.
+for Csh-style shells. (This procedure may also be needed if for some
+unexpected reason Configure fails to set up Makefile correctly.)
+
+You can often recognize failures to build/use a shared libperl from error
+messages complaining about a missing libperl.so (or libperl.sl in HP-UX),
+for example:
+18126:./miniperl: /sbin/loader: Fatal Error: cannot map libperl.so
There is also an potential problem with the shared perl library if you
want to have more than one "flavor" of the same version of perl (e.g.
perl's performance can be noticeably affected by the performance of
the malloc function on your system.
-The perl source is shipped with a version of malloc that is very fast
-but somewhat wasteful of space. On the other hand, your system's
-malloc() function may be a bit slower but also a bit more frugal.
+The perl source is shipped with a version of malloc that is very fast but
+somewhat wasteful of space. On the other hand, your system's malloc
+function may be a bit slower but also a bit more frugal. However,
+as of 5.004_68, perl's malloc has been optimized for the typical
+requests from perl, so there's a chance that it may be both faster and
+use less memory.
For many uses, speed is probably the most important consideration, so
the default behavior (for most systems) is to use the malloc supplied
(e.g. Tk or PDL) or if your system already has an excellent malloc, or
if you are experiencing difficulties with extensions that use
third-party libraries that call malloc, then you might wish to use
-your system's malloc. (Or, you might wish to explore the experimental
-malloc flags discussed below.)
+your system's malloc. (Or, you might wish to explore the malloc flags
+discussed below.)
To build without perl's malloc, you can use the Configure command
or you can answer 'n' at the appropriate interactive Configure prompt.
+Note that Perl's malloc family of functions are called Perl_malloc(),
+Perl_realloc(), Perl_calloc() and Perl_mfree(). The names do not clash
+with the system versions of these functions. See -DPERL_POLLUTE_MALLOC
+below if you want to do that for some reason.
+
=head2 Malloc Performance Flags
-If you are using Perl's malloc, you may add one or
-more of the following items to your cflags config.sh variable
-to change its behavior in potentially useful ways. You can find out
-more about these flags by reading the malloc.c source.
-In a future version of perl, these might be enabled by default.
+If you are using Perl's malloc, you may add one or more of the following
+items to your ccflags config.sh variable to change its behavior. You can
+find out more about these and other flags by reading the commentary near
+the top of the malloc.c source. The defaults should be fine for
+nearly everyone.
=over 4
-=item -DPERL_EMERGENCY_SBRK
-
-If PERL_EMERGENCY_SBRK is defined, running out of memory need not be a
-fatal error: a memory pool can allocated by assigning to the special
-variable $^M. See perlvar(1) for more details.
+=item -DNO_FANCY_MALLOC
-=item -DPACK_MALLOC
+Undefined by default. Defining it returns malloc to the version used
+in Perl 5.004.
-If PACK_MALLOC is defined, malloc.c uses a slightly different
-algorithm for small allocations (up to 64 bytes long). Such small
-allocations are quite common in typical Perl scripts.
+=item -DPLAIN_MALLOC
-The expected memory savings (with 8-byte alignment in $alignbytes) is
-about 20% for typical Perl usage. The expected slowdown due to the
-additional malloc overhead is in fractions of a percent. (It is hard
-to measure because of the effect of the saved memory on speed).
+Undefined by default. Defining it in addition to NO_FANCY_MALLOC returns
+malloc to the version used in Perl version 5.000.
-=item -DTWO_POT_OPTIMIZE
+=item -DPERL_POLLUTE_MALLOC
-If TWO_POT_OPTIMIZE is defined, malloc.c uses a slightly different
-algorithm for large allocations that are close to a power of two
-(starting with 16K). Such allocations are typical for big hashes and
-special-purpose scripts, especially image processing. If you will be
-manipulating very large blocks with sizes close to powers of two, it
-might be wise to define this macro.
+Undefined by default. This is used to force Perl's malloc family of functions
+to have the same names as the system versions. This is normally only required
+when you have a need to replace the system versions of these functions.
+This may be sometimes required when you have libraries that like to free()
+data that may have been allocated by Perl_malloc() and vice versa.
-The expected saving of memory is 0-100% (100% in applications which
-require most memory in such 2**n chunks). The expected slowdown is
-negligible.
+Note that enabling this option may sometimes lead to duplicate symbols from
+the linker for malloc et al. In such cases, the system probably does not
+allow its malloc functions to be fully replaced with custom versions.
=back
This will do two independent things: First, it will force compilation
to use cc -g so that you can use your system's debugger on the
executable. (Note: Your system may actually require something like
-cc -g2. Check you man pages for cc(1) and also any hint file for your
+cc -g2. Check your man pages for cc(1) and also any hint file for your
system.) Second, it will add -DDEBUGGING to your ccflags variable in
config.sh so that you can use B<perl -D> to access perl's internal
state. (Note: Configure will only add -DDEBUGGING by
by adding appropriate -D directives to your ccflags variable in
config.sh.
-For example, you can replace the rand() and srand() functions in the
-perl source by any other random number generator by a trick such as the
-following:
-
- sh Configure -Dccflags='-Drand=random -Dsrand=srandom'
-
-or by adding -Drand=random and -Dsrand=srandom to your ccflags
-at the appropriate Configure prompt. (Note: Although this worked for
-me, it might not work for you if your system's header files give
-different prototypes for rand() and random() or srand() and srandom().)
+Starting from Perl 5.005_53 you no more need to replace the rand() and
+srand() functions in the perl source by any other random number
+generator because Configure chooses the widest one available
+(drand48(), srandom(), or rand()).
You should also run Configure interactively to verify that a hint file
doesn't inadvertently override your ccflags setting. (Hints files
shouldn't do that, but some might.)
+=head2 Extensions
+
+By default, Configure will offer to build every extension which appears
+to be supported. For example, Configure will offer to build GDBM_File
+only if it is able to find the gdbm library. (See examples below.)
+B, DynaLoader, Fcntl, IO, and attrs are always built by default.
+Configure does not contain code to test for POSIX compliance, so POSIX
+is always built by default as well. If you wish to skip POSIX, you can
+set the Configure variable useposix=false either in a hint file or from
+the Configure command line. Similarly, the Opcode extension is always
+built by default, but you can skip it by setting the Configure variable
+useopcode=false either in a hint file for from the command line.
+
+You can learn more about each of these extensions by consulting the
+documentation in the individual .pm modules, located under the
+ext/ subdirectory.
+
+Even if you do not have dynamic loading, you must still build the
+DynaLoader extension; you should just build the stub dl_none.xs
+version. (Configure will suggest this as the default.)
+
+In summary, here are the Configure command-line variables you can set
+to turn off each extension:
+
+ B (Always included by default)
+ DB_File i_db
+ DynaLoader (Must always be included as a static extension)
+ Fcntl (Always included by default)
+ GDBM_File i_gdbm
+ IO (Always included by default)
+ NDBM_File i_ndbm
+ ODBM_File i_dbm
+ POSIX useposix
+ SDBM_File (Always included by default)
+ Opcode useopcode
+ Socket d_socket
+ Threads usethreads
+ attrs (Always included by default)
+
+Thus to skip the NDBM_File extension, you can use
+
+ sh Configure -Ui_ndbm
+
+Again, this is taken care of automatically if you don't have the ndbm
+library.
+
+Of course, you may always run Configure interactively and select only
+the extensions you want.
+
+Note: The DB_File module will only work with version 1.x of Berkeley
+DB or newer releases of version 2. Configure will automatically detect
+this for you and refuse to try to build DB_File with earlier
+releases of version 2.
+
+If you re-use your old config.sh but change your system (e.g. by
+adding libgdbm) Configure will still offer your old choices of extensions
+for the default answer, but it will also point out the discrepancy to
+you.
+
+Finally, if you have dynamic loading (most modern Unix systems do)
+remember that these extensions do not increase the size of your perl
+executable, nor do they impact start-up time, so you probably might as
+well build all the ones that will work on your system.
+
+=head2 Including locally-installed libraries
+
+Perl5 comes with interfaces to number of database extensions, including
+dbm, ndbm, gdbm, and Berkeley db. For each extension, if
+Configure can find the appropriate header files and libraries, it will
+automatically include that extension. The gdbm and db libraries
+are not included with perl. See the library documentation for
+how to obtain the libraries.
+
+Note: If your database header (.h) files are not in a
+directory normally searched by your C compiler, then you will need to
+include the appropriate -I/your/directory option when prompted by
+Configure. If your database library (.a) files are not in a directory
+normally searched by your C compiler and linker, then you will need to
+include the appropriate -L/your/directory option when prompted by
+Configure. See the examples below.
+
+=head2 Examples
+
+=over 4
+
+=item gdbm in /usr/local
+
+Suppose you have gdbm and want Configure to find it and build the
+GDBM_File extension. This examples assumes you have gdbm.h
+installed in /usr/local/include/gdbm.h and libgdbm.a installed in
+/usr/local/lib/libgdbm.a. Configure should figure all the
+necessary steps out automatically.
+
+Specifically, when Configure prompts you for flags for
+your C compiler, you should include -I/usr/local/include.
+
+When Configure prompts you for linker flags, you should include
+-L/usr/local/lib.
+
+If you are using dynamic loading, then when Configure prompts you for
+linker flags for dynamic loading, you should again include
+-L/usr/local/lib.
+
+Again, this should all happen automatically. If you want to accept the
+defaults for all the questions and have Configure print out only terse
+messages, then you can just run
+
+ sh Configure -des
+
+and Configure should include the GDBM_File extension automatically.
+
+This should actually work if you have gdbm installed in any of
+(/usr/local, /opt/local, /usr/gnu, /opt/gnu, /usr/GNU, or /opt/GNU).
+
+=item gdbm in /usr/you
+
+Suppose you have gdbm installed in some place other than /usr/local/,
+but you still want Configure to find it. To be specific, assume you
+have /usr/you/include/gdbm.h and /usr/you/lib/libgdbm.a. You
+still have to add -I/usr/you/include to cc flags, but you have to take
+an extra step to help Configure find libgdbm.a. Specifically, when
+Configure prompts you for library directories, you have to add
+/usr/you/lib to the list.
+
+It is possible to specify this from the command line too (all on one
+line):
+
+ sh Configure -des \
+ -Dlocincpth="/usr/you/include" \
+ -Dloclibpth="/usr/you/lib"
+
+locincpth is a space-separated list of include directories to search.
+Configure will automatically add the appropriate -I directives.
+
+loclibpth is a space-separated list of library directories to search.
+Configure will automatically add the appropriate -L directives. If
+you have some libraries under /usr/local/ and others under
+/usr/you, then you have to include both, namely
+
+ sh Configure -des \
+ -Dlocincpth="/usr/you/include /usr/local/include" \
+ -Dloclibpth="/usr/you/lib /usr/local/lib"
+
+=back
+
=head2 What if it doesn't work?
+If you run into problems, try some of the following ideas.
+If none of them help, then see L<"Reporting Problems"> below.
+
=over 4
+=item Environment variable clashes
+
+Configure uses a CONFIG variable that is reported to cause trouble on
+ReliantUnix 5.44. If your system sets this variable, you can try
+unsetting it before you run Configure. Configure should eventually
+be fixed to avoid polluting the namespace of the environment.
+
=item Running Configure Interactively
If Configure runs into trouble, remember that you can always run
will offer to use that hint file.
Several of the hint files contain additional important information.
-If you have any problems, it is a good idea to read the relevant hint
-file for further information. See hints/solaris_2.sh for an
-extensive example.
+If you have any problems, it is a good idea to read the relevant hint file
+for further information. See hints/solaris_2.sh for an extensive example.
+More information about writing good hints is in the hints/README.hints
+file.
=item *** WHOA THERE!!! ***
For example, suppose you have added libgdbm.a to your system
and you decide to reconfigure perl to use GDBM_File. When you run
Configure again, you will need to add -lgdbm to the list of libraries.
-Now, Configure will find your gdbm library and will issue a message:
+Now, Configure will find your gdbm include file and library and will
+issue a message:
*** WHOA THERE!!! ***
The previous value for $i_gdbm on this machine was "undef"!
can also edit cflags directly, but beware that your changes will be
lost the next time you run Configure.
-To change the C flags for all the files, edit config.sh
-and change either $ccflags or $optimize,
-and then re-run
+To explore various ways of changing ccflags from within a hint file,
+see the file hints/README.hints.
+
+To change the C flags for all the files, edit config.sh and change either
+$ccflags or $optimize, and then re-run
sh Configure -S
make depend
=head1 make depend
-This will look for all the includes.
-The output is stored in makefile. The only difference between
-Makefile and makefile is the dependencies at the bottom of
-makefile. If you have to make any changes, you should edit
-makefile, not Makefile since the Unix make command reads
-makefile first. (On non-Unix systems, the output may be stored in
-a different file. Check the value of $firstmakefile in your config.sh
-if in doubt.)
+This will look for all the includes. The output is stored in makefile.
+The only difference between Makefile and makefile is the dependencies at
+the bottom of makefile. If you have to make any changes, you should edit
+makefile, not Makefile since the Unix make command reads makefile first.
+(On non-Unix systems, the output may be stored in a different file.
+Check the value of $firstmakefile in your config.sh if in doubt.)
Configure will offer to do this step for you, so it isn't listed
explicitly above.
This will attempt to make perl in the current directory.
+=head2 What if it doesn't work?
+
If you can't compile successfully, try some of the following ideas.
If none of them help, and careful reading of the error message and
-the relevant manual pages on your system doesn't help, you can
-send a message to either the comp.lang.perl.misc newsgroup or to
-perlbug@perl.com with an accurate description of your problem.
-See L<"Reporting Problems"> below.
+the relevant manual pages on your system doesn't help,
+then see L<"Reporting Problems"> below.
=over 4
If you can successfully build miniperl, but the process crashes
during the building of extensions, you should run
- make minitest
+ make minitest
to test your version of miniperl.
=item locale
-If you have any locale-related environment variables set, try
-unsetting them. I have some reports that some versions of IRIX hang
-while running B<./miniperl configpm> with locales other than the C
-locale. See the discussion under L<"make test"> below about locales
-and the whole L<Locale problems> section in the file pod/perllocale.pod.
+If you have any locale-related environment variables set, try unsetting
+them. I have some reports that some versions of IRIX hang while
+running B<./miniperl configpm> with locales other than the C locale.
+See the discussion under L<"make test"> below about locales and the
+whole L<"Locale problems"> section in the file pod/perllocale.pod.
The latter is especially useful if you see something like this
perl: warning: Setting locale failed.
at Perl startup.
-=item malloc duplicates
-
-If you get duplicates upon linking for malloc et al, add -DEMBEDMYMALLOC
-to your ccflags variable in config.sh.
-
=item varargs
If you get varargs problems with gcc, be sure that gcc is installed
-correctly. When using gcc, you should probably have i_stdarg='define'
-and i_varargs='undef' in config.sh. The problem is usually solved by
-running fixincludes correctly. If you do change config.sh, don't
-forget to propagate your changes (see
-L<"Propagating your changes to config.sh"> below).
+correctly and that you are not passing -I/usr/include to gcc. When using
+gcc, you should probably have i_stdarg='define' and i_varargs='undef'
+in config.sh. The problem is usually solved by running fixincludes
+correctly. If you do change config.sh, don't forget to propagate
+your changes (see L<"Propagating your changes to config.sh"> below).
See also the L<"vsprintf"> item below.
-=item croak
+=item util.c
If you get error messages such as the following (the exact line
-numbers will vary in different versions of perl):
+numbers and function name may vary in different versions of perl):
- util.c: In function `Perl_croak':
- util.c:962: number of arguments doesn't match prototype
- proto.h:45: prototype declaration
+ util.c: In function `Perl_form':
+ util.c:1107: number of arguments doesn't match prototype
+ proto.h:125: prototype declaration
it might well be a symptom of the gcc "varargs problem". See the
previous L<"varargs"> item.
If you have previously run Configure, you should not reuse your old
config.sh.
+=item umask not found
+
+If the build processes encounters errors relating to umask(), the problem
+is probably that Configure couldn't find your umask() system call.
+Check your config.sh. You should have d_umask='define'. If you don't,
+this is probably the L<"nm extraction"> problem discussed above. Also,
+try reading the hints file for your system for further information.
+
=item vsprintf
If you run into problems with vsprintf in compiling util.c, the
d_vprintf='define'
If Configure guessed wrong, it is likely that Configure guessed wrong
-on a number of other common functions too. You are probably better off
-re-running Configure without using nm extraction (see previous item).
+on a number of other common functions too. This is probably
+the L<"nm extraction"> problem discussed above.
=item do_aspawn
If you run into problems relating to do_aspawn or do_spawn, the
problem is probably that Configure failed to detect your system's
-fork() function. Follow the procedure in the previous items
-on L<"vsprintf"> and L<"nm extraction">.
+fork() function. Follow the procedure in the previous item
+on L<"nm extraction">.
=item __inet_* errors
optimize='-O'
-to something like
+to
optimize=' '
If you have missing routines, you probably need to add some library or
other, or you need to undefine some feature that Configure thought was
there but is defective or incomplete. Look through config.h for
-likely suspects.
+likely suspects. If Configure guessed wrong on a number of functions,
+you might have the L<"nm extraction"> problem discussed above.
=item toke.c
with FreeBSD 2.1) had broken handling of recno databases with modified
bval settings. Upgrade your DB library or OS.
+=item Bad arg length for semctl, is XX, should be ZZZ
+
+If you get this error message from the lib/ipc_sysv test, your System
+V IPC may be broken. The XX typically is 20, and that is what ZZZ
+also should be. Consider upgrading your OS, or reconfiguring your OS
+to include the System V semaphores.
+
+=item lib/ipc_sysv........semget: No space left on device
+
+Either your account or the whole system has run out of semaphores. Or
+both. Either list the semaphores with "ipcs" and remove the unneeded
+ones (which ones these are depends on your system and applications)
+with "ipcrm -s SEMAPHORE_ID_HERE" or configure more semaphores to your
+system.
+
=item Miscellaneous
Some additional things that have been reported for either perl4 or perl5:
UTS may need one or more of -DCRIPPLED_CC, -K or -g, and undef LSTAT.
+FreeBSD can fail the lib/ipc_sysv.t test if SysV IPC has not been
+configured to the kernel. Perl tries to detect this, though, and
+you will get a message telling what to do.
+
If you get syntax errors on '(', try -DCRIPPLED_CC.
Machines with half-implemented dbm routines will need to #undef I_ODBM
tries to exercise the regular expression subsystem quite thoroughly,
and may well be far more demanding than your normal usage.
-You may also be able to reduce perl's memory usage by using some of
-the ideas described above in L<"Malloc Performance Flags">.
-
=back
=head1 make install
are not root, you must own the directories in question and you should
ignore any messages about chown not working.
+=head2 Installing perl under different names
+
+If you want to install perl under a name other than "perl" (for example,
+when installing perl with special features enabled, such as debugging),
+indicate the alternate name on the "make install" line, such as:
+
+ make install PERLNAME=myperl
+
+You can separately change the base used for versioned names (like
+"perl5.005") by setting PERLNAME_VERBASE, like
+
+ make install PERLNAME=perl5 PERLNAME_VERBASE=perl
+
+This can be useful if you have to install perl as "perl5" (due to an
+ancient version in /usr/bin supplied by your vendor, eg). Without this
+the versioned binary would be called "perl55.005".
+
+=head2 Installed files
+
If you want to see exactly what will happen without installing
anything, you can run
Installperl will also create the library directories $siteperl and
$sitearch listed in config.sh. Usually, these are something like
- /usr/local/lib/perl5/site_perl/
- /usr/local/lib/perl5/site_perl/$archname
-where $archname is something like sun4-sunos. These directories
+
+ /usr/local/lib/perl5/site_perl/5.005
+ /usr/local/lib/perl5/site_perl/5.005/archname
+
+where archname is something like sun4-sunos. These directories
will be used for installing extensions.
Perl's *.h header files and the libperl.a library are also installed
top of the script with the particular version you want to run, e.g.
#!/usr/local/bin/perl5.00404.
-(If you are upgrading from 5.002 or earlier, beware that some of the
-standard library files have changed in incompatible ways, so you are
-probably better off starting with a fresh installation.)
-
-The standard library files in /usr/local/lib/perl5 should be usable by
-all versions of perl5 after 5.002. An exception is the diagnostics.pm
-module. Since that module uses the /usr/local/lib/perl5/pod/perldiag.pod
-documentation file, the C<use diagnostics;> pragma and the splain script
-will only identify and explain any warnings or errors that the most
-recently-installed version of perl can generate. Usually, this is not
-a problem.
-
Most extensions will probably not need to be recompiled to use
with a newer version of perl. Here is how it is supposed to work.
(These examples assume you accept all the Configure defaults.)
-The directories searched by version 5.004_05 will be
-
- /usr/local/lib/perl5/archname/5.00405
- /usr/local/lib/perl5/
- /usr/local/lib/perl5/site_perl/archname
- /usr/local/lib/perl5/site_perl
-
-while the directories searched by version 5.004_04 are
-
- /usr/local/lib/perl5/archname/5.00404
- /usr/local/lib/perl5/
- /usr/local/lib/perl5/site_perl/archname
- /usr/local/lib/perl5/site_perl
-
-When you install an add-on extension, it gets installed into
-/usr/local/lib/perl5/site_perl/archname (if it is architecture-specific.)
-This directory is deliberately NOT version-specific so that both 5.004_04
-and 5.004_05 can use the extension.
-
-However, if you do run into problems, and you want to continue to
-use the old version of perl along with your extension, simply move
-those extension files to the appropriate version directory, such as
-/usr/local/lib/perl5/archname/5.00404. Then use your newer version of
-perl to rebuild and re-install the extension into site_perl. This way,
-Perl 5.004_04 will find your files in the 5.00404 directory, and
-newer versions of perl will find your newer extension in the site_perl
-directory.
+The directories searched by version 5.005 will be
+
+ Configure variable Default value
+ $archlib /usr/local/lib/perl5/5.005/archname
+ $privlib /usr/local/lib/perl5/5.005
+ $sitearch /usr/local/lib/perl5/site_perl/5.005/archname
+ $sitelib /usr/local/lib/perl5/site_perl/5.005
+
+while the directories searched by version 5.005_01 will be
+
+ $archlib /usr/local/lib/perl5/5.00501/archname
+ $privlib /usr/local/lib/perl5/5.00501
+ $sitearch /usr/local/lib/perl5/site_perl/5.005/archname
+ $sitelib /usr/local/lib/perl5/site_perl/5.005
+
+When you install an add-on extension, it gets installed into $sitelib (or
+$sitearch if it is architecture-specific). This directory deliberately
+does NOT include the sub-version number (01) so that both 5.005 and
+5.005_01 can use the extension. Only when a perl version changes to
+break backwards compatibility will the default suggestions for the
+$sitearch and $sitelib version numbers be increased.
+
+However, if you do run into problems, and you want to continue to use the
+old version of perl along with your extension, move those extension files
+to the appropriate version directory, such as $privlib (or $archlib).
+(The extension's .packlist file lists the files installed with that
+extension. For the Tk extension, for example, the list of files installed
+is in $sitearch/auto/Tk/.packlist.) Then use your newer version of perl
+to rebuild and re-install the extension into $sitelib. This way, Perl
+5.005 will find your files in the 5.005 directory, and newer versions
+of perl will find your newer extension in the $sitelib directory.
+(This is also why perl searches the site-specific libraries last.)
+
+Alternatively, if you are willing to reinstall all your extensions
+every time you upgrade perl, then you can include the subversion
+number in $sitearch and $sitelib when you run Configure.
=head2 Maintaining completely separate versions
=head2 Upgrading from 5.004 to 5.005
-Extensions compiled with versions of perl prior to 5.004_50 will need
-to be recompiled to be used with 5.004_50 and later.
-
-If you wish to continue using those extensions under 5.004_04, for
-example, then you need to move those extensions from their current
-directories, which are something like
-
- /usr/local/lib/perl5/site_perl/
- /usr/local/lib/perl5/site_perl/archname
-
-to the version-specific directory such as
-
- /usr/local/lib/perl5/archname/5.00404
-
-as described above.
-
-Once you have moved the 5.00404 versions of the extensions out of the
-way, you may recompile and reinstall with 5.005.
+Extensions built and installed with versions of perl prior to 5.004_50
+will need to be recompiled to be used with 5.004_50 and later. You will,
+however, be able to continue using 5.004 even after you install 5.005.
+The 5.004 binary will still be able to find the extensions built under
+5.004; the 5.005 binary will look in the new $sitearch and $sitelib
+directories, and will not find them.
=head1 Coexistence with perl4
Some perl scripts need to be able to obtain information from
the system header files. This command will convert the most commonly used
header files in /usr/include into files that can be easily interpreted
-by perl. These files will be placed in the architectural library directory
-you specified to Configure; by default this is
-/usr/local/lib/perl5/ARCH/VERSION, where ARCH is your architecture
-(such as sun4-solaris) and VERSION is the version of perl you are
-building (for example, 5.004).
+by perl. These files will be placed in the architecture-dependent library
+($archlib) directory you specified to Configure.
Note: Due to differences in the C and perl languages, the
conversion of the header files is not perfect. You will probably have
=head1 Reporting Problems
-If you have difficulty building perl, and none of the advice in this
-file helps, and careful reading of the error message and the relevant
-manual pages on your system doesn't help either, then you should send a
-message to either the comp.lang.perl.misc newsgroup or to
-perlbug@perl.com with an accurate description of your problem.
-
-Please include the output of the ./myconfig shell script
-that comes with the distribution. Alternatively, you can use the
-perlbug program that comes with the perl distribution,
-but you need to have perl compiled and installed before you can use it.
-
-You might also find helpful information in the Porting
-directory of the perl distribution.
+If you have difficulty building perl, and none of the advice in this file
+helps, and careful reading of the error message and the relevant manual
+pages on your system doesn't help either, then you should send a message
+to either the comp.lang.perl.misc newsgroup or to perlbug@perl.com with
+an accurate description of your problem.
+
+Please include the output of the ./myconfig shell script that comes with
+the distribution. Alternatively, you can use the perlbug program that
+comes with the perl distribution, but you need to have perl compiled
+before you can use it. (If you have not installed it yet, you need to
+run C<./perl -Ilib utils/perlbug> instead of a plain C<perlbug>.)
+
+Please try to make your message brief but clear. Trim out unnecessary
+information. Do not include large files (such as config.sh or a complete
+Configure or make log) unless absolutely necessary. Do not include a
+complete transcript of your build session. Just include the failing
+commands, the relevant error messages, and whatever preceeding commands
+are necessary to give the appropriate context. Plain text should
+usually be sufficient--fancy attachments or encodings may actually
+reduce the number of people who read your message. Your message
+will get relayed to over 400 subscribers around the world so please
+try to keep it brief but clear.
=head1 DOCUMENTATION
-Read the manual entries before running perl. The main documentation is
-in the pod/ subdirectory and should have been installed during the
+Read the manual entries before running perl. The main documentation
+is in the pod/ subdirectory and should have been installed during the
build process. Type B<man perl> to get started. Alternatively, you
-can type B<perldoc perl> to use the supplied perldoc script. This
-is sometimes useful for finding things in the library modules.
+can type B<perldoc perl> to use the supplied perldoc script. This is
+sometimes useful for finding things in the library modules.
Under UNIX, you can produce a documentation book in postscript form,
-along with its table of contents, by going to the pod/ subdirectory
-and running (either):
+along with its table of contents, by going to the pod/ subdirectory and
+running (either):
./roffitall -groff # If you have GNU groff installed
./roffitall -psroff # If you have psroff
(You may need to fix the roffitall command to use your local troff
set-up.)
-Note that you must have performed the installation already before
-running the above, since the script collects the installed files to
-generate the documentation.
+Note that you must have performed the installation already before running
+the above, since the script collects the installed files to generate
+the documentation.
=head1 AUTHOR
-Original author: Andy Dougherty doughera@lafcol.lafayette.edu ,
-borrowing very heavily from the original README by Larry Wall,
-with lots of helpful feedback and additions from the
-perl5-porters@perl.org folks.
+Original author: Andy Dougherty doughera@lafayette.edu , borrowing very
+heavily from the original README by Larry Wall, with lots of helpful
+feedback and additions from the perl5-porters@perl.org folks.
-If you have problems or questions, please see L<"Reporting Problems">
-above.
+If you have problems, corrections, or questions, please see
+L<"Reporting Problems"> above.
+
+=head1 REDISTRIBUTION
+
+This document is part of the Perl package and may be distributed under
+the same terms as perl itself.
+
+If you are distributing a modified version of perl (perhaps as part of
+a larger package) please do modify these installation instructions and
+the contact information to match your distribution.
=head1 LAST MODIFIED
-$Id: INSTALL,v 1.34 1998/04/23 18:19:41 doughera Released $
+$Id: INSTALL,v 1.49 1999/05/12 15:36:02 doughera Released $