=head2 Compiling Perl 5 on AIX
-For information on compilers on older versions of AIX, see L<Compiling
-Perl 5 on older AIX>.
+For information on compilers on older versions of AIX, see L<Compiling
+Perl 5 on older AIX versions up to 4.3.3>.
When compiling Perl, you must use an ANSI C compiler. AIX does not ship
an ANSI compliant C-compiler with AIX by default, but binary builds of
=head2 Supported Compilers
Currently all versions of IBM's "xlc", "xlc_r", "cc", "cc_r" or
-"vac" ANSI/C compiler will work for building perl if that compiler
+"vac" ANSI/C compiler will work for building Perl if that compiler
works on your system.
-If you plan to link perl to any module that requires thread-support,
+If you plan to link Perl to any module that requires thread-support,
like DBD::Oracle, it is better to use the _r version of the compiler.
-This will not build a threaded perl, but a thread-enabled perl. See
-also L<Threaded perl> later on.
+This will not build a threaded Perl, but a thread-enabled Perl. See
+also L<Threaded Perl> later on.
-As of writing (2008-11) only the IBM XL C for AIX or XL C/C++ for AIX
+As of writing (2009-08) only the IBM XL C for AIX or XL C/C++ for AIX
compiler is supported by IBM on AIX 5L/6.1.
The following compiler versions are supported by IBM:
The XL C for AIX is integrated in the XL C/C++ for AIX compiler.
-If you choose XL C/C++ V9 you need APAR IZ35785 installed
-otherwise the integrated SDBM_File do not compile correctly due
-to an optimization bug. You can circumvent this problem by
-adding -qipa to the optimization flags (-Doptimize='-O -qipa').
-The PTF for APAR IZ35785 which solves this problem will be available
-in 1Q 2009. IBM does provide an emergency fix for this problem.
+If you choose XL C/C++ V9 you need APAR IZ35785 installed
+otherwise the integrated SDBM_File do not compile correctly due
+to an optimization bug. You can circumvent this problem by
+adding -qipa to the optimization flags (-Doptimize='-O -qipa').
+The PTF for APAR IZ35785 which solves this problem is available
+from IBM (April 2009 PTF for XL C/C++ Enterprise Edition for AIX, V9.0).
-Perl can be compiled with either IBM's ANSI C compiler or with gcc.
-The former is recommended, as not only it can compile Perl with no
-difficulty, but also can take advantage of features listed later
+Perl can be compiled with either IBM's ANSI C compiler or with gcc.
+The former is recommended, as not only it can compile Perl with no
+difficulty, but also can take advantage of features listed later
that require the use of IBM compiler-specific command-line flags.
-If you decide to use gcc, make sure your installation is recent and
-complete, and be sure to read the Perl INSTALL file for more gcc-specific
-details. Please report any hoops you had to jump through to the
+If you decide to use gcc, make sure your installation is recent and
+complete, and be sure to read the Perl INSTALL file for more gcc-specific
+details. Please report any hoops you had to jump through to the
development team.
-=head2 Perl 5.8.9 was successfully compiled and tested on:
-
+=head2 Incompatibility with AIX Toolbox lib gdbm
+
+If the AIX Toolbox version of lib gdbm 1.8.x is installed on the
+system then Perl will not work. This library contains a defect version
+of the dbm_store() function. The lib gdbm will be automatically removed
+from the wanted libraries.
+
+=head2 Perl 5.10 was successfully compiled and tested on:
+
AIX Level | Compiler Level | w th | w/o th
--------------------------+-------------------------+------+-------
5.1 TL9 32 bit | XL C/C++ V7 | OK | OK
5.1 TL9 32 bit | gcc 3.2.2 | OK | OK
5.1 TL9 64 bit | XL C/C++ V7 | OK | OK
5.2 TL10 32 bit | XL C/C++ V8 | OK | OK
+ 5.2 TL8 64 bit | VA C/C++ V6 | OK | OK
5.2 TL10 64 bit | XL C/C++ V8 | OK | OK
5.3 TL7 32 bit | XL C/C++ V9 + IZ35785 | OK | OK
5.3 TL7 32 bit | gcc 4.2.4 | OK | OK
5.3 TL7 64 bit | XL C/C++ V9 + IZ35785 | OK | OK
6.1 TL1 32 bit | XL C/C++ V10 | OK | OK
6.1 TL1 64 bit + IZ39077 | XL C/C++ V10 | OK | OK
-
+
w th = with thread
w/o th = without thread
+ OK = tested
-Successfully tested means that all make test runs with an result of 100% OK.
-All tests were conducted with -Duseshrplib set.
+Successfully tested means that all "make test" runs finish with an
+result of 100% OK. All tests were conducted with -Duseshrplib set.
=head2 Building Dynamic Extensions on AIX
=head2 Threaded Perl
-Should yield no problems with AIX 5.2 / 5.3 and 6.1.
+Should yield no problems with AIX 5.1 / 5.2 / 5.3 and 6.1.
-IBM uses the AIX system Perl (V5.8.2 as of writing) for some AIX
-system scripts. If you switches the links in /usr/bin from the
+IBM uses the AIX system Perl (V5.6.0 on AIX 5.1 and V5.8.2 on
+AIX 5.2 / 5.3 and 6.1) for some AIX
+system scripts. If you switch the links in /usr/bin from the
AIX system Perl (/usr/opt/perl5) to the newly build Perl then you
get the same features as with the IBM AIX system Perl if the
threaded options are used.
+The threaded Perl build works also on AIX 5.1 but the IBM Perl
+build (Perl v5.6.0) is not threaded on AIX 5.1.
+
=head2 64-bit Perl
If your AIX system is installed with 64-bit support, you can expect 64-bit
configurations to work. If you want to use 64-bit Perl on AIX 6.1
you need a APAR for a libc.a bug which affects (n)dbm_XXX functions.
-The APAR number for this problem is currently not yet available. If
-the fileset bos.rte.libc is at level 6.1.1.2 or lower then the problem
-is no fixed on your system.
+The APAR number for this problem is IZ39077.
If you need more memory (larger data segment) for your Perl programs you
can set:
/etc/security/limits
default: (or your user)
- data = -1 (default is 262144 * 512 byte)
+ data = -1 (default is 262144 * 512 byte)
With the default setting the size is limited to 128MB.
-The -1 removes this limit.
+The -1 removes this limit. If the "make test" fails please change
+your /etc/security/limits as stated above.
=head2 Recommended Options AIX 5.1/5.2/5.3 and 6.1 (threaded/32-bit)
With the following options you get a threaded Perl version which
passes all make tests in threaded 32-bit mode, which is the default
-configuration for the perl builds that AIX ships with.
+configuration for the Perl builds that AIX ships with.
rm config.sh
./Configure \
make tests in 64-bit mode.
export OBJECT_MODE=64 / setenv OBJECT_MODE 64 (depending on your shell)
-
+
rm config.sh
./Configure \
-d \
The -Dprefix option will install Perl in a directory parallel to the
IBM AIX system Perl installation.
-If you choose gcc to compile 64-bit Perl then you need to use the
-following options:
+If you choose gcc to compile 64-bit Perl then you need to add the
+following option:
-Dcc='gcc -maix64'
bos.rte 4.3.2.0 COMMITTED Base Operating System Runtime
#
-The same might happen to AIX 5.1 or other OS levels. As a side note, perl
+The same might happen to AIX 5.1 or other OS levels. As a side note, Perl
cannot be built without bos.adt.syscalls and bos.adt.libm installed
# lslpp -l | egrep "syscalls|libm"
AIX supports dynamically loadable objects as well as shared libraries.
Shared libraries by convention end with the suffix .a, which is a bit
misleading, as an archive can contain static as well as dynamic members.
-For perl dynamically loaded objects we use the .so suffix also used on
+For Perl dynamically loaded objects we use the .so suffix also used on
many other platforms.
Note that starting from Perl 5.7.2 (and consequently 5.8.0) and AIX 4.3
called runtime linking mode instead of the emulated interface that was
used in Perl releases 5.6.1 and earlier or, for AIX releases 4.2 and
earlier. This change does break backward compatibility with compiled
-modules from earlier perl releases. The change was made to make Perl
+modules from earlier Perl releases. The change was made to make Perl
more compliant with other applications like Apache/mod_perl which are
using the AIX native interface. This change also enables the use of C++
-code with static constructors and destructors in perl extensions, which
+code with static constructors and destructors in Perl extensions, which
was not possible using the emulated interface.
=head2 The IBM ANSI C Compiler
level. Of course this is subject to changes. You can only upgrade
versions from ftp-available updates if the first three digit groups
are the same (in where you can skip intermediate unlike the patches
-in the developer snapshots of perl), or to one version up where the
+in the developer snapshots of Perl), or to one version up where the
"base" is available. In other words, the AIX compiler patches are
cumulative.
Related to this, you probably should not use the C<-r> option of
Configure in AIX, because that affects of how the C<nm> tool is used.
-=head2 Using GNU's gcc for building perl
+=head2 Using GNU's gcc for building Perl
Using gcc-3.x (tested with 3.0.4, 3.1, and 3.2) now works out of the box,
as do recent gcc-2.9 builds available directly from IBM as part of their
=head1 DATE
-Version 0.0.8: 01 Dec 2008
+Version 0.0.10: 07 Aug 2009
=cut