=head1 NAME
-perlfaq2 - Obtaining and Learning about Perl ($Revision: 1.25 $, $Date: 1998/08/05 11:47:25 $)
+perlfaq2 - Obtaining and Learning about Perl
=head1 DESCRIPTION
source and documentation for Perl, support, and
related matters.
-=head2 What machines support Perl? Where do I get it?
+=head2 What machines support perl? Where do I get it?
-The standard release of Perl (the one maintained by the perl
+The standard release of perl (the one maintained by the perl
development team) is distributed only in source code form. You
-can find this at http://www.perl.com/CPAN/src/latest.tar.gz, which
-in standard Internet format (a gzipped archive in POSIX tar format).
+can find the latest releases at http://www.cpan.org/src/README.html .
Perl builds and runs on a bewildering number of platforms. Virtually
-all known and current Unix derivatives are supported (Perl's native
-platform), as are proprietary systems like VMS, DOS, OS/2, Windows,
-QNX, BeOS, and the Amiga. There are also the beginnings of support
-for MPE/iX.
-
-Binary distributions for some proprietary platforms, including
-Apple systems can be found http://www.perl.com/CPAN/ports/ directory.
-Because these are not part of the standard distribution, they may
-and in fact do differ from the base Perl port in a variety of ways.
-You'll have to check their respective release notes to see just
-what the differences are. These differences can be either positive
-(e.g. extensions for the features of the particular platform that
-are not supported in the source release of perl) or negative (e.g.
-might be based upon a less current source release of perl).
-
-A useful FAQ for Win32 Perl users is
-http://www.endcontsw.com/people/evangelo/Perl_for_Win32_FAQ.html
-
-=head2 How can I get a binary version of Perl?
-
-If you don't have a C compiler because for whatever reasons your
-vendor did not include one with your system, the best thing to do is
-grab a binary version of gcc from the net and use that to compile perl
-with. CPAN only has binaries for systems that are terribly hard to
-get free compilers for, not for Unix systems.
-
-Your first stop should be http://www.perl.com/CPAN/ports to see what
-information is already available. A simple installation guide for
-MS-DOS is available at http://www.cs.ruu.nl/~piet/perl5dos.html , and
-similarly for Windows 3.1 at http://www.cs.ruu.nl/~piet/perlwin3.html
-.
-
-=head2 I don't have a C compiler on my system. How can I compile perl?
+all known and current Unix derivatives are supported (perl's native
+platform), as are other systems like VMS, DOS, OS/2, Windows,
+QNX, BeOS, OS X, MPE/iX and the Amiga.
+
+Binary distributions for some proprietary platforms can be found
+http://www.cpan.org/ports/ directory. Because these are not part of
+the standard distribution, they may and in fact do differ from the
+base perl port in a variety of ways. You'll have to check their
+respective release notes to see just what the differences are. These
+differences can be either positive (e.g. extensions for the features
+of the particular platform that are not supported in the source
+release of perl) or negative (e.g. might be based upon a less current
+source release of perl).
+
+=head2 How can I get a binary version of perl?
+
+(contributed by brian d foy)
+
+ActiveState: Windows, Linux, Mac OS X, Solaris, AIX and HP-UX
+
+ http://www.activestate.com/
+
+Sunfreeware.com: Solaris 2.5 to Solaris 10 (SPARC and x86)
+
+ http://www.sunfreeware.com/
+
+Strawberry Perl: Windows, Perl 5.8.8 and 5.10.0
+
+ http://www.strawberryperl.com
+
+IndigoPerl: Windows
+
+ http://indigostar.com/
+
+=head2 I don't have a C compiler. How can I build my own Perl interpreter?
Since you don't have a C compiler, you're doomed and your vendor
should be sacrificed to the Sun gods. But that doesn't help you.
first. Consult the Usenet FAQs for your operating system for
information on where to get such a binary version.
-=head2 I copied the Perl binary from one machine to another, but scripts don't work.
+You might look around the net for a pre-built binary of Perl (or a
+C compiler!) that meets your needs, though:
+
+For Windows, Vanilla Perl ( http://vanillaperl.com/ ) and Strawberry Perl
+( http://strawberryperl.com/ ) come with a
+bundled C compiler. ActivePerl is a pre-compiled version of Perl
+ready-to-use.
+
+For Sun systems, SunFreeware.com provides binaries of most popular
+applications, including compilers and Perl.
+
+=head2 I copied the perl binary from one machine to another, but scripts don't work.
That's probably because you forgot libraries, or library paths differ.
You really should build the whole distribution on the machine it will
approaches are doomed to failure.
One simple way to check that things are in the right place is to print out
-the hard-coded @INC which perl is looking for.
+the hard-coded @INC that perl looks through for libraries:
- perl -e 'print join("\n",@INC)'
+ % perl -le 'print for @INC'
-If this command lists any paths which don't exist on your system, then you
+If this command lists any paths that don't exist on your system, then you
may need to move the appropriate libraries to these locations, or create
-symlinks, aliases, or shortcuts appropriately.
+symbolic links, aliases, or shortcuts appropriately. @INC is also printed as
+part of the output of
+
+ % perl -V
-You might also want to check out L<perlfaq8/"How do I keep my own
-module/library directory?">.
+You might also want to check out
+L<perlfaq8/"How do I keep my own module/library directory?">.
=head2 I grabbed the sources and tried to compile but gdbm/dynamic loading/malloc/linking/... failed. How do I make it work?
Read the F<INSTALL> file, which is part of the source distribution.
-It describes in detail how to cope with most idiosyncracies that the
+It describes in detail how to cope with most idiosyncrasies that the
Configure script can't work around for any given system or
architecture.
=head2 What modules and extensions are available for Perl? What is CPAN? What does CPAN/src/... mean?
-CPAN stands for Comprehensive Perl Archive Network, a huge archive
-replicated on dozens of machines all over the world. CPAN contains
-source code, non-native ports, documentation, scripts, and many
-third-party modules and extensions, designed for everything from
+CPAN stands for Comprehensive Perl Archive Network, a multi-gigabyte
+archive replicated on hundreds of machines all over the world. CPAN
+contains source code, non-native ports, documentation, scripts, and
+many third-party modules and extensions, designed for everything from
commercial database interfaces to keyboard/screen control to web
-walking and CGI scripts. The master machine for CPAN is
-ftp://ftp.funet.fi/pub/languages/perl/CPAN/, but you can use the
-address http://www.perl.com/CPAN/CPAN.html to fetch a copy from a
-"site near you". See http://www.perl.com/CPAN (without a slash at the
-end) for how this process works.
+walking and CGI scripts. The master web site for CPAN is
+http://www.cpan.org/ and there is the CPAN Multiplexer at
+http://www.cpan.org/CPAN.html which will choose a mirror near you via
+DNS. See http://www.perl.com/CPAN (without a slash at the end) for
+how this process works. Also, http://mirror.cpan.org/ has a nice
+interface to the http://www.cpan.org/MIRRORED.BY mirror directory.
+
+See the CPAN FAQ at http://www.cpan.org/misc/cpan-faq.html for answers
+to the most frequently asked questions about CPAN including how to
+become a mirror.
CPAN/path/... is a naming convention for files available on CPAN
sites. CPAN indicates the base directory of a CPAN mirror, and the
-rest of the path is the path from that directory to the file. For
+rest of the path is the path from that directory to the file. For
instance, if you're using ftp://ftp.funet.fi/pub/languages/perl/CPAN
-as your CPAN site, the file CPAN/misc/japh file is downloadable as
+as your CPAN site, the file CPAN/misc/japh is downloadable as
ftp://ftp.funet.fi/pub/languages/perl/CPAN/misc/japh .
-Considering that there are hundreds of existing modules in the
-archive, one probably exists to do nearly anything you can think of.
-Current categories under CPAN/modules/by-category/ include perl core
-modules; development support; operating system interfaces; networking,
-devices, and interprocess communication; data type utilities; database
-interfaces; user interfaces; interfaces to other languages; filenames,
-file systems, and file locking; internationalization and locale; world
-wide web support; server and daemon utilities; archiving and
-compression; image manipulation; mail and news; control flow
-utilities; filehandle and I/O; Microsoft Windows modules; and
-miscellaneous modules.
+Considering that, as of 2006, there are over ten thousand existing
+modules in the archive, one probably exists to do nearly anything you
+can think of. Current categories under CPAN/modules/by-category/
+include Perl core modules; development support; operating system
+interfaces; networking, devices, and interprocess communication; data
+type utilities; database interfaces; user interfaces; interfaces to
+other languages; filenames, file systems, and file locking;
+internationalization and locale; world wide web support; server and
+daemon utilities; archiving and compression; image manipulation; mail
+and news; control flow utilities; filehandle and I/O; Microsoft
+Windows modules; and miscellaneous modules.
+
+See http://www.cpan.org/modules/00modlist.long.html or
+http://search.cpan.org/ for a more complete list of modules by
+category.
+
+CPAN is a free service and is not affiliated with O'Reilly Media.
=head2 Is there an ISO or ANSI certified version of Perl?
=head2 Where can I get information on Perl?
-The complete Perl documentation is available with the perl distribution.
-If you have perl installed locally, you probably have the documentation
+The complete Perl documentation is available with the Perl distribution.
+If you have Perl installed locally, you probably have the documentation
installed as well: type C<man perl> if you're on a system resembling Unix.
This will lead you to other important man pages, including how to set your
$MANPATH. If you're not on a Unix system, access to the documentation
-will be different; for example, it might be only in HTML format. But all
+will be different; for example, documentation might only be in HTML format. All
proper perl installations have fully-accessible documentation.
You might also try C<perldoc perl> in case your system doesn't
have a proper man command, or it's been misinstalled. If that doesn't
work, try looking in /usr/local/lib/perl5/pod for documentation.
-If all else fails, consult the CPAN/doc directory, which contains the
-complete documentation in various formats, including native pod,
-troff, html, and plain text. There's also a web page at
-http://www.perl.com/perl/info/documentation.html that might help.
+If all else fails, consult http://perldoc.perl.org/ which has the
+complete documentation in HTML and PDF format.
+
+Many good books have been written about Perl--see the section later in
+L<perlfaq2> for more details.
-Many good books have been written about Perl -- see the section below
-for more details.
+Tutorial documents are included in current or upcoming Perl releases
+include L<perltoot> for objects or L<perlboot> for a beginner's
+approach to objects, L<perlopentut> for file opening semantics,
+L<perlreftut> for managing references, L<perlretut> for regular
+expressions, L<perlthrtut> for threads, L<perldebtut> for debugging,
+and L<perlxstut> for linking C and Perl together. There may be more
+by the time you read this. These URLs might also be useful:
-=head2 What are the Perl newsgroups on USENET? Where do I post questions?
+ http://perldoc.perl.org/
+ http://bookmarks.cpan.org/search.cgi?cat=Training%2FTutorials
-The now defunct comp.lang.perl newsgroup has been superseded by the
-following groups:
+=head2 What are the Perl newsgroups on Usenet? Where do I post questions?
- comp.lang.perl.announce Moderated announcement group
- comp.lang.perl.misc Very busy group about Perl in general
- comp.lang.perl.moderated Moderated discussion group
- comp.lang.perl.modules Use and development of Perl modules
- comp.lang.perl.tk Using Tk (and X) from Perl
+Several groups devoted to the Perl language are on Usenet:
- comp.infosystems.www.authoring.cgi Writing CGI scripts for the Web.
+ comp.lang.perl.announce Moderated announcement group
+ comp.lang.perl.misc High traffic general Perl discussion
+ comp.lang.perl.moderated Moderated discussion group
+ comp.lang.perl.modules Use and development of Perl modules
+ comp.lang.perl.tk Using Tk (and X) from Perl
-Actually, the moderated group hasn't passed yet, but we're
-keeping our fingers crossed.
+Some years ago, comp.lang.perl was divided into those groups, and
+comp.lang.perl itself officially removed. While that group may still
+be found on some news servers, it is unwise to use it, because
+postings there will not appear on news servers which honour the
+official list of group names. Use comp.lang.perl.misc for topics
+which do not have a more-appropriate specific group.
-There is also USENET gateway to the mailing list used by the crack
-Perl development team (perl5-porters) at
-news://news.perl.com/perl.porters-gw/ .
+There is also a Usenet gateway to Perl mailing lists sponsored by
+perl.org at nntp://nntp.perl.org , a web interface to the same lists
+at http://nntp.perl.org/group/ and these lists are also available
+under the C<perl.*> hierarchy at http://groups.google.com . Other
+groups are listed at http://lists.perl.org/ ( also known as
+http://lists.cpan.org/ ).
+
+A nice place to ask questions is the PerlMonks site,
+http://www.perlmonks.org/ , or the Perl Beginners mailing list
+http://lists.perl.org/showlist.cgi?name=beginners .
+
+Note that none of the above are supposed to write your code for you:
+asking questions about particular problems or general advice is fine,
+but asking someone to write your code for free is not very cool.
=head2 Where should I post source code?
-You should post source code to whichever group is most appropriate,
-but feel free to cross-post to comp.lang.perl.misc. If you want to
-cross-post to alt.sources, please make sure it follows their posting
-standards, including setting the Followup-To header line to NOT
-include alt.sources; see their FAQ for details.
+You should post source code to whichever group is most appropriate, but
+feel free to cross-post to comp.lang.perl.misc. If you want to cross-post
+to alt.sources, please make sure it follows their posting standards,
+including setting the Followup-To header line to NOT include alt.sources;
+see their FAQ ( http://www.faqs.org/faqs/alt-sources-intro/ ) for details.
-If you're just looking for software, first use Alta Vista, Deja News, and
-search CPAN. This is faster and more productive than just posting
-a request.
+If you're just looking for software, first use Google
+( http://www.google.com ), Google's usenet search interface
+( http://groups.google.com ), and CPAN Search ( http://search.cpan.org ).
+This is faster and more productive than just posting a request.
=head2 Perl Books
-A number of books on Perl and/or CGI programming are available. A few of
-these are good, some are ok, but many aren't worth your money. Tom
-Christiansen maintains a list of these books, some with extensive
-reviews, at http://www.perl.com/perl/critiques/index.html.
+A number of books on Perl and/or CGI programming are available. A few
+of these are good, some are OK, but many aren't worth your money.
+There is a list of these books, some with extensive reviews, at
+http://books.perl.org/ . If you don't see your book listed here, you
+can write to perlfaq-workers@perl.org .
The incontestably definitive reference book on Perl, written by
-the creator of Perl, is now in its second edition:
+the creator of Perl, is Programming Perl:
- Programming Perl (the "Camel Book"):
- Authors: Larry Wall, Tom Christiansen, and Randal Schwartz
- ISBN 1-56592-149-6 (English)
- ISBN 4-89052-384-7 (Japanese)
- URL: http://www.oreilly.com/catalog/pperl2/
- (French, German, Italian, and Hungarian translations also
- available)
+ Programming Perl (the "Camel Book"):
+ by Larry Wall, Tom Christiansen, and Jon Orwant
+ ISBN 0-596-00027-8 [3rd edition July 2000]
+ http://www.oreilly.com/catalog/pperl3/
+ (English, translations to several languages are also available)
The companion volume to the Camel containing thousands
-of real-world examples, mini-tutorials, and complete programs
-(first premiering at the 1998 Perl Conference), is:
-
- The Perl Cookbook (the "Ram Book"):
- Authors: Tom Christiansen and Nathan Torkington,
- with Foreword by Larry Wall
- ISBN: 1-56592-243-3
- URL: http://perl.oreilly.com/cookbook/
-
-If you're already a hard-core systems programmer, then the Camel Book
-might suffice for you to learn Perl from. But if you're not, check
-out:
-
- Learning Perl (the "Llama Book"):
- Authors: Randal Schwartz and Tom Christiansen
- with Foreword by Larry Wall
- ISBN: 1-56592-284-0
- URL: http://www.oreilly.com/catalog/lperl2/
-
-Despite the picture at the URL above, the second edition of "Llama
-Book" really has a blue cover, and is updated for the 5.004 release
-of Perl. Various foreign language editions are available, including
-I<Learning Perl on Win32 Systems> (the Gecko Book).
-
-If you're not an accidental programmer, but a more serious and possibly
-even degreed computer scientist who doesn't need as much hand-holding as
-we try to provide in the Llama or its defurred cousin the Gecko, please
-check out the delightful book, I<Perl: The Programmer's Companion>,
-written by Nigel Chapman.
-
-You can order O'Reilly books directly from O'Reilly & Associates,
-1-800-998-9938. Local/overseas is 1-707-829-0515. If you can
-locate an O'Reilly order form, you can also fax to 1-707-829-0104.
-See http://www.ora.com/ on the Web.
-
-What follows is a list of the books that the FAQ authors found personally
-useful. Your mileage may (but, we hope, probably won't) vary.
-
-Recommended books on (or muchly on) Perl follow; those marked with
-a star may be ordered from O'Reilly.
-
-=over
-
-=item References
-
- *Programming Perl
- by Larry Wall, Tom Christiansen, and Randal L. Schwartz
-
- *Perl 5 Desktop Reference
- By Johan Vromans
+of real-world examples, mini-tutorials, and complete programs is:
-=item Tutorials
-
- *Learning Perl [2nd edition]
- by Randal L. Schwartz and Tom Christiansen
- with foreword by Larry Wall
+ The Perl Cookbook (the "Ram Book"):
+ by Tom Christiansen and Nathan Torkington,
+ with Foreword by Larry Wall
+ ISBN 0-596-00313-7 [2nd Edition August 2003]
+ http://www.oreilly.com/catalog/perlckbk2/
- *Learning Perl on Win32 Systems
- by Randal L. Schwartz, Erik Olson, and Tom Christiansen,
- with foreword by Larry Wall
+If you're already a seasoned programmer, then the Camel Book might
+suffice for you to learn Perl. If you're not, check out the
+Llama book:
- Perl: The Programmer's Companion
- by Nigel Chapman
+ Learning Perl
+ by Randal L. Schwartz, Tom Phoenix, and brian d foy
+ ISBN 0-596-10105-8 [4th edition July 2005]
+ http://www.oreilly.com/catalog/learnperl4/
- Cross-Platform Perl
- by Eric F. Johnson
+And for more advanced information on writing larger programs,
+presented in the same style as the Llama book, continue your education
+with the Alpaca book:
- MacPerl: Power and Ease
- by Vicki Brown and Chris Nandor, foreword by Matthias Neeracher
+ Intermediate Perl (the "Alpaca Book")
+ by Randal L. Schwartz and brian d foy, with Tom Phoenix (foreword by Damian Conway)
+ ISBN 0-596-10206-2 [1st edition March 2006]
+ http://www.oreilly.com/catalog/lrnperlorm/
-=item Task-Oriented
+Addison-Wesley ( http://www.awlonline.com/ ) and Manning
+( http://www.manning.com/ ) are also publishers of some fine Perl books
+such as I<Object Oriented Programming with Perl> by Damian Conway and
+I<Network Programming with Perl> by Lincoln Stein.
- *The Perl Cookbook
- by Tom Christiansen and Nathan Torkington
- with foreword by Larry Wall
+An excellent technical book discounter is Bookpool at
+http://www.bookpool.com/ where a 30% discount or more is not unusual.
- Perl5 Interactive Course [2nd edition]
- by Jon Orwant
+What follows is a list of the books that the FAQ authors found personally
+useful. Your mileage may (but, we hope, probably won't) vary.
- *Advanced Perl Programming
- by Sriram Srinivasan
+Recommended books on (or mostly on) Perl follow.
- Effective Perl Programming
- by Joseph Hall
+=over 4
-=item Special Topics
+=item References
- *Mastering Regular Expressions
- by Jeffrey Friedl
+ Programming Perl
+ by Larry Wall, Tom Christiansen, and Jon Orwant
+ ISBN 0-596-00027-8 [3rd edition July 2000]
+ http://www.oreilly.com/catalog/pperl3/
- How to Set up and Maintain a World Wide Web Site [2nd edition]
- by Lincoln Stein
+ Perl 5 Pocket Reference
+ by Johan Vromans
+ ISBN 0-596-00374-9 [4th edition July 2002]
+ http://www.oreilly.com/catalog/perlpr4/
-=back
+=item Tutorials
-=head2 Perl in Magazines
+ Beginning Perl
+ by James Lee
+ ISBN 1-59059-391-X [2nd edition August 2004]
+ http://apress.com/book/bookDisplay.html?bID=344
-The first and only periodical devoted to All Things Perl, I<The
-Perl Journal> contains tutorials, demonstrations, case studies,
-announcements, contests, and much more. TPJ has columns on web
-development, databases, Win32 Perl, graphical programming, regular
-expressions, and networking, and sponsors the Obfuscated Perl
-Contest. It is published quarterly under the gentle hand of its
-editor, Jon Orwant. See http://www.tpj.com/ or send mail to
-subscriptions@tpj.com.
+ Elements of Programming with Perl
+ by Andrew L. Johnson
+ ISBN 1-884777-80-5 [1st edition October 1999]
+ http://www.manning.com/johnson/
-Beyond this, magazines that frequently carry high-quality articles
-on Perl are I<Web Techniques> (see http://www.webtechniques.com/),
-I<Performance Computing> (http://www.performance-computing.com/), and Usenix's
-newsletter/magazine to its members, I<login:>, at http://www.usenix.org/.
-Randal's Web Technique's columns are available on the web at
-http://www.stonehenge.com/merlyn/WebTechniques/.
+ Learning Perl
+ by Randal L. Schwartz, Tom Phoenix, and brian d foy
+ ISBN 0-596-52010-7 [5th edition June 2008]
+ http://oreilly.com/catalog/9780596520106/
-=head2 Perl on the Net: FTP and WWW Access
+ Intermediate Perl (the "Alpaca Book")
+ by Randal L. Schwartz and brian d foy, with Tom Phoenix (foreword by Damian Conway)
+ ISBN 0-596-10206-2 [1st edition March 2006]
+ http://www.oreilly.com/catalog/intermediateperl/
-To get the best (and possibly cheapest) performance, pick a site from
-the list below and use it to grab the complete list of mirror sites.
-From there you can find the quickest site for you. Remember, the
-following list is I<not> the complete list of CPAN mirrors.
+ Mastering Perl
+ by brian d foy
+ ISBN 0-596-52724-1 [1st edition July 2007]
+ http://www.oreilly.com/catalog/9780596527242/
- http://www.perl.com/CPAN (redirects to another mirror)
- http://www.perl.org/CPAN
- ftp://ftp.funet.fi/pub/languages/perl/CPAN/
- http://www.cs.ruu.nl/pub/PERL/CPAN/
- ftp://ftp.cs.colorado.edu/pub/perl/CPAN/
+=item Task-Oriented
-=head2 What mailing lists are there for perl?
+ Writing Perl Modules for CPAN
+ by Sam Tregar
+ ISBN 1-59059-018-X [1st edition Aug 2002]
+ http://apress.com/book/bookDisplay.html?bID=14
-Most of the major modules (tk, CGI, libwww-perl) have their own
-mailing lists. Consult the documentation that came with the module for
-subscription information. The following are a list of mailing lists
-related to perl itself.
+ The Perl Cookbook
+ by Tom Christiansen and Nathan Torkington
+ with foreword by Larry Wall
+ ISBN 1-56592-243-3 [1st edition August 1998]
+ http://www.oreilly.com/catalog/cookbook/
-If you subscribe to a mailing list, it behooves you to know how to
-unsubscribe from it. Strident pleas to the list itself to get you off
-will not be favorably received.
+ Effective Perl Programming
+ by Joseph Hall
+ ISBN 0-201-41975-0 [1st edition 1998]
+ http://www.awl.com/
-=over 4
+ Real World SQL Server Administration with Perl
+ by Linchi Shea
+ ISBN 1-59059-097-X [1st edition July 2003]
+ http://apress.com/book/bookDisplay.html?bID=171
-=item MacPerl
+=item Special Topics
-There is a mailing list for discussing Macintosh Perl. Contact
-"mac-perl-request@iis.ee.ethz.ch".
+ Perl Best Practices
+ by Damian Conway
+ ISBN: 0-596-00173-8 [1st edition July 2005]
+ http://www.oreilly.com/catalog/perlbp/
-Also see Matthias Neeracher's (the creator and maintainer of MacPerl)
-webpage at http://www.iis.ee.ethz.ch/~neeri/macintosh/perl.html for
-many links to interesting MacPerl sites, and the applications/MPW
-tools, precompiled.
+ Higher Order Perl
+ by Mark-Jason Dominus
+ ISBN: 1558607013 [1st edition March 2005]
+ http://hop.perl.plover.com/
-=item Perl5-Porters
+ Perl 6 Now: The Core Ideas Illustrated with Perl 5
+ by Scott Walters
+ ISBN 1-59059-395-2 [1st edition December 2004]
+ http://apress.com/book/bookDisplay.html?bID=355
-The core development team have a mailing list for discussing fixes and
-changes to the language. Send mail to
-"perl5-porters-request@perl.org" with help in the body of the message
-for information on subscribing.
+ Mastering Regular Expressions
+ by Jeffrey E. F. Friedl
+ ISBN 0-596-00289-0 [2nd edition July 2002]
+ http://www.oreilly.com/catalog/regex2/
-=item NTPerl
+ Network Programming with Perl
+ by Lincoln Stein
+ ISBN 0-201-61571-1 [1st edition 2001]
+ http://www.awlonline.com/
+
+ Object Oriented Perl
+ Damian Conway
+ with foreword by Randal L. Schwartz
+ ISBN 1-884777-79-1 [1st edition August 1999]
+ http://www.manning.com/conway/
+
+ Data Munging with Perl
+ Dave Cross
+ ISBN 1-930110-00-6 [1st edition 2001]
+ http://www.manning.com/cross
+
+ Mastering Perl/Tk
+ by Steve Lidie and Nancy Walsh
+ ISBN 1-56592-716-8 [1st edition January 2002]
+ http://www.oreilly.com/catalog/mastperltk/
+
+ Extending and Embedding Perl
+ by Tim Jenness and Simon Cozens
+ ISBN 1-930110-82-0 [1st edition August 2002]
+ http://www.manning.com/jenness
+
+ Perl Debugger Pocket Reference
+ by Richard Foley
+ ISBN 0-596-00503-2 [1st edition January 2004]
+ http://www.oreilly.com/catalog/perldebugpr/
+
+ Pro Perl Debugging
+ by Richard Foley with Andy Lester
+ ISBN 1-59059-454-1 [1st edition July 2005]
+ http://www.apress.com/book/view/1590594541
-This list is used to discuss issues involving Win32 Perl 5 (Windows NT
-and Win95). Subscribe by mailing ListManager@ActiveWare.com with the
-message body:
+=back
- subscribe Perl-Win32-Users
+=head2 Which magazines have Perl content?
+
+I<The Perl Review> ( http://www.theperlreview.com ) focuses on Perl
+almost completely (although it sometimes sneaks in an article about
+another language). There's also I<$foo Magazin>, a german magazine
+dedicated to Perl, at ( http://www.foo-magazin.de ).
+
+Magazines that frequently carry quality articles on Perl include I<The
+Perl Review> ( http://www.theperlreview.com ), I<Unix Review> (
+http://www.unixreview.com/ ), I<Linux Magazine> (
+http://www.linuxmagazine.com/ ), and Usenix's newsletter/magazine to
+its members, I<login:> ( http://www.usenix.org/ )
+
+The Perl columns of Randal L. Schwartz are available on the web at
+http://www.stonehenge.com/merlyn/WebTechniques/ ,
+http://www.stonehenge.com/merlyn/UnixReview/ , and
+http://www.stonehenge.com/merlyn/LinuxMag/ .
+
+The first (and for a long time, only) periodical devoted to All Things
+Perl, I<The Perl Journal> contains tutorials, demonstrations, case
+studies, announcements, contests, and much more. I<TPJ> has columns
+on web development, databases, Win32 Perl, graphical programming,
+regular expressions, and networking, and sponsors the Obfuscated Perl
+Contest and the Perl Poetry Contests. Beginning in November 2002, TPJ
+moved to a reader-supported monthly e-zine format in which subscribers
+can download issues as PDF documents. In 2006, TPJ merged with Dr.
+Dobbs Journal (online edition). To read old TPJ articles, see
+http://www.ddj.com/ .
+
+=head2 What mailing lists are there for Perl?
+
+Most of the major modules (Tk, CGI, libwww-perl) have their own
+mailing lists. Consult the documentation that came with the module for
+subscription information.
-The list software, also written in perl, will automatically determine
-your address, and subscribe you automatically. To unsubscribe, mail
-the following in the message body to the same address like so:
+A comprehensive list of Perl related mailing lists can be found at:
- unsubscribe Perl-Win32-Users
+ http://lists.perl.org/
-You can also check http://www.activeware.com/ and select "Mailing Lists"
-to join or leave this list.
+=head2 Where are the archives for comp.lang.perl.misc?
-=item Perl-Packrats
+The Google search engine now carries archived and searchable newsgroup
+content.
-Discussion related to archiving of perl materials, particularly the
-Comprehensive Perl Archive Network (CPAN). Subscribe by emailing
-majordomo@cis.ufl.edu:
+http://groups.google.com/group/comp.lang.perl.misc/topics
- subscribe perl-packrats
+If you have a question, you can be sure someone has already asked the
+same question at some point on c.l.p.m. It requires some time and patience
+to sift through all the content but often you will find the answer you
+seek.
-The list software, also written in perl, will automatically determine
-your address, and subscribe you automatically. To unsubscribe, simple
-prepend the same command with an "un", and mail to the same address
-like so:
+=head2 Where can I buy a commercial version of perl?
- unsubscribe perl-packrats
+In a real sense, perl already I<is> commercial software: it has a license
+that you can grab and carefully read to your manager. It is distributed
+in releases and comes in well-defined packages. There is a very large
+user community and an extensive literature. The comp.lang.perl.*
+newsgroups and several of the mailing lists provide free answers to your
+questions in near real-time. Perl has traditionally been supported by
+Larry, scores of software designers and developers, and myriad
+programmers, all working for free to create a useful thing to make life
+better for everyone.
-=back
+However, these answers may not suffice for managers who require a
+purchase order from a company whom they can sue should anything go awry.
+Or maybe they need very serious hand-holding and contractual obligations.
+Shrink-wrapped CDs with perl on them are available from several sources if
+that will help. For example, many Perl books include a distribution of perl,
+as do the O'Reilly Perl Resource Kits (in both the Unix flavor
+and in the proprietary Microsoft flavor); the free Unix distributions
+also all come with perl.
-=head2 Archives of comp.lang.perl.misc
+=head2 Where do I send bug reports?
-Have you tried Deja News or Alta Vista?
+(contributed by brian d foy)
-ftp.cis.ufl.edu:/pub/perl/comp.lang.perl.*/monthly has an almost
-complete collection dating back to 12/89 (missing 08/91 through
-12/93). They are kept as one large file for each month.
+First, ensure that you've found an actual bug. Second, ensure you've
+found an actual bug.
-You'll probably want more a sophisticated query and retrieval mechanism
-than a file listing, preferably one that allows you to retrieve
-articles using a fast-access indices, keyed on at least author, date,
-subject, thread (as in "trn") and probably keywords. The best
-solution the FAQ authors know of is the MH pick command, but it is
-very slow to select on 18000 articles.
+If you've found a bug with the perl interpreter or one of the modules
+in the standard library (those that come with Perl), you can use the
+C<perlbug> utility that comes with Perl (>= 5.004). It collects
+information about your installation to include with your message, then
+sends the message to the right place.
-If you have, or know where can be found, the missing sections, please
-let perlfaq-suggestions@perl.com know.
+To determine if a module came with your version of Perl, you can
+use the C<Module::CoreList> module. It has the information about
+the modules (with their versions) included with each release of Perl.
-=head2 Where can I buy a commercial version of Perl?
+Every CPAN module has a bug tracker set up in RT, http://rt.cpan.org .
+You can submit bugs to RT either through its web interface or by
+email. To email a bug report, send it to
+bug-E<lt>distribution-nameE<gt>@rt.cpan.org . For example, if you
+wanted to report a bug in C<Business::ISBN>, you could send a message to
+bug-Business-ISBN@rt.cpan.org .
-In a sense, Perl already I<is> commercial software: It has a licence
-that you can grab and carefully read to your manager. It is
-distributed in releases and comes in well-defined packages. There is a
-very large user community and an extensive literature. The
-comp.lang.perl.* newsgroups and several of the mailing lists provide
-free answers to your questions in near real-time. Perl has
-traditionally been supported by Larry, dozens of software designers
-and developers, and thousands of programmers, all working for free
-to create a useful thing to make life better for everyone.
+Some modules might have special reporting requirements, such as a
+Sourceforge or Google Code tracking system, so you should check the
+module documentation too.
-However, these answers may not suffice for managers who require a
-purchase order from a company whom they can sue should anything go
-wrong. Or maybe they need very serious hand-holding and contractual
-obligations. Shrink-wrapped CDs with perl on them are available from
-several sources if that will help.
-
-Or you can purchase a real support contract. Although Cygnus historically
-provided this service, they no longer sell support contracts for Perl.
-Instead, the Paul Ingram Group will be taking up the slack through The
-Perl Clinic. The following is a commercial from them:
-
-"Do you need professional support for Perl and/or Oraperl? Do you need
-a support contract with defined levels of service? Do you want to pay
-only for what you need?
-
-"The Paul Ingram Group has provided quality software development and
-support services to some of the world's largest corporations for ten
-years. We are now offering the same quality support services for Perl
-at The Perl Clinic. This service is led by Tim Bunce, an active perl
-porter since 1994 and well known as the author and maintainer of the
-DBI, DBD::Oracle, and Oraperl modules and author/co-maintainer of The
-Perl 5 Module List. We also offer Oracle users support for Perl5
-Oraperl and related modules (which Oracle is planning to ship as part
-of Oracle Web Server 3). 20% of the profit from our Perl support work
-will be donated to The Perl Institute."
-
-For more information, contact the The Perl Clinic:
-
- Tel: +44 1483 424424
- Fax: +44 1483 419419
- Web: http://www.perl.co.uk/
- Email: perl-support-info@perl.co.uk or Tim.Bunce@ig.co.uk
-
-See also www.perl.com for updates on training and support.
+=head2 What is perl.com? Perl Mongers? pm.org? perl.org? cpan.org?
-=head2 Where do I send bug reports?
+Perl.com at http://www.perl.com/ is part of the O'Reilly Network, a
+subsidiary of O'Reilly Media.
-If you are reporting a bug in the perl interpreter or the modules
-shipped with perl, use the I<perlbug> program in the perl distribution or
-mail your report to perlbug@perl.com.
+The Perl Foundation is an advocacy organization for the Perl language
+which maintains the web site http://www.perl.org/ as a general
+advocacy site for the Perl language. It uses the domain to provide
+general support services to the Perl community, including the hosting
+of mailing lists, web sites, and other services. There are also many
+other sub-domains for special topics like learning Perl, Perl news, jobs
+in Perl, such as:
-If you are posting a bug with a non-standard port (see the answer to
-"What platforms is Perl available for?"), a binary distribution, or a
-non-standard module (such as Tk, CGI, etc), then please see the
-documentation that came with it to determine the correct place to post
-bugs.
+ http://learn.perl.org/
+ http://use.perl.org/
+ http://jobs.perl.org/
+ http://lists.perl.org/
-Read the perlbug(1) man page (perl5.004 or later) for more information.
+Perl Mongers uses the pm.org domain for services related to Perl user
+groups, including the hosting of mailing lists and web sites. See the
+Perl user group web site at http://www.pm.org/ for more information about
+joining, starting, or requesting services for a Perl user group.
-=head2 What is perl.com? perl.org? The Perl Institute?
+http://www.cpan.org/ is the Comprehensive Perl Archive Network,
+a replicated worldwide repository of Perl software, see
+the I<What is CPAN?> question earlier in this document.
-The perl.com domain is managed by Tom Christiansen, who created it as a
-public service long before perl.org came about. Despite the name, it's a
-pretty non-commercial site meant to be a clearinghouse for information
-about all things Perlian, accepting no paid advertisements, bouncy
-happy gifs, or silly java applets on its pages. The Perl Home Page at
-http://www.perl.com/ is currently hosted on a T3 line courtesy of Songline
-Systems, a software-oriented subsidiary of O'Reilly and Associates.
+=head1 REVISION
-perl.org is the official vehicle for The Perl Institute. The motto of
-TPI is "helping people help Perl help people" (or something like
-that). It's a non-profit organization supporting development,
-documentation, and dissemination of perl.
+Revision: $Revision$
-=head2 How do I learn about object-oriented Perl programming?
+Date: $Date$
-L<perltoot> (distributed with 5.004 or later) is a good place to start.
-Also, L<perlobj>, L<perlref>, and L<perlmod> are useful references,
-while L<perlbot> has some excellent tips and tricks.
+See L<perlfaq> for source control details and availability.
=head1 AUTHOR AND COPYRIGHT
-Copyright (c) 1997, 1998 Tom Christiansen and Nathan Torkington.
-All rights reserved.
+Copyright (c) 1997-2009 Tom Christiansen, Nathan Torkington, and
+other authors as noted. All rights reserved.
-When included as an integrated part of the Standard Distribution
-of Perl or of its documentation (printed or otherwise), this works is
-covered under Perl's Artistic Licence. For separate distributions of
-all or part of this FAQ outside of that, see L<perlfaq>.
+This documentation is free; you can redistribute it and/or modify it
+under the same terms as Perl itself.
-Irrespective of its distribution, all code examples here are public
+Irrespective of its distribution, all code examples here are in the public
domain. You are permitted and encouraged to use this code and any
derivatives thereof in your own programs for fun or for profit as you
see fit. A simple comment in the code giving credit to the FAQ would
projects / p5sagit/p5-mst-13.2.git / blobdiff