# not using file->stat as it invokes File::stat which in turn breaks stat(_)
my ($mf_pl_mtime, $mf_mtime, $optdeps_mtime) = ( map
- { (stat ($root->file ($_)) )[9] }
+ { (stat ($root->file ($_)) )[9] || undef } # stat returns () on nonexistent files
(qw|Makefile.PL Makefile|, $optdeps)
);