120 lines
4.5 KiB
Perl
120 lines
4.5 KiB
Perl
TOC
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===
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- Notes on Perl
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- Notes on Perl on Windows
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- Notes on Perl modules we use
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- Notes on installing a perl module
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Notes on Perl
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-------------
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For our scripts, we rely quite a bit on Perl, and increasingly on
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some core Perl modules. These Perl modules are part of the Perl
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source, so if you build Perl on your own, you should be set.
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However, if you install Perl as binary packages, the outcome might
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differ, and you may have to check that you do get the core modules
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installed properly. We do not claim to know them all, but experience
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has told us the following:
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- on Linux distributions based on Debian, the package 'perl' will
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install the core Perl modules as well, so you will be fine.
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- on Linux distributions based on RPMs, you will need to install
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'perl-core' rather than just 'perl'.
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You MUST have at least Perl version 5.10.0 installed. This minimum
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requirement is due to our use of regexp backslash sequence \R among
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other features that didn't exist in core Perl before that version.
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Notes on Perl on Windows
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------------------------
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There are a number of build targets that can be viewed as "Windows".
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Indeed, there are VC-* configs targeting VisualStudio C, as well as
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MinGW and Cygwin. The key recommendation is to use "matching" Perl,
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one that matches build environment. For example, if you will build
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on Cygwin be sure to use the Cygwin package manager to install Perl.
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For MSYS builds use the MSYS provided Perl. For VC-* builds we
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recommend ActiveState Perl, available from
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http://www.activestate.com/ActivePerl.
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Notes on Perl on VMS
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--------------------
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You will need to install Perl separately. One way to do so is to
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download the source from http://perl.org/, unpacking it, reading
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README.vms and follow the instructions. Another way is to download a
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.PCSI file from http://www.vmsperl.com/ and install it using the
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POLYCENTER install tool.
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Notes on Perl modules we use
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----------------------------
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We make increasing use of Perl modules, and do our best to limit
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ourselves to core Perl modules to keep the requirements down. There
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are just a few exceptions:
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Test::More We require the minimum version to be 0.96, which
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appeared in Perl 5.13.4, because that version was
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the first to have all the features we're using.
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This module is required for testing only! If you
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don't plan on running the tests, you don't need to
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bother with this one.
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Text::Template This module is not part of the core Perl modules.
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As a matter of fact, the core Perl modules do not
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include any templating module to date.
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This module is absolutely needed, configuration
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depends on it.
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To avoid unnecessary initial hurdles, we have bundled a copy of the
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following modules in our source. They will work as fallbacks if
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these modules aren't already installed on the system.
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Text::Template
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Notes on installing a perl module
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---------------------------------
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There are a number of ways to install a perl module. In all
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descriptions below, Text::Template will server as an example.
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1. for Linux users, the easiest is to install with the use of your
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favorite package manager. Usually, all you need to do is search
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for the module name and to install the package that comes up.
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On Debian based Linux distributions, it would go like this:
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$ apt-cache search Text::Template
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...
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libtext-template-perl - perl module to process text templates
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$ sudo apt-get install libtext-template-perl
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Perl modules in Debian based distributions use package names like
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the name of the module in question, with "lib" prepended and
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"-perl" appended.
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2. Install using CPAN. This is very easy, but usually requires root
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access:
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$ cpan -i Text::Template
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Note that this runs all the tests that the module to be installed
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comes with. This is usually a smooth operation, but there are
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platforms where a failure is indicated even though the actual tests
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were successful. Should that happen, you can force an
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installation regardless (that should be safe since you've already
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seen the tests succeed!):
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$ cpan -f -i Text::Template
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Note: on VMS, you must quote any argument that contains upper case
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characters, so the lines above would be:
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$ cpan -i "Text::Template"
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and:
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$ cpan -f -i "Text::Template"
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