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1 | If you read this file _as_is_, just ignore the funny characters you |
2 | see. It is written in the POD format (see pod/perlpod.pod) which is | |
3 | specially designed to be readable as is. | |
4 | ||
5 | =head1 NAME | |
6 | ||
7 | perlwin32 - Perl under Win32 | |
8 | ||
9 | =head1 SYNOPSIS | |
10 | ||
11 | These are instructions for building Perl under Windows (9x, NT and | |
12 | 2000). | |
13 | ||
14 | =head1 DESCRIPTION | |
15 | ||
16 | Before you start, you should glance through the README file | |
0ab7fa47 | 17 | found in the top-level directory to which the Perl distribution |
a9226780 JH |
18 | was extracted. Make sure you read and understand the terms under |
19 | which this software is being distributed. | |
20 | ||
21 | Also make sure you read L<BUGS AND CAVEATS> below for the | |
22 | known limitations of this port. | |
23 | ||
24 | The INSTALL file in the perl top-level has much information that is | |
25 | only relevant to people building Perl on Unix-like systems. In | |
26 | particular, you can safely ignore any information that talks about | |
27 | "Configure". | |
28 | ||
29 | You may also want to look at two other options for building | |
30 | a perl that will work on Windows NT: the README.cygwin and | |
0ab7fa47 Y |
31 | README.os2 files, each of which give a different set of rules to |
32 | build a Perl that will work on Win32 platforms. Those two methods | |
33 | will probably enable you to build a more Unix-compatible perl, but | |
34 | you will also need to download and use various other build-time and | |
a9226780 JH |
35 | run-time support software described in those files. |
36 | ||
37 | This set of instructions is meant to describe a so-called "native" | |
38 | port of Perl to Win32 platforms. The resulting Perl requires no | |
39 | additional software to run (other than what came with your operating | |
40 | system). Currently, this port is capable of using one of the | |
41 | following compilers: | |
42 | ||
43 | Borland C++ version 5.02 or later | |
44 | Microsoft Visual C++ version 4.2 or later | |
45 | Mingw32 with GCC version 2.95.2 or better | |
46 | ||
47 | The last of these is a high quality freeware compiler. Support | |
48 | for it is still experimental. (Older versions of GCC are known | |
49 | not to work.) | |
50 | ||
51 | This port currently supports MakeMaker (the set of modules that | |
52 | is used to build extensions to perl). Therefore, you should be | |
53 | able to build and install most extensions found in the CPAN sites. | |
54 | See L<Usage Hints> below for general hints about this. | |
55 | ||
56 | =head2 Setting Up | |
57 | ||
58 | =over 4 | |
59 | ||
60 | =item Make | |
61 | ||
62 | You need a "make" program to build the sources. If you are using | |
63 | Visual C++ under Windows NT or 2000, nmake will work. All other | |
64 | builds need dmake. | |
65 | ||
66 | dmake is a freely available make that has very nice macro features | |
67 | and parallelability. | |
68 | ||
69 | A port of dmake for Windows is available from: | |
70 | ||
71 | http://www.cpan.org/authors/id/GSAR/dmake-4.1pl1-win32.zip | |
72 | ||
0ab7fa47 | 73 | (This is a fixed version of the original dmake sources obtained from |
a9226780 | 74 | http://www.wticorp.com/dmake/. As of version 4.1PL1, the original |
0ab7fa47 | 75 | sources did not build as shipped and had various other problems. |
a9226780 JH |
76 | A patch is included in the above fixed version.) |
77 | ||
78 | Fetch and install dmake somewhere on your path (follow the instructions | |
79 | in the README.NOW file). | |
80 | ||
81 | =item Command Shell | |
82 | ||
83 | Use the default "cmd" shell that comes with NT. Some versions of the | |
84 | popular 4DOS/NT shell have incompatibilities that may cause you trouble. | |
85 | If the build fails under that shell, try building again with the cmd | |
86 | shell. | |
87 | ||
88 | The nmake Makefile also has known incompatibilities with the | |
89 | "command.com" shell that comes with Windows 9x. You will need to | |
90 | use dmake and makefile.mk to build under Windows 9x. | |
91 | ||
92 | The surest way to build it is on Windows NT, using the cmd shell. | |
93 | ||
94 | Make sure the path to the build directory does not contain spaces. The | |
95 | build usually works in this circumstance, but some tests will fail. | |
96 | ||
97 | =item Borland C++ | |
98 | ||
99 | If you are using the Borland compiler, you will need dmake. | |
0ab7fa47 | 100 | (The make that Borland supplies is seriously crippled and will not |
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101 | work for MakeMaker builds.) |
102 | ||
0ab7fa47 | 103 | See L</"Make"> above. |
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104 | |
105 | =item Microsoft Visual C++ | |
106 | ||
107 | The nmake that comes with Visual C++ will suffice for building. | |
0ab7fa47 | 108 | You will need to run the VCVARS32.BAT file, usually found somewhere |
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109 | like C:\MSDEV4.2\BIN. This will set your build environment. |
110 | ||
0ab7fa47 | 111 | You can also use dmake to build using Visual C++; provided, however, |
a9226780 | 112 | you set OSRELEASE to "microsft" (or whatever the directory name |
0ab7fa47 | 113 | under which the Visual C dmake configuration lives) in your environment |
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114 | and edit win32/config.vc to change "make=nmake" into "make=dmake". The |
115 | latter step is only essential if you want to use dmake as your default | |
116 | make for building extensions using MakeMaker. | |
117 | ||
118 | =item Mingw32 with GCC | |
119 | ||
120 | GCC-2.95.2 binaries can be downloaded from: | |
121 | ||
122 | ftp://ftp.xraylith.wisc.edu/pub/khan/gnu-win32/mingw32/ | |
123 | ||
124 | The GCC-2.95.2 bundle comes with Mingw32 libraries and headers. | |
125 | ||
126 | Make sure you install the binaries that work with MSVCRT.DLL as indicated | |
127 | in the README for the GCC bundle. You may need to set up a few environment | |
0ab7fa47 | 128 | variables (usually ran from a batch file). |
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129 | |
130 | The version of gcc-2.95.2-msvcrt.exe released 7 November 1999 left out | |
131 | a fix for certain command line quotes, so be sure to download and install | |
132 | fixes/quote-fix-msvcrt.exe too. | |
133 | ||
134 | You also need dmake. See L</"Make"> above on how to get it. | |
135 | ||
136 | =back | |
137 | ||
138 | =head2 Building | |
139 | ||
140 | =over 4 | |
141 | ||
142 | =item * | |
143 | ||
144 | Make sure you are in the "win32" subdirectory under the perl toplevel. | |
145 | This directory contains a "Makefile" that will work with | |
146 | versions of nmake that come with Visual C++, and a dmake "makefile.mk" | |
147 | that will work for all supported compilers. The defaults in the dmake | |
148 | makefile are setup to build using the GCC compiler. | |
149 | ||
150 | =item * | |
151 | ||
0ab7fa47 Y |
152 | Edit the makefile.mk (or Makefile, if you're using nmake) and change |
153 | the values of INST_DRV and INST_TOP. You can also enable various | |
154 | build flags. These are explained in the makefiles. | |
a9226780 | 155 | |
0ab7fa47 Y |
156 | You will have to make sure that CCTYPE is set correctly and that |
157 | CCHOME points to wherever you installed your compiler. | |
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158 | |
159 | The default value for CCHOME in the makefiles for Visual C++ | |
160 | may not be correct for some versions. Make sure the default exists | |
161 | and is valid. | |
162 | ||
163 | If you have either the source or a library that contains des_fcrypt(), | |
164 | enable the appropriate option in the makefile. des_fcrypt() is not | |
165 | bundled with the distribution due to US Government restrictions | |
166 | on the export of cryptographic software. Nevertheless, this routine | |
167 | is part of the "libdes" library (written by Eric Young) which is widely | |
0ab7fa47 | 168 | available worldwide, usually along with SSLeay (for example, |
a9226780 JH |
169 | "ftp://fractal.mta.ca/pub/crypto/SSLeay/DES/"). Set CRYPT_SRC to the |
170 | name of the file that implements des_fcrypt(). Alternatively, if | |
171 | you have built a library that contains des_fcrypt(), you can set | |
172 | CRYPT_LIB to point to the library name. The location above contains | |
173 | many versions of the "libdes" library, all with slightly different | |
174 | implementations of des_fcrypt(). Older versions have a single, | |
175 | self-contained file (fcrypt.c) that implements crypt(), so they may be | |
176 | easier to use. A patch against the fcrypt.c found in libdes-3.06 is | |
177 | in des_fcrypt.patch. | |
178 | ||
179 | Perl will also build without des_fcrypt(), but the crypt() builtin will | |
180 | fail at run time. | |
181 | ||
182 | Be sure to read the instructions near the top of the makefiles carefully. | |
183 | ||
184 | =item * | |
185 | ||
186 | Type "dmake" (or "nmake" if you are using that make). | |
187 | ||
188 | This should build everything. Specifically, it will create perl.exe, | |
189 | perl56.dll at the perl toplevel, and various other extension dll's | |
190 | under the lib\auto directory. If the build fails for any reason, make | |
191 | sure you have done the previous steps correctly. | |
192 | ||
193 | =back | |
194 | ||
195 | =head2 Testing | |
196 | ||
197 | Type "dmake test" (or "nmake test"). This will run most of the tests from | |
198 | the testsuite (many tests will be skipped). | |
199 | ||
200 | There should be no test failures when running under Windows NT 4.0 or | |
201 | Windows 2000. Many tests I<will> fail under Windows 9x due to the inferior | |
202 | command shell. | |
203 | ||
204 | Some test failures may occur if you use a command shell other than the | |
205 | native "cmd.exe", or if you are building from a path that contains | |
206 | spaces. So don't do that. | |
207 | ||
208 | If you are running the tests from a emacs shell window, you may see | |
209 | failures in op/stat.t. Run "dmake test-notty" in that case. | |
210 | ||
211 | If you're using the Borland compiler, you may see a failure in op/taint.t | |
212 | arising from the inability to find the Borland Runtime DLLs on the system | |
213 | default path. You will need to copy the DLLs reported by the messages | |
214 | from where Borland chose to install it, into the Windows system directory | |
0ab7fa47 | 215 | (usually somewhere like C:\WINNT\SYSTEM32) and rerun the test. |
a9226780 | 216 | |
cbebf344 JH |
217 | If you're using Borland compiler versions 5.2 and below, you're risking |
218 | to face a problem with finding incorrect header files. Don't be surprised | |
219 | when during compiling perl extension "Tk" you will fail because both perl | |
220 | and tk contain a header file with same name - "patchlevel.h". The latest | |
221 | Borland compilers are free of this misbehaviour, and they even invented | |
222 | option -VI- for backward (bugward) compatibility as "Use old Borland | |
223 | search algorithm to locate header files". | |
224 | ||
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225 | Please report any other failures as described under L<BUGS AND CAVEATS>. |
226 | ||
227 | =head2 Installation | |
228 | ||
229 | Type "dmake install" (or "nmake install"). This will put the newly | |
230 | built perl and the libraries under whatever C<INST_TOP> points to in the | |
231 | Makefile. It will also install the pod documentation under | |
232 | C<$INST_TOP\$VERSION\lib\pod> and HTML versions of the same under | |
233 | C<$INST_TOP\$VERSION\lib\pod\html>. To use the Perl you just installed, | |
234 | you will need to add two components to your PATH environment variable, | |
0ab7fa47 | 235 | C<$INST_TOP\$VERSION\bin> and C<$INST_TOP\$VERSION\bin\$ARCHNAME>. |
a9226780 JH |
236 | For example: |
237 | ||
238 | set PATH c:\perl\5.6.0\bin;c:\perl\5.6.0\bin\MSWin32-x86;%PATH% | |
239 | ||
240 | If you opt to comment out INST_VER and INST_ARCH in the makefiles, the | |
241 | installation structure is much simpler. In that case, it will be | |
242 | sufficient to add a single entry to the path, for instance: | |
243 | ||
244 | set PATH c:\perl\bin;%PATH% | |
245 | ||
246 | =head2 Usage Hints | |
247 | ||
248 | =over 4 | |
249 | ||
250 | =item Environment Variables | |
251 | ||
252 | The installation paths that you set during the build get compiled | |
253 | into perl, so you don't have to do anything additional to start | |
254 | using that perl (except add its location to your PATH variable). | |
255 | ||
256 | If you put extensions in unusual places, you can set PERL5LIB | |
257 | to a list of paths separated by semicolons where you want perl | |
258 | to look for libraries. Look for descriptions of other environment | |
259 | variables you can set in L<perlrun>. | |
260 | ||
261 | You can also control the shell that perl uses to run system() and | |
262 | backtick commands via PERL5SHELL. See L<perlrun>. | |
263 | ||
264 | Perl does not depend on the registry, but it can look up certain default | |
265 | values if you choose to put them there. Perl attempts to read entries from | |
266 | C<HKEY_CURRENT_USER\Software\Perl> and C<HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\Software\Perl>. | |
267 | Entries in the former override entries in the latter. One or more of the | |
268 | following entries (of type REG_SZ or REG_EXPAND_SZ) may be set: | |
269 | ||
270 | lib-$] version-specific standard library path to add to @INC | |
271 | lib standard library path to add to @INC | |
272 | sitelib-$] version-specific site library path to add to @INC | |
273 | sitelib site library path to add to @INC | |
274 | vendorlib-$] version-specific vendor library path to add to @INC | |
275 | vendorlib vendor library path to add to @INC | |
276 | PERL* fallback for all %ENV lookups that begin with "PERL" | |
277 | ||
278 | Note the C<$]> in the above is not literal. Substitute whatever version | |
279 | of perl you want to honor that entry, e.g. C<5.6.0>. Paths must be | |
280 | separated with semicolons, as usual on win32. | |
281 | ||
282 | =item File Globbing | |
283 | ||
284 | By default, perl handles file globbing using the File::Glob extension, | |
285 | which provides portable globbing. | |
286 | ||
287 | If you want perl to use globbing that emulates the quirks of DOS | |
288 | filename conventions, you might want to consider using File::DosGlob | |
289 | to override the internal glob() implementation. See L<File::DosGlob> for | |
290 | details. | |
291 | ||
292 | =item Using perl from the command line | |
293 | ||
294 | If you are accustomed to using perl from various command-line | |
295 | shells found in UNIX environments, you will be less than pleased | |
296 | with what Windows offers by way of a command shell. | |
297 | ||
298 | The crucial thing to understand about the Windows environment is that | |
299 | the command line you type in is processed twice before Perl sees it. | |
300 | First, your command shell (usually CMD.EXE on Windows NT, and | |
301 | COMMAND.COM on Windows 9x) preprocesses the command line, to handle | |
302 | redirection, environment variable expansion, and location of the | |
303 | executable to run. Then, the perl executable splits the remaining | |
304 | command line into individual arguments, using the C runtime library | |
305 | upon which Perl was built. | |
306 | ||
307 | It is particularly important to note that neither the shell nor the C | |
308 | runtime do any wildcard expansions of command-line arguments (so | |
309 | wildcards need not be quoted). Also, the quoting behaviours of the | |
310 | shell and the C runtime are rudimentary at best (and may, if you are | |
311 | using a non-standard shell, be inconsistent). The only (useful) quote | |
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312 | character is the double quote ("). It can be used to protect spaces |
313 | and other special characters in arguments. | |
314 | ||
315 | The Windows NT documentation has almost no description of how the | |
316 | quoting rules are implemented, but here are some general observations | |
317 | based on experiments: The C runtime breaks arguments at spaces and | |
318 | passes them to programs in argc/argv. Double quotes can be used to | |
319 | prevent arguments with spaces in them from being split up. You can | |
320 | put a double quote in an argument by escaping it with a backslash and | |
321 | enclosing the whole argument within double quotes. The backslash and | |
322 | the pair of double quotes surrounding the argument will be stripped by | |
323 | the C runtime. | |
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324 | |
325 | The file redirection characters "<", ">", and "|" can be quoted by | |
326 | double quotes (although there are suggestions that this may not always | |
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327 | be true). Single quotes are not treated as quotes by the shell or |
328 | the C runtime, they don't get stripped by the shell (just to make | |
329 | this type of quoting completely useless). The caret "^" has also | |
330 | been observed to behave as a quoting character, but this appears | |
331 | to be a shell feature, and the caret is not stripped from the command | |
332 | line, so Perl still sees it (and the C runtime phase does not treat | |
333 | the caret as a quote character). | |
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334 | |
335 | Here are some examples of usage of the "cmd" shell: | |
336 | ||
337 | This prints two doublequotes: | |
338 | ||
339 | perl -e "print '\"\"' " | |
340 | ||
341 | This does the same: | |
342 | ||
343 | perl -e "print \"\\\"\\\"\" " | |
344 | ||
345 | This prints "bar" and writes "foo" to the file "blurch": | |
346 | ||
347 | perl -e "print 'foo'; print STDERR 'bar'" > blurch | |
348 | ||
349 | This prints "foo" ("bar" disappears into nowhereland): | |
350 | ||
351 | perl -e "print 'foo'; print STDERR 'bar'" 2> nul | |
352 | ||
353 | This prints "bar" and writes "foo" into the file "blurch": | |
354 | ||
355 | perl -e "print 'foo'; print STDERR 'bar'" 1> blurch | |
356 | ||
357 | This pipes "foo" to the "less" pager and prints "bar" on the console: | |
358 | ||
359 | perl -e "print 'foo'; print STDERR 'bar'" | less | |
360 | ||
361 | This pipes "foo\nbar\n" to the less pager: | |
362 | ||
363 | perl -le "print 'foo'; print STDERR 'bar'" 2>&1 | less | |
364 | ||
365 | This pipes "foo" to the pager and writes "bar" in the file "blurch": | |
366 | ||
367 | perl -e "print 'foo'; print STDERR 'bar'" 2> blurch | less | |
368 | ||
369 | ||
370 | Discovering the usefulness of the "command.com" shell on Windows 9x | |
371 | is left as an exercise to the reader :) | |
372 | ||
373 | One particularly pernicious problem with the 4NT command shell for | |
374 | Windows NT is that it (nearly) always treats a % character as indicating | |
375 | that environment variable expansion is needed. Under this shell, it is | |
376 | therefore important to always double any % characters which you want | |
377 | Perl to see (for example, for hash variables), even when they are | |
378 | quoted. | |
379 | ||
380 | =item Building Extensions | |
381 | ||
382 | The Comprehensive Perl Archive Network (CPAN) offers a wealth | |
383 | of extensions, some of which require a C compiler to build. | |
384 | Look in http://www.cpan.org/ for more information on CPAN. | |
385 | ||
386 | Note that not all of the extensions available from CPAN may work | |
387 | in the Win32 environment; you should check the information at | |
388 | http://testers.cpan.org/ before investing too much effort into | |
389 | porting modules that don't readily build. | |
390 | ||
391 | Most extensions (whether they require a C compiler or not) can | |
392 | be built, tested and installed with the standard mantra: | |
393 | ||
394 | perl Makefile.PL | |
395 | $MAKE | |
396 | $MAKE test | |
397 | $MAKE install | |
398 | ||
399 | where $MAKE is whatever 'make' program you have configured perl to | |
400 | use. Use "perl -V:make" to find out what this is. Some extensions | |
0ab7fa47 | 401 | may not provide a testsuite (so "$MAKE test" may not do anything or |
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402 | fail), but most serious ones do. |
403 | ||
404 | It is important that you use a supported 'make' program, and | |
405 | ensure Config.pm knows about it. If you don't have nmake, you can | |
0ab7fa47 | 406 | either get dmake from the location mentioned earlier or get an |
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407 | old version of nmake reportedly available from: |
408 | ||
409 | ftp://ftp.microsoft.com/Softlib/MSLFILES/nmake15.exe | |
410 | ||
411 | Another option is to use the make written in Perl, available from | |
412 | CPAN: | |
413 | ||
414 | http://www.cpan.org/authors/id/NI-S/Make-0.03.tar.gz | |
415 | ||
416 | You may also use dmake. See L</"Make"> above on how to get it. | |
417 | ||
418 | Note that MakeMaker actually emits makefiles with different syntax | |
419 | depending on what 'make' it thinks you are using. Therefore, it is | |
420 | important that one of the following values appears in Config.pm: | |
421 | ||
422 | make='nmake' # MakeMaker emits nmake syntax | |
423 | make='dmake' # MakeMaker emits dmake syntax | |
424 | any other value # MakeMaker emits generic make syntax | |
425 | (e.g GNU make, or Perl make) | |
426 | ||
427 | If the value doesn't match the 'make' program you want to use, | |
428 | edit Config.pm to fix it. | |
429 | ||
430 | If a module implements XSUBs, you will need one of the supported | |
431 | C compilers. You must make sure you have set up the environment for | |
432 | the compiler for command-line compilation. | |
433 | ||
434 | If a module does not build for some reason, look carefully for | |
435 | why it failed, and report problems to the module author. If | |
436 | it looks like the extension building support is at fault, report | |
437 | that with full details of how the build failed using the perlbug | |
438 | utility. | |
439 | ||
440 | =item Command-line Wildcard Expansion | |
441 | ||
442 | The default command shells on DOS descendant operating systems (such | |
443 | as they are) usually do not expand wildcard arguments supplied to | |
444 | programs. They consider it the application's job to handle that. | |
445 | This is commonly achieved by linking the application (in our case, | |
446 | perl) with startup code that the C runtime libraries usually provide. | |
447 | However, doing that results in incompatible perl versions (since the | |
448 | behavior of the argv expansion code differs depending on the | |
449 | compiler, and it is even buggy on some compilers). Besides, it may | |
450 | be a source of frustration if you use such a perl binary with an | |
451 | alternate shell that *does* expand wildcards. | |
452 | ||
453 | Instead, the following solution works rather well. The nice things | |
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454 | about it are 1) you can start using it right away; 2) it is more |
455 | powerful, because it will do the right thing with a pattern like | |
456 | */*/*.c; 3) you can decide whether you do/don't want to use it; and | |
457 | 4) you can extend the method to add any customizations (or even | |
458 | entirely different kinds of wildcard expansion). | |
a9226780 JH |
459 | |
460 | C:\> copy con c:\perl\lib\Wild.pm | |
461 | # Wild.pm - emulate shell @ARGV expansion on shells that don't | |
462 | use File::DosGlob; | |
463 | @ARGV = map { | |
464 | my @g = File::DosGlob::glob($_) if /[*?]/; | |
465 | @g ? @g : $_; | |
466 | } @ARGV; | |
467 | 1; | |
468 | ^Z | |
469 | C:\> set PERL5OPT=-MWild | |
470 | C:\> perl -le "for (@ARGV) { print }" */*/perl*.c | |
471 | p4view/perl/perl.c | |
472 | p4view/perl/perlio.c | |
473 | p4view/perl/perly.c | |
474 | perl5.005/win32/perlglob.c | |
475 | perl5.005/win32/perllib.c | |
476 | perl5.005/win32/perlglob.c | |
477 | perl5.005/win32/perllib.c | |
478 | perl5.005/win32/perlglob.c | |
479 | perl5.005/win32/perllib.c | |
480 | ||
481 | Note there are two distinct steps there: 1) You'll have to create | |
482 | Wild.pm and put it in your perl lib directory. 2) You'll need to | |
483 | set the PERL5OPT environment variable. If you want argv expansion | |
484 | to be the default, just set PERL5OPT in your default startup | |
485 | environment. | |
486 | ||
487 | If you are using the Visual C compiler, you can get the C runtime's | |
488 | command line wildcard expansion built into perl binary. The resulting | |
489 | binary will always expand unquoted command lines, which may not be | |
490 | what you want if you use a shell that does that for you. The expansion | |
491 | done is also somewhat less powerful than the approach suggested above. | |
492 | ||
493 | =item Win32 Specific Extensions | |
494 | ||
495 | A number of extensions specific to the Win32 platform are available | |
496 | from CPAN. You may find that many of these extensions are meant to | |
497 | be used under the Activeware port of Perl, which used to be the only | |
498 | native port for the Win32 platform. Since the Activeware port does not | |
499 | have adequate support for Perl's extension building tools, these | |
0ab7fa47 | 500 | extensions typically do not support those tools either and, therefore, |
a9226780 JH |
501 | cannot be built using the generic steps shown in the previous section. |
502 | ||
503 | To ensure smooth transitioning of existing code that uses the | |
504 | ActiveState port, there is a bundle of Win32 extensions that contains | |
505 | all of the ActiveState extensions and most other Win32 extensions from | |
506 | CPAN in source form, along with many added bugfixes, and with MakeMaker | |
507 | support. This bundle is available at: | |
508 | ||
509 | http://www.cpan.org/authors/id/GSAR/libwin32-0.151.zip | |
510 | ||
511 | See the README in that distribution for building and installation | |
512 | instructions. Look for later versions that may be available at the | |
513 | same location. | |
514 | ||
515 | =item Running Perl Scripts | |
516 | ||
517 | Perl scripts on UNIX use the "#!" (a.k.a "shebang") line to | |
518 | indicate to the OS that it should execute the file using perl. | |
519 | Win32 has no comparable means to indicate arbitrary files are | |
520 | executables. | |
521 | ||
522 | Instead, all available methods to execute plain text files on | |
523 | Win32 rely on the file "extension". There are three methods | |
524 | to use this to execute perl scripts: | |
525 | ||
526 | =over 8 | |
527 | ||
528 | =item 1 | |
529 | ||
530 | There is a facility called "file extension associations" that will | |
531 | work in Windows NT 4.0. This can be manipulated via the two | |
532 | commands "assoc" and "ftype" that come standard with Windows NT | |
533 | 4.0. Type "ftype /?" for a complete example of how to set this | |
534 | up for perl scripts (Say what? You thought Windows NT wasn't | |
535 | perl-ready? :). | |
536 | ||
537 | =item 2 | |
538 | ||
539 | Since file associations don't work everywhere, and there are | |
540 | reportedly bugs with file associations where it does work, the | |
541 | old method of wrapping the perl script to make it look like a | |
542 | regular batch file to the OS, may be used. The install process | |
543 | makes available the "pl2bat.bat" script which can be used to wrap | |
544 | perl scripts into batch files. For example: | |
545 | ||
546 | pl2bat foo.pl | |
547 | ||
548 | will create the file "FOO.BAT". Note "pl2bat" strips any | |
549 | .pl suffix and adds a .bat suffix to the generated file. | |
550 | ||
551 | If you use the 4DOS/NT or similar command shell, note that | |
552 | "pl2bat" uses the "%*" variable in the generated batch file to | |
553 | refer to all the command line arguments, so you may need to make | |
554 | sure that construct works in batch files. As of this writing, | |
555 | 4DOS/NT users will need a "ParameterChar = *" statement in their | |
0ab7fa47 | 556 | 4NT.INI file or will need to execute "setdos /p*" in the 4DOS/NT |
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557 | startup file to enable this to work. |
558 | ||
559 | =item 3 | |
560 | ||
561 | Using "pl2bat" has a few problems: the file name gets changed, | |
562 | so scripts that rely on C<$0> to find what they must do may not | |
563 | run properly; running "pl2bat" replicates the contents of the | |
564 | original script, and so this process can be maintenance intensive | |
565 | if the originals get updated often. A different approach that | |
566 | avoids both problems is possible. | |
567 | ||
568 | A script called "runperl.bat" is available that can be copied | |
569 | to any filename (along with the .bat suffix). For example, | |
570 | if you call it "foo.bat", it will run the file "foo" when it is | |
571 | executed. Since you can run batch files on Win32 platforms simply | |
572 | by typing the name (without the extension), this effectively | |
573 | runs the file "foo", when you type either "foo" or "foo.bat". | |
574 | With this method, "foo.bat" can even be in a different location | |
575 | than the file "foo", as long as "foo" is available somewhere on | |
576 | the PATH. If your scripts are on a filesystem that allows symbolic | |
577 | links, you can even avoid copying "runperl.bat". | |
578 | ||
579 | Here's a diversion: copy "runperl.bat" to "runperl", and type | |
580 | "runperl". Explain the observed behavior, or lack thereof. :) | |
581 | Hint: .gnidnats llits er'uoy fi ,"lrepnur" eteled :tniH | |
582 | ||
583 | =back | |
584 | ||
585 | =item Miscellaneous Things | |
586 | ||
587 | A full set of HTML documentation is installed, so you should be | |
588 | able to use it if you have a web browser installed on your | |
589 | system. | |
590 | ||
591 | C<perldoc> is also a useful tool for browsing information contained | |
592 | in the documentation, especially in conjunction with a pager | |
593 | like C<less> (recent versions of which have Win32 support). You may | |
594 | have to set the PAGER environment variable to use a specific pager. | |
595 | "perldoc -f foo" will print information about the perl operator | |
596 | "foo". | |
597 | ||
598 | If you find bugs in perl, you can run C<perlbug> to create a | |
599 | bug report (you may have to send it manually if C<perlbug> cannot | |
600 | find a mailer on your system). | |
601 | ||
602 | =back | |
603 | ||
604 | =head1 BUGS AND CAVEATS | |
605 | ||
3789aae2 NIS |
606 | Norton AntiVirus interferes with the build process, particularly if |
607 | set to "AutoProtect, All Files, when Opened". Unlike large applications | |
608 | the perl build process opens and modifies a lot of files. Having the | |
609 | the AntiVirus scan each and every one slows build the process significantly. | |
610 | Worse, with PERLIO=stdio the build process fails with peculiar messages | |
611 | as the virus checker interacts badly with miniperl.exe writing configure | |
612 | files (it seems to either catch file part written and treat it as suspicious, | |
613 | or virus checker may have it "locked" in a way which inhibits miniperl | |
614 | updating it). The build does complete with | |
615 | ||
616 | set PERLIO=perlio | |
617 | ||
618 | but that may be just luck. Other AntiVirus software may have similar issues. | |
619 | ||
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620 | Some of the built-in functions do not act exactly as documented in |
621 | L<perlfunc>, and a few are not implemented at all. To avoid | |
622 | surprises, particularly if you have had prior exposure to Perl | |
623 | in other operating environments or if you intend to write code | |
0ab7fa47 | 624 | that will be portable to other environments. See L<perlport> |
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625 | for a reasonably definitive list of these differences. |
626 | ||
627 | Not all extensions available from CPAN may build or work properly | |
628 | in the Win32 environment. See L</"Building Extensions">. | |
629 | ||
630 | Most C<socket()> related calls are supported, but they may not | |
631 | behave as on Unix platforms. See L<perlport> for the full list. | |
632 | ||
633 | Signal handling may not behave as on Unix platforms (where it | |
634 | doesn't exactly "behave", either :). For instance, calling C<die()> | |
635 | or C<exit()> from signal handlers will cause an exception, since most | |
636 | implementations of C<signal()> on Win32 are severely crippled. | |
637 | Thus, signals may work only for simple things like setting a flag | |
638 | variable in the handler. Using signals under this port should | |
639 | currently be considered unsupported. | |
640 | ||
641 | Please send detailed descriptions of any problems and solutions that | |
642 | you may find to <F<perlbug@perl.com>>, along with the output produced | |
643 | by C<perl -V>. | |
644 | ||
645 | =head1 AUTHORS | |
646 | ||
647 | =over 4 | |
648 | ||
13a2d996 | 649 | =item Gary Ng E<lt>71564.1743@CompuServe.COME<gt> |
a9226780 | 650 | |
13a2d996 | 651 | =item Gurusamy Sarathy E<lt>gsar@activestate.comE<gt> |
a9226780 | 652 | |
3789aae2 | 653 | =item Nick Ing-Simmons E<lt>nick@ing-simmons.netE<gt> |
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654 | |
655 | =back | |
656 | ||
657 | This document is maintained by Gurusamy Sarathy. | |
658 | ||
659 | =head1 SEE ALSO | |
660 | ||
661 | L<perl> | |
662 | ||
663 | =head1 HISTORY | |
664 | ||
665 | This port was originally contributed by Gary Ng around 5.003_24, | |
666 | and borrowed from the Hip Communications port that was available | |
667 | at the time. Various people have made numerous and sundry hacks | |
668 | since then. | |
669 | ||
670 | Borland support was added in 5.004_01 (Gurusamy Sarathy). | |
671 | ||
672 | GCC/mingw32 support was added in 5.005 (Nick Ing-Simmons). | |
673 | ||
674 | Support for PERL_OBJECT was added in 5.005 (ActiveState Tool Corp). | |
675 | ||
676 | Support for fork() emulation was added in 5.6 (ActiveState Tool Corp). | |
677 | ||
678 | Win9x support was added in 5.6 (Benjamin Stuhl). | |
679 | ||
3789aae2 | 680 | Last updated: 22 November 2000 |
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681 | |
682 | =cut |