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68dc0745 | 1 | =head1 NAME |
2 | ||
90bb42f6 | 3 | perlfaq2 - Obtaining and Learning about Perl ($Revision: 1.32 $, $Date: 1999/10/14 18:46:09 $) |
68dc0745 | 4 | |
5 | =head1 DESCRIPTION | |
6 | ||
7 | This section of the FAQ answers questions about where to find | |
92c2ed05 | 8 | source and documentation for Perl, support, and |
68dc0745 | 9 | related matters. |
10 | ||
11 | =head2 What machines support Perl? Where do I get it? | |
12 | ||
13 | The standard release of Perl (the one maintained by the perl | |
5e3006a4 | 14 | development team) is distributed only in source code form. You |
65acb1b1 | 15 | can find this at http://www.perl.com/CPAN/src/latest.tar.gz , which |
5e3006a4 GS |
16 | in standard Internet format (a gzipped archive in POSIX tar format). |
17 | ||
18 | Perl builds and runs on a bewildering number of platforms. Virtually | |
19 | all known and current Unix derivatives are supported (Perl's native | |
87275199 | 20 | platform), as are other systems like VMS, DOS, OS/2, Windows, |
5e3006a4 GS |
21 | QNX, BeOS, and the Amiga. There are also the beginnings of support |
22 | for MPE/iX. | |
23 | ||
24 | Binary distributions for some proprietary platforms, including | |
65acb1b1 | 25 | Apple systems, can be found http://www.perl.com/CPAN/ports/ directory. |
5e3006a4 GS |
26 | Because these are not part of the standard distribution, they may |
27 | and in fact do differ from the base Perl port in a variety of ways. | |
28 | You'll have to check their respective release notes to see just | |
29 | what the differences are. These differences can be either positive | |
30 | (e.g. extensions for the features of the particular platform that | |
31 | are not supported in the source release of perl) or negative (e.g. | |
32 | might be based upon a less current source release of perl). | |
92c2ed05 | 33 | |
68dc0745 | 34 | =head2 How can I get a binary version of Perl? |
35 | ||
65acb1b1 TC |
36 | If you don't have a C compiler because your vendor for whatever |
37 | reasons did not include one with your system, the best thing to do is | |
68dc0745 | 38 | grab a binary version of gcc from the net and use that to compile perl |
39 | with. CPAN only has binaries for systems that are terribly hard to | |
40 | get free compilers for, not for Unix systems. | |
41 | ||
65acb1b1 TC |
42 | Some URLs that might help you are: |
43 | ||
44 | http://language.perl.com/info/software.html | |
45 | http://www.perl.com/latest/ | |
46 | http://www.perl.com/CPAN/ports/ | |
47 | ||
87275199 | 48 | Someone looking for a Perl for Win16 might look to Laszlo Molnar's djgpp |
d92eb7b0 GS |
49 | port in http://www.perl.com/CPAN/ports/msdos/ , which comes with clear |
50 | installation instructions. A simple installation guide for MS-DOS using | |
87275199 GS |
51 | Ilya Zakharevich's OS/2 port is available at |
52 | http://www.cs.ruu.nl/%7Epiet/perl5dos.html | |
53 | and similarly for Windows 3.1 at http://www.cs.ruu.nl/%7Epiet/perlwin3.html . | |
3fe9a6f1 | 54 | |
55 | =head2 I don't have a C compiler on my system. How can I compile perl? | |
56 | ||
57 | Since you don't have a C compiler, you're doomed and your vendor | |
58 | should be sacrificed to the Sun gods. But that doesn't help you. | |
59 | ||
60 | What you need to do is get a binary version of gcc for your system | |
61 | first. Consult the Usenet FAQs for your operating system for | |
62 | information on where to get such a binary version. | |
63 | ||
68dc0745 | 64 | =head2 I copied the Perl binary from one machine to another, but scripts don't work. |
65 | ||
66 | That's probably because you forgot libraries, or library paths differ. | |
67 | You really should build the whole distribution on the machine it will | |
68 | eventually live on, and then type C<make install>. Most other | |
69 | approaches are doomed to failure. | |
70 | ||
71 | One simple way to check that things are in the right place is to print out | |
46fc3d4c | 72 | the hard-coded @INC which perl is looking for. |
68dc0745 | 73 | |
65acb1b1 | 74 | % perl -e 'print join("\n",@INC)' |
68dc0745 | 75 | |
76 | If this command lists any paths which don't exist on your system, then you | |
77 | may need to move the appropriate libraries to these locations, or create | |
87275199 | 78 | symbolic links, aliases, or shortcuts appropriately. @INC is also printed as |
65acb1b1 TC |
79 | part of the output of |
80 | ||
81 | % perl -V | |
68dc0745 | 82 | |
3fe9a6f1 | 83 | You might also want to check out L<perlfaq8/"How do I keep my own |
84 | module/library directory?">. | |
85 | ||
68dc0745 | 86 | =head2 I grabbed the sources and tried to compile but gdbm/dynamic loading/malloc/linking/... failed. How do I make it work? |
87 | ||
88 | Read the F<INSTALL> file, which is part of the source distribution. | |
65acb1b1 | 89 | It describes in detail how to cope with most idiosyncrasies that the |
68dc0745 | 90 | Configure script can't work around for any given system or |
91 | architecture. | |
92 | ||
93 | =head2 What modules and extensions are available for Perl? What is CPAN? What does CPAN/src/... mean? | |
94 | ||
95 | CPAN stands for Comprehensive Perl Archive Network, a huge archive | |
96 | replicated on dozens of machines all over the world. CPAN contains | |
46fc3d4c | 97 | source code, non-native ports, documentation, scripts, and many |
68dc0745 | 98 | third-party modules and extensions, designed for everything from |
99 | commercial database interfaces to keyboard/screen control to web | |
100 | walking and CGI scripts. The master machine for CPAN is | |
101 | ftp://ftp.funet.fi/pub/languages/perl/CPAN/, but you can use the | |
102 | address http://www.perl.com/CPAN/CPAN.html to fetch a copy from a | |
103 | "site near you". See http://www.perl.com/CPAN (without a slash at the | |
104 | end) for how this process works. | |
105 | ||
106 | CPAN/path/... is a naming convention for files available on CPAN | |
107 | sites. CPAN indicates the base directory of a CPAN mirror, and the | |
108 | rest of the path is the path from that directory to the file. For | |
109 | instance, if you're using ftp://ftp.funet.fi/pub/languages/perl/CPAN | |
110 | as your CPAN site, the file CPAN/misc/japh file is downloadable as | |
111 | ftp://ftp.funet.fi/pub/languages/perl/CPAN/misc/japh . | |
112 | ||
113 | Considering that there are hundreds of existing modules in the | |
114 | archive, one probably exists to do nearly anything you can think of. | |
87275199 | 115 | Current categories under CPAN/modules/by-category/ include Perl core |
68dc0745 | 116 | modules; development support; operating system interfaces; networking, |
117 | devices, and interprocess communication; data type utilities; database | |
118 | interfaces; user interfaces; interfaces to other languages; filenames, | |
119 | file systems, and file locking; internationalization and locale; world | |
120 | wide web support; server and daemon utilities; archiving and | |
121 | compression; image manipulation; mail and news; control flow | |
122 | utilities; filehandle and I/O; Microsoft Windows modules; and | |
123 | miscellaneous modules. | |
124 | ||
125 | =head2 Is there an ISO or ANSI certified version of Perl? | |
126 | ||
127 | Certainly not. Larry expects that he'll be certified before Perl is. | |
128 | ||
129 | =head2 Where can I get information on Perl? | |
130 | ||
87275199 GS |
131 | The complete Perl documentation is available with the Perl distribution. |
132 | If you have Perl installed locally, you probably have the documentation | |
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133 | installed as well: type C<man perl> if you're on a system resembling Unix. |
134 | This will lead you to other important man pages, including how to set your | |
135 | $MANPATH. If you're not on a Unix system, access to the documentation | |
136 | will be different; for example, it might be only in HTML format. But all | |
87275199 | 137 | proper Perl installations have fully-accessible documentation. |
68dc0745 | 138 | |
139 | You might also try C<perldoc perl> in case your system doesn't | |
140 | have a proper man command, or it's been misinstalled. If that doesn't | |
141 | work, try looking in /usr/local/lib/perl5/pod for documentation. | |
142 | ||
143 | If all else fails, consult the CPAN/doc directory, which contains the | |
144 | complete documentation in various formats, including native pod, | |
145 | troff, html, and plain text. There's also a web page at | |
146 | http://www.perl.com/perl/info/documentation.html that might help. | |
147 | ||
68dc0745 | 148 | Many good books have been written about Perl -- see the section below |
149 | for more details. | |
150 | ||
65acb1b1 TC |
151 | Tutorial documents are included in current or upcoming Perl releases |
152 | include L<perltoot> for objects, L<perlopentut> for file opening | |
153 | semantics, L<perlreftut> for managing references, and L<perlxstut> | |
154 | for linking C and Perl together. There may be more by the | |
155 | time you read this. The following URLs might also be of | |
156 | assistance: | |
157 | ||
158 | http://language.perl.com/info/documentation.html | |
159 | http://reference.perl.com/query.cgi?tutorials | |
160 | ||
87275199 | 161 | =head2 What are the Perl newsgroups on Usenet? Where do I post questions? |
68dc0745 | 162 | |
163 | The now defunct comp.lang.perl newsgroup has been superseded by the | |
164 | following groups: | |
165 | ||
166 | comp.lang.perl.announce Moderated announcement group | |
167 | comp.lang.perl.misc Very busy group about Perl in general | |
5a964f20 | 168 | comp.lang.perl.moderated Moderated discussion group |
68dc0745 | 169 | comp.lang.perl.modules Use and development of Perl modules |
170 | comp.lang.perl.tk Using Tk (and X) from Perl | |
171 | ||
172 | comp.infosystems.www.authoring.cgi Writing CGI scripts for the Web. | |
173 | ||
87275199 | 174 | There is also Usenet gateway to the mailing list used by the crack |
68dc0745 | 175 | Perl development team (perl5-porters) at |
5a964f20 | 176 | news://news.perl.com/perl.porters-gw/ . |
68dc0745 | 177 | |
178 | =head2 Where should I post source code? | |
179 | ||
65acb1b1 TC |
180 | You should post source code to whichever group is most appropriate, but |
181 | feel free to cross-post to comp.lang.perl.misc. If you want to cross-post | |
182 | to alt.sources, please make sure it follows their posting standards, | |
183 | including setting the Followup-To header line to NOT include alt.sources; | |
184 | see their FAQ (http://www.faqs.org/faqs/alt-sources-intro/) for details. | |
68dc0745 | 185 | |
87275199 GS |
186 | If you're just looking for software, first use AltaVista |
187 | (http://www.altavista.com), Deja (http://www.deja.com), and | |
5a964f20 TC |
188 | search CPAN. This is faster and more productive than just posting |
189 | a request. | |
190 | ||
68dc0745 | 191 | =head2 Perl Books |
192 | ||
7b8d334a | 193 | A number of books on Perl and/or CGI programming are available. A few of |
87275199 | 194 | these are good, some are OK, but many aren't worth your money. Tom |
68dc0745 | 195 | Christiansen maintains a list of these books, some with extensive |
196 | reviews, at http://www.perl.com/perl/critiques/index.html. | |
197 | ||
5e3006a4 GS |
198 | The incontestably definitive reference book on Perl, written by |
199 | the creator of Perl, is now in its second edition: | |
68dc0745 | 200 | |
201 | Programming Perl (the "Camel Book"): | |
65acb1b1 | 202 | by Larry Wall, Tom Christiansen, and Randal Schwartz |
68dc0745 | 203 | ISBN 1-56592-149-6 (English) |
204 | ISBN 4-89052-384-7 (Japanese) | |
5e3006a4 GS |
205 | URL: http://www.oreilly.com/catalog/pperl2/ |
206 | (French, German, Italian, and Hungarian translations also | |
207 | available) | |
68dc0745 | 208 | |
5e3006a4 GS |
209 | The companion volume to the Camel containing thousands |
210 | of real-world examples, mini-tutorials, and complete programs | |
211 | (first premiering at the 1998 Perl Conference), is: | |
212 | ||
213 | The Perl Cookbook (the "Ram Book"): | |
65acb1b1 | 214 | by Tom Christiansen and Nathan Torkington, |
5e3006a4 GS |
215 | with Foreword by Larry Wall |
216 | ISBN: 1-56592-243-3 | |
217 | URL: http://perl.oreilly.com/cookbook/ | |
68dc0745 | 218 | |
5a964f20 TC |
219 | If you're already a hard-core systems programmer, then the Camel Book |
220 | might suffice for you to learn Perl from. But if you're not, check | |
5e3006a4 GS |
221 | out: |
222 | ||
223 | Learning Perl (the "Llama Book"): | |
65acb1b1 | 224 | by Randal Schwartz and Tom Christiansen |
5e3006a4 GS |
225 | with Foreword by Larry Wall |
226 | ISBN: 1-56592-284-0 | |
227 | URL: http://www.oreilly.com/catalog/lperl2/ | |
228 | ||
229 | Despite the picture at the URL above, the second edition of "Llama | |
230 | Book" really has a blue cover, and is updated for the 5.004 release | |
231 | of Perl. Various foreign language editions are available, including | |
232 | I<Learning Perl on Win32 Systems> (the Gecko Book). | |
5a964f20 TC |
233 | |
234 | If you're not an accidental programmer, but a more serious and possibly | |
235 | even degreed computer scientist who doesn't need as much hand-holding as | |
236 | we try to provide in the Llama or its defurred cousin the Gecko, please | |
237 | check out the delightful book, I<Perl: The Programmer's Companion>, | |
238 | written by Nigel Chapman. | |
239 | ||
c8db1d39 | 240 | You can order O'Reilly books directly from O'Reilly & Associates, |
5a964f20 TC |
241 | 1-800-998-9938. Local/overseas is 1-707-829-0515. If you can |
242 | locate an O'Reilly order form, you can also fax to 1-707-829-0104. | |
243 | See http://www.ora.com/ on the Web. | |
244 | ||
68dc0745 | 245 | What follows is a list of the books that the FAQ authors found personally |
246 | useful. Your mileage may (but, we hope, probably won't) vary. | |
247 | ||
65acb1b1 | 248 | Recommended books on (or mostly on) Perl follow; those marked with |
5e3006a4 | 249 | a star may be ordered from O'Reilly. |
68dc0745 | 250 | |
5a964f20 | 251 | =over |
68dc0745 | 252 | |
5a964f20 | 253 | =item References |
68dc0745 | 254 | |
5a964f20 TC |
255 | *Programming Perl |
256 | by Larry Wall, Tom Christiansen, and Randal L. Schwartz | |
68dc0745 | 257 | |
5a964f20 | 258 | *Perl 5 Desktop Reference |
87275199 GS |
259 | by Johan Vromans |
260 | ||
261 | *Perl in a Nutshell | |
262 | by Ellen Siever, Stephan Spainhour, and Nathan Patwardhan | |
68dc0745 | 263 | |
5a964f20 TC |
264 | =item Tutorials |
265 | ||
266 | *Learning Perl [2nd edition] | |
267 | by Randal L. Schwartz and Tom Christiansen | |
5e3006a4 | 268 | with foreword by Larry Wall |
68dc0745 | 269 | |
5a964f20 TC |
270 | *Learning Perl on Win32 Systems |
271 | by Randal L. Schwartz, Erik Olson, and Tom Christiansen, | |
272 | with foreword by Larry Wall | |
68dc0745 | 273 | |
5a964f20 TC |
274 | Perl: The Programmer's Companion |
275 | by Nigel Chapman | |
68dc0745 | 276 | |
5a964f20 TC |
277 | Cross-Platform Perl |
278 | by Eric F. Johnson | |
68dc0745 | 279 | |
5a964f20 TC |
280 | MacPerl: Power and Ease |
281 | by Vicki Brown and Chris Nandor, foreword by Matthias Neeracher | |
68dc0745 | 282 | |
65acb1b1 | 283 | =item Task-Oriented |
5a964f20 TC |
284 | |
285 | *The Perl Cookbook | |
286 | by Tom Christiansen and Nathan Torkington | |
287 | with foreword by Larry Wall | |
288 | ||
289 | Perl5 Interactive Course [2nd edition] | |
290 | by Jon Orwant | |
291 | ||
292 | *Advanced Perl Programming | |
293 | by Sriram Srinivasan | |
68dc0745 | 294 | |
5a964f20 TC |
295 | Effective Perl Programming |
296 | by Joseph Hall | |
68dc0745 | 297 | |
5a964f20 TC |
298 | =item Special Topics |
299 | ||
300 | *Mastering Regular Expressions | |
301 | by Jeffrey Friedl | |
302 | ||
303 | How to Set up and Maintain a World Wide Web Site [2nd edition] | |
304 | by Lincoln Stein | |
305 | ||
87275199 GS |
306 | *Learning Perl/Tk |
307 | by Nancy Walsh | |
308 | ||
5a964f20 TC |
309 | =back |
310 | ||
311 | =head2 Perl in Magazines | |
312 | ||
313 | The first and only periodical devoted to All Things Perl, I<The | |
314 | Perl Journal> contains tutorials, demonstrations, case studies, | |
315 | announcements, contests, and much more. TPJ has columns on web | |
316 | development, databases, Win32 Perl, graphical programming, regular | |
5e3006a4 GS |
317 | expressions, and networking, and sponsors the Obfuscated Perl |
318 | Contest. It is published quarterly under the gentle hand of its | |
319 | editor, Jon Orwant. See http://www.tpj.com/ or send mail to | |
65acb1b1 | 320 | subscriptions@tpj.com . |
5a964f20 TC |
321 | |
322 | Beyond this, magazines that frequently carry high-quality articles | |
323 | on Perl are I<Web Techniques> (see http://www.webtechniques.com/), | |
c8db1d39 | 324 | I<Performance Computing> (http://www.performance-computing.com/), and Usenix's |
5a964f20 TC |
325 | newsletter/magazine to its members, I<login:>, at http://www.usenix.org/. |
326 | Randal's Web Technique's columns are available on the web at | |
327 | http://www.stonehenge.com/merlyn/WebTechniques/. | |
68dc0745 | 328 | |
329 | =head2 Perl on the Net: FTP and WWW Access | |
330 | ||
331 | To get the best (and possibly cheapest) performance, pick a site from | |
332 | the list below and use it to grab the complete list of mirror sites. | |
87275199 | 333 | From there you can find the quickest site for you. Remember, the |
68dc0745 | 334 | following list is I<not> the complete list of CPAN mirrors. |
335 | ||
65acb1b1 TC |
336 | http://www.perl.com/CPAN-local |
337 | http://www.perl.com/CPAN (redirects to an ftp mirror) | |
68dc0745 | 338 | http://www.perl.org/CPAN |
339 | ftp://ftp.funet.fi/pub/languages/perl/CPAN/ | |
340 | http://www.cs.ruu.nl/pub/PERL/CPAN/ | |
341 | ftp://ftp.cs.colorado.edu/pub/perl/CPAN/ | |
342 | ||
87275199 | 343 | =head2 What mailing lists are there for Perl? |
68dc0745 | 344 | |
87275199 | 345 | Most of the major modules (Tk, CGI, libwww-perl) have their own |
68dc0745 | 346 | mailing lists. Consult the documentation that came with the module for |
0b8d69e9 | 347 | subscription information. The Perl Mongers attempt to maintain a |
65acb1b1 | 348 | list of mailing lists at: |
68dc0745 | 349 | |
f6c51b38 | 350 | http://www.perl.org/support/online_support.html#mail |
68dc0745 | 351 | |
65acb1b1 | 352 | =head2 Archives of comp.lang.perl.misc |
68dc0745 | 353 | |
87275199 | 354 | Have you tried Deja or AltaVista? Those are the |
65acb1b1 | 355 | best archives. Just look up "*perl*" as a newsgroup. |
68dc0745 | 356 | |
87275199 | 357 | http://www.deja.com/dnquery.xp?QRY=&DBS=2&ST=PS&defaultOp=AND&LNG=ALL&format=terse&showsort=date&maxhits=25&subjects=&groups=*perl*&authors=&fromdate=&todate= |
68dc0745 | 358 | |
65acb1b1 | 359 | You'll probably want to trim that down a bit, though. |
68dc0745 | 360 | |
361 | ftp.cis.ufl.edu:/pub/perl/comp.lang.perl.*/monthly has an almost | |
362 | complete collection dating back to 12/89 (missing 08/91 through | |
363 | 12/93). They are kept as one large file for each month. | |
364 | ||
365 | You'll probably want more a sophisticated query and retrieval mechanism | |
366 | than a file listing, preferably one that allows you to retrieve | |
367 | articles using a fast-access indices, keyed on at least author, date, | |
368 | subject, thread (as in "trn") and probably keywords. The best | |
369 | solution the FAQ authors know of is the MH pick command, but it is | |
370 | very slow to select on 18000 articles. | |
371 | ||
372 | If you have, or know where can be found, the missing sections, please | |
373 | let perlfaq-suggestions@perl.com know. | |
374 | ||
68dc0745 | 375 | =head2 Where can I buy a commercial version of Perl? |
376 | ||
d92eb7b0 | 377 | In a real sense, Perl already I<is> commercial software: It has a license |
65acb1b1 TC |
378 | that you can grab and carefully read to your manager. It is distributed |
379 | in releases and comes in well-defined packages. There is a very large | |
380 | user community and an extensive literature. The comp.lang.perl.* | |
381 | newsgroups and several of the mailing lists provide free answers to your | |
382 | questions in near real-time. Perl has traditionally been supported by | |
383 | Larry, scores of software designers and developers, and myriads of | |
384 | programmers, all working for free to create a useful thing to make life | |
385 | better for everyone. | |
68dc0745 | 386 | |
387 | However, these answers may not suffice for managers who require a | |
65acb1b1 TC |
388 | purchase order from a company whom they can sue should anything go awry. |
389 | Or maybe they need very serious hand-holding and contractual obligations. | |
87275199 GS |
390 | Shrink-wrapped CDs with Perl on them are available from several sources if |
391 | that will help. For example, many Perl books carry a Perl distribution | |
d92eb7b0 | 392 | on them, as do the O'Reilly Perl Resource Kits (in both the Unix flavor |
65acb1b1 TC |
393 | and in the proprietary Microsoft flavor); the free Unix distributions |
394 | also all come with Perl. | |
68dc0745 | 395 | |
396 | Or you can purchase a real support contract. Although Cygnus historically | |
397 | provided this service, they no longer sell support contracts for Perl. | |
398 | Instead, the Paul Ingram Group will be taking up the slack through The | |
399 | Perl Clinic. The following is a commercial from them: | |
400 | ||
401 | "Do you need professional support for Perl and/or Oraperl? Do you need | |
402 | a support contract with defined levels of service? Do you want to pay | |
403 | only for what you need? | |
404 | ||
405 | "The Paul Ingram Group has provided quality software development and | |
406 | support services to some of the world's largest corporations for ten | |
407 | years. We are now offering the same quality support services for Perl | |
408 | at The Perl Clinic. This service is led by Tim Bunce, an active perl | |
409 | porter since 1994 and well known as the author and maintainer of the | |
410 | DBI, DBD::Oracle, and Oraperl modules and author/co-maintainer of The | |
411 | Perl 5 Module List. We also offer Oracle users support for Perl5 | |
412 | Oraperl and related modules (which Oracle is planning to ship as part | |
413 | of Oracle Web Server 3). 20% of the profit from our Perl support work | |
414 | will be donated to The Perl Institute." | |
415 | ||
65acb1b1 | 416 | For more information, contact The Perl Clinic: |
68dc0745 | 417 | |
418 | Tel: +44 1483 424424 | |
419 | Fax: +44 1483 419419 | |
420 | Web: http://www.perl.co.uk/ | |
421 | Email: perl-support-info@perl.co.uk or Tim.Bunce@ig.co.uk | |
422 | ||
65acb1b1 | 423 | See also www.perl.com for updates on tutorials, training, and support. |
5e3006a4 | 424 | |
68dc0745 | 425 | =head2 Where do I send bug reports? |
426 | ||
427 | If you are reporting a bug in the perl interpreter or the modules | |
87275199 | 428 | shipped with Perl, use the I<perlbug> program in the Perl distribution or |
65acb1b1 | 429 | mail your report to perlbug@perl.com . |
68dc0745 | 430 | |
46fc3d4c | 431 | If you are posting a bug with a non-standard port (see the answer to |
68dc0745 | 432 | "What platforms is Perl available for?"), a binary distribution, or a |
46fc3d4c | 433 | non-standard module (such as Tk, CGI, etc), then please see the |
68dc0745 | 434 | documentation that came with it to determine the correct place to post |
435 | bugs. | |
436 | ||
5a964f20 | 437 | Read the perlbug(1) man page (perl5.004 or later) for more information. |
68dc0745 | 438 | |
90bb42f6 | 439 | =head2 What is perl.com? Perl Mongers? pm.org? perl.org? |
68dc0745 | 440 | |
65acb1b1 | 441 | The perl.com domain is owned by Tom Christiansen, who created it as a |
5a964f20 TC |
442 | public service long before perl.org came about. Despite the name, it's a |
443 | pretty non-commercial site meant to be a clearinghouse for information | |
444 | about all things Perlian, accepting no paid advertisements, bouncy | |
87275199 | 445 | happy GIFs, or silly Java applets on its pages. The Perl Home Page at |
5a964f20 TC |
446 | http://www.perl.com/ is currently hosted on a T3 line courtesy of Songline |
447 | Systems, a software-oriented subsidiary of O'Reilly and Associates. | |
65acb1b1 | 448 | Other starting points include |
5a964f20 | 449 | |
65acb1b1 TC |
450 | http://language.perl.com/ |
451 | http://conference.perl.com/ | |
452 | http://reference.perl.com/ | |
68dc0745 | 453 | |
90bb42f6 GS |
454 | Perl Mongers is an advocacy organization for the Perl language. For |
455 | details, see the Perl Mongers web site at http://www.perlmongers.org/. | |
456 | ||
457 | Perl Mongers uses the pm.org domain for services related to Perl user | |
458 | groups. See the Perl user group web site at http://www.pm.org/ for more | |
459 | information about joining, starting, or requesting services for a Perl | |
460 | user group. | |
461 | ||
462 | Perl Mongers also maintains the perl.org domain to provide general | |
463 | support services to the Perl community, including the hosting of mailing | |
464 | lists, web sites, and other services. The web site | |
465 | http://www.perl.org/ is a general advocacy site for the Perl language, | |
466 | and there are many other sub-domains for special topics, such as | |
467 | ||
468 | http://history.perl.org/ | |
469 | http://bugs.perl.org/ | |
470 | http://www.news.perl.org/ | |
471 | ||
68dc0745 | 472 | =head1 AUTHOR AND COPYRIGHT |
473 | ||
65acb1b1 | 474 | Copyright (c) 1997-1999 Tom Christiansen and Nathan Torkington. |
5a964f20 TC |
475 | All rights reserved. |
476 | ||
c8db1d39 | 477 | When included as an integrated part of the Standard Distribution |
d92eb7b0 GS |
478 | of Perl or of its documentation (printed or otherwise), this works is |
479 | covered under Perl's Artistic License. For separate distributions of | |
c8db1d39 TC |
480 | all or part of this FAQ outside of that, see L<perlfaq>. |
481 | ||
87275199 | 482 | Irrespective of its distribution, all code examples here are in the public |
c8db1d39 TC |
483 | domain. You are permitted and encouraged to use this code and any |
484 | derivatives thereof in your own programs for fun or for profit as you | |
485 | see fit. A simple comment in the code giving credit to the FAQ would | |
486 | be courteous but is not required. |