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1 | This is a short set of guidelines for those patching |
2 | ExtUtils::MakeMaker. Its not an iron-clad set of rules, but just | |
3 | things which make life easier when reading and integrating a patch. | |
4 | ||
5 | Lots of information can be found in makemaker.org. | |
6 | ||
7 | MakerMaker is being maintained until something else can replace it. | |
8 | Bugs will be fixed and compatibility improved, but I would like to | |
9 | avoid new features. If you want to add something to MakeMaker, | |
10 | consider instead working on Module::Build, MakeMaker's heir apparent. | |
11 | ||
12 | ||
dedf98bc MS |
13 | Reporting bugs |
14 | ||
15 | - Often the only information we have for fixing a bug is contained in your | |
16 | report. So... | |
17 | ||
18 | - Please report your bugs via http://rt.cpan.org or by mailing to | |
19 | makemaker@perl.org. RT is preferred. | |
20 | ||
21 | - Please report your bug immediately upon encountering it. Do not wait | |
22 | until you have a patch to fix the bug. Patches are good, but not at | |
23 | the expense of timely bug reports. | |
24 | ||
25 | - Please be as verbose as possible. Include the complete output of | |
26 | your 'make test' or even 'make test TEST_VERBOSE=1' and a copy of the | |
27 | generated Makefile. Err on the side of verbosity. The more data we | |
28 | have to work with, the faster we can diagnose the problem. | |
29 | ||
30 | - If you find an undocumented feature, or if a feature has changed/been | |
31 | added which causes a problem, report it. Do not assume it was done | |
32 | deliberately. Even if it was done deliberately, we still want to hear | |
33 | if it caused problems. | |
34 | ||
35 | ||
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36 | Patching details |
37 | ||
38 | - Please use unified diffs. (diff -u) | |
39 | ||
40 | - Patches against the latest development snapshot from makemaker.org are | |
41 | preferred. Patches against the latest CPAN version are ok, too. | |
42 | ||
43 | - Post your patch to makemaker@perl.org. | |
44 | ||
45 | ||
46 | Code formatting | |
47 | ||
48 | - No literal tabs (except where necessary inside Makefile code, obviously). | |
49 | ||
50 | - 4 character indentation. | |
51 | ||
52 | - this_style is prefered instead of studlyCaps. | |
53 | ||
54 | - Private subroutine names (ie. those used only in the same package | |
55 | they're declared in) should start with an underscore (_sekret_method). | |
56 | ||
57 | - Protected subroutines (ie. ones intended to be used by other modules in | |
58 | ExtUtils::*) should be named normally (no leading underscore) but | |
59 | documented as protected (see Documentation below). | |
60 | ||
61 | - Do not use indirect object syntax (ie. new Foo::Bar (@args)) | |
62 | ||
63 | - make variables use dollar signs like Perl scalars. This causes problems | |
64 | when you have to mix them both in a string. If you find yourself | |
65 | backwacking lots of dollar signs because you have one interpolated | |
66 | perl variable, like this: | |
67 | ||
68 | return <<'EOT' | |
69 | ||
70 | subdirs :: | |
71 | \$(NOECHO)cd $subdir && \$(MAKE) -f \$(FIRST_MAKEFILE) all \$(PASTHRU) | |
72 | EOT | |
73 | ||
74 | or are switching quoting contexts: | |
75 | ||
76 | return <<q{ | |
77 | subdirs :: | |
78 | $(NOECHO)cd }.$subdir.q{ && $(MAKE) -f $(FIRST_MAKEFILE) all $(PASTHRU) | |
79 | }; | |
80 | ||
81 | consider using sprintf instead. | |
82 | ||
83 | return sprintf <<'EOT', $subdir; | |
84 | ||
85 | subdirs :: | |
86 | $(NOECHO)cd %s && $(MAKE) -f $(FIRST_MAKEFILE) all $(PASTHRU) | |
87 | EOT | |
88 | ||
89 | ||
90 | Refactoring and Cleanup | |
91 | ||
92 | - MakeMaker is a mess. We like patches which clean things up. | |
93 | ||
94 | ||
95 | Backwards Compatibility | |
96 | ||
97 | - MakeMaker must be backwards compatible to 5.5.3 (5.005_03). Avoid any | |
98 | obvious 5.6-isms (threads, warnings.pm, Unicode, our, v1.2.3, attributes | |
99 | open my $fh, lvalue subroutines, any new core modules, etc...). | |
100 | ||
101 | - MakeMaker should avoid having module dependencies. Avoid using modules | |
102 | which didn't come with 5.5.3 and avoid using features from newer | |
103 | versions. Sometimes this is unavoidable. | |
104 | ||
105 | ||
106 | Cross-Platform Compatibility | |
107 | ||
108 | - MakeMaker must work on all architectures Perl works on (see perlport.pod) | |
109 | and with many different versions of make. This means all Unixen | |
110 | (including Cygwin and MacOS X), Windows (including DOS), MacOS Classic | |
111 | and VMS. | |
112 | ||
113 | - Often when you patch ExtUtils::MM_Unix, similar patches must be done | |
114 | to the other MM_* modules. If you can, please do this extra work | |
115 | otherwise I have to. If you can't, that's ok. We can help. | |
116 | ||
117 | - If possible, please test your patch on two Very Different architectures. | |
118 | Unix, Windows, MacOS Classic and VMS being Very Different. Note: Cygwin | |
119 | and OS X are Unixen for our purposes. | |
120 | ||
121 | - If nothing else, at least try it on two different Unixen or Windows | |
122 | machines (ie. Linux and IRIX or WinNT and Win95). | |
123 | ||
124 | - HP's TestDrive (www.testdrive.compaq.com) and SourceForge's | |
125 | compile farm (www.sourceforge.net) are good sources of testing | |
126 | machines of many different architectures and platforms. Accounts are | |
127 | free. | |
128 | ||
129 | - If you find yourself writing "do_this if $^O eq 'That'" (ie. checks on | |
130 | the OS type) perhaps your code belongs in one of the non-Unix MM_* | |
131 | modules (ie. MM_Win32, MM_VMS, etc...). If one does not exist, consider | |
132 | creating one. Its ok to have an MM_* module with only one method. | |
133 | ||
134 | - Some shells have very small buffers. This means command lines must | |
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135 | be as small as possible. If your command is just too long, consider |
136 | making it an ExtUtils::Command::MM function. If your command might | |
137 | receive many arguments (such as pod2man or pm_to_blib) consider | |
138 | using split_command() to split it into several, shorter calls. | |
479d2113 MS |
139 | |
140 | - Most shells quote differently. If you need to put a perl one-liner | |
141 | in the Makefile, please use oneliner() to generate it. | |
142 | ||
143 | ||
144 | Tests | |
145 | ||
146 | - Tests would be nice, but I'm not going to pretend testing MakeMaker | |
147 | is easy. If nothing else, let us know how you tested your patch by | |
148 | hand. | |
149 | ||
150 | ||
151 | Documentation | |
152 | ||
153 | - Documentation would be nice. | |
154 | ||
155 | - If the new feature/method is private, please document it with POD | |
156 | wrapped in "=begin/end private" tags. That way it will be documented, | |
157 | but won't be displayed (future versions of perldoc may have options | |
158 | to display). | |
159 | ||
160 | =begin private | |
161 | ||
162 | =item _foo_bar | |
163 | ||
164 | $mm->_foo_bar | |
165 | ||
166 | Blah blah blah | |
167 | ||
168 | =end private | |
169 | ||
170 | =cut | |
171 | ||
172 | sub _foo_bar { | |
173 | ... | |
174 | ||
175 | - If you're overriding a method, document that its an override and | |
176 | *why* its being overridden. Don't repeat the original documentation. |