| 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 Windows |
| 8 | |
| 9 | =head1 SYNOPSIS |
| 10 | |
| 11 | These are instructions for building Perl under Windows 2000 and later. |
| 12 | |
| 13 | =head1 DESCRIPTION |
| 14 | |
| 15 | Before you start, you should glance through the README file |
| 16 | found in the top-level directory to which the Perl distribution |
| 17 | was extracted. Make sure you read and understand the terms under |
| 18 | which this software is being distributed. |
| 19 | |
| 20 | Also make sure you read L<BUGS AND CAVEATS> below for the |
| 21 | known limitations of this port. |
| 22 | |
| 23 | The INSTALL file in the perl top-level has much information that is |
| 24 | only relevant to people building Perl on Unix-like systems. In |
| 25 | particular, you can safely ignore any information that talks about |
| 26 | "Configure". |
| 27 | |
| 28 | You may also want to look at one other option for building a perl that |
| 29 | will work on Windows: the README.cygwin file, which give a different |
| 30 | set of rules to build a perl for Windows. This method will probably |
| 31 | enable you to build a more Unix-compatible perl, but you will also |
| 32 | need to download and use various other build-time and run-time support |
| 33 | software described in that file. |
| 34 | |
| 35 | This set of instructions is meant to describe a so-called "native" |
| 36 | port of Perl to the Windows platform. This includes both 32-bit and |
| 37 | 64-bit Windows operating systems. The resulting Perl requires no |
| 38 | additional software to run (other than what came with your operating |
| 39 | system). Currently, this port is capable of using one of the |
| 40 | following compilers on the Intel x86 architecture: |
| 41 | |
| 42 | Microsoft Visual C++ version 6.0 or later |
| 43 | Gcc by mingw.org gcc version 3.2 or later |
| 44 | Gcc by mingw-w64.sf.net gcc version 4.4.3 or later |
| 45 | |
| 46 | Note that the last two of these are actually competing projects both |
| 47 | delivering complete gcc toolchain for MS Windows: |
| 48 | |
| 49 | =over 4 |
| 50 | |
| 51 | =item L<http://mingw.org> |
| 52 | |
| 53 | Delivers gcc toolchain targeting 32-bit Windows platform. |
| 54 | |
| 55 | =item L<http://mingw-w64.sf.net> |
| 56 | |
| 57 | Delivers gcc toolchain targeting both 64-bit Windows and 32-bit Windows |
| 58 | platforms (despite the project name "mingw-w64" they are not only 64-bit |
| 59 | oriented). They deliver the native gcc compilers and cross-compilers |
| 60 | that are also supported by perl's makefile. |
| 61 | |
| 62 | =back |
| 63 | |
| 64 | The Microsoft Visual C++ compilers are also now being given away free. They are |
| 65 | available as "Visual C++ Toolkit 2003" or "Visual C++ 2005/2008/2010 Express |
| 66 | Edition" (and also as part of the ".NET Framework SDK") and are the same |
| 67 | compilers that ship with "Visual C++ .NET 2003 Professional" or "Visual C++ |
| 68 | 2005/2008/2010 Professional" respectively. |
| 69 | |
| 70 | This port can also be built on IA64/AMD64 using: |
| 71 | |
| 72 | Microsoft Platform SDK Nov 2001 (64-bit compiler and tools) |
| 73 | MinGW64 compiler (gcc version 4.4.3 or later) |
| 74 | |
| 75 | The Windows SDK can be downloaded from L<http://www.microsoft.com/>. |
| 76 | The MinGW64 compiler is available at L<http://sourceforge.net/projects/mingw-w64>. |
| 77 | The latter is actually a cross-compiler targeting Win64. There's also a trimmed |
| 78 | down compiler (no java, or gfortran) suitable for building perl available at: |
| 79 | L<http://strawberryperl.com/package/kmx/64_gcctoolchain/> |
| 80 | |
| 81 | NOTE: If you're using a 32-bit compiler to build perl on a 64-bit Windows |
| 82 | operating system, then you should set the WIN64 environment variable to "undef". |
| 83 | Also, the trimmed down compiler only passes tests when USE_ITHREADS *= define |
| 84 | (as opposed to undef) and when the CFG *= Debug line is commented out. |
| 85 | |
| 86 | This port fully supports MakeMaker (the set of modules that |
| 87 | is used to build extensions to perl). Therefore, you should be |
| 88 | able to build and install most extensions found in the CPAN sites. |
| 89 | See L<Usage Hints for Perl on Windows> below for general hints about this. |
| 90 | |
| 91 | =head2 Setting Up Perl on Windows |
| 92 | |
| 93 | =over 4 |
| 94 | |
| 95 | =item Make |
| 96 | |
| 97 | You need a "make" program to build the sources. If you are using |
| 98 | Visual C++ or the Windows SDK tools, nmake will work. Builds using |
| 99 | the gcc need dmake. |
| 100 | |
| 101 | dmake is a freely available make that has very nice macro features |
| 102 | and parallelability. |
| 103 | |
| 104 | A port of dmake for Windows is available from: |
| 105 | |
| 106 | L<http://search.cpan.org/dist/dmake/> |
| 107 | |
| 108 | Fetch and install dmake somewhere on your path. |
| 109 | |
| 110 | =item Command Shell |
| 111 | |
| 112 | Use the default "cmd" shell that comes with Windows. Some versions of the |
| 113 | popular 4DOS/NT shell have incompatibilities that may cause you trouble. |
| 114 | If the build fails under that shell, try building again with the cmd |
| 115 | shell. |
| 116 | |
| 117 | Make sure the path to the build directory does not contain spaces. The |
| 118 | build usually works in this circumstance, but some tests will fail. |
| 119 | |
| 120 | =item Microsoft Visual C++ |
| 121 | |
| 122 | The nmake that comes with Visual C++ will suffice for building. |
| 123 | You will need to run the VCVARS32.BAT file, usually found somewhere |
| 124 | like C:\Program Files\Microsoft Visual Studio\VC98\Bin. |
| 125 | This will set your build environment. |
| 126 | |
| 127 | You can also use dmake to build using Visual C++; provided, however, |
| 128 | you set OSRELEASE to "microsft" (or whatever the directory name |
| 129 | under which the Visual C dmake configuration lives) in your environment |
| 130 | and edit win32/config.vc to change "make=nmake" into "make=dmake". The |
| 131 | latter step is only essential if you want to use dmake as your default |
| 132 | make for building extensions using MakeMaker. |
| 133 | |
| 134 | =item Microsoft Visual C++ 2008/2010 Express Edition |
| 135 | |
| 136 | These free versions of Visual C++ 2008/2010 Professional contain the same |
| 137 | compilers and linkers that ship with the full versions, and also contain |
| 138 | everything necessary to build Perl, rather than requiring a separate download |
| 139 | of the Windows SDK like previous versions did. |
| 140 | |
| 141 | These packages can be downloaded by searching in the Download Center at |
| 142 | L<http://www.microsoft.com/downloads/search.aspx?displaylang=en>. (Providing exact |
| 143 | links to these packages has proven a pointless task because the links keep on |
| 144 | changing so often.) |
| 145 | |
| 146 | Install Visual C++ 2008/2010 Express, then setup your environment using, e.g. |
| 147 | |
| 148 | C:\Program Files\Microsoft Visual Studio 10.0\Common7\Tools\vsvars32.bat |
| 149 | |
| 150 | (assuming the default installation location was chosen). |
| 151 | |
| 152 | Perl should now build using the win32/Makefile. You will need to edit that |
| 153 | file to set CCTYPE to MSVC90FREE or MSVC100FREE first. |
| 154 | |
| 155 | =item Microsoft Visual C++ 2005 Express Edition |
| 156 | |
| 157 | This free version of Visual C++ 2005 Professional contains the same compiler |
| 158 | and linker that ship with the full version, but doesn't contain everything |
| 159 | necessary to build Perl. |
| 160 | |
| 161 | You will also need to download the "Windows SDK" (the "Core SDK" and "MDAC |
| 162 | SDK" components are required) for more header files and libraries. |
| 163 | |
| 164 | These packages can both be downloaded by searching in the Download Center at |
| 165 | L<http://www.microsoft.com/downloads/search.aspx?displaylang=en>. (Providing exact |
| 166 | links to these packages has proven a pointless task because the links keep on |
| 167 | changing so often.) |
| 168 | |
| 169 | Try to obtain the latest version of the Windows SDK. Sometimes these packages |
| 170 | contain a particular Windows OS version in their name, but actually work on |
| 171 | other OS versions too. For example, the "Windows Server 2003 R2 Platform SDK" |
| 172 | also runs on Windows XP SP2 and Windows 2000. |
| 173 | |
| 174 | Install Visual C++ 2005 first, then the Platform SDK. Setup your environment |
| 175 | as follows (assuming default installation locations were chosen): |
| 176 | |
| 177 | SET PlatformSDKDir=C:\Program Files\Microsoft Platform SDK |
| 178 | |
| 179 | SET PATH=%SystemRoot%\system32;%SystemRoot%;C:\Program Files\Microsoft Visual Studio 8\Common7\IDE;C:\Program Files\Microsoft Visual Studio 8\VC\BIN;C:\Program Files\Microsoft Visual Studio 8\Common7\Tools;C:\Program Files\Microsoft Visual Studio 8\SDK\v2.0\bin;C:\WINDOWS\Microsoft.NET\Framework\v2.0.50727;C:\Program Files\Microsoft Visual Studio 8\VC\VCPackages;%PlatformSDKDir%\Bin |
| 180 | |
| 181 | SET INCLUDE=C:\Program Files\Microsoft Visual Studio 8\VC\INCLUDE;%PlatformSDKDir%\include |
| 182 | |
| 183 | SET LIB=C:\Program Files\Microsoft Visual Studio 8\VC\LIB;C:\Program Files\Microsoft Visual Studio 8\SDK\v2.0\lib;%PlatformSDKDir%\lib |
| 184 | |
| 185 | SET LIBPATH=C:\WINDOWS\Microsoft.NET\Framework\v2.0.50727 |
| 186 | |
| 187 | (The PlatformSDKDir might need to be set differently depending on which version |
| 188 | you are using. Earlier versions installed into "C:\Program Files\Microsoft SDK", |
| 189 | while the latest versions install into version-specific locations such as |
| 190 | "C:\Program Files\Microsoft Platform SDK for Windows Server 2003 R2".) |
| 191 | |
| 192 | Perl should now build using the win32/Makefile. You will need to edit that |
| 193 | file to set |
| 194 | |
| 195 | CCTYPE = MSVC80FREE |
| 196 | |
| 197 | and to set CCHOME, CCINCDIR and CCLIBDIR as per the environment setup above. |
| 198 | |
| 199 | =item Microsoft Visual C++ Toolkit 2003 |
| 200 | |
| 201 | This free toolkit contains the same compiler and linker that ship with |
| 202 | Visual C++ .NET 2003 Professional, but doesn't contain everything |
| 203 | necessary to build Perl. |
| 204 | |
| 205 | You will also need to download the "Platform SDK" (the "Core SDK" and "MDAC |
| 206 | SDK" components are required) for header files, libraries and rc.exe, and |
| 207 | ".NET Framework SDK" for more libraries and nmake.exe. Note that the latter |
| 208 | (which also includes the free compiler and linker) requires the ".NET |
| 209 | Framework Redistributable" to be installed first. This can be downloaded and |
| 210 | installed separately, but is included in the "Visual C++ Toolkit 2003" anyway. |
| 211 | |
| 212 | These packages can all be downloaded by searching in the Download Center at |
| 213 | L<http://www.microsoft.com/downloads/search.aspx?displaylang=en>. (Providing exact |
| 214 | links to these packages has proven a pointless task because the links keep on |
| 215 | changing so often.) |
| 216 | |
| 217 | Try to obtain the latest version of the Windows SDK. Sometimes these packages |
| 218 | contain a particular Windows OS version in their name, but actually work on |
| 219 | other OS versions too. For example, the "Windows Server 2003 R2 Platform SDK" |
| 220 | also runs on Windows XP SP2 and Windows 2000. |
| 221 | |
| 222 | Install the Toolkit first, then the Platform SDK, then the .NET Framework SDK. |
| 223 | Setup your environment as follows (assuming default installation locations |
| 224 | were chosen): |
| 225 | |
| 226 | SET PlatformSDKDir=C:\Program Files\Microsoft Platform SDK |
| 227 | |
| 228 | SET PATH=%SystemRoot%\system32;%SystemRoot%;C:\Program Files\Microsoft Visual C++ Toolkit 2003\bin;%PlatformSDKDir%\Bin;C:\Program Files\Microsoft.NET\SDK\v1.1\Bin |
| 229 | |
| 230 | SET INCLUDE=C:\Program Files\Microsoft Visual C++ Toolkit 2003\include;%PlatformSDKDir%\include;C:\Program Files\Microsoft Visual Studio .NET 2003\Vc7\include |
| 231 | |
| 232 | SET LIB=C:\Program Files\Microsoft Visual C++ Toolkit 2003\lib;%PlatformSDKDir%\lib;C:\Program Files\Microsoft Visual Studio .NET 2003\Vc7\lib |
| 233 | |
| 234 | (The PlatformSDKDir might need to be set differently depending on which version |
| 235 | you are using. Earlier versions installed into "C:\Program Files\Microsoft SDK", |
| 236 | while the latest versions install into version-specific locations such as |
| 237 | "C:\Program Files\Microsoft Platform SDK for Windows Server 2003 R2".) |
| 238 | |
| 239 | Several required files will still be missing: |
| 240 | |
| 241 | =over 4 |
| 242 | |
| 243 | =item * |
| 244 | |
| 245 | cvtres.exe is required by link.exe when using a .res file. It is actually |
| 246 | installed by the .NET Framework SDK, but into a location such as the |
| 247 | following: |
| 248 | |
| 249 | C:\WINDOWS\Microsoft.NET\Framework\v1.1.4322 |
| 250 | |
| 251 | Copy it from there to %PlatformSDKDir%\Bin |
| 252 | |
| 253 | =item * |
| 254 | |
| 255 | lib.exe is normally used to build libraries, but link.exe with the /lib |
| 256 | option also works, so change win32/config.vc to use it instead: |
| 257 | |
| 258 | Change the line reading: |
| 259 | |
| 260 | ar='lib' |
| 261 | |
| 262 | to: |
| 263 | |
| 264 | ar='link /lib' |
| 265 | |
| 266 | It may also be useful to create a batch file called lib.bat in |
| 267 | C:\Program Files\Microsoft Visual C++ Toolkit 2003\bin containing: |
| 268 | |
| 269 | @echo off |
| 270 | link /lib %* |
| 271 | |
| 272 | for the benefit of any naughty C extension modules that you might want to build |
| 273 | later which explicitly reference "lib" rather than taking their value from |
| 274 | $Config{ar}. |
| 275 | |
| 276 | =item * |
| 277 | |
| 278 | setargv.obj is required to build perlglob.exe (and perl.exe if the USE_SETARGV |
| 279 | option is enabled). The Platform SDK supplies this object file in source form |
| 280 | in %PlatformSDKDir%\src\crt. Copy setargv.c, cruntime.h and |
| 281 | internal.h from there to some temporary location and build setargv.obj using |
| 282 | |
| 283 | cl.exe /c /I. /D_CRTBLD setargv.c |
| 284 | |
| 285 | Then copy setargv.obj to %PlatformSDKDir%\lib |
| 286 | |
| 287 | Alternatively, if you don't need perlglob.exe and don't need to enable the |
| 288 | USE_SETARGV option then you can safely just remove all mention of $(GLOBEXE) |
| 289 | from win32/Makefile and setargv.obj won't be required anyway. |
| 290 | |
| 291 | =back |
| 292 | |
| 293 | Perl should now build using the win32/Makefile. You will need to edit that |
| 294 | file to set |
| 295 | |
| 296 | CCTYPE = MSVC70FREE |
| 297 | |
| 298 | and to set CCHOME, CCINCDIR and CCLIBDIR as per the environment setup above. |
| 299 | |
| 300 | =item Microsoft Platform SDK 64-bit Compiler |
| 301 | |
| 302 | The nmake that comes with the Platform SDK will suffice for building |
| 303 | Perl. Make sure you are building within one of the "Build Environment" |
| 304 | shells available after you install the Platform SDK from the Start Menu. |
| 305 | |
| 306 | =item MinGW release 3 with gcc |
| 307 | |
| 308 | Perl can be compiled with gcc from MinGW release 3 and later (using gcc 3.2.x |
| 309 | and later). It can be downloaded here: |
| 310 | |
| 311 | L<http://www.mingw.org/> |
| 312 | |
| 313 | You also need dmake. See L</"Make"> above on how to get it. |
| 314 | |
| 315 | =back |
| 316 | |
| 317 | =head2 Building |
| 318 | |
| 319 | =over 4 |
| 320 | |
| 321 | =item * |
| 322 | |
| 323 | Make sure you are in the "win32" subdirectory under the perl toplevel. |
| 324 | This directory contains a "Makefile" that will work with |
| 325 | versions of nmake that come with Visual C++ or the Windows SDK, and |
| 326 | a dmake "makefile.mk" that will work for all supported compilers. The |
| 327 | defaults in the dmake makefile are setup to build using MinGW/gcc. |
| 328 | |
| 329 | =item * |
| 330 | |
| 331 | Edit the makefile.mk (or Makefile, if you're using nmake) and change |
| 332 | the values of INST_DRV and INST_TOP. You can also enable various |
| 333 | build flags. These are explained in the makefiles. |
| 334 | |
| 335 | Note that it is generally not a good idea to try to build a perl with |
| 336 | INST_DRV and INST_TOP set to a path that already exists from a previous |
| 337 | build. In particular, this may cause problems with the |
| 338 | lib/ExtUtils/t/Embed.t test, which attempts to build a test program and |
| 339 | may end up building against the installed perl's lib/CORE directory rather |
| 340 | than the one being tested. |
| 341 | |
| 342 | You will have to make sure that CCTYPE is set correctly and that |
| 343 | CCHOME points to wherever you installed your compiler. |
| 344 | |
| 345 | If building with the cross-compiler provided by |
| 346 | mingw-w64.sourceforge.net you'll need to uncomment the line that sets |
| 347 | GCCCROSS in the makefile.mk. Do this only if it's the cross-compiler - ie |
| 348 | only if the bin folder doesn't contain a gcc.exe. (The cross-compiler |
| 349 | does not provide a gcc.exe, g++.exe, ar.exe, etc. Instead, all of these |
| 350 | executables are prefixed with 'x86_64-w64-mingw32-'.) |
| 351 | |
| 352 | The default value for CCHOME in the makefiles for Visual C++ |
| 353 | may not be correct for some versions. Make sure the default exists |
| 354 | and is valid. |
| 355 | |
| 356 | You may also need to comment out the C<DELAYLOAD = ...> line in the |
| 357 | Makefile if you're using VC++ 6.0 without the latest service pack and |
| 358 | the linker reports an internal error. |
| 359 | |
| 360 | If you want build some core extensions statically into perl's dll, specify |
| 361 | them in the STATIC_EXT macro. |
| 362 | |
| 363 | Be sure to read the instructions near the top of the makefiles carefully. |
| 364 | |
| 365 | =item * |
| 366 | |
| 367 | Type "dmake" (or "nmake" if you are using that make). |
| 368 | |
| 369 | This should build everything. Specifically, it will create perl.exe, |
| 370 | perl515.dll at the perl toplevel, and various other extension dll's |
| 371 | under the lib\auto directory. If the build fails for any reason, make |
| 372 | sure you have done the previous steps correctly. |
| 373 | |
| 374 | =back |
| 375 | |
| 376 | =head2 Testing Perl on Windows |
| 377 | |
| 378 | Type "dmake test" (or "nmake test"). This will run most of the tests from |
| 379 | the testsuite (many tests will be skipped). |
| 380 | |
| 381 | There should be no test failures. |
| 382 | |
| 383 | Some test failures may occur if you use a command shell other than the |
| 384 | native "cmd.exe", or if you are building from a path that contains |
| 385 | spaces. So don't do that. |
| 386 | |
| 387 | If you are running the tests from a emacs shell window, you may see |
| 388 | failures in op/stat.t. Run "dmake test-notty" in that case. |
| 389 | |
| 390 | If you run the tests on a FAT partition, you may see some failures for |
| 391 | C<link()> related tests (I<op/write.t>, I<op/stat.t> ...). Testing on |
| 392 | NTFS avoids these errors. |
| 393 | |
| 394 | Furthermore, you should make sure that during C<make test> you do not |
| 395 | have any GNU tool packages in your path: some toolkits like Unixutils |
| 396 | include some tools (C<type> for instance) which override the Windows |
| 397 | ones and makes tests fail. Remove them from your path while testing to |
| 398 | avoid these errors. |
| 399 | |
| 400 | Please report any other failures as described under L<BUGS AND CAVEATS>. |
| 401 | |
| 402 | =head2 Installation of Perl on Windows |
| 403 | |
| 404 | Type "dmake install" (or "nmake install"). This will put the newly |
| 405 | built perl and the libraries under whatever C<INST_TOP> points to in the |
| 406 | Makefile. It will also install the pod documentation under |
| 407 | C<$INST_TOP\$INST_VER\lib\pod> and HTML versions of the same under |
| 408 | C<$INST_TOP\$INST_VER\lib\pod\html>. |
| 409 | |
| 410 | To use the Perl you just installed you will need to add a new entry to |
| 411 | your PATH environment variable: C<$INST_TOP\bin>, e.g. |
| 412 | |
| 413 | set PATH=c:\perl\bin;%PATH% |
| 414 | |
| 415 | If you opted to uncomment C<INST_VER> and C<INST_ARCH> in the makefile |
| 416 | then the installation structure is a little more complicated and you will |
| 417 | need to add two new PATH components instead: C<$INST_TOP\$INST_VER\bin> and |
| 418 | C<$INST_TOP\$INST_VER\bin\$ARCHNAME>, e.g. |
| 419 | |
| 420 | set PATH=c:\perl\5.6.0\bin;c:\perl\5.6.0\bin\MSWin32-x86;%PATH% |
| 421 | |
| 422 | =head2 Usage Hints for Perl on Windows |
| 423 | |
| 424 | =over 4 |
| 425 | |
| 426 | =item Environment Variables |
| 427 | |
| 428 | The installation paths that you set during the build get compiled |
| 429 | into perl, so you don't have to do anything additional to start |
| 430 | using that perl (except add its location to your PATH variable). |
| 431 | |
| 432 | If you put extensions in unusual places, you can set PERL5LIB |
| 433 | to a list of paths separated by semicolons where you want perl |
| 434 | to look for libraries. Look for descriptions of other environment |
| 435 | variables you can set in L<perlrun>. |
| 436 | |
| 437 | You can also control the shell that perl uses to run system() and |
| 438 | backtick commands via PERL5SHELL. See L<perlrun>. |
| 439 | |
| 440 | Perl does not depend on the registry, but it can look up certain default |
| 441 | values if you choose to put them there. Perl attempts to read entries from |
| 442 | C<HKEY_CURRENT_USER\Software\Perl> and C<HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\Software\Perl>. |
| 443 | Entries in the former override entries in the latter. One or more of the |
| 444 | following entries (of type REG_SZ or REG_EXPAND_SZ) may be set: |
| 445 | |
| 446 | lib-$] version-specific standard library path to add to @INC |
| 447 | lib standard library path to add to @INC |
| 448 | sitelib-$] version-specific site library path to add to @INC |
| 449 | sitelib site library path to add to @INC |
| 450 | vendorlib-$] version-specific vendor library path to add to @INC |
| 451 | vendorlib vendor library path to add to @INC |
| 452 | PERL* fallback for all %ENV lookups that begin with "PERL" |
| 453 | |
| 454 | Note the C<$]> in the above is not literal. Substitute whatever version |
| 455 | of perl you want to honor that entry, e.g. C<5.6.0>. Paths must be |
| 456 | separated with semicolons, as usual on Windows. |
| 457 | |
| 458 | =item File Globbing |
| 459 | |
| 460 | By default, perl handles file globbing using the File::Glob extension, |
| 461 | which provides portable globbing. |
| 462 | |
| 463 | If you want perl to use globbing that emulates the quirks of DOS |
| 464 | filename conventions, you might want to consider using File::DosGlob |
| 465 | to override the internal glob() implementation. See L<File::DosGlob> for |
| 466 | details. |
| 467 | |
| 468 | =item Using perl from the command line |
| 469 | |
| 470 | If you are accustomed to using perl from various command-line |
| 471 | shells found in UNIX environments, you will be less than pleased |
| 472 | with what Windows offers by way of a command shell. |
| 473 | |
| 474 | The crucial thing to understand about the Windows environment is that |
| 475 | the command line you type in is processed twice before Perl sees it. |
| 476 | First, your command shell (usually CMD.EXE) preprocesses the command |
| 477 | line, to handle redirection, environment variable expansion, and |
| 478 | location of the executable to run. Then, the perl executable splits |
| 479 | the remaining command line into individual arguments, using the |
| 480 | C runtime library upon which Perl was built. |
| 481 | |
| 482 | It is particularly important to note that neither the shell nor the C |
| 483 | runtime do any wildcard expansions of command-line arguments (so |
| 484 | wildcards need not be quoted). Also, the quoting behaviours of the |
| 485 | shell and the C runtime are rudimentary at best (and may, if you are |
| 486 | using a non-standard shell, be inconsistent). The only (useful) quote |
| 487 | character is the double quote ("). It can be used to protect spaces |
| 488 | and other special characters in arguments. |
| 489 | |
| 490 | The Windows documentation describes the shell parsing rules here: |
| 491 | L<http://www.microsoft.com/resources/documentation/windows/xp/all/proddocs/en-us/cmd.mspx?mfr=true> |
| 492 | and the C runtime parsing rules here: |
| 493 | L<http://msdn.microsoft.com/en-us/library/17w5ykft%28v=VS.100%29.aspx>. |
| 494 | |
| 495 | Here are some further observations based on experiments: The C runtime |
| 496 | breaks arguments at spaces and passes them to programs in argc/argv. |
| 497 | Double quotes can be used to prevent arguments with spaces in them from |
| 498 | being split up. You can put a double quote in an argument by escaping |
| 499 | it with a backslash and enclosing the whole argument within double quotes. |
| 500 | The backslash and the pair of double quotes surrounding the argument will |
| 501 | be stripped by the C runtime. |
| 502 | |
| 503 | The file redirection characters "E<lt>", "E<gt>", and "|" can be quoted by |
| 504 | double quotes (although there are suggestions that this may not always |
| 505 | be true). Single quotes are not treated as quotes by the shell or |
| 506 | the C runtime, they don't get stripped by the shell (just to make |
| 507 | this type of quoting completely useless). The caret "^" has also |
| 508 | been observed to behave as a quoting character, but this appears |
| 509 | to be a shell feature, and the caret is not stripped from the command |
| 510 | line, so Perl still sees it (and the C runtime phase does not treat |
| 511 | the caret as a quote character). |
| 512 | |
| 513 | Here are some examples of usage of the "cmd" shell: |
| 514 | |
| 515 | This prints two doublequotes: |
| 516 | |
| 517 | perl -e "print '\"\"' " |
| 518 | |
| 519 | This does the same: |
| 520 | |
| 521 | perl -e "print \"\\\"\\\"\" " |
| 522 | |
| 523 | This prints "bar" and writes "foo" to the file "blurch": |
| 524 | |
| 525 | perl -e "print 'foo'; print STDERR 'bar'" > blurch |
| 526 | |
| 527 | This prints "foo" ("bar" disappears into nowhereland): |
| 528 | |
| 529 | perl -e "print 'foo'; print STDERR 'bar'" 2> nul |
| 530 | |
| 531 | This prints "bar" and writes "foo" into the file "blurch": |
| 532 | |
| 533 | perl -e "print 'foo'; print STDERR 'bar'" 1> blurch |
| 534 | |
| 535 | This pipes "foo" to the "less" pager and prints "bar" on the console: |
| 536 | |
| 537 | perl -e "print 'foo'; print STDERR 'bar'" | less |
| 538 | |
| 539 | This pipes "foo\nbar\n" to the less pager: |
| 540 | |
| 541 | perl -le "print 'foo'; print STDERR 'bar'" 2>&1 | less |
| 542 | |
| 543 | This pipes "foo" to the pager and writes "bar" in the file "blurch": |
| 544 | |
| 545 | perl -e "print 'foo'; print STDERR 'bar'" 2> blurch | less |
| 546 | |
| 547 | |
| 548 | Discovering the usefulness of the "command.com" shell on Windows 9x |
| 549 | is left as an exercise to the reader :) |
| 550 | |
| 551 | One particularly pernicious problem with the 4NT command shell for |
| 552 | Windows is that it (nearly) always treats a % character as indicating |
| 553 | that environment variable expansion is needed. Under this shell, it is |
| 554 | therefore important to always double any % characters which you want |
| 555 | Perl to see (for example, for hash variables), even when they are |
| 556 | quoted. |
| 557 | |
| 558 | =item Building Extensions |
| 559 | |
| 560 | The Comprehensive Perl Archive Network (CPAN) offers a wealth |
| 561 | of extensions, some of which require a C compiler to build. |
| 562 | Look in L<http://www.cpan.org/> for more information on CPAN. |
| 563 | |
| 564 | Note that not all of the extensions available from CPAN may work |
| 565 | in the Windows environment; you should check the information at |
| 566 | L<http://testers.cpan.org/> before investing too much effort into |
| 567 | porting modules that don't readily build. |
| 568 | |
| 569 | Most extensions (whether they require a C compiler or not) can |
| 570 | be built, tested and installed with the standard mantra: |
| 571 | |
| 572 | perl Makefile.PL |
| 573 | $MAKE |
| 574 | $MAKE test |
| 575 | $MAKE install |
| 576 | |
| 577 | where $MAKE is whatever 'make' program you have configured perl to |
| 578 | use. Use "perl -V:make" to find out what this is. Some extensions |
| 579 | may not provide a testsuite (so "$MAKE test" may not do anything or |
| 580 | fail), but most serious ones do. |
| 581 | |
| 582 | It is important that you use a supported 'make' program, and |
| 583 | ensure Config.pm knows about it. If you don't have nmake, you can |
| 584 | either get dmake from the location mentioned earlier or get an |
| 585 | old version of nmake reportedly available from: |
| 586 | |
| 587 | L<http://download.microsoft.com/download/vc15/Patch/1.52/W95/EN-US/nmake15.exe> |
| 588 | |
| 589 | Another option is to use the make written in Perl, available from |
| 590 | CPAN. |
| 591 | |
| 592 | L<http://www.cpan.org/modules/by-module/Make/> |
| 593 | |
| 594 | You may also use dmake. See L</"Make"> above on how to get it. |
| 595 | |
| 596 | Note that MakeMaker actually emits makefiles with different syntax |
| 597 | depending on what 'make' it thinks you are using. Therefore, it is |
| 598 | important that one of the following values appears in Config.pm: |
| 599 | |
| 600 | make='nmake' # MakeMaker emits nmake syntax |
| 601 | make='dmake' # MakeMaker emits dmake syntax |
| 602 | any other value # MakeMaker emits generic make syntax |
| 603 | (e.g GNU make, or Perl make) |
| 604 | |
| 605 | If the value doesn't match the 'make' program you want to use, |
| 606 | edit Config.pm to fix it. |
| 607 | |
| 608 | If a module implements XSUBs, you will need one of the supported |
| 609 | C compilers. You must make sure you have set up the environment for |
| 610 | the compiler for command-line compilation. |
| 611 | |
| 612 | If a module does not build for some reason, look carefully for |
| 613 | why it failed, and report problems to the module author. If |
| 614 | it looks like the extension building support is at fault, report |
| 615 | that with full details of how the build failed using the perlbug |
| 616 | utility. |
| 617 | |
| 618 | =item Command-line Wildcard Expansion |
| 619 | |
| 620 | The default command shells on DOS descendant operating systems (such |
| 621 | as they are) usually do not expand wildcard arguments supplied to |
| 622 | programs. They consider it the application's job to handle that. |
| 623 | This is commonly achieved by linking the application (in our case, |
| 624 | perl) with startup code that the C runtime libraries usually provide. |
| 625 | However, doing that results in incompatible perl versions (since the |
| 626 | behavior of the argv expansion code differs depending on the |
| 627 | compiler, and it is even buggy on some compilers). Besides, it may |
| 628 | be a source of frustration if you use such a perl binary with an |
| 629 | alternate shell that *does* expand wildcards. |
| 630 | |
| 631 | Instead, the following solution works rather well. The nice things |
| 632 | about it are 1) you can start using it right away; 2) it is more |
| 633 | powerful, because it will do the right thing with a pattern like |
| 634 | */*/*.c; 3) you can decide whether you do/don't want to use it; and |
| 635 | 4) you can extend the method to add any customizations (or even |
| 636 | entirely different kinds of wildcard expansion). |
| 637 | |
| 638 | C:\> copy con c:\perl\lib\Wild.pm |
| 639 | # Wild.pm - emulate shell @ARGV expansion on shells that don't |
| 640 | use File::DosGlob; |
| 641 | @ARGV = map { |
| 642 | my @g = File::DosGlob::glob($_) if /[*?]/; |
| 643 | @g ? @g : $_; |
| 644 | } @ARGV; |
| 645 | 1; |
| 646 | ^Z |
| 647 | C:\> set PERL5OPT=-MWild |
| 648 | C:\> perl -le "for (@ARGV) { print }" */*/perl*.c |
| 649 | p4view/perl/perl.c |
| 650 | p4view/perl/perlio.c |
| 651 | p4view/perl/perly.c |
| 652 | perl5.005/win32/perlglob.c |
| 653 | perl5.005/win32/perllib.c |
| 654 | perl5.005/win32/perlglob.c |
| 655 | perl5.005/win32/perllib.c |
| 656 | perl5.005/win32/perlglob.c |
| 657 | perl5.005/win32/perllib.c |
| 658 | |
| 659 | Note there are two distinct steps there: 1) You'll have to create |
| 660 | Wild.pm and put it in your perl lib directory. 2) You'll need to |
| 661 | set the PERL5OPT environment variable. If you want argv expansion |
| 662 | to be the default, just set PERL5OPT in your default startup |
| 663 | environment. |
| 664 | |
| 665 | If you are using the Visual C compiler, you can get the C runtime's |
| 666 | command line wildcard expansion built into perl binary. The resulting |
| 667 | binary will always expand unquoted command lines, which may not be |
| 668 | what you want if you use a shell that does that for you. The expansion |
| 669 | done is also somewhat less powerful than the approach suggested above. |
| 670 | |
| 671 | =item Notes on 64-bit Windows |
| 672 | |
| 673 | Windows .NET Server supports the LLP64 data model on the Intel Itanium |
| 674 | architecture. |
| 675 | |
| 676 | The LLP64 data model is different from the LP64 data model that is the |
| 677 | norm on 64-bit Unix platforms. In the former, C<int> and C<long> are |
| 678 | both 32-bit data types, while pointers are 64 bits wide. In addition, |
| 679 | there is a separate 64-bit wide integral type, C<__int64>. In contrast, |
| 680 | the LP64 data model that is pervasive on Unix platforms provides C<int> |
| 681 | as the 32-bit type, while both the C<long> type and pointers are of |
| 682 | 64-bit precision. Note that both models provide for 64-bits of |
| 683 | addressability. |
| 684 | |
| 685 | 64-bit Windows running on Itanium is capable of running 32-bit x86 |
| 686 | binaries transparently. This means that you could use a 32-bit build |
| 687 | of Perl on a 64-bit system. Given this, why would one want to build |
| 688 | a 64-bit build of Perl? Here are some reasons why you would bother: |
| 689 | |
| 690 | =over |
| 691 | |
| 692 | =item * |
| 693 | |
| 694 | A 64-bit native application will run much more efficiently on |
| 695 | Itanium hardware. |
| 696 | |
| 697 | =item * |
| 698 | |
| 699 | There is no 2GB limit on process size. |
| 700 | |
| 701 | =item * |
| 702 | |
| 703 | Perl automatically provides large file support when built under |
| 704 | 64-bit Windows. |
| 705 | |
| 706 | =item * |
| 707 | |
| 708 | Embedding Perl inside a 64-bit application. |
| 709 | |
| 710 | =back |
| 711 | |
| 712 | =back |
| 713 | |
| 714 | =head2 Running Perl Scripts |
| 715 | |
| 716 | Perl scripts on UNIX use the "#!" (a.k.a "shebang") line to |
| 717 | indicate to the OS that it should execute the file using perl. |
| 718 | Windows has no comparable means to indicate arbitrary files are |
| 719 | executables. |
| 720 | |
| 721 | Instead, all available methods to execute plain text files on |
| 722 | Windows rely on the file "extension". There are three methods |
| 723 | to use this to execute perl scripts: |
| 724 | |
| 725 | =over 8 |
| 726 | |
| 727 | =item 1 |
| 728 | |
| 729 | There is a facility called "file extension associations". This can be |
| 730 | manipulated via the two commands "assoc" and "ftype" that come |
| 731 | standard with Windows. Type "ftype /?" for a complete example of how |
| 732 | to set this up for perl scripts (Say what? You thought Windows |
| 733 | wasn't perl-ready? :). |
| 734 | |
| 735 | =item 2 |
| 736 | |
| 737 | Since file associations don't work everywhere, and there are |
| 738 | reportedly bugs with file associations where it does work, the |
| 739 | old method of wrapping the perl script to make it look like a |
| 740 | regular batch file to the OS, may be used. The install process |
| 741 | makes available the "pl2bat.bat" script which can be used to wrap |
| 742 | perl scripts into batch files. For example: |
| 743 | |
| 744 | pl2bat foo.pl |
| 745 | |
| 746 | will create the file "FOO.BAT". Note "pl2bat" strips any |
| 747 | .pl suffix and adds a .bat suffix to the generated file. |
| 748 | |
| 749 | If you use the 4DOS/NT or similar command shell, note that |
| 750 | "pl2bat" uses the "%*" variable in the generated batch file to |
| 751 | refer to all the command line arguments, so you may need to make |
| 752 | sure that construct works in batch files. As of this writing, |
| 753 | 4DOS/NT users will need a "ParameterChar = *" statement in their |
| 754 | 4NT.INI file or will need to execute "setdos /p*" in the 4DOS/NT |
| 755 | startup file to enable this to work. |
| 756 | |
| 757 | =item 3 |
| 758 | |
| 759 | Using "pl2bat" has a few problems: the file name gets changed, |
| 760 | so scripts that rely on C<$0> to find what they must do may not |
| 761 | run properly; running "pl2bat" replicates the contents of the |
| 762 | original script, and so this process can be maintenance intensive |
| 763 | if the originals get updated often. A different approach that |
| 764 | avoids both problems is possible. |
| 765 | |
| 766 | A script called "runperl.bat" is available that can be copied |
| 767 | to any filename (along with the .bat suffix). For example, |
| 768 | if you call it "foo.bat", it will run the file "foo" when it is |
| 769 | executed. Since you can run batch files on Windows platforms simply |
| 770 | by typing the name (without the extension), this effectively |
| 771 | runs the file "foo", when you type either "foo" or "foo.bat". |
| 772 | With this method, "foo.bat" can even be in a different location |
| 773 | than the file "foo", as long as "foo" is available somewhere on |
| 774 | the PATH. If your scripts are on a filesystem that allows symbolic |
| 775 | links, you can even avoid copying "runperl.bat". |
| 776 | |
| 777 | Here's a diversion: copy "runperl.bat" to "runperl", and type |
| 778 | "runperl". Explain the observed behavior, or lack thereof. :) |
| 779 | Hint: .gnidnats llits er'uoy fi ,"lrepnur" eteled :tniH |
| 780 | |
| 781 | =back |
| 782 | |
| 783 | =head2 Miscellaneous Things |
| 784 | |
| 785 | A full set of HTML documentation is installed, so you should be |
| 786 | able to use it if you have a web browser installed on your |
| 787 | system. |
| 788 | |
| 789 | C<perldoc> is also a useful tool for browsing information contained |
| 790 | in the documentation, especially in conjunction with a pager |
| 791 | like C<less> (recent versions of which have Windows support). You may |
| 792 | have to set the PAGER environment variable to use a specific pager. |
| 793 | "perldoc -f foo" will print information about the perl operator |
| 794 | "foo". |
| 795 | |
| 796 | One common mistake when using this port with a GUI library like C<Tk> |
| 797 | is assuming that Perl's normal behavior of opening a command-line |
| 798 | window will go away. This isn't the case. If you want to start a copy |
| 799 | of C<perl> without opening a command-line window, use the C<wperl> |
| 800 | executable built during the installation process. Usage is exactly |
| 801 | the same as normal C<perl> on Windows, except that options like C<-h> |
| 802 | don't work (since they need a command-line window to print to). |
| 803 | |
| 804 | If you find bugs in perl, you can run C<perlbug> to create a |
| 805 | bug report (you may have to send it manually if C<perlbug> cannot |
| 806 | find a mailer on your system). |
| 807 | |
| 808 | =head1 BUGS AND CAVEATS |
| 809 | |
| 810 | Norton AntiVirus interferes with the build process, particularly if |
| 811 | set to "AutoProtect, All Files, when Opened". Unlike large applications |
| 812 | the perl build process opens and modifies a lot of files. Having the |
| 813 | the AntiVirus scan each and every one slows build the process significantly. |
| 814 | Worse, with PERLIO=stdio the build process fails with peculiar messages |
| 815 | as the virus checker interacts badly with miniperl.exe writing configure |
| 816 | files (it seems to either catch file part written and treat it as suspicious, |
| 817 | or virus checker may have it "locked" in a way which inhibits miniperl |
| 818 | updating it). The build does complete with |
| 819 | |
| 820 | set PERLIO=perlio |
| 821 | |
| 822 | but that may be just luck. Other AntiVirus software may have similar issues. |
| 823 | |
| 824 | Some of the built-in functions do not act exactly as documented in |
| 825 | L<perlfunc>, and a few are not implemented at all. To avoid |
| 826 | surprises, particularly if you have had prior exposure to Perl |
| 827 | in other operating environments or if you intend to write code |
| 828 | that will be portable to other environments, see L<perlport> |
| 829 | for a reasonably definitive list of these differences. |
| 830 | |
| 831 | Not all extensions available from CPAN may build or work properly |
| 832 | in the Windows environment. See L</"Building Extensions">. |
| 833 | |
| 834 | Most C<socket()> related calls are supported, but they may not |
| 835 | behave as on Unix platforms. See L<perlport> for the full list. |
| 836 | |
| 837 | Signal handling may not behave as on Unix platforms (where it |
| 838 | doesn't exactly "behave", either :). For instance, calling C<die()> |
| 839 | or C<exit()> from signal handlers will cause an exception, since most |
| 840 | implementations of C<signal()> on Windows are severely crippled. |
| 841 | Thus, signals may work only for simple things like setting a flag |
| 842 | variable in the handler. Using signals under this port should |
| 843 | currently be considered unsupported. |
| 844 | |
| 845 | Please send detailed descriptions of any problems and solutions that |
| 846 | you may find to E<lt>F<perlbug@perl.org>E<gt>, along with the output |
| 847 | produced by C<perl -V>. |
| 848 | |
| 849 | =head1 ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS |
| 850 | |
| 851 | The use of a camel with the topic of Perl is a trademark |
| 852 | of O'Reilly and Associates, Inc. Used with permission. |
| 853 | |
| 854 | =head1 AUTHORS |
| 855 | |
| 856 | =over 4 |
| 857 | |
| 858 | =item Gary Ng E<lt>71564.1743@CompuServe.COME<gt> |
| 859 | |
| 860 | =item Gurusamy Sarathy E<lt>gsar@activestate.comE<gt> |
| 861 | |
| 862 | =item Nick Ing-Simmons E<lt>nick@ing-simmons.netE<gt> |
| 863 | |
| 864 | =item Jan Dubois E<lt>jand@activestate.comE<gt> |
| 865 | |
| 866 | =item Steve Hay E<lt>steve.m.hay@googlemail.comE<gt> |
| 867 | |
| 868 | =back |
| 869 | |
| 870 | This document is maintained by Jan Dubois. |
| 871 | |
| 872 | =head1 SEE ALSO |
| 873 | |
| 874 | L<perl> |
| 875 | |
| 876 | =head1 HISTORY |
| 877 | |
| 878 | This port was originally contributed by Gary Ng around 5.003_24, |
| 879 | and borrowed from the Hip Communications port that was available |
| 880 | at the time. Various people have made numerous and sundry hacks |
| 881 | since then. |
| 882 | |
| 883 | GCC/mingw32 support was added in 5.005 (Nick Ing-Simmons). |
| 884 | |
| 885 | Support for PERL_OBJECT was added in 5.005 (ActiveState Tool Corp). |
| 886 | |
| 887 | Support for fork() emulation was added in 5.6 (ActiveState Tool Corp). |
| 888 | |
| 889 | Win9x support was added in 5.6 (Benjamin Stuhl). |
| 890 | |
| 891 | Support for 64-bit Windows added in 5.8 (ActiveState Corp). |
| 892 | |
| 893 | Last updated: 10 September 2011 |
| 894 | |
| 895 | =cut |