5 [ this is a template for a new perldelta file. Any text flagged as XXX needs
6 to be processed before release. ]
8 perldelta - what is new for perl v5.17.9
12 This document describes differences between the 5.17.8 release and the 5.17.9
15 If you are upgrading from an earlier release such as 5.17.7, first read
16 L<perl5178delta>, which describes differences between 5.17.7 and 5.17.8.
20 XXX Any important notices here
22 =head1 Core Enhancements
24 XXX New core language features go here. Summarize user-visible core language
25 enhancements. Particularly prominent performance optimisations could go
26 here, but most should go in the L</Performance Enhancements> section.
28 [ List each enhancement as a =head2 entry ]
30 =head2 Interpolations now Accepted in Regular Expression Set Operations
32 Perl v5.17.8 introduced L<regular expression set operations|perlre/(?[ ])>.
33 They have now been expanded to allow the interpolation of a
34 previously-compiled set into a bigger set, like this:
36 my $thai_or_lao = qr/\p{Thai} + \p{Lao}/;
38 qr/(?[ \p{Digit} & $thai_or_lao ])/;
42 XXX Any security-related notices go here. In particular, any security
43 vulnerabilities closed should be noted here rather than in the
44 L</Selected Bug Fixes> section.
46 [ List each security issue as a =head2 entry ]
48 =head1 Incompatible Changes
50 XXX For a release on a stable branch, this section aspires to be:
52 There are no changes intentionally incompatible with 5.XXX.XXX
53 If any exist, they are bugs, and we request that you submit a
54 report. See L</Reporting Bugs> below.
56 [ List each incompatible change as a =head2 entry ]
60 XXX Any deprecated features, syntax, modules etc. should be listed here. In
61 particular, deprecated modules should be listed here even if they are listed as
62 an updated module in the L</Modules and Pragmata> section.
64 [ List each deprecation as a =head2 entry ]
66 =head2 Deprecated Modules
68 The following modules will be removed from the core distribution in a
69 future release, and should be installed from CPAN instead. Distributions
70 on CPAN which require these should add them to their prerequisites. The
71 core versions of these modules C<warnings> will issue a deprecation warning.
73 You can silence these deprecation warnings by installing the modules
74 in question from CPAN.
78 =item L<Archive::Extract>
82 =item L<B::Lint::Debug>
86 =item L<CPANPLUS::Backend>
88 =item L<CPANPLUS::Backend::RV>
90 =item L<CPANPLUS::Config>
92 =item L<CPANPLUS::Config::HomeEnv>
94 =item L<CPANPLUS::Configure>
96 =item C<CPANPLUS::Configure::Setup>
98 =item L<CPANPLUS::Dist>
100 =item L<CPANPLUS::Dist::Autobundle>
102 =item L<CPANPLUS::Dist::Base>
104 =item L<CPANPLUS::Dist::Build>
106 =item L<CPANPLUS::Dist::Build::Constants>
108 =item L<CPANPLUS::Dist::MM>
110 =item L<CPANPLUS::Dist::Sample>
112 =item L<CPANPLUS::Error>
114 =item L<CPANPLUS::Internals>
116 =item C<CPANPLUS::Internals::Constants>
118 =item C<CPANPLUS::Internals::Constants::Report>
120 =item L<CPANPLUS::Internals::Extract>
122 =item L<CPANPLUS::Internals::Fetch>
124 =item L<CPANPLUS::Internals::Report>
126 =item L<CPANPLUS::Internals::Search>
128 =item L<CPANPLUS::Internals::Source>
130 =item L<CPANPLUS::Internals::Source::Memory>
132 =item L<CPANPLUS::Internals::Source::SQLite>
134 =item C<CPANPLUS::Internals::Source::SQLite::Tie>
136 =item L<CPANPLUS::Internals::Utils>
138 =item C<CPANPLUS::Internals::Utils::Autoflush>
140 =item L<CPANPLUS::Module>
142 =item L<CPANPLUS::Module::Author>
144 =item L<CPANPLUS::Module::Author::Fake>
146 =item L<CPANPLUS::Module::Checksums>
148 =item L<CPANPLUS::Module::Fake>
150 =item C<CPANPLUS::Module::Signature>
152 =item L<CPANPLUS::Selfupdate>
154 =item L<CPANPLUS::Shell>
156 =item L<CPANPLUS::Shell::Classic>
158 =item L<CPANPLUS::Shell::Default>
160 =item L<CPANPLUS::Shell::Default::Plugins::CustomSource>
162 =item L<CPANPLUS::Shell::Default::Plugins::Remote>
164 =item L<CPANPLUS::Shell::Default::Plugins::Source>
166 =item L<Devel::InnerPackage>
168 =item L<Log::Message>
170 =item L<Log::Message::Config>
172 =item L<Log::Message::Handlers>
174 =item L<Log::Message::Item>
176 =item L<Log::Message::Simple>
178 =item L<Module::Pluggable>
180 =item L<Module::Pluggable::Object>
182 =item L<Object::Accessor>
186 =item L<Term::UI::History>
190 =head3 Deprecated Utilities
192 The following utilities will be removed from the core distribution in a
193 future release as their associated modules have been deprecated. They
194 will remain available with the applicable CPAN distribution.
200 Included with L<CPANPLUS>.
202 =item C<cpanp-run-perl>
204 Included with L<CPANPLUS>.
208 Included with L<CPANPLUS>.
212 The L<Pod::LaTeX> module was deprecated with 5.17.8.
216 =head2 Five additional characters should be escaped in patterns with C</x>
218 When a regular expression pattern is compiled with C</x>, Perl treats 6
219 characters as white space to ignore, such as SPACE and TAB. However,
220 Unicode recommends 11 characters be treated thusly. In preparation to
221 conforming with this in a future Perl version, in the meantime, use of
222 any of the missing characters will raise a deprecation warning, unless
223 turned off. The five characters are:
225 U+200E LEFT-TO-RIGHT MARK,
226 U+200F RIGHT-TO-LEFT MARK,
227 U+2028 LINE SEPARATOR,
229 U+2029 PARAGRAPH SEPARATOR.
231 =head1 Performance Enhancements
233 XXX Changes which enhance performance without changing behaviour go here.
234 There may well be none in a stable release.
236 [ List each enhancement as a =item entry ]
246 =head1 Modules and Pragmata
248 XXX All changes to installed files in F<cpan/>, F<dist/>, F<ext/> and F<lib/>
249 go here. If Module::CoreList is updated, generate an initial draft of the
250 following sections using F<Porting/corelist-perldelta.pl>, which prints stub
251 entries to STDOUT. Results can be pasted in place of the '=head2' entries
252 below. A paragraph summary for important changes should then be added by hand.
253 In an ideal world, dual-life modules would have a F<Changes> file that could be
256 [ Within each section, list entries as a =item entry ]
258 =head2 New Modules and Pragmata
264 L<Config::Perl::V> version 0.16 has been added as a dual-lifed module.
265 It provides structured data retrieval of C<perl -V> output including
266 information only known to the C<perl> binary and not available via L<Config>.
270 =head2 Updated Modules and Pragmata
276 L<Benchmark> has been upgraded from version 1.13 to 1.14.
278 The "too few iterations" message is now a warning on STDERR
279 instead of being output on STDOUT.
283 L<File::Temp> has been upgraded from version 0.22 to 0.22_90
285 Fixes various bugs involving directory removal. Defers unlinking tempfiles if
286 the initial unlink fails, which fixes problems on NFS.
290 L<PerlIO::scalar> has been upgraded from version 0.15 to 0.16.
292 The buffer scalar supplied may now only contain code pounts 0xFF or
293 lower. [perl #109828]
297 =head2 Removed Modules and Pragmata
309 XXX Changes to files in F<pod/> go here. Consider grouping entries by
310 file and be sure to link to the appropriate page, e.g. L<perlfunc>.
312 =head2 New Documentation
314 XXX Changes which create B<new> files in F<pod/> go here.
318 XXX Description of the purpose of the new file here
320 =head2 Changes to Existing Documentation
322 XXX Changes which significantly change existing files in F<pod/> go here.
323 However, any changes to F<pod/perldiag.pod> should go in the L</Diagnostics>
332 XXX Description of the change here
338 The following additions or changes have been made to diagnostic output,
339 including warnings and fatal error messages. For the complete list of
340 diagnostic messages, see L<perldiag>.
342 XXX New or changed warnings emitted by the core's C<C> code go here. Also
343 include any changes in L<perldiag> that reconcile it to the C<C> code.
345 =head2 New Diagnostics
347 XXX Newly added diagnostic messages go under here, separated into New Errors
356 XXX L<message|perldiag/"message">
366 XXX L<message|perldiag/"message">
370 =head2 Changes to Existing Diagnostics
372 XXX Changes (i.e. rewording) of diagnostic messages go here
378 XXX Describe change here
382 =head1 Utility Changes
384 XXX Changes to installed programs such as F<perlbug> and F<xsubpp> go here.
385 Most of these are built within the directories F<utils> and F<x2p>.
387 [ List utility changes as a =head3 entry for each utility and =item
388 entries for each change
389 Use L<XXX> with program names to get proper documentation linking. ]
397 Added C<--feature> switch which lists the first version bundle of each
402 =head1 Configuration and Compilation
404 XXX Changes to F<Configure>, F<installperl>, F<installman>, and analogous tools
405 go here. Any other changes to the Perl build process should be listed here.
406 However, any platform-specific changes should be listed in the
407 L</Platform Support> section, instead.
409 [ List changes as a =item entry ].
421 XXX Any significant changes to the testing of a freshly built perl should be
422 listed here. Changes which create B<new> files in F<t/> go here as do any
423 large changes to the testing harness (e.g. when parallel testing was added).
424 Changes to existing files in F<t/> aren't worth summarizing, although the bugs
425 that they represent may be covered elsewhere.
427 [ List each test improvement as a =item entry ]
437 =head1 Platform Support
439 XXX Any changes to platform support should be listed in the sections below.
441 [ Within the sections, list each platform as a =item entry with specific
442 changes as paragraphs below it. ]
446 XXX List any platforms that this version of perl compiles on, that previous
447 versions did not. These will either be enabled by new files in the F<hints/>
448 directories, or new subdirectories and F<README> files at the top level of the
453 =item XXX-some-platform
459 =head2 Discontinued Platforms
461 XXX List any platforms that this version of perl no longer compiles on.
465 =item XXX-some-platform
471 =head2 Platform-Specific Notes
473 XXX List any changes for specific platforms. This could include configuration
474 and compilation changes or changes in portability/compatibility. However,
475 changes within modules for platforms should generally be listed in the
476 L</Modules and Pragmata> section.
480 =item XXX-some-platform
486 =head1 Internal Changes
488 XXX Changes which affect the interface available to C<XS> code go here. Other
489 significant internal changes for future core maintainers should be noted as
492 [ List each change as a =item entry ]
498 Synonyms for the misleadingly named C<av_len()> has been created:
499 C<av_top_index()> and C<av_tindex>. All three of these return the
500 number of the highest index in the array, not the number of elements it
501 contains. (The name C<av_top> which was introduced in Perl v.5.17.8 has
508 =head1 Selected Bug Fixes
510 XXX Important bug fixes in the core language are summarized here. Bug fixes in
511 files in F<ext/> and F<lib/> are best summarized in L</Modules and Pragmata>.
513 [ List each fix as a =item entry ]
519 -DPERL_GLOBAL_STRUCT builds now free the global struct B<after>
520 they've finished using it.
524 =head1 Known Problems
526 XXX Descriptions of platform agnostic bugs we know we can't fix go here. Any
527 tests that had to be C<TODO>ed for the release would be noted here. Unfixed
528 platform specific bugs also go here.
530 [ List each fix as a =item entry ]
542 XXX If any significant core contributor has died, we've added a short obituary
545 =head1 Acknowledgements
547 XXX Generate this with:
549 perl Porting/acknowledgements.pl v5.17.8..HEAD
551 =head1 Reporting Bugs
553 If you find what you think is a bug, you might check the articles recently
554 posted to the comp.lang.perl.misc newsgroup and the perl bug database at
555 http://rt.perl.org/perlbug/ . There may also be information at
556 http://www.perl.org/ , the Perl Home Page.
558 If you believe you have an unreported bug, please run the L<perlbug> program
559 included with your release. Be sure to trim your bug down to a tiny but
560 sufficient test case. Your bug report, along with the output of C<perl -V>,
561 will be sent off to perlbug@perl.org to be analysed by the Perl porting team.
563 If the bug you are reporting has security implications, which make it
564 inappropriate to send to a publicly archived mailing list, then please send it
565 to perl5-security-report@perl.org. This points to a closed subscription
566 unarchived mailing list, which includes all the core committers, who will be
567 able to help assess the impact of issues, figure out a resolution, and help
568 co-ordinate the release of patches to mitigate or fix the problem across all
569 platforms on which Perl is supported. Please only use this address for
570 security issues in the Perl core, not for modules independently distributed on
575 The F<Changes> file for an explanation of how to view exhaustive details on
578 The F<INSTALL> file for how to build Perl.
580 The F<README> file for general stuff.
582 The F<Artistic> and F<Copying> files for copyright information.