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 v5.25.9
12 This document describes differences between the 5.25.8 release and the 5.25.9
15 If you are upgrading from an earlier release such as 5.25.7, first read
16 L<perl5258delta>, which describes differences between 5.25.7 and 5.25.8.
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 ]
32 XXX Any security-related notices go here. In particular, any security
33 vulnerabilities closed should be noted here rather than in the
34 L</Selected Bug Fixes> section.
36 [ List each security issue as a =head2 entry ]
38 =head1 Incompatible Changes
40 XXX For a release on a stable branch, this section aspires to be:
42 There are no changes intentionally incompatible with 5.XXX.XXX
43 If any exist, they are bugs, and we request that you submit a
44 report. See L</Reporting Bugs> below.
46 [ List each incompatible change as a =head2 entry ]
50 =head2 String delimiters that aren't stand-alone graphemes are now
53 In order for Perl to eventually allow string delimiters to be Unicode
54 grapheme clusters (which look like a single character, but may be
55 a sequence of several ones), we have to stop allowing a single char
56 delimiter that isn't a grapheme by itself. These are unlikely to exist
57 in actual code, as they would typically display as attached to the
58 character in front of them.
60 =head2 Module removals
62 XXX Remove this section if inapplicable.
64 The following modules will be removed from the core distribution in a
65 future release, and will at that time need to be installed from CPAN.
66 Distributions on CPAN which require these modules will need to list them as
69 The core versions of these modules will now issue C<"deprecated">-category
70 warnings to alert you to this fact. To silence these deprecation warnings,
71 install the modules in question from CPAN.
73 Note that these are (with rare exceptions) fine modules that you are encouraged
74 to continue to use. Their disinclusion from core primarily hinges on their
75 necessity to bootstrapping a fully functional, CPAN-capable Perl installation,
76 not usually on concerns over their design.
82 XXX Note that deprecated modules should be listed here even if they are listed
83 as an updated module in the L</Modules and Pragmata> section.
87 [ List each other deprecation as a =head2 entry ]
89 =head1 Performance Enhancements
91 XXX Changes which enhance performance without changing behaviour go here.
92 There may well be none in a stable release.
94 [ List each enhancement as a =item entry ]
104 =head1 Modules and Pragmata
106 XXX All changes to installed files in F<cpan/>, F<dist/>, F<ext/> and F<lib/>
107 go here. If Module::CoreList is updated, generate an initial draft of the
108 following sections using F<Porting/corelist-perldelta.pl>. A paragraph summary
109 for important changes should then be added by hand. In an ideal world,
110 dual-life modules would have a F<Changes> file that could be cribbed.
112 [ Within each section, list entries as a =item entry ]
114 =head2 New Modules and Pragmata
124 =head2 Updated Modules and Pragmata
130 L<XXX> has been upgraded from version A.xx to B.yy.
134 L<B::Xref> has been upgraded from version 1.05 to 1.06.
138 L<VMS-DCLsym::DCLsym> has been upgraded from version 1.07 to 1.08.
142 L<diagnostics> has been upgraded from version 1.35 to 1.36.
146 L<Devel::SelfStubber> has been upgraded from version 1.05 to 1.06.
150 L<DynaLoader> has been upgraded from version 1.40 to 1.41.
154 L<Errno> has been upgraded from version 1.27 to 1.28.
158 L<ExtUtils::Embed> has been upgraded from version 1.33 to 1.34.
162 L<I18N::LangTags> has been upgraded from version 0.41 to 0.42.
166 L<lib> has been upgraded from version 0.63 to 0.64.
170 L<Module::CoreList> has been upgraded from version 5.20161220 to 5.20170120.
174 L<OS2-Process::Process> has been upgraded from version 1.11 to 1.12.
178 L<perl5db.pl> has been upgraded from version 1.50 to 1.51.
182 L<Storable> has been upgraded from version 2.59 to 2.60.
186 L<Symbol> has been upgraded from version 1.07 to 1.08.
190 L<Term::ReadLine> has been upgraded from version 1.15 to 1.16.
194 L<Test> has been upgraded from version 1.29 to 1.30.
198 L<Unicode::UCD> has been upgraded from version 0.67 to 0.68.
202 L<XSLoader> has been upgraded from version 0.24 to 0.26.
206 =head2 Removed Modules and Pragmata
218 XXX Changes to files in F<pod/> go here. Consider grouping entries by
219 file and be sure to link to the appropriate page, e.g. L<perlfunc>.
221 =head2 New Documentation
223 XXX Changes which create B<new> files in F<pod/> go here.
227 XXX Description of the purpose of the new file here
229 =head2 Changes to Existing Documentation
231 XXX Changes which significantly change existing files in F<pod/> go here.
232 However, any changes to F<pod/perldiag.pod> should go in the L</Diagnostics>
241 XXX Description of the change here
247 The following additions or changes have been made to diagnostic output,
248 including warnings and fatal error messages. For the complete list of
249 diagnostic messages, see L<perldiag>.
251 XXX New or changed warnings emitted by the core's C<C> code go here. Also
252 include any changes in L<perldiag> that reconcile it to the C<C> code.
254 =head2 New Diagnostics
256 XXX Newly added diagnostic messages go under here, separated into New Errors
265 XXX L<message|perldiag/"message">
275 XXX L<message|perldiag/"message">
279 =head2 Changes to Existing Diagnostics
281 XXX Changes (i.e. rewording) of diagnostic messages go here
287 XXX Describe change here
291 =head1 Utility Changes
293 XXX Changes to installed programs such as F<perlbug> and F<xsubpp> go here.
294 Most of these are built within the directory F<utils>.
296 [ List utility changes as a =head2 entry for each utility and =item
297 entries for each change
298 Use L<XXX> with program names to get proper documentation linking. ]
310 =head1 Configuration and Compilation
312 XXX Changes to F<Configure>, F<installperl>, F<installman>, and analogous tools
313 go here. Any other changes to the Perl build process should be listed here.
314 However, any platform-specific changes should be listed in the
315 L</Platform Support> section, instead.
317 [ List changes as a =item entry ].
329 XXX Any significant changes to the testing of a freshly built perl should be
330 listed here. Changes which create B<new> files in F<t/> go here as do any
331 large changes to the testing harness (e.g. when parallel testing was added).
332 Changes to existing files in F<t/> aren't worth summarizing, although the bugs
333 that they represent may be covered elsewhere.
335 [ List each test improvement as a =item entry ]
345 =head1 Platform Support
347 XXX Any changes to platform support should be listed in the sections below.
349 [ Within the sections, list each platform as a =item entry with specific
350 changes as paragraphs below it. ]
354 XXX List any platforms that this version of perl compiles on, that previous
355 versions did not. These will either be enabled by new files in the F<hints/>
356 directories, or new subdirectories and F<README> files at the top level of the
361 =item XXX-some-platform
367 =head2 Discontinued Platforms
369 XXX List any platforms that this version of perl no longer compiles on.
373 =item XXX-some-platform
379 =head2 Platform-Specific Notes
381 XXX List any changes for specific platforms. This could include configuration
382 and compilation changes or changes in portability/compatibility. However,
383 changes within modules for platforms should generally be listed in the
384 L</Modules and Pragmata> section.
388 =item XXX-some-platform
394 =head1 Internal Changes
396 XXX Changes which affect the interface available to C<XS> code go here. Other
397 significant internal changes for future core maintainers should be noted as
400 [ List each change as a =item entry ]
406 New versions of macros like C<isALPHA_utf8> and C<toLOWER_utf8> have
407 been added, each with the
408 suffix C<_safe>, like C<isSPACE_utf8_safe>. These take an extra
409 parameter, giving an upper limit of how far into the string it is safe
410 to read. Using the old versions could cause attempts to read beyond the
411 end of the input buffer if the UTF-8 is not well-formed, and ther use
412 now raises a deprecation warning. Details are at
413 L<perlapi/Character classification>.
417 Calling macros like C<isALPHA_utf8> on malformed UTF-8 have issued a
418 deprecation warning since Perl v5.18. They now die.
419 Similarly, macros like C<toLOWER_utf8> on malformed UTF-8 now die.
423 Calling the functions C<utf8n_to_uvchr> and its derivatives, while
424 passing a string length of 0 is now asserted against in DEBUGGING
425 builds, and otherwise returns the Unicode REPLACEMENT CHARACTER. If
426 you have nothing to decode, you shouldn't call the decode function.
430 The functions C<utf8n_to_uvchr> and its derivatives now return the
431 Unicode REPLACEMENT CHARACTER if called with UTF-8 that has the overlong
432 malformation, and that malformation is allowed by the input parameters.
433 This malformation is where the UTF-8 looks valid syntactically, but
434 there is a shorter sequence that yields the same code point. This has
435 been forbidden since Unicode version 3.1.
439 The functions C<utf8n_to_uvchr> and its derivatives now accept an input
440 flag to allow the overflow malformation. This malformation is when the
441 UTF-8 may be syntactically valid, but the code point it represents is
442 not capable of being represented in the word length on the platform.
443 What "allowed" means in this case is that the function doesn't return an
444 error, and advances the parse pointer to beyond the UTF-8 in question,
445 but it returns the Unicode REPLACEMENT CHARACTER as the value of the
446 code point (since the real value is not representable).
450 =head1 Selected Bug Fixes
452 XXX Important bug fixes in the core language are summarized here. Bug fixes in
453 files in F<ext/> and F<lib/> are best summarized in L</Modules and Pragmata>.
455 [ List each fix as a =item entry ]
461 Under C<use utf8>, the entire Perl program is now checked that the UTF-8
462 is wellformed. This resolves [perl #126310].
466 =head1 Known Problems
468 XXX Descriptions of platform agnostic bugs we know we can't fix go here. Any
469 tests that had to be C<TODO>ed for the release would be noted here. Unfixed
470 platform specific bugs also go here.
472 [ List each fix as a =item entry ]
482 =head1 Errata From Previous Releases
488 XXX Add anything here that we forgot to add, or were mistaken about, in
489 the perldelta of a previous release.
495 XXX If any significant core contributor has died, we've added a short obituary
498 =head1 Acknowledgements
500 XXX Generate this with:
502 perl Porting/acknowledgements.pl v5.25.5..HEAD
504 =head1 Reporting Bugs
506 If you find what you think is a bug, you might check the perl bug database
507 at L<https://rt.perl.org/> . There may also be information at
508 L<http://www.perl.org/> , the Perl Home Page.
510 If you believe you have an unreported bug, please run the L<perlbug> program
511 included with your release. Be sure to trim your bug down to a tiny but
512 sufficient test case. Your bug report, along with the output of C<perl -V>,
513 will be sent off to perlbug@perl.org to be analysed by the Perl porting team.
515 If the bug you are reporting has security implications which make it
516 inappropriate to send to a publicly archived mailing list, then see
517 L<perlsec/SECURITY VULNERABILITY CONTACT INFORMATION>
518 for details of how to report the issue.
522 The F<Changes> file for an explanation of how to view exhaustive details on
525 The F<INSTALL> file for how to build Perl.
527 The F<README> file for general stuff.
529 The F<Artistic> and F<Copying> files for copyright information.