=head1 NAME
-perlfaq2 - Obtaining and Learning about Perl ($Revision: 1.15 $, $Date: 1997/03/25 18:15:48 $)
+perlfaq2 - Obtaining and Learning about Perl ($Revision: 1.30 $, $Date: 1998/12/29 19:43:32 $)
=head1 DESCRIPTION
This section of the FAQ answers questions about where to find
-source and documentation for Perl, support and training, and
+source and documentation for Perl, support, and
related matters.
=head2 What machines support Perl? Where do I get it?
The standard release of Perl (the one maintained by the perl
-development team) is distributed only in source code form. You can
-find this at http://www.perl.com/CPAN/src/latest.tar.gz, which is a
-gzipped archive in POSIX tar format. This source builds with no
-porting whatsoever on most Unix systems (Perl's native environment),
-as well as Plan 9, VMS, QNX, OS/2, and the Amiga.
-
-Although it's rumored that the (imminent) 5.004 release may build
-on Windows NT, this is yet to be proven. Binary distributions
-for 32-bit Microsoft systems and for Apple systems can be found
-http://www.perl.com/CPAN/ports/ directory. Because these are not part of
-the standard distribution, they may and in fact do differ from the base
-Perl port in a variety of ways. You'll have to check their respective
-release notes to see just what the differences are. These differences
-can be either positive (e.g. extensions for the features of the particular
-platform that are not supported in the source release of perl) or negative
-(e.g. might be based upon a less current source release of perl).
-
-A useful FAQ for Win32 Perl users is
-http://www.endcontsw.com/people/evangelo/Perl_for_Win32_FAQ.html
+development team) is distributed only in source code form. You
+can find this at http://www.perl.com/CPAN/src/latest.tar.gz , which
+in standard Internet format (a gzipped archive in POSIX tar format).
+
+Perl builds and runs on a bewildering number of platforms. Virtually
+all known and current Unix derivatives are supported (Perl's native
+platform), as are proprietary systems like VMS, DOS, OS/2, Windows,
+QNX, BeOS, and the Amiga. There are also the beginnings of support
+for MPE/iX.
+
+Binary distributions for some proprietary platforms, including
+Apple systems, can be found http://www.perl.com/CPAN/ports/ directory.
+Because these are not part of the standard distribution, they may
+and in fact do differ from the base Perl port in a variety of ways.
+You'll have to check their respective release notes to see just
+what the differences are. These differences can be either positive
+(e.g. extensions for the features of the particular platform that
+are not supported in the source release of perl) or negative (e.g.
+might be based upon a less current source release of perl).
=head2 How can I get a binary version of Perl?
-If you don't have a C compiler because for whatever reasons your
-vendor did not include one with your system, the best thing to do is
+If you don't have a C compiler because your vendor for whatever
+reasons did not include one with your system, the best thing to do is
grab a binary version of gcc from the net and use that to compile perl
with. CPAN only has binaries for systems that are terribly hard to
get free compilers for, not for Unix systems.
-Your first stop should be http://www.perl.com/CPAN/ports to see what
-information is already available. A simple installation guide for
-MS-DOS is available at http://www.cs.ruu.nl/~piet/perl5dos.html , and
-similarly for Windows 3.1 at http://www.cs.ruu.nl/~piet/perlwin3.html
-.
+Some URLs that might help you are:
+
+ http://language.perl.com/info/software.html
+ http://www.perl.com/latest/
+ http://www.perl.com/CPAN/ports/
+
+If you want information on proprietary systems. A simple installation
+guide for MS-DOS is available at http://www.cs.ruu.nl/~piet/perl5dos.html
+and similarly for Windows 3.1 at http://www.cs.ruu.nl/~piet/perlwin3.html .
=head2 I don't have a C compiler on my system. How can I compile perl?
approaches are doomed to failure.
One simple way to check that things are in the right place is to print out
-the hardcoded @INC which perl is looking for.
+the hard-coded @INC which perl is looking for.
- perl -e 'print join("\n",@INC)'
+ % perl -e 'print join("\n",@INC)'
If this command lists any paths which don't exist on your system, then you
may need to move the appropriate libraries to these locations, or create
-symlinks, aliases, or shortcuts appropriately.
+symlinks, aliases, or shortcuts appropriately. @INC is also printed as
+part of the output of
+
+ % perl -V
You might also want to check out L<perlfaq8/"How do I keep my own
module/library directory?">.
CPAN stands for Comprehensive Perl Archive Network, a huge archive
replicated on dozens of machines all over the world. CPAN contains
-source code, nonnative ports, documentation, scripts, and many
+source code, non-native ports, documentation, scripts, and many
third-party modules and extensions, designed for everything from
commercial database interfaces to keyboard/screen control to web
walking and CGI scripts. The master machine for CPAN is
=head2 Where can I get information on Perl?
-The complete Perl documentation is available with the perl
-distribution. If you have perl installed locally, you probably have
-the documentation installed as well: type C<man perl> if you're on a
-system resembling Unix. This will lead you to other important man
-pages. If you're not on a Unix system, access to the documentation
-will be different; for example, it might be only in HTML format. But
-all proper perl installations have fully-accessible documentation.
+The complete Perl documentation is available with the perl distribution.
+If you have perl installed locally, you probably have the documentation
+installed as well: type C<man perl> if you're on a system resembling Unix.
+This will lead you to other important man pages, including how to set your
+$MANPATH. If you're not on a Unix system, access to the documentation
+will be different; for example, it might be only in HTML format. But all
+proper perl installations have fully-accessible documentation.
You might also try C<perldoc perl> in case your system doesn't
have a proper man command, or it's been misinstalled. If that doesn't
troff, html, and plain text. There's also a web page at
http://www.perl.com/perl/info/documentation.html that might help.
-It's also worth noting that there's a PDF version of the complete
-documentation for perl available in the CPAN/authors/id/BMIDD
-directory.
-
Many good books have been written about Perl -- see the section below
for more details.
+Tutorial documents are included in current or upcoming Perl releases
+include L<perltoot> for objects, L<perlopentut> for file opening
+semantics, L<perlreftut> for managing references, and L<perlxstut>
+for linking C and Perl together. There may be more by the
+time you read this. The following URLs might also be of
+assistance:
+
+ http://language.perl.com/info/documentation.html
+ http://reference.perl.com/query.cgi?tutorials
+
=head2 What are the Perl newsgroups on USENET? Where do I post questions?
The now defunct comp.lang.perl newsgroup has been superseded by the
comp.lang.perl.announce Moderated announcement group
comp.lang.perl.misc Very busy group about Perl in general
+ comp.lang.perl.moderated Moderated discussion group
comp.lang.perl.modules Use and development of Perl modules
comp.lang.perl.tk Using Tk (and X) from Perl
There is also USENET gateway to the mailing list used by the crack
Perl development team (perl5-porters) at
-news://genetics.upenn.edu/perl.porters-gw/ .
+news://news.perl.com/perl.porters-gw/ .
=head2 Where should I post source code?
-You should post source code to whichever group is most appropriate,
-but feel free to cross-post to comp.lang.perl.misc. If you want to
-cross-post to alt.sources, please make sure it follows their posting
-standards, including setting the Followup-To header line to NOT
-include alt.sources; see their FAQ for details.
+You should post source code to whichever group is most appropriate, but
+feel free to cross-post to comp.lang.perl.misc. If you want to cross-post
+to alt.sources, please make sure it follows their posting standards,
+including setting the Followup-To header line to NOT include alt.sources;
+see their FAQ (http://www.faqs.org/faqs/alt-sources-intro/) for details.
+
+If you're just looking for software, first use Alta Vista, Deja News, and
+search CPAN. This is faster and more productive than just posting
+a request.
=head2 Perl Books
-A number books on Perl and/or CGI programming are available. A few of
+A number of books on Perl and/or CGI programming are available. A few of
these are good, some are ok, but many aren't worth your money. Tom
Christiansen maintains a list of these books, some with extensive
reviews, at http://www.perl.com/perl/critiques/index.html.
-The incontestably definitive reference book on Perl, written by the
-creator of Perl and his apostles, is now in its second edition and
-fourth printing.
+The incontestably definitive reference book on Perl, written by
+the creator of Perl, is now in its second edition:
Programming Perl (the "Camel Book"):
- Authors: Larry Wall, Tom Christiansen, and Randal Schwartz
+ by Larry Wall, Tom Christiansen, and Randal Schwartz
ISBN 1-56592-149-6 (English)
ISBN 4-89052-384-7 (Japanese)
- (French and German translations in progress)
-
-Note that O'Reilly books are color-coded: turquoise (some would call
-it teal) covers indicate perl5 coverage, while magenta (some would
-call it pink) covers indicate perl4 only. Check the cover color
-before you buy!
+ URL: http://www.oreilly.com/catalog/pperl2/
+ (French, German, Italian, and Hungarian translations also
+ available)
+
+The companion volume to the Camel containing thousands
+of real-world examples, mini-tutorials, and complete programs
+(first premiering at the 1998 Perl Conference), is:
+
+ The Perl Cookbook (the "Ram Book"):
+ by Tom Christiansen and Nathan Torkington,
+ with Foreword by Larry Wall
+ ISBN: 1-56592-243-3
+ URL: http://perl.oreilly.com/cookbook/
+
+If you're already a hard-core systems programmer, then the Camel Book
+might suffice for you to learn Perl from. But if you're not, check
+out:
+
+ Learning Perl (the "Llama Book"):
+ by Randal Schwartz and Tom Christiansen
+ with Foreword by Larry Wall
+ ISBN: 1-56592-284-0
+ URL: http://www.oreilly.com/catalog/lperl2/
+
+Despite the picture at the URL above, the second edition of "Llama
+Book" really has a blue cover, and is updated for the 5.004 release
+of Perl. Various foreign language editions are available, including
+I<Learning Perl on Win32 Systems> (the Gecko Book).
+
+If you're not an accidental programmer, but a more serious and possibly
+even degreed computer scientist who doesn't need as much hand-holding as
+we try to provide in the Llama or its defurred cousin the Gecko, please
+check out the delightful book, I<Perl: The Programmer's Companion>,
+written by Nigel Chapman.
+
+You can order O'Reilly books directly from O'Reilly & Associates,
+1-800-998-9938. Local/overseas is 1-707-829-0515. If you can
+locate an O'Reilly order form, you can also fax to 1-707-829-0104.
+See http://www.ora.com/ on the Web.
What follows is a list of the books that the FAQ authors found personally
useful. Your mileage may (but, we hope, probably won't) vary.
-If you're already a hardcore systems programmer, then the Camel Book
-just might suffice for you to learn Perl from. But if you're not,
-check out the "Llama Book". It currently doesn't cover perl5, but the
-2nd edition is nearly done and should be out by summer 97:
+Recommended books on (or mostly on) Perl follow; those marked with
+a star may be ordered from O'Reilly.
- Learning Perl (the Llama Book):
- Author: Randal Schwartz, with intro by Larry Wall
- ISBN 1-56592-042-2 (English)
- ISBN 4-89502-678-1 (Japanese)
- ISBN 2-84177-005-2 (French)
- ISBN 3-930673-08-8 (German)
+=over
-Another stand-out book in the turquoise O'Reilly Perl line is the "Hip
-Owls" book. It covers regular expressions inside and out, with quite a
-bit devoted exclusively to Perl:
+=item References
- Mastering Regular Expressions (the Cute Owls Book):
- Author: Jeffrey Friedl
- ISBN 1-56592-257-3
+ *Programming Perl
+ by Larry Wall, Tom Christiansen, and Randal L. Schwartz
-You can order any of these books from O'Reilly & Associates,
-1-800-998-9938. Local/overseas is 1-707-829-0515. If you can locate
-an O'Reilly order form, you can also fax to 1-707-829-0104. See
-http://www.ora.com/ on the Web.
+ *Perl 5 Desktop Reference
+ By Johan Vromans
-Recommended Perl books that are not from O'Reilly are the following:
+=item Tutorials
+
+ *Learning Perl [2nd edition]
+ by Randal L. Schwartz and Tom Christiansen
+ with foreword by Larry Wall
- Cross-Platform Perl, (for Unix and Windows NT)
- Author: Eric F. Johnson
- ISBN: 1-55851-483-X
+ *Learning Perl on Win32 Systems
+ by Randal L. Schwartz, Erik Olson, and Tom Christiansen,
+ with foreword by Larry Wall
- How to Set up and Maintain a World Wide Web Site, (2nd edition)
- Author: Lincoln Stein, M.D., Ph.D.
- ISBN: 0-201-63462-7
+ Perl: The Programmer's Companion
+ by Nigel Chapman
- CGI Programming in C & Perl,
- Author: Thomas Boutell
- ISBN: 0-201-42219-0
+ Cross-Platform Perl
+ by Eric F. Johnson
-Note that some of these address specific application areas (e.g. the
-Web) and are not general-purpose programming books.
+ MacPerl: Power and Ease
+ by Vicki Brown and Chris Nandor, foreword by Matthias Neeracher
-=head2 Perl in Magazines
+=item Task-Oriented
+
+ *The Perl Cookbook
+ by Tom Christiansen and Nathan Torkington
+ with foreword by Larry Wall
+
+ Perl5 Interactive Course [2nd edition]
+ by Jon Orwant
-The Perl Journal is the first and only magazine dedicated to Perl.
-It is published (on paper, not online) quarterly by Jon Orwant
-(orwant@tpj.com), editor. Subscription information is at http://tpj.com
-or via email to subscriptions@tpj.com.
+ *Advanced Perl Programming
+ by Sriram Srinivasan
-Beyond this, two other magazines that frequently carry high-quality
-articles on Perl are Web Techniques (see
-http://www.webtechniques.com/) and Unix Review
-(http://www.unixreview.com/). Randal Schwartz's Web Technique's
-columns are available on the web at
-http://www.stonehenge.com/merlyn/WebTechniques/ .
+ Effective Perl Programming
+ by Joseph Hall
+
+=item Special Topics
+
+ *Mastering Regular Expressions
+ by Jeffrey Friedl
+
+ How to Set up and Maintain a World Wide Web Site [2nd edition]
+ by Lincoln Stein
+
+=back
+
+=head2 Perl in Magazines
+
+The first and only periodical devoted to All Things Perl, I<The
+Perl Journal> contains tutorials, demonstrations, case studies,
+announcements, contests, and much more. TPJ has columns on web
+development, databases, Win32 Perl, graphical programming, regular
+expressions, and networking, and sponsors the Obfuscated Perl
+Contest. It is published quarterly under the gentle hand of its
+editor, Jon Orwant. See http://www.tpj.com/ or send mail to
+subscriptions@tpj.com .
+
+Beyond this, magazines that frequently carry high-quality articles
+on Perl are I<Web Techniques> (see http://www.webtechniques.com/),
+I<Performance Computing> (http://www.performance-computing.com/), and Usenix's
+newsletter/magazine to its members, I<login:>, at http://www.usenix.org/.
+Randal's Web Technique's columns are available on the web at
+http://www.stonehenge.com/merlyn/WebTechniques/.
=head2 Perl on the Net: FTP and WWW Access
To get the best (and possibly cheapest) performance, pick a site from
the list below and use it to grab the complete list of mirror sites.
-From there you can find the quickest site for you. Remember, the
+>From there you can find the quickest site for you. Remember, the
following list is I<not> the complete list of CPAN mirrors.
- http://www.perl.com/CPAN (redirects to another mirror)
+ http://www.perl.com/CPAN-local
+ http://www.perl.com/CPAN (redirects to an ftp mirror)
http://www.perl.org/CPAN
ftp://ftp.funet.fi/pub/languages/perl/CPAN/
http://www.cs.ruu.nl/pub/PERL/CPAN/
Most of the major modules (tk, CGI, libwww-perl) have their own
mailing lists. Consult the documentation that came with the module for
-subscription information. The following are a list of mailing lists
-related to perl itself.
-
-If you subscribe to a mailing list, it behooves you to know how to
-unsubscribe from it. Strident pleas to the list itself to get you off
-will not be favorably received.
-
-=over 4
-
-=item MacPerl
+subscription information. The Perl Institute attempts to maintain a
+list of mailing lists at:
-There is a mailing list for discussing Macintosh Perl. Contact
-"mac-perl-request@iis.ee.ethz.ch".
+ http://www.perl.org/maillist.html
-Also see Matthias Neeracher's (the creator and maintainer of MacPerl)
-web page at http://www.iis.ee.ethz.ch/~neeri/macintosh/perl.html for
-many links to interesting MacPerl sites, and the applications/MPW
-tools, precompiled.
-
-=item Perl5-Porters
-
-The core development team have a mailing list for discussing fixes and
-changes to the language. Send mail to
-"perl5-porters-request@perl.org" with help in the body of the message
-for information on subscribing.
-
-=item NTPerl
-
-This list is used to discuss issues involving Win32 Perl 5 (Windows NT
-and Win95). Subscribe by emailing ListManager@ActiveWare.com with the
-message body:
-
- subscribe Perl-Win32-Users
-
-The list software, also written in perl, will automatically determine
-your address, and subscribe you automatically. To unsubscribe, email
-the following in the message body to the same address like so:
-
- unsubscribe Perl-Win32-Users
-
-You can also check http://www.activeware.com/ and select "Mailing Lists"
-to join or leave this list.
-
-=item Perl-Packrats
-
-Discussion related to archiving of perl materials, particularly the
-Comprehensive PerlArchive Network (CPAN). Subscribe by emailing
-majordomo@cis.ufl.edu:
-
- subscribe perl-packrats
-
-The list software, also written in perl, will automatically determine
-your address, and subscribe you automatically. To unsubscribe, simple
-prepend the same command with an "un", and mail to the same address
-like so:
-
- unsubscribe perl-packrats
+=head2 Archives of comp.lang.perl.misc
-=back
+Have you tried Deja News or Alta Vista? Those are the
+best archives. Just look up "*perl*" as a newsgroup.
-=head2 Archives of comp.lang.perl.misc
+ http://www.dejanews.com/dnquery.xp?QRY=&DBS=2&ST=PS&defaultOp=AND&LNG=ALL&format=terse&showsort=date&maxhits=25&subjects=&groups=*perl*&authors=&fromdate=&todate=
-Have you tried Deja News or Alta Vista?
+You'll probably want to trim that down a bit, though.
ftp.cis.ufl.edu:/pub/perl/comp.lang.perl.*/monthly has an almost
complete collection dating back to 12/89 (missing 08/91 through
If you have, or know where can be found, the missing sections, please
let perlfaq-suggestions@perl.com know.
-=head2 Perl Training
-
-While some large training companies offer their own courses on Perl,
-you may prefer to contact individuals near and dear to the heart of
-Perl development. Two well-known members of the Perl development team
-who offer such things are Tom Christiansen <perl-classes@perl.com>
-and Randal Schwartz <perl-training-info@stonehenge.com>, plus their
-respective minions, who offer a variety of professional tutorials
-and seminars on Perl. These courses include large public seminars,
-private corporate training, and fly-ins to Colorado and Oregon.
-See http://www.perl.com/perl/info/training.html for more details.
-
=head2 Where can I buy a commercial version of Perl?
-In a sense, Perl already I<is> commercial software: It has a licence
-that you can grab and carefully read to your manager. It is
-distributed in releases and comes in well-defined packages. There is a
-very large user community and an extensive literature. The
-comp.lang.perl.* newsgroups and several of the mailing lists provide
-free answers to your questions in near real-time. Perl has
-traditionally been supported by Larry, dozens of software designers
-and developers, and thousands of programmers, all working for free
-to create a useful thing to make life better for everyone.
+In a real sense, Perl already I<is> commercial software: It has a licence
+that you can grab and carefully read to your manager. It is distributed
+in releases and comes in well-defined packages. There is a very large
+user community and an extensive literature. The comp.lang.perl.*
+newsgroups and several of the mailing lists provide free answers to your
+questions in near real-time. Perl has traditionally been supported by
+Larry, scores of software designers and developers, and myriads of
+programmers, all working for free to create a useful thing to make life
+better for everyone.
However, these answers may not suffice for managers who require a
-purchase order from a company whom they can sue should anything go
-wrong. Or maybe they need very serious hand-holding and contractual
-obligations. Shrink-wrapped CDs with perl on them are available from
-several sources if that will help.
+purchase order from a company whom they can sue should anything go awry.
+Or maybe they need very serious hand-holding and contractual obligations.
+Shrink-wrapped CDs with perl on them are available from several sources if
+that will help. For example, many perl books carry a perl distribution
+on them, as do the O'Reily Perl Resource Kits (in both the Unix flavor
+and in the proprietary Microsoft flavor); the free Unix distributions
+also all come with Perl.
Or you can purchase a real support contract. Although Cygnus historically
provided this service, they no longer sell support contracts for Perl.
of Oracle Web Server 3). 20% of the profit from our Perl support work
will be donated to The Perl Institute."
-For more information, contact the The Perl Clinic:
+For more information, contact The Perl Clinic:
Tel: +44 1483 424424
Fax: +44 1483 419419
Web: http://www.perl.co.uk/
Email: perl-support-info@perl.co.uk or Tim.Bunce@ig.co.uk
+See also www.perl.com for updates on tutorials, training, and support.
+
=head2 Where do I send bug reports?
If you are reporting a bug in the perl interpreter or the modules
-shipped with perl, use the perlbug program in the perl distribution or
-email your report to perlbug@perl.com.
+shipped with perl, use the I<perlbug> program in the perl distribution or
+mail your report to perlbug@perl.com .
-If you are posting a bug with a nonstandard port (see the answer to
+If you are posting a bug with a non-standard port (see the answer to
"What platforms is Perl available for?"), a binary distribution, or a
-nonstandard module (such as Tk, CGI, etc), then please see the
+non-standard module (such as Tk, CGI, etc), then please see the
documentation that came with it to determine the correct place to post
bugs.
-Read the perlbug manpage (perl5.004 or later) for more information.
+Read the perlbug(1) man page (perl5.004 or later) for more information.
-=head2 What is perl.com? perl.org? The Perl Institute?
+=head2 What is perl.com?
-perl.org is the official vehicle for The Perl Institute. The motto of
-TPI is "helping people help Perl help people" (or something like
-that). It's a nonprofit organization supporting development,
-documentation, and dissemination of perl. Current directors of TPI
-include Larry Wall, Tom Christiansen, and Randal Schwartz, whom you
-may have heard of somewhere else around here.
+The perl.com domain is owned by Tom Christiansen, who created it as a
+public service long before perl.org came about. Despite the name, it's a
+pretty non-commercial site meant to be a clearinghouse for information
+about all things Perlian, accepting no paid advertisements, bouncy
+happy gifs, or silly java applets on its pages. The Perl Home Page at
+http://www.perl.com/ is currently hosted on a T3 line courtesy of Songline
+Systems, a software-oriented subsidiary of O'Reilly and Associates.
+Other starting points include
-The perl.com domain is Tom Christiansen's domain. He created it as a
-public service long before perl.org came about. It's the original PBS
-of the Perl world, a clearinghouse for information about all things
-Perlian, accepting no paid advertisements, glossy GIFs, or (gasp!)
-Java applets on its pages.
+ http://language.perl.com/
+ http://conference.perl.com/
+ http://reference.perl.com/
-=head2 How do I learn about object-oriented Perl programming?
+=head1 AUTHOR AND COPYRIGHT
-L<perltoot> (distributed with 5.004 or later) is a good place to start.
-Also, L<perlobj>, L<perlref>, and L<perlmod> are useful references,
-while L<perlbot> has some excellent tips and tricks.
+Copyright (c) 1997-1999 Tom Christiansen and Nathan Torkington.
+All rights reserved.
-=head1 AUTHOR AND COPYRIGHT
+When included as an integrated part of the Standard Distribution
+of Perl or of its documentation (printed or otherwise), this work is
+covered under Perl's Artistic Licence. For separate distributions of
+all or part of this FAQ outside of that, see L<perlfaq>.
+
+Irrespective of its distribution, all code examples here are public
+domain. You are permitted and encouraged to use this code and any
+derivatives thereof in your own programs for fun or for profit as you
+see fit. A simple comment in the code giving credit to the FAQ would
+be courteous but is not required.
-Copyright (c) 1997 Tom Christiansen and Nathan Torkington.
-All rights reserved. See L<perlfaq> for distribution information.
https://perl5.git.perl.org / perl5.git / blobdiff