=head1 NAME
-README.freebsd - Perl version 5 on FreeBSD systems
+perlfreebsd - Perl version 5 on FreeBSD systems
=head1 DESCRIPTION
=head2 $^X doesn't always contain a full path in FreeBSD
-perl 5.8.0 sets C<$^X> where possible to a full path by asking the operating
-system. On FreeBSD the full path of the perl interpreter is found by reading
-the symlink F</proc/curproc/file>. FreeBSD has a bug where reading this
-symlink sometimes returns an incorrect value
+perl sets C<$^X> where possible to a full path by asking the operating
+system. On FreeBSD the full path of the perl interpreter is found by using
+C<sysctl> with C<KERN_PROC_PATHNAME> if that is supported, else by reading
+the symlink F</proc/curproc/file>. FreeBSD 7 and earlier has a bug where
+either approach sometimes returns an incorrect value
(see http://www.freebsd.org/cgi/query-pr.cgi?pr=35703 ).
In these cases perl will fall back to the old behaviour of using C's
argv[0] value for C<$^X>.
-=head2 Perl will no longer be part of "base FreeBSD"
-
-Not as bad as it sounds--what this means is that Perl will no longer be
-part of the B<kernel build system> of FreeBSD. Perl will still very
-probably be part of the "default install", and in any case the latest
-version will be in the ports system. The first FreeBSD version this
-change will affect is 5.0, all 4.n versions will keep the status quo.
-
=head1 AUTHOR
Nicholas Clark <nick@ccl4.org>, collating wisdom supplied by Slaven Rezic