PERLBUILD -- kit to build and install Perl + extensions on VMS

23-May-2004	Craig A. Berry	craigberry@mac.com

This kit contains the Perl 5.8.4 final release, a selection of
extensions, and a command procedure to build and install the whole
shebang. The kit is about 15 MB.  The prerequisites are: unzip,
DEC/Compaq C, and MMK or MMS.  The basic steps to follow are: 1) unzip,
and 2) run the procedure.  Those steps would look something like this:

   $ unzip perlbuild584.zip
   Archive:  D0:[CRAIG.KITS]PERLBUILD584.ZIP;1
     inflating: [.perlbuild584]build_perl.com
    extracting: [.perlbuild584]libraries.zip
    extracting: [.perlbuild584]modules.zip
    extracting: [.perlbuild584]source.zip
   $ set default [.perlbuild584]
   $ submit/noprint build_perl
   Job BUILD_PERL (queue SYS$BATCH, entry 15) started on SYS$BATCH

The job has been taking me 3 1/2 hours to run on an AlphaStation 250 4/266.

I've tried to use rooted logicals to avoid directory depth problems, but
if you are on VAX or pre-7.2 Alpha, it's probably wise to unpack the kit
as close to the root of your volume as you can.  (I haven't had a chance
to test on those platforms.)

When the procedure completes, the directory tree [.perlbuild584.perl...] will
contain an installed snapshot of Perl and the extensions included in the
kit.  You can leave the installation where it is or use BACKUP to put it
anywhere else.  Just copy the PERL_SETUP.COM from the [.perlbuild584] directory
and modify the definition of PERL_ROOT contained therein to point to the
final location.  The snapshot is also suitable for zipping up and
distributing as a pre-built binary.

The list of modules I've included follows below.  Sorry about omitting
version numbers, but these have all been downloaded from CPAN recently and
should be the latest.  The module list is the intersection of "most
requested" and "most functional on VMS."  

DATA-FIXEDFORMAT
DBI
LIBNET
DIGEST-MD5
HTML-TAGSET
HTML-PARSER
MIME-BASE64
URI
LIBWWW-PERL
MIME-LITE
SMG
VMS-DEVICE
VMS-FILEUTILS
VMS-FINDFILE
VMS-ICC
VMS-INDEXEDFILE
VMS-FLATFILE
VMS-LIBRARIAN
VMS-LOCK
VMS-MAIL
VMS-MISC
VMS-MONITOR
VMS-PERSONA
VMS-PRIV
VMS-PROCESS
VMS-QUEUE
VMS-SYSTEM
VMS-USER
XML-PARSER

Various notes and gotchas:


You may seem some test failures, particularly with some of the
extensions. These may be bugs/features of the test suites and not
necessarily of the extensions themselves.  Please note that while the
version of Perl included here is a production-quality final release, the
same is not necessarily true of all the extensions.   How important the
test failures are may vary from insignificant to critical, and I'm
afraid you'll have to determine that for yourself on a case by case
basis.

The BUILD_PERL.COM procedure does accept two parameters, mostly
untested.  P1 can be an alternate root directory where you want Perl to
be installed, much like the prefix parameter to Configure.com.  Here's
an example (trailing dot significant):

   $ submit build_perl.com/param=disk2:[utils.perl-5_8_4.]

P2 is the stage of the procedure you want to start at.  For example, if Perl
has been successfully built and installed but you get hung up in the
modules, you can try something like:

   $ submit build_perl.com/parameters=("","MODULES")

to restart at the MODULES step (look in the procedure to see what the labels
are).

If you want to test a development release of Perl with the extensions
included here, untar it, rename  PERL.DIR to SOURCE.DIR, zip it up, and
stick it in place of the SOURCE.ZIP included in this kit.

