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1 perry 1 PERLWIN32
2 !!!PERLWIN32
3 NAME
4 SYNOPSIS
5 DESCRIPTION
6 BUGS AND CAVEATS
7 AUTHORS
8 SEE ALSO
9 HISTORY
10 ----
11 !!NAME
12
13
14 perlwin32 - Perl under Win32
15 !!SYNOPSIS
16
17
18 These are instructions for building Perl under Windows (9x,
19 NT and 2000).
20 !!DESCRIPTION
21
22
23 Before you start, you should glance through the
24 README file found in the top-level directory
25 to which the Perl distribution was extracted. Make sure you
26 read and understand the terms under which this software is
27 being distributed.
28
29
30 Also make sure you read `` BUGS AND CAVEATS
31 '' below for the known limitations of this
32 port.
33
34
35 The INSTALL file in the perl top-level has
36 much information that is only relevant to people building
37 Perl on Unix-like systems. In particular, you can safely
38 ignore any information that talks about
39 ``Configure''.
40
41
42 You may also want to look at two other options for building
43 a perl that will work on Windows NT: the
44 README .cygwin and README .os2
45 files, each of which give a different set of rules to build
46 a Perl that will work on Win32 platforms. Those two methods
47 will probably enable you to build a more Unix-compatible
48 perl, but you will also need to download and use various
49 other build-time and run-time support software described in
50 those files.
51
52
53 This set of instructions is meant to describe a so-called
54 ``native'' port of Perl to Win32 platforms. The resulting
55 Perl requires no additional software to run (other than what
56 came with your operating system). Currently, this port is
57 capable of using one of the following
58 compilers:
59
60
61 Borland C++ version 5.02 or later
62 Microsoft Visual C++ version 4.2 or later
63 Mingw32 with GCC version 2.95.2 or better
64 The last of these is a high quality freeware compiler. Support for it is still experimental. (Older versions of GCC are known not to work.)
65
66
2 perry 67 This port currently supports !MakeMaker (the set of modules
1 perry 68 that is used to build extensions to perl). Therefore, you
69 should be able to build and install most extensions found in
70 the CPAN sites. See ``Usage Hints'' below for
71 general hints about this.
72
73
74 __Setting Up__
75
76
77 Make
78
79
80 You need a ``make'' program to build the sources. If you are
81 using Visual C ++ under Windows
82 NT or 2000, nmake will work. All other builds
83 need dmake.
84
85
86 dmake is a freely available make that has very nice macro
87 features and parallelability.
88
89
90 A port of dmake for Windows is available from:
91
92
93 http://www.cpan.org/authors/id/GSAR/dmake-4.1pl1-win32.zip
94 (This is a fixed version of the original dmake sources obtained from http://www.wticorp.com/dmake/. As of version 4.1PL1, the original sources did not build as shipped and had various other problems. A patch is included in the above fixed version.)
95
96
97 Fetch and install dmake somewhere on your path (follow the
98 instructions in the README .NOW
99 file).
100
101
102 There exists a minor coexistence problem with dmake and
103 Borland C ++ compilers. Namely, if a
104 distribution has C files named with mixed case letters, they
105 will be compiled into appropriate .obj-files named with all
106 lowercase letters, and every time dmake is invoked to bring
107 files up to date, it will try to recompile such files again.
108 For example, Tk distribution has a lot of such files,
109 resulting in needless recompiles everytime dmake is invoked.
110 To avoid this, you may use the script ``sncfnmcs.pl'' after
111 a successful build. It is available in the win32
112 subdirectory of the Perl source distribution.
113
114
115 Command Shell
116
117
118 Use the default ``cmd'' shell that comes with
119 NT . Some versions of the popular 4DOS/NT
120 shell have incompatibilities that may cause you trouble. If
121 the build fails under that shell, try building again with
122 the cmd shell.
123
124
125 The nmake Makefile also has known incompatibilities with the
126 ``command.com'' shell that comes with Windows 9x. You will
127 need to use dmake and makefile.mk to build under Windows
128 9x.
129
130
131 The surest way to build it is on Windows NT ,
132 using the cmd shell.
133
134
135 Make sure the path to the build directory does not contain
136 spaces. The build usually works in this circumstance, but
137 some tests will fail.
138
139
140 Borland C ++
141
142
143 If you are using the Borland compiler, you will need dmake.
144 (The make that Borland supplies is seriously crippled and
2 perry 145 will not work for !MakeMaker builds.)
1 perry 146
147
148 See ``Make'' above.
149
150
151 Microsoft Visual C ++
152
153
154 The nmake that comes with Visual C ++ will
155 suffice for building. You will need to run the
156 VCVARS32 .BAT file, usually found somewhere
157 like C:MSDEV4.2BIN. This will set your build
158 environment.
159
160
161 You can also use dmake to build using Visual C
162 ++ ; provided, however, you set
163 OSRELEASE to ``microsft'' (or whatever the
164 directory name under which the Visual C dmake configuration
165 lives) in your environment and edit win32/config.vc to
166 change ``make=nmake'' into ``make=dmake''. The latter step
167 is only essential if you want to use dmake as your default
2 perry 168 make for building extensions using !MakeMaker.
1 perry 169
170
171 Mingw32 with GCC
172
173
174 GCC-2 .95.2 binaries can be downloaded
175 from:
176
177
178 ftp://ftp.xraylith.wisc.edu/pub/khan/gnu-win32/mingw32/
179 You also need dmake. See ``Make'' above on how to get it.
180
181
182 The GCC-2 .95.2 bundle comes with Mingw32
183 libraries and headers.
184
185
186 Make sure you install the binaries that work with
187 MSVCRT .DLL as indicated in the
188 README for the GCC bundle. You
189 may need to set up a few environment variables (usually ran
190 from a batch file).
191
192
193 There are a couple of problems with the version of
194 gcc-2.95.2-msvcrt.exe released 7 November 1999:
195
196
197 It left out a fix for certain command line quotes. To fix
198 this, be sure to download and install the file
199 fixes/quote-fix-msvcrt.exe from the above ftp
200 location.
201
202
203 The definition of the fpos_t type in stdio.h may be wrong.
204 If your stdio.h has this problem, you will see an exception
205 when running the test t/lib/io_xs.t. To fix this, change the
206 typedef for fpos_t from ``long'' to ``long long'' in the
207 file i386-mingw32msvc/include/stdio.h, and
208 rebuild.
209
210
211 A potentially simpler to install (but probably
212 soon-to-be-outdated) bundle of the above package with the
213 mentioned fixes already applied is available
214 here:
215
216
2 perry 217 http://downloads.!ActiveState.com/pub/staff/gsar/gcc-2.95.2-msvcrt.zip
218 ftp://ftp.!ActiveState.com/pub/staff/gsar/gcc-2.95.2-msvcrt.zip
1 perry 219
220
221 __Building__
222
223
224 Make sure you are in the ``win32'' subdirectory under the
225 perl toplevel. This directory contains a ``Makefile'' that
226 will work with versions of nmake that come with Visual C
227 ++ , and a dmake ``makefile.mk'' that will
228 work for all supported compilers. The defaults in the dmake
229 makefile are setup to build using the GCC
230 compiler.
231
232
233 Edit the makefile.mk (or Makefile, if you're using nmake)
234 and change the values of INST_DRV and
235 INST_TOP . You can also enable various build
236 flags. These are explained in the makefiles.
237
238
239 You will have to make sure that CCTYPE is set
240 correctly and that CCHOME points to wherever
241 you installed your compiler.
242
243
244 The default value for CCHOME in the makefiles
245 for Visual C ++ may not be correct for some
246 versions. Make sure the default exists and is
247 valid.
248
249
250 If you have either the source or a library that contains
251 ''des_fcrypt()'', enable the appropriate option in the
252 makefile. ''des_fcrypt()'' is not bundled with the
253 distribution due to US Government
254 restrictions on the export of cryptographic software.
255 Nevertheless, this routine is part of the ``libdes'' library
256 (written by Eric Young) which is widely available worldwide,
257 usually along with SSLeay (for example,
258 ``ftp://fractal.mta.ca/pub/crypto/SSLeay/DES/''). Set
259 CRYPT_SRC to the name of the file that
260 implements ''des_fcrypt()''. Alternatively, if you have
261 built a library that contains ''des_fcrypt()'', you can
262 set CRYPT_LIB to point to the library name.
263 The location above contains many versions of the ``libdes''
264 library, all with slightly different implementations of
265 ''des_fcrypt()''. Older versions have a single,
266 self-contained file (fcrypt.c) that implements
267 ''crypt()'', so they may be easier to use. A patch
268 against the fcrypt.c found in libdes-3.06 is in
269 des_fcrypt.patch.
270
271
272 Perl will also build without ''des_fcrypt()'', but the
273 ''crypt()'' builtin will fail at run time.
274
275
276 Be sure to read the instructions near the top of the
277 makefiles carefully.
278
279
280 Type ``dmake'' (or ``nmake'' if you are using that
281 make).
282
283
284 This should build everything. Specifically, it will create
285 perl.exe, perl56.dll at the perl toplevel, and various other
286 extension dll's under the libauto directory. If the build
287 fails for any reason, make sure you have done the previous
288 steps correctly.
289
290
291 __Testing__
292
293
294 Type ``dmake test'' (or ``nmake test''). This will run most
295 of the tests from the testsuite (many tests will be
296 skipped).
297
298
299 There should be no test failures when running under Windows
300 NT 4.0 or Windows 2000. Many tests
301 ''will'' fail under Windows 9x due to the inferior
302 command shell.
303
304
305 Some test failures may occur if you use a command shell
306 other than the native ``cmd.exe'', or if you are building
307 from a path that contains spaces. So don't do
308 that.
309
310
311 If you are running the tests from a emacs shell window, you
312 may see failures in op/stat.t. Run ``dmake test-notty'' in
313 that case.
314
315
316 If you're using the Borland compiler, you may see a failure
317 in op/taint.t arising from the inability to find the Borland
318 Runtime DLLs on the system default path. You will need to
319 copy the DLLs reported by the messages from where Borland
320 chose to install it, into the Windows system directory
321 (usually somewhere like C:WINNTSYSTEM32) and rerun the
322 test.
323
324
325 If you're using Borland compiler versions 5.2 and below, you
326 may run into problems finding the correct header files when
327 building extensions. For example, building the ``Tk''
328 extension may fail because both perl and Tk contain a header
329 file called ``patchlevel.h''. The latest Borland compiler
330 (v5.5) is free of this misbehaviour, and it even supports an
331 option -VI- for backward (bugward) compatibility for using
332 the old Borland search algorithm to locate header
333 files.
334
335
336 Please report any other failures as described under ``
337 BUGS AND CAVEATS ''.
338
339
340 __Installation__
341
342
343 Type ``dmake install'' (or ``nmake install''). This will put
344 the newly built perl and the libraries under whatever
345 INST_TOP points to in the Makefile. It will also
346 install the pod documentation under
347 $INST_TOP$VERSIONlibpod and HTML
348 versions of the same under
349 $INST_TOP$VERSIONlibpodhtml. To use the Perl you
350 just installed, you will need to add two components to your
351 PATH environment variable,
352 $INST_TOP$VERSIONbin and
353 $INST_TOP$VERSIONbin$ARCHNAME. For
354 example:
355
356
357 set PATH c:perl5.6.0bin;c:perl5.6.0binMSWin32-x86;%PATH%
358 If you opt to comment out INST_VER and INST_ARCH in the makefiles, the installation structure is much simpler. In that case, it will be sufficient to add a single entry to the path, for instance:
359
360
361 set PATH c:perlbin;%PATH%
362
363
364 __Usage Hints__
365
366
367 Environment Variables
368
369
370 The installation paths that you set during the build get
371 compiled into perl, so you don't have to do anything
372 additional to start using that perl (except add its location
373 to your PATH variable).
374
375
376 If you put extensions in unusual places, you can set
377 PERL5LIB to a list of paths separated by
378 semicolons where you want perl to look for libraries. Look
379 for descriptions of other environment variables you can set
380 in perlrun.
381
382
383 You can also control the shell that perl uses to run
384 ''system()'' and backtick commands via
385 PERL5SHELL . See perlrun.
386
387
388 Perl does not depend on the registry, but it can look up
389 certain default values if you choose to put them there. Perl
390 attempts to read entries from
391 HKEY_CURRENT_USERSoftwarePerl and
392 HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINESoftwarePerl. Entries in the
393 former override entries in the latter. One or more of the
394 following entries (of type REG_SZ or
395 REG_EXPAND_SZ ) may be set:
396
397
398 lib-$] version-specific standard library path to add to @INC
399 lib standard library path to add to @INC
400 sitelib-$] version-specific site library path to add to @INC
401 sitelib site library path to add to @INC
402 vendorlib-$] version-specific vendor library path to add to @INC
403 vendorlib vendor library path to add to @INC
404 PERL* fallback for all %ENV lookups that begin with
405 Note the $] in the above is not literal. Substitute whatever version of perl you want to honor that entry, e.g. 5.6.0. Paths must be separated with semicolons, as usual on win32.
406
407
408 File Globbing
409
410
411 By default, perl handles file globbing using the File::Glob
412 extension, which provides portable globbing.
413
414
415 If you want perl to use globbing that emulates the quirks of
416 DOS filename conventions, you might want to
2 perry 417 consider using File::!DosGlob to override the internal
418 ''glob()'' implementation. See File::!DosGlob for
1 perry 419 details.
420
421
422 Using perl from the command line
423
424
425 If you are accustomed to using perl from various
426 command-line shells found in UNIX
427 environments, you will be less than pleased with what
428 Windows offers by way of a command shell.
429
430
431 The crucial thing to understand about the Windows
432 environment is that the command line you type in is
433 processed twice before Perl sees it. First, your command
434 shell (usually CMD .EXE on Windows
435 NT , and COMMAND .COM on
436 Windows 9x) preprocesses the command line, to handle
437 redirection, environment variable expansion, and location of
438 the executable to run. Then, the perl executable splits the
439 remaining command line into individual arguments, using the
440 C runtime library upon which Perl was built.
441
442
443 It is particularly important to note that neither the shell
444 nor the C runtime do any wildcard expansions of command-line
445 arguments (so wildcards need not be quoted). Also, the
446 quoting behaviours of the shell and the C runtime are
447 rudimentary at best (and may, if you are using a
448 non-standard shell, be inconsistent). The only (useful)
449 quote character is the double quote (
450
451
452 The Windows NT documentation has almost no
453 description of how the quoting rules are implemented, but
454 here are some general observations based on experiments: The
455 C runtime breaks arguments at spaces and passes them to
456 programs in argc/argv. Double quotes can be used to prevent
457 arguments with spaces in them from being split up. You can
458 put a double quote in an argument by escaping it with a
459 backslash and enclosing the whole argument within double
460 quotes. The backslash and the pair of double quotes
461 surrounding the argument will be stripped by the C
462 runtime.
463
464
465 The file redirection characters ``
466
467
468 Here are some examples of usage of the ``cmd''
469 shell:
470
471
472 This prints two doublequotes:
473
474
475 perl -e
476 This does the same:
477
478
479 perl -e
480 This prints ``bar'' and writes ``foo'' to the file ``blurch'':
481
482
483 perl -e
484 This prints ``foo'' (``bar'' disappears into nowhereland):
485
486
487 perl -e
488 This prints ``bar'' and writes ``foo'' into the file ``blurch'':
489
490
491 perl -e
492 This pipes ``foo'' to the ``less'' pager and prints ``bar'' on the console:
493
494
495 perl -e
496 This pipes ``foonbarn'' to the less pager:
497
498
499 perl -le
500 This pipes ``foo'' to the pager and writes ``bar'' in the file ``blurch'':
501
502
503 perl -e
504 Discovering the usefulness of the ``command.com'' shell on Windows 9x is left as an exercise to the reader :)
505
506
507 One particularly pernicious problem with the 4NT command
508 shell for Windows NT is that it (nearly)
509 always treats a % character as indicating that environment
510 variable expansion is needed. Under this shell, it is
511 therefore important to always double any % characters which
512 you want Perl to see (for example, for hash variables), even
513 when they are quoted.
514
515
516 Building Extensions
517
518
519 The Comprehensive Perl Archive Network ( CPAN
520 ) offers a wealth of extensions, some of which require a C
521 compiler to build. Look in http://www.cpan.org/ for more
522 information on CPAN .
523
524
525 Note that not all of the extensions available from
526 CPAN may work in the Win32 environment; you
527 should check the information at http://testers.cpan.org/
528 before investing too much effort into porting modules that
529 don't readily build.
530
531
532 Most extensions (whether they require a C compiler or not)
533 can be built, tested and installed with the standard
534 mantra:
535
536
537 perl Makefile.PL
538 $MAKE
539 $MAKE test
540 $MAKE install
541 where $MAKE is whatever 'make' program you have configured perl to use. Use ``perl -V:make'' to find out what this is. Some extensions may not provide a testsuite (so ``$MAKE test'' may not do anything or fail), but most serious ones do.
542
543
544 It is important that you use a supported 'make' program, and
545 ensure Config.pm knows about it. If you don't have nmake,
546 you can either get dmake from the location mentioned earlier
547 or get an old version of nmake reportedly available
548 from:
549
550
551 ftp://ftp.microsoft.com/Softlib/MSLFILES/nmake15.exe
552 Another option is to use the make written in Perl, available from CPAN:
553
554
555 http://www.cpan.org/authors/id/NI-S/Make-0.03.tar.gz
556 You may also use dmake. See ``Make'' above on how to get it.
557
558
2 perry 559 Note that !MakeMaker actually emits makefiles with different
1 perry 560 syntax depending on what 'make' it thinks you are using.
561 Therefore, it is important that one of the following values
562 appears in Config.pm:
563
564
2 perry 565 make='nmake' # !MakeMaker emits nmake syntax
566 make='dmake' # !MakeMaker emits dmake syntax
567 any other value # !MakeMaker emits generic make syntax
1 perry 568 (e.g GNU make, or Perl make)
569 If the value doesn't match the 'make' program you want to use, edit Config.pm to fix it.
570
571
572 If a module implements XSUBs, you will need one of the
573 supported C compilers. You must make sure you have set up
574 the environment for the compiler for command-line
575 compilation.
576
577
578 If a module does not build for some reason, look carefully
579 for why it failed, and report problems to the module author.
580 If it looks like the extension building support is at fault,
581 report that with full details of how the build failed using
582 the perlbug utility.
583
584
585 Command-line Wildcard Expansion
586
587
588 The default command shells on DOS descendant
589 operating systems (such as they are) usually do not expand
590 wildcard arguments supplied to programs. They consider it
591 the application's job to handle that. This is commonly
592 achieved by linking the application (in our case, perl) with
593 startup code that the C runtime libraries usually provide.
594 However, doing that results in incompatible perl versions
595 (since the behavior of the argv expansion code differs
596 depending on the compiler, and it is even buggy on some
597 compilers). Besides, it may be a source of frustration if
598 you use such a perl binary with an alternate shell that
599 *does* expand wildcards.
600
601
602 Instead, the following solution works rather well. The nice
603 things about it are 1) you can start using it right away; 2)
604 it is more powerful, because it will do the right thing with
605 a pattern like */*/*.c; 3) you can decide whether you
606 do/don't want to use it; and 4) you can extend the method to
607 add any customizations (or even entirely different kinds of
608 wildcard expansion).
609
610
611 C:
612 Note there are two distinct steps there: 1) You'll have to create Wild.pm and put it in your perl lib directory. 2) You'll need to set the PERL5OPT environment variable. If you want argv expansion to be the default, just set PERL5OPT in your default startup environment.
613
614
615 If you are using the Visual C compiler, you can get the C
616 runtime's command line wildcard expansion built into perl
617 binary. The resulting binary will always expand unquoted
618 command lines, which may not be what you want if you use a
619 shell that does that for you. The expansion done is also
620 somewhat less powerful than the approach suggested
621 above.
622
623
624 Win32 Specific Extensions
625
626
627 A number of extensions specific to the Win32 platform are
628 available from CPAN . You may find that many
629 of these extensions are meant to be used under the
630 Activeware port of Perl, which used to be the only native
631 port for the Win32 platform. Since the Activeware port does
632 not have adequate support for Perl's extension building
633 tools, these extensions typically do not support those tools
634 either and, therefore, cannot be built using the generic
635 steps shown in the previous section.
636
637
638 To ensure smooth transitioning of existing code that uses
2 perry 639 the !ActiveState port, there is a bundle of Win32 extensions
640 that contains all of the !ActiveState extensions and most
1 perry 641 other Win32 extensions from CPAN in source
2 perry 642 form, along with many added bugfixes, and with !MakeMaker
1 perry 643 support. This bundle is available at:
644
645
646 http://www.cpan.org/authors/id/GSAR/libwin32-0.151.zip
647 See the README in that distribution for building and installation instructions. Look for later versions that may be available at the same location.
648
649
650 Running Perl Scripts
651
652
653 Perl scripts on UNIX use the ``#!'' (a.k.a
654 ``shebang'') line to indicate to the OS that
655 it should execute the file using perl. Win32 has no
656 comparable means to indicate arbitrary files are
657 executables.
658
659
660 Instead, all available methods to execute plain text files
661 on Win32 rely on the file ``extension''. There are three
662 methods to use this to execute perl scripts:
663
664
665 1
666
667
668 There is a facility called ``file extension associations''
669 that will work in Windows NT 4.0. This can be
670 manipulated via the two commands ``assoc'' and ``ftype''
671 that come standard with Windows NT 4.0. Type
672 ``ftype /?'' for a complete example of how to set this up
673 for perl scripts (Say what? You thought Windows
674 NT wasn't perl-ready? :).
675
676
677 2
678
679
680 Since file associations don't work everywhere, and there are
681 reportedly bugs with file associations where it does work,
682 the old method of wrapping the perl script to make it look
683 like a regular batch file to the OS , may be
684 used. The install process makes available the ``pl2bat.bat''
685 script which can be used to wrap perl scripts into batch
686 files. For example:
687
688
689 pl2bat foo.pl
690 will create the file `` FOO .BAT''. Note ``pl2bat'' strips any .pl suffix and adds a .bat suffix to the generated file.
691
692
693 If you use the 4DOS/NT or similar command shell, note that
694 ``pl2bat'' uses the ``%*'' variable in the generated batch
695 file to refer to all the command line arguments, so you may
696 need to make sure that construct works in batch files. As of
2 perry 697 this writing, 4DOS/NT users will need a ``!ParameterChar =
1 perry 698 *'' statement in their 4NT.INI file or will need to execute
699 ``setdos /p*'' in the 4DOS/NT startup file to enable this to
700 work.
701
702
703 3
704
705
706 Using ``pl2bat'' has a few problems: the file name gets
707 changed, so scripts that rely on $0 to find what
708 they must do may not run properly; running ``pl2bat''
709 replicates the contents of the original script, and so this
710 process can be maintenance intensive if the originals get
711 updated often. A different approach that avoids both
712 problems is possible.
713
714
715 A script called ``runperl.bat'' is available that can be
716 copied to any filename (along with the .bat suffix). For
717 example, if you call it ``foo.bat'', it will run the file
718 ``foo'' when it is executed. Since you can run batch files
719 on Win32 platforms simply by typing the name (without the
720 extension), this effectively runs the file ``foo'', when you
721 type either ``foo'' or ``foo.bat''. With this method,
722 ``foo.bat'' can even be in a different location than the
723 file ``foo'', as long as ``foo'' is available somewhere on
724 the PATH . If your scripts are on a
725 filesystem that allows symbolic links, you can even avoid
726 copying ``runperl.bat''.
727
728
729 Here's a diversion: copy ``runperl.bat'' to ``runperl'', and
730 type ``runperl''. Explain the observed behavior, or lack
731 thereof. :) Hint: .gnidnats llits er'uoy fi ,``lrepnur''
732 eteled :tniH
733
734
735 Miscellaneous Things
736
737
738 A full set of HTML documentation is
739 installed, so you should be able to use it if you have a web
740 browser installed on your system.
741
742
743 perldoc is also a useful tool for browsing
744 information contained in the documentation, especially in
745 conjunction with a pager like less (recent versions
746 of which have Win32 support). You may have to set the
747 PAGER environment variable to use a specific
748 pager. ``perldoc -f foo'' will print information about the
749 perl operator ``foo''.
750
751
752 If you find bugs in perl, you can run perlbug to
753 create a bug report (you may have to send it manually if
754 perlbug cannot find a mailer on your
755 system).
756 !!BUGS AND CAVEATS
757
758
759 Some of the built-in functions do not act exactly as
760 documented in perlfunc, and a few are not implemented at
761 all. To avoid surprises, particularly if you have had prior
762 exposure to Perl in other operating environments or if you
763 intend to write code that will be portable to other
764 environments. See perlport for a reasonably definitive list
765 of these differences.
766
767
768 Not all extensions available from CPAN may
769 build or work properly in the Win32 environment. See
770 ``Building Extensions''.
771
772
773 Most socket() related calls are supported, but they
774 may not behave as on Unix platforms. See perlport for the
775 full list.
776
777
778 Signal handling may not behave as on Unix platforms (where
779 it doesn't exactly ``behave'', either :). For instance,
780 calling die() or exit() from signal
781 handlers will cause an exception, since most implementations
782 of signal() on Win32 are severely crippled. Thus,
783 signals may work only for simple things like setting a flag
784 variable in the handler. Using signals under this port
785 should currently be considered unsupported.
786
787
788 Please send detailed descriptions of any problems and
789 solutions that you may find to
790 perlbug@perl.com''
791 ''perl -V.
792 !!AUTHORS
793
794
795 Gary Ng
796
797
798 Gurusamy Sarathy
799
800
801 Nick Ing-Simmons
802
803
804 This document is maintained by Gurusamy
805 Sarathy.
806 !!SEE ALSO
807
808
809 perl
810 !!HISTORY
811
812
813 This port was originally contributed by Gary Ng around
814 5.003_24, and borrowed from the Hip Communications port that
815 was available at the time. Various people have made numerous
816 and sundry hacks since then.
817
818
819 Borland support was added in 5.004_01 (Gurusamy
820 Sarathy).
821
822
823 GCC/mingw32 support was added in 5.005 (Nick
824 Ing-Simmons).
825
826
827 Support for PERL_OBJECT was added in 5.005
2 perry 828 (!ActiveState Tool Corp).
1 perry 829
830
831 Support for ''fork()'' emulation was added in 5.6
2 perry 832 (!ActiveState Tool Corp).
1 perry 833
834
835 Win9x support was added in 5.6 (Benjamin
836 Stuhl).
837
838
839 Last updated: 1 April 2001
840 ----
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