FAQ 2.1 What machines support perl? Where do I get it?

This is an excerpt from the latest version perlfaq2.pod, which
comes with the standard Perl distribution. These postings aim to
reduce the number of repeated questions as well as allow the community
to review and update the answers. The latest version of the complete
perlfaq is at http://faq.perl.org .

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2.1: 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.cpan.org/src/latest.tar.gz , which is in a 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 other systems like VMS, DOS, OS/2, Windows, QNX, BeOS,
OS X, MPE/iX and the Amiga.

Binary distributions for some proprietary platforms, including Apple
systems, can be found http://www.cpan.org/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).



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Re: FAQ 2.1 What machines support perl? Where do I get it?

In article <6cp1e5-cpi.ln1@blue.stonehenge.com>,
PerlFAQ Server wrote:

> 2.1: 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.cpan.org/src/latest.tar.gz , which is in a 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 other systems like VMS, DOS, OS/2, Windows, QNX, BeOS,
> OS X, MPE/iX and the Amiga.
>
> Binary distributions for some proprietary platforms, including Apple
> systems, can be found http://www.cpan.org/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).


The language in the last paragraph is a little confusing, in that it
seems to imply that current Apple users (for the most part, OS X users)
will need to obtain a binary distribution from CPAN.

Maybe this could be improved by saying "including legacy Apple systems"
or "including pre-OS X Apple systems"?

--
Mark Shroyer, http://markshroyer.com/contact/
I have joined others in blocking Google Groups due to excessive
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Re: FAQ 2.1 What machines support perl? Where do I get it?

In article ,
Mark Shroyer wrote:

> In article <6cp1e5-cpi.ln1@blue.stonehenge.com>,
> PerlFAQ Server wrote:
>
> > 2.1: What machines support perl? Where do I get it?

> > Binary distributions for some proprietary platforms, including Apple
> > systems, can be found http://www.cpan.org/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).

> Maybe this could be improved by saying "including legacy Apple systems"
> or "including pre-OS X Apple systems"?

I'll just remove the comment about Apple. Thanks, :)