NAME
README.beos - Perl version 5.8+ on BeOS
DESCRIPTION
This file contains instructions how to build Perl under BeOS and lists
known problems.
BUILD AND INSTALL
Requirements
I have built and tested Perl 5.8.6 and 5.9.1 under BeOS R5 x86 net
server. I can’t say anything with regard to PPC. Since Perl 5.8.0 had
been released for BeOS BONE, I suspect, there is a good chance, that it
still compiles on a BONE system. The only change I’ve made, that
affects BONE systems is the recognition of whether it is a BONE system
or not in "hints/beos.sh". Now network socket support should remain
enabled on BONE systems. This might as well break the build, though.
As more recent versions of autoconf require flock() support, I wrote a
flock() emulation (flock_server) and released it on BeBits:
http://www.bebits.com/app/4030
If you want to build a Perl with flock() support, you have to install
this package first.
Configure
With flock() support:
CFLAGS=-I/path/to/flock/server/headers ./configure.gnu \
--prefix=/boot/home/config
Replace "/path/to/flock/server/headers" with the path to the directory
containing the "flock.h" header.
Without flock() support:
./configure.gnu --prefix=/boot/home/config
Build
With flock() support:
make LDLOADLIBS="-lnet -lflock"
Without flock() support:
make LDLOADLIBS="-lnet"
"-lnet" is needed on net server systems only and if the compiler
doesn’t add it automatically (Be’s R5 gcc does, Oliver Tappe’s gcc
2.95.3 does not).
Install
Install all perl files:
make install
Create a symlink for libperl:
cd ~/config/lib; ln -s perl5/5.8.6/BePC-beos/CORE/libperl.so .
Replace 5.8.6 with your respective version of Perl.
KNOWN PROBLEMS
· Network socket support is disabled for BeOS R5 net server. I didn’t
dare yet to try enabling it and see what problems occur.
· The LFS (large file support) tests ("t/op/lfs" and
"xt/Fcntl/t/syslfs") are disabled as seeking beyond 2 GB is broken
according to jhi@iki.fi who was the last one checking the BeOS port
and updating this file before me. Haven’t checked this myself.
· The "t/io/fflush" test fails at #6. As far as I can tell, this is
caused by a bug in the BeOS pipes implementation that occurs when
starting other child processes. In the particular test case a
"system("perl -e 0")" flushes the stdout pipe of another child
process.
· The "ext/POSIX/t/waitpid" test fails at #1. After all child
processes are gone BeOS’ waitpid(-1,...) returns 0 instead of -1
(as it should). No idea how to fix this.
CONTACT
For BeOS specifics problems feel free to mail to: Ingo Weinhold
<bonefish@cs.tu-berlin.de>
Last update: 2004-12-16