I do recall a few times were apt-get gets out of whack and needs some manual cleanup before it will proceed with trouble-free installs. It doesn't matter what's being installed; if apt-get's database (if you can call it that) is messed up, nothing works right until it's reset.

Your explanation of the 32/64 bit libstdc++ issue might be a good catch. I think that the FAILs I see could be related to the same issue you're seeing on the deb box. It seems possible some people have 64 bit Perl builds, and only a 32-bit libstdc++. That's at least as good an explanation as I can come up with; I know Inline::CPP works on run-of-the-mill Linux systems. And there seems to be no obvious trend in the FAIL reports.

If you do figure that aspect out, let me know how you fixed it. I might start a TROUBLESHOOTING section in Inline::CPP's POD for such issues.

Now for my Windows jab; I once somehow got the Windows installer service's database wonky. I think a .NET upgrade failed partway through back when I was doing some MSVC++ work. It hung the system, and required a restart. From that point on, I wasn't able to install or upgrade anything, and couldn't find anything online to explain what needed to happen. Even rolling back to an earlier restore point didn't resolve the problem. Ultimately I had to restore the system to its factory-fresh state. Now that I think back on it, fixing apt-get turned out to be a much simpler process. ;)