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nobull has asked for the
wisdom of the Perl Monks concerning the following question:
Admin note: I posted this to "Seekers..." but on reflection it probably should be a "Meditation". Could someone with the power please move it.
I have Strawberry Perl 5.10.0.2 installed on WinXP SP3 and Win2003 boxes.
I can download modules from CPAN and build them manually using.
perl Makefile.PL
dmake
dmake test
dmake install
This all works fine because the PATH, INCLUDE and LIB environment variables contain the relevant directories under C:\strawberry.
However if I use the CPAN module it invokes perl to build the Makefile thus:
C:\strawberry\perl\bin\perl.exe Makefile.PL LIBS=-LC:\strawberry\c\lib
+ INC=-
IC:\strawberry\c\include
Most of the time this is harmless but in some cases this results in a broken Makefile. For example in Compress::Raw::Zlib Makefile.PL contains the following:
WriteMakefile(
NAME => 'Compress::Raw::Zlib',
VERSION_FROM => 'lib/Compress/Raw/Zlib.pm',
INC => "-I$ZLIB_INCLUDE" ,
Relevant extracts from the (broken) Makefile for Compress::Raw::Zlib generated by running Makefile.PL from CPAN:
#
# MakeMaker ARGV: (q[LIBS=-LC:\strawberry\c\lib], q[INC=-IC:\strawbe
+rry\c\include])
#
# MakeMaker Parameters:
# INC => q[-I./zlib-src]
# --- MakeMaker constants section:
INC = -IC:\strawberry\c\include
And, for comparison, relevant extracts from (working) Makefile for Compress::Raw::Zlib generated by running Makefile.PL manually:
#
# MakeMaker ARGV: ()
#
# MakeMaker Parameters:
# INC => q[-I./zlib-src]
# --- MakeMaker constants section:
INC = -I./zlib-src
The outcome of this is that under the CPAN module the compiler can't find any of the include files in the zlib-src subdirctory.
This is relatively easy to fix by editing c:/strawberry/perl/lib/CPAN/Config.pm and changing the line...
makepl_arg => q[LIBS=-LC:\\strawberry\\c\\lib INC=-IC:\\strawberry\\c\
+\include],
...to...
makepl_arg => q[],
Who should I advise this to in order to get it fixed in the next release of Strawberry?
Update: oops, transposition in the Makefile snippets corrected.
Update: jettero suggests there may be a mailing list. I hate mailing lists as a way of reporting bugs. They are just the wrong tool. I have now found (in the obvious place (D'oh!)) the "official" way to report bugs. I think I will copy have copied the relevant parts of this thread to ticket 39663 in the CPAN RT for Perl-Dist-Strawberry . Then I may post links to that to relevant mailing lists.
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Re: Strawberry CPAN.pm wrongly overrides INC in Makefile.PL
by jettero (Prior) on Sep 28, 2008 at 10:46 UTC |
I was going to recommend their mailing list, but I'm not actually finding any information on it. I know I've seen those guys active (arguing the merits of strawberry over active) on one of the lists I follow. (Probably perl-xs?) I'm sure they have a list somewhere. That's definitely where I'd start.
My thinking is that you'll have to argue your way through it. It isn't a bug. They did that because they include a bunch of libs with strawberry, which is part of the reason people like that dist I believe.
You might argue it's a bug in CPAN... It seems to be the various INC dirs (from config and makefiles) should be additive in some circumstances. So maybe it's a bug in EU::MM? I certainly couldn't say. I can think of cases were you'd want to be able to override INC and others where you'd want to add them.
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I was going to recommend their mailing list, but I'm not actually finding any information on it. I know I've seen those guys active (arguing the merits of strawberry over active) on one of the lists I follow. (Probably perl-xs?) I'm sure they have a list somewhere. That's definitely where I'd start.
Thanks. I'll address that in an update to my original node.
It isn't a bug. They did that because they include a bunch of libs with strawberry, which is part of the reason people like that dist I believe.
I think you are mistaken. Or more accurately you may be right in your assertion that "they did that because..." but they were in fact suffering from confused thinking when they did it.
The directories that are being added (or rather substituted) here are not the (just) directories containing the "bunch of libs" they are the directories containing the standard include files and libraries that are part of the GCC installation.
The Makefile invokes GCC as simply "gcc" thus assuming that the environment (at least PATH) is configured correctly to find the correct GCC installation. If you are using the GCC.EXE that's found by traversing the PATH environment variable then you should be using the headers and libraries that are found by traversing the LIB and INCLUDE environment variables.
Ironically when Strawberry is installed it also puts C:\strawberry\perl\lib\CORE into the INCLUDE environment variable (and similarly the LIB variable). This is also wrong! The Makefile that is created by Makefile.PL does not and should not assume that these directories are listed in the environment variables.
(Update: the Vanilla Perl documentation admits "LIB and INCLUDE changes are likely more than are necessary, but attempt to head off potential problems compiling external programs for use with Perl and various CPAN modules.". I still think it is wrong to include the C:\strawberry\perl libraries in the INCLUDE and LIB environment variables.) (Further update: these are to be removed in the next release.)
You might argue it's a bug in CPAN...
Definitely not, the setting in the CPAN/Config.pm file is explicitly there for providing arguments to be passed unchanged through to the invocation of Makefile.PL. It is impossible to fault CPAN.pm for doing so.
That's of course assuming the thing that wrote the CPAN/Config.pm isn't considered part of the CPAN module. (Update: The file is hardwired in Perl-Dist-Strawberry.)
It seems to be the various INC dirs (from config and makefiles) should be additive in some circumstances. So maybe it's a bug in EU::MM? I certainly couldn't say. I can think of cases were you'd want to be able to override INC and others where you'd want to add them.
This is all true. However, for the reasons I give above, I consider it irrelevant in the current context.
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...Appreciated a lot that you, nobull, posted this since it could not have come at a better time for me: I just set up Strawberry on a new box and hadn’t started using it yet.
There is no need to pass these setting. The Makefile invokes GCC as simply “gcc” thus assuming that the environment (at least PATH) is configured correctly to find the correct GCC installation. If you are using the GCC.EXE that’s found by traversing the PATH environment variable then you should be using the (standard) headers and libraries that are found by traversing the LIB and INCLUDE environment variables.
It might not be smart to take for granted that the user’s PATH is set up correctly. Mine or yours always would be; but a lot of experience answering questions on realtime chat has demonstrated that many users do not even know what PATH is, or understand PATH and other environmental vars at all. This applies to people right here on Perlmonks everyday; I am not talking at all about some hypothetical breed far outside the possible user base of Strawberry. So a superior approach might be to set cc in the Perl Config-heavy.pl file to the fully-qualified pathname where the mingw gcc that’s shipped with Strawberry is installed. That way the right gcc is always called:
Config_heavy.pl: cc='gcc'
becomes cc='C:/strawberry/c/bin/gcc'
Strawberry’s setup program alters the MSWindows system PATH (%Path%) env var but that’s inherently fragile when something later (like a brain-damaged user or other software setup program) could come along and clobber that.
In summation, yeah, this is not being done the right way by the current release of Strawberry 5.10. This needs to be fixed.
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Re: Strawberry CPAN.pm wrongly overrides INC in Makefile.PL
by adamk (Chaplain) on Sep 29, 2008 at 02:41 UTC |
To follow up from the RT ticket...
A command line provided INC value is part of the officially supported API of ExtUtils::MakeMaker, and is known to override any INC passed to MakeMaker from the Perl code.
This is known and intended (if admittedly somewhat confusing) behaviour.
It is the responsibility of any and all MakeMaker Makefile.PL that make use of the INC type params to themselves check for a command line INC param, remove if from @ARGV, and integrate THEIR INC params into the one provided on the command line.
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Personally, I used the "I'm staying at Schwern's place and asked him" form of the documentation. So perhaps it's an unofficially-supported feature...
One of the long-standings problems with the Makefile.PL command line invocation is that it's really an API, but nobody has formalised it or told anyone.
There's a long-standing assumption by the CPAN clients that you can just pass in the same params to everything (which is why that CPAN/Config.pm setting exists) and a long-standing assumption by module authors that you can ask the user to provide you anything you like as a param to Makefile.PL.
The former is actually the more-correct, since in the general case there IS no user to read your docs and type stuff into Makefile.PL. And any module that HAS to have a user type in stuff is more of less incompatible with the CPAN.
I believe one of Schwern's "improving the CPAN" tasks was to try and properly codify the Makefile.PL "API".
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