Re: Best strategy to facilitate dependency installation for a Perl-based software distribution

[hermida]

Ok so I've gone the route of including all non-CORE and non-XS dependencies bundled in an extlib in my distribution to make things as easy as possible for people trying to install the software, looks to be a good way.

When I started building the extlib in my development environment using cpanm -L extlib <module> etc I realized that cpanm installs everything in a local::lib compatible way, meaning everything doesn't go starting at extlib but rather extlib/lib/perl5. Therefore I would have to use local::lib "$FindBin::Bin/../extlib" in my programs instead of use lib "$FindBin::Bin/../extlib" to get use the dependencies in extlib but this brings a chicken-or-egg problem, local::lib in not in CORE :-(

Is there something I'm not thinking right here? I don't want to make to have to make an external dependency that people have local::lib already installed in their Perl tree (which could require administrator access)

[Anonymous Monk]

Is there something I'm not thinking right here?

I think so :)

If the route you have chosen is to bundle all non-CORE dependencies, and local::lib is not core, why can't you bundle local::lib?

[hermida]

Sorry if I wasn't clear, its because one needs to use local::lib "$FindBin::Bin/../extlib" to be able to include and use these bundled dependencies therefore local::lib cannot be bundled

[Anonymous Monk]

Sorry if I wasn't clear, its because one needs to use local::lib "$FindBin::Bin/../extlib" to be able to include and use these bundled dependencies therefore local::lib cannot be bundled

??

Maybe you want to study local::lib a little closer?

$ perl Makefile.PL
purchasing clue ...
Checking if your kit is complete...
Looks good
Writing Makefile for ...
Writing MYMETA.yml and MYMETA.json

$ make test
...

$ make install
...
Installing  /home/username/perl5/lib/perl5/bin/clue

$ cat /home/username/perl5/lib/perl5/bin/clue
#!/usr/bin/perl --
use lib
  '/home/username/perl5/lib/perl5/i386-linux',
  '/home/username/perl5/lib/perl5',
  ;
use MyClues;
MyClues->run;
__END__

$ perl -I$HOME/perl5/lib/perl5 -Mlocal::lib -e 1
  export PERL_MB_OPT='--install_base /home/username/perl5'
  export PERL_MM_OPT='INSTALL_BASE=/home/username/perl5'
  export PERL5LIB='/home/username/perl5/lib/perl5/i386-linux:/home/use
+rname/perl5/lib/perl5'
  export PATH="/home/username/perl5/bin:$PATH"


$ echo 'eval $(perl -I$HOME/perl5/lib/perl5 -Mlocal::lib)' >>~/.bashrc

Now this clue preparation can be generating scripts/clue from template, it can "bootstrapping" local::lib, or instructing your users to append to bashrc

I don't see a problem