in reply to Build.PL versus Makefile.PL
Current state? I don't see either one going away. Even if, say, everyone were utterly convinced of the obvious superiority of one over the other, there are too many modules that need too little maintenance to completely effect any definitive change to tools such as CPAN. Perhaps one day, one will be so underused that it is no longer ported to a new platform (somewhat unlikely). But then TPTB would have to decide: port the install module, or port the underlying module to the other install module. My bet is that they'll go for porting the install module, no matter how unwieldy it may or may not be, just because porting someone else's module and releasing it may be seen as "more evil" (as in, usurping a module) than porting the installer.