I don't use perl2exe to hide anything. It solves a deployability issue where I am not allowed to install Perl on the remote system.

I tried PAR. FAIL.
I tried TinyPerl. FAIL.
I tried Perl2Exe. WIN. Worked out of the box.

I see errors I can chase down, but therein lies the rub -- It's cost me more in dollars-per-hour trying to get these "free" tools to work than I spent on my last version of Perl2Exe.

So it looks like I will upgrade Perl2Exe and shelve getting these other, cooler, neater tools to function for me until I have some free time.

Sample TinyPerl attempt:

C:\Steve\Dev\psql-perl>C:\App\tinyperl\tinyperl.exe -bin psql.pl psql.
+exe
Binary created at: psql.exe
OK!
Enjoy ;-P

C:\Steve\Dev\psql-perl>psql.exe
Can't find or load LibZip: ERROR: No filename given
Perl lib version (v5.8.0) doesn't match executable version (v5.8.9) at
+ (eval 1) line 28.
[download]

Sample PAR attempt:

C:\Steve\Install\PAR\PAR-Packer-1.006>dir
 Volume in drive C is CBoot
 Volume Serial Number is B4AB-1A65

 Directory of C:\Steve\Install\PAR\PAR-Packer-1.006

09/01/2010  12:38 PM    <DIR>          .
09/01/2010  12:38 PM    <DIR>          ..
06/13/2010  11:10 AM               394 AUTHORS
06/26/2010  05:02 AM            48,710 ChangeLog
09/01/2010  12:38 PM    <DIR>          contrib
09/01/2010  12:38 PM    <DIR>          inc
09/01/2010  12:38 PM    <DIR>          lib
06/19/2010  11:50 AM             4,643 Makefile.PL
06/26/2010  05:18 AM             1,829 MANIFEST
06/19/2010  11:50 AM               451 MANIFEST.SKIP
06/26/2010  05:04 AM               745 META.yml
09/01/2010  12:38 PM    <DIR>          myldr
06/26/2010  05:18 AM    <DIR>          package
06/13/2010  11:10 AM             5,846 README
09/01/2010  12:38 PM    <DIR>          script
09/01/2010  12:38 PM    <DIR>          t
06/13/2010  11:10 AM               185 TODO
               8 File(s)         62,803 bytes
               9 Dir(s)   4,356,517,888 bytes free

C:\Steve\Install\PAR\PAR-Packer-1.006>perl Makefile.PL
*** You have extra Perl library paths set in your environment.
    Please note that these paths (set with PERL5LIB or PERLLIB)
    are not honored by perl when running under taint mode, which
    may lead to problems. This is a limitation (by design) of
    Perl, not of PAR::Packer; but some of the problems may
    manifest here during installation.

Checking if your kit is complete...
Looks good
Warning: prerequisite Getopt::ArgvFile 1.07 not found.
Warning: prerequisite Module::ScanDeps 0.96 not found.
Warning: prerequisite PAR 1.000 not found.
Warning: prerequisite PAR::Dist 0.22 not found.
Warning: prerequisite Parse::Binary 0.04 not found.
Warning: prerequisite Win32::Exe 0.14 not found.
Note (probably harmless): No library found for oldnames.lib
Note (probably harmless): No library found for kernel32.lib
Note (probably harmless): No library found for user32.lib
Note (probably harmless): No library found for gdi32.lib
Note (probably harmless): No library found for winspool.lib
Note (probably harmless): No library found for comdlg32.lib
Note (probably harmless): No library found for advapi32.lib
Note (probably harmless): No library found for shell32.lib
Note (probably harmless): No library found for ole32.lib
Note (probably harmless): No library found for oleaut32.lib
Note (probably harmless): No library found for netapi32.lib
Note (probably harmless): No library found for uuid.lib
Note (probably harmless): No library found for ws2_32.lib
Note (probably harmless): No library found for mpr.lib
Note (probably harmless): No library found for winmm.lib
Note (probably harmless): No library found for version.lib
Note (probably harmless): No library found for odbc32.lib
Note (probably harmless): No library found for odbccp32.lib
Note (probably harmless): No library found for msvcrt.lib
Writing Makefile for the par.exe program
Writing Makefile for PAR::Packer

C:\Steve\Install\PAR\PAR-Packer-1.006>nmake

Microsoft (R) Program Maintenance Utility   Version 1.50
Copyright (c) Microsoft Corp 1988-94. All rights reserved.

         C:\Perl\bin\perl.exe "-Minc::Module::Install" -e "extract_par
+(q(PAR-Packer-1.006-MSWin32-x86-multi-thread-5.8.9.par))"
cp lib/App/Packer/PAR.pm blib\lib\App\Packer\PAR.pm
cp lib/PAR/Packer.pm blib\lib\PAR\Packer.pm
cp lib/PAR/Filter/Obfuscate.pm blib\lib\PAR\Filter\Obfuscate.pm
cp lib/PAR/Filter/PodStrip.pm blib\lib\PAR\Filter\PodStrip.pm
cp lib/PAR/StrippedPARL/Base.pm blib\lib\PAR\StrippedPARL\Base.pm
cp lib/PAR/Filter.pm blib\lib\PAR\Filter.pm
cp lib/PAR/Filter/PatchContent.pm blib\lib\PAR\Filter\PatchContent.pm
cp lib/PAR/StrippedPARL/Dynamic.pm blib\lib\PAR\StrippedPARL\Dynamic.p
+m
cp lib/PAR/Filter/Bytecode.pm blib\lib\PAR\Filter\Bytecode.pm
cp lib/pp.pm blib\lib\pp.pm
cp lib/PAR/Filter/Bleach.pm blib\lib\PAR\Filter\Bleach.pm
cp lib/PAR/StrippedPARL/Static.pm blib\lib\PAR\StrippedPARL\Static.pm
        C:\Steve\Utils\nmake.exe -f Makefile all -nologo
        C:\Perl\bin\perl.exe sha1.c.PL sha1.c
        cl -c -Zm1000  -nologo -GF -W3 -MD -Zi -DNDEBUG -O1 -DWIN32 -D
+_CONSOLE -DNO_STRICT -DHAVE_DES_FCRYPT -DNO_HASH_SEED -DUSE_SITECUSTO
+M
IZE -DPRIVLIB_LAST_IN_INC -DPERL_IMPLICIT_CONTEXT -DPERL_IMPLICIT_SYS 
+-DUSE_PERLIO -DPERL_MSVCRT_READFIX  -I"C:\Perl\lib\CORE"  -DPARL_EXE=
+\
"parl.exe\" -MD -Zi -DNDEBUG -O1 main.c
The system cannot execute the specified program.
NMAKE : fatal error U1077: 'C:\WINDOWS\system32\cmd.exe' : return code
+ '0x1'
Stop.
NMAKE : fatal error U1077: 'C:\WINDOWS\system32\cmd.exe' : return code
+ '0x2'
Stop.

C:\Steve\Install\PAR\PAR-Packer-1.006>
[download]