Re: Check the dependencies of modules you want to install

[syphilis]

I hope it will be of use to whoever stumbles across it

Nice ... it will certainly be of use to me from time to time - and I intend to make use of it.
I've given it a couple of test runs and it seems fine.

I try to avoid using the CPAN* modules to handle installations, so having a script like this to tell me up front which modules I need to install is very handy.
It would be even more handy if it could tell me the order in which I needed to install the missing dependencies, though I suspect this capability might be a little difficult to provide. (Haven't yet had time to investigate that aspect.)

Cheers,
Rob

[thomas895]

It would be even more handy if it could tell me the order in which I needed to install the missing dependencies

That would be handy, agreed, but usually when using cpan or cpanp(not sure about cpanm, never used it), the dependencies are automatically installed for you. That's handy, until one distribution in the chain of many decides to fail on a test or make, in which case you get to start over again(for the most part).

I don't think I can do it with just CPANDeps' XML, I would likely have to poll many sources to get that information.

[syphilis]

I don't think I can do it with just CPANDeps' XML, I would likely have to poll many sources to get that information.

Does the "depth" field tell us anything useful in regard to a module's position in the dependency chain ?

I certainly wouldn't advocate pulling in more sources, as the nice feature of this script is the promptness with which it provides the information.
The only other thing it fails to detect is the case where the version of the dependency that is already installed is not sufficiently recent. (To remedy this would also require significant additional overhead.)
Anyway, like I said, I'll be making good use of it as is ;-)

I opened up one of the XML files in my browser, and found this near the beginning of the file:

This is an experimental XML interface.
It's structure and location may change.
If you want them to change, please ask.
Please try to avoid kicking the shit out of my server,
it's only little and doesn't like being bullied.

So there's a couple of things of which we need to be mindful.

Cheers,
Rob

[thomas895]

Does the "depth" field tell us anything useful in regard to a module's position in the dependency chain ?

I actually did not notice that when I read over the XML. Hmm, I'll think about adding that, somehow.

The only other thing it fails to detect is the case where the version of the dependency that is already installed is not sufficiently recent.

Now that I can try to fix. I will update this node when I make a fix to that...
Update: Nope, I would have to go scanning Makefiles etc., CPAN Deps doesn't provide the version number :-(