Perl compiling help

ant80

Senior member
Dec 4, 2001
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I am a newbie in this. I downloaded the perl source from the website. I want to compile it, because the binary costs money, something that is pretty scarce nowadays. Can someone plz tell me how to compile this? I have visual studio 6, running win2k. Thanks in advance.
 

stndn

Golden Member
Mar 10, 2001
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do you mean the perl source code interpretor?
you will need a perl interpretor, which can be downloaded from active state perl.

and i dont think visual studio has perl interpretor .. or maybe i just didn't look through the cd i have.. dunno.
 

ant80

Senior member
Dec 4, 2001
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Thanks for ur help so far folks. Well, thats not what I mean. I went to Perl website, and then downloaded the windows version 5.8.0 from the download section here. This is a bunch of source code that needs to be compiled to get the perl platform running. The windows version binary is available at active state. I wanted to know how I can get the perl platform running so that I can learn it. Or do i have to buy it? I didn't think I did.
 

ant80

Senior member
Dec 4, 2001
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I guess my question should be what should i do from this point on to start learning Perl?
 

Nothinman

Elite Member
Sep 14, 2001
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Once you have an interpreter installed (like the free one from ActiveState) you have everything you need to get started with perl, all you need is a tutorial, book or whatever. I personally used the O'Reilly books, but they cost money.
 

stndn

Golden Member
Mar 10, 2001
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if you want to build your own perl binary from perl.com, it will take a lot of things to do ...
open the readme.dos and readme for more information

but if you just want to start learning perl, just get active state perl, then consider getting the "Programming Perl" book from Oreilly (good stuff)
also you can use http://www.perldoc.com/ as your reference site

also, some tutorial sites:
http://www.codebits.com/p5be/
http://www.devshed.com/Server_Side/Perl/Perl101/Perl101_1/page1.html
http://voyager.deanza.fhda.edu/~perry/ (my class website)

(sorry, too lazy to link them now -p)

have fun :)
 

Agamar

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Oct 9, 1999
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Or you could stop the Windows/Perl headache and just install any linux distro on a spare machine. Believe me, when I started Perl I did it on a linux box....after a while I wanted to do it on my windows box too. After installing it and trying some things out on the windows box...I decided that I would never again try perl outside of unix. It just didn't feel the same. Not to mention all my servers run Linux.
 

ant80

Senior member
Dec 4, 2001
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Thanks for all your help guys.

Once you have an interpreter installed (like the free one from ActiveState) you have everything you need to get started with perl

Ok, how do I install the interpreter? I got a zip file from ActiveState, and I unzipped it. All I see is a bunch of folders, and a whole bunch of .c and .h files. I also see one executable 'cinfigure', and several files with no extensions or extensions not recognized by windows.

There is a folder called win32. But the same kind of files there, and no executables in this folder. I know some of the linux things dont have a typical windows 'setup.exe' file to start, but I haven't had much experience with those kinds of installation procedures. Any assistance would be immensely helpful. Thanks again.

I dont know linux, but I eventually plan to learn. Sometime after I graduate from college. I dont have the time, to do that before graduation, cause i am aftaid of a steep learning curve, especially with two majors and two minors.
 

Nothinman

Elite Member
Sep 14, 2001
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You should have downloaded an msi or exe, you appear to have gotten the source again.
 

ant80

Senior member
Dec 4, 2001
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That sucks. Let me try again...

Oops, no luck again. Could u guys plz give me a linkie to the executable plz? Also where would I find the executable? In one of the subfolders or in the main folder?
 

ant80

Senior member
Dec 4, 2001
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Just one last question. What is the difference between the msi and the as package?
 

stndn

Golden Member
Mar 10, 2001
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i don't think there are any differences between MSI and AS package
MSI version is packed using microsoft's installer, so you just download and run the installer
AS is zipped, so you need to unzip them and then run the batch file to install them (two step process)

also, in AS package, if you want to change the settings, etc, you'll have to edit configure.pl found under the bin directory (and maybe some more, i'm not so sure since i used the MSI package)

happy perl-ing :)
 

Nothinman

Elite Member
Sep 14, 2001
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The AS package isn't easily removed since it's not using a real install program, stick with the msi.