NAME
README.vmesa − building and installing Perl for VM/ESA.
SYNOPSIS
This document will help you Configure, build, test and install Perl on VM/ESA .
DESCRIPTION
This is a fully ported perl for VM/ESA 2.3.0. It may work on other versions, but that’s the one we’ve tested it on.
If you’ve downloaded the binary distribution, it needs to be installed below /usr/local. Source code distributions have an automated "make install" step that means you do not need to extract the source code below /usr/local (though that is where it will be installed by default). You may need to worry about the networking configuration files discussed in the last bullet below.
Unpacking
Perl Distribution on VM/ESA
To extract an ASCII tar archive on
VM/ESA , try this:
pax −o to=IBM−1047,from=ISO8859−1 −r < latest.tar
Setup Perl
and utilities on VM/ESA
GNU make for VM/ESA , which may be
required for the build of perl, is available from:
http://vm.marist.edu/~neale/vmoe.html
Configure
Perl on VM/ESA
Once you’ve unpacked the distribution, run Configure
(see INSTALL for full discussion of the
Configure options), and then run make, then "make
test" then "make install" (this last step may
require UID=0 privileges).
There is a "hints" file for vmesa that specifies the correct values for most things. Some things to watch out for are:
• |
this port does support dynamic loading but it’s not had much testing | ||
• |
Don’t turn on the compiler optimization flag "−O". There’s a bug in the compiler ( APAR PQ18812 ) that generates some bad code the optimizer is on. | ||
• |
As VM/ESA doesn’t fully support the fork() API programs relying on this call will not work. I’ve replaced fork()/exec() with spawn() and the standalone exec() with spawn(). This has a side effect when opening unnamed pipes in a shell script: there is no child process generated under. | ||
• |
At the moment the hints file for VM/ESA basically bypasses all of the automatic configuration process. This is because Configure relies on: 1. The header files living in the Byte File System (you could put the there if you want); 2. The C preprocessor including the #include statements in the preprocessor output (.i) file. |
Testing
Anomalies of Perl on VM/ESA
The "make test" step runs a Perl Verification
Procedure, usually before installation. As the 5.6.1 kit was
being assembled the following "failures" were
known to appear on some machines during "make
test" (mostly due to ASCII vs.
EBCDIC conflicts), your results may
differ:
[the list of failures being compiled]
Usage Hints
for Perl on VM/ESA
When using perl on VM/ESA please keep in mind
that the EBCDIC and ASCII
character sets are different. Perl builtin functions that
may behave differently under EBCDIC are
mentioned in the perlport.pod document.
OpenEdition ( UNIX System Services) does not (yet) support the #! means of script invocation. See:
head `whence perldoc`
for an example of how to use the "eval exec" trick to ask the shell to have perl run your scripts for you.
AUTHORS
Neale Ferguson.
SEE ALSO
INSTALL , perlport, perlebcdic.
Mailing list
for Perl on VM/ESA
If you are interested in the VM/ESA , z/OS
(formerly known as OS/390 ) and POSIX-BC (
BS2000 ) ports of Perl then see the perl-mvs
mailing list. To subscribe, send an empty message to
perl−mvs−subscribe [AT] perl.org.
See also:
http://lists.perl.org/showlist.cgi?name=perl−mvs
There are web archives of the mailing list at:
http://www.xray.mpe.mpg.de/mailing−lists/perl−mvs/ http://archive.develooper.com/perl−mvs [AT] perl.org/