1PERLMACOSX(1) Perl Programmers Reference Guide PERLMACOSX(1)
2
6 perlmacosx - Perl under Mac OS X
7
9 This document briefly describes Perl under Mac OS X.
10 curl http://www.cpan.org/src/perl-5.12.3.tar.gz > perl-5.12.3.tar.gz
12 tar -xzf perl-5.12.3.tar.gz
13 cd perl-5.12.3
14 ./Configure -des -Dprefix=/usr/local/
15 make
16 make test
17 sudo make install
18
20 The latest Perl release (5.12.3 as of this writing) builds without
21 changes under all versions of Mac OS X from 10.3 "Panther" onwards.
22 In order to build your own version of Perl you will need 'make' this is
24 part of the Apples developer tools (you only need the 'unix tools'),
25 usually supplied with Mac OS install DVDs. You do not need the latest
26 version of Xcode (which is now charged for) in order to install make.
27 Earlier Mac OS X releases (10.2 "Jaguar" and older) did not include a
29 completely thread-safe libc, so threading is not fully supported. Also,
30 earlier releases included a buggy libdb, so some of the DB_File tests
31 are known to fail on those releases.
32 Installation Prefix
34 The default installation location for this release uses the traditional
35 UNIX directory layout under /usr/local. This is the recommended
36 location for most users, and will leave the Apple-supplied Perl and its
37 modules undisturbed.
38 Using an installation prefix of '/usr' will result in a directory
40 layout that mirrors that of Apple's default Perl, with core modules
41 stored in '/System/Library/Perl/${version}', CPAN modules stored in
42 '/Library/Perl/${version}', and the addition of
43 '/Network/Library/Perl/${version}' to @INC for modules that are stored
44 on a file server and used by many Macs.
45 SDK support
47 First, export the path to the SDK into the build environment:
48 export SDK=/Developer/SDKs/MacOSX10.3.9.sdk
50 Use an SDK by exporting some additions to Perl's 'ccflags' and
52 '..flags' config variables:
53 ./Configure -Accflags="-nostdinc -B$SDK/usr/include/gcc \
55 -B$SDK/usr/lib/gcc -isystem$SDK/usr/include \
56 -F$SDK/System/Library/Frameworks" \
57 -Aldflags="-Wl,-syslibroot,$SDK" \
58 -de
59 Universal Binary support
61 To compile perl as a universal binary (built for both ppc and intel),
62 export the SDK variable as above, selecting the 10.4u SDK:
63 export SDK=/Developer/SDKs/MacOSX10.4u.sdk
65 In addition to the compiler flags used to select the SDK, also add the
67 flags for creating a universal binary:
68 ./Configure -Accflags="-arch i686 -arch ppc -nostdinc -B$SDK/usr/include/gcc \
70 -B$SDK/usr/lib/gcc -isystem$SDK/usr/include \
71 -F$SDK/System/Library/Frameworks" \
72 -Aldflags="-arch i686 -arch ppc -Wl,-syslibroot,$SDK" \
73 -de
74 In Leopard (MacOSX 10.5.6 at the time of this writing) you must use the
76 10.5 SDK:
77 export SDK=/Developer/SDKs/MacOSX10.5.sdk
79 You can use the same compiler flags you would use with the 10.4u SDK.
81 Keep in mind that these compiler and linker settings will also be used
83 when building CPAN modules. For XS modules to be compiled as a
84 universal binary, any libraries it links to must also be universal
85 binaries. The system libraries that Apple includes with the 10.4u SDK
86 are all universal, but user-installed libraries may need to be re-
87 installed as universal binaries.
88 64-bit PPC support
90 Follow the instructions in INSTALL to build perl with support for
91 64-bit integers ("use64bitint") or both 64-bit integers and 64-bit
92 addressing ("use64bitall"). In the latter case, the resulting binary
93 will run only on G5-based hosts.
94 Support for 64-bit addressing is experimental: some aspects of Perl may
96 be omitted or buggy. Note the messages output by Configure for further
97 information. Please use "perlbug" to submit a problem report in the
98 event that you encounter difficulties.
99 When building 64-bit modules, it is your responsibility to ensure that
101 linked external libraries and frameworks provide 64-bit support: if
102 they do not, module building may appear to succeed, but attempts to use
103 the module will result in run-time dynamic linking errors, and
104 subsequent test failures. You can use "file" to discover the
105 architectures supported by a library:
106 $ file libgdbm.3.0.0.dylib
108 libgdbm.3.0.0.dylib: Mach-O fat file with 2 architectures
109 libgdbm.3.0.0.dylib (for architecture ppc): Mach-O dynamically linked shared library ppc
110 libgdbm.3.0.0.dylib (for architecture ppc64): Mach-O 64-bit dynamically linked shared library ppc64
111 Note that this issue precludes the building of many Macintosh-specific
113 CPAN modules ("Mac::*"), as the required Apple frameworks do not
114 provide PPC64 support. Similarly, downloads from Fink or Darwinports
115 are unlikely to provide 64-bit support; the libraries must be rebuilt
116 from source with the appropriate compiler and linker flags. For further
117 information, see Apple's 64-Bit Transition Guide at
118 <http://developer.apple.com/documentation/Darwin/Conceptual/64bitPorting/index.html>.
119 libperl and Prebinding
121 Mac OS X ships with a dynamically-loaded libperl, but the default for
122 this release is to compile a static libperl. The reason for this is
123 pre-binding. Dynamic libraries can be pre-bound to a specific address
124 in memory in order to decrease load time. To do this, one needs to be
125 aware of the location and size of all previously-loaded libraries.
126 Apple collects this information as part of their overall OS build
127 process, and thus has easy access to it when building Perl, but
128 ordinary users would need to go to a great deal of effort to obtain the
129 information needed for pre-binding.
130 You can override the default and build a shared libperl if you wish
132 (Configure ... -Duseshrplib), but the load time on pre-10.4 OS releases
133 will be greater than either the static library, or Apple's pre-bound
134 dynamic library.
135 With 10.4 "Tiger" and newer, Apple has all but eliminated the
137 performance penalty for non-prebound libraries.
138 Updating Apple's Perl
140 In a word - don't, at least without a *very* good reason. Your scripts
141 can just as easily begin with "#!/usr/local/bin/perl" as with
142 "#!/usr/bin/perl". Scripts supplied by Apple and other third parties as
143 part of installation packages and such have generally only been tested
144 with the /usr/bin/perl that's installed by Apple.
145 If you find that you do need to update the system Perl, one issue worth
147 keeping in mind is the question of static vs. dynamic libraries. If you
148 upgrade using the default static libperl, you will find that the
149 dynamic libperl supplied by Apple will not be deleted. If both
150 libraries are present when an application that links against libperl is
151 built, ld will link against the dynamic library by default. So, if you
152 need to replace Apple's dynamic libperl with a static libperl, you need
153 to be sure to delete the older dynamic library after you've installed
154 the update.
155 Known problems
157 If you have installed extra libraries such as GDBM through Fink (in
158 other words, you have libraries under /sw/lib), or libdlcompat to
159 /usr/local/lib, you may need to be extra careful when running Configure
160 to not to confuse Configure and Perl about which libraries to use.
161 Being confused will show up for example as "dyld" errors about symbol
162 problems, for example during "make test". The safest bet is to run
163 Configure as
164 Configure ... -Uloclibpth -Dlibpth=/usr/lib
166 to make Configure look only into the system libraries. If you have
168 some extra library directories that you really want to use (such as
169 newer Berkeley DB libraries in pre-Panther systems), add those to the
170 libpth:
171 Configure ... -Uloclibpth -Dlibpth='/usr/lib /opt/lib'
173 The default of building Perl statically may cause problems with complex
175 applications like Tk: in that case consider building shared Perl
176 Configure ... -Duseshrplib
178 but remember that there's a startup cost to pay in that case (see above
180 "libperl and Prebinding").
181 Starting with Tiger (Mac OS X 10.4), Apple shipped broken locale files
183 for the eu_ES locale (Basque-Spain). In previous releases of Perl,
184 this resulted in failures in the lib/locale test. These failures have
185 been suppressed in the current release of Perl by making the test
186 ignore the broken locale. If you need to use the eu_ES locale, you
187 should contact Apple support.
188 Cocoa
190 There are two ways to use Cocoa from Perl. Apple's PerlObjCBridge
191 module, included with Mac OS X, can be used by standalone scripts to
192 access Foundation (i.e. non-GUI) classes and objects.
193 An alternative is CamelBones, a framework that allows access to both
195 Foundation and AppKit classes and objects, so that full GUI
196 applications can be built in Perl. CamelBones can be found on
197 SourceForge, at <http://www.sourceforge.net/projects/camelbones/>.
198
200 Unfortunately it is not that difficult somehow manage to break one's
201 Mac OS X Perl rather severely. If all else fails and you want to
202 really, REALLY, start from scratch and remove even your Apple Perl
203 installation (which has become corrupted somehow), the following
204 instructions should do it. Please think twice before following these
205 instructions: they are much like conducting brain surgery to yourself.
206 Without anesthesia. We will not come to fix your system if you do
207 this.
208 First, get rid of the libperl.dylib:
210 # cd /System/Library/Perl/darwin/CORE
212 # rm libperl.dylib
213 Then delete every .bundle file found anywhere in the folders:
215 /System/Library/Perl
217 /Library/Perl
218 You can find them for example by
220 # find /System/Library/Perl /Library/Perl -name '*.bundle' -print
222 After this you can either copy Perl from your operating system media
224 (you will need at least the /System/Library/Perl and /usr/bin/perl), or
225 rebuild Perl from the source code with "Configure -Dprefix=/usr
226 -Duseshrplib" NOTE: the "-Dprefix=/usr" to replace the system Perl
227 works much better with Perl 5.8.1 and later, in Perl 5.8.0 the settings
228 were not quite right.
229 "Pacifist" from CharlesSoft (<http://www.charlessoft.com/>) is a nice
231 way to extract the Perl binaries from the OS media, without having to
232 reinstall the entire OS.
233
235 This README was written by Sherm Pendley <sherm@dot-app.org>, and
236 subsequently updated by Dominic Dunlop <domo@computer.org>. The
237 "Starting From Scratch" recipe was contributed by John Montbriand
238 <montbriand@apple.com>.
239
241 Last modified 2006-02-24.
242perl v5.16.3 2013-03-04 PERLMACOSX(1)