From owner-freebsd-questions@FreeBSD.ORG Fri Dec 31 11:46:15 2004 Return-Path: Delivered-To: freebsd-questions@freebsd.org Received: from mx1.FreeBSD.org (mx1.freebsd.org [216.136.204.125]) by hub.freebsd.org (Postfix) with ESMTP id 49D0E16A4CE for ; Fri, 31 Dec 2004 11:46:15 +0000 (GMT) Received: from top.daemonsecurity.com (FW-182-254.go.retevision.es [62.174.254.182]) by mx1.FreeBSD.org (Postfix) with ESMTP id 3515043D4C for ; Fri, 31 Dec 2004 11:46:14 +0000 (GMT) (envelope-from norgaard@locolomo.org) Received: from [192.168.0.32] (charm.daemonsecurity.com [192.168.0.32]) by top.daemonsecurity.com (Postfix) with ESMTP id D7C1AFD008; Fri, 31 Dec 2004 12:46:12 +0100 (CET) Message-ID: <41D53C00.5000707@locolomo.org> Date: Fri, 31 Dec 2004 12:46:09 +0100 From: Erik Norgaard User-Agent: Mozilla/5.0 (X11; U; FreeBSD i386; en-US; rv:1.7.2) Gecko/20041114 X-Accept-Language: en, en-us, da, it, es MIME-Version: 1.0 To: Karl Agee References: In-Reply-To: Content-Type: text/plain; charset=us-ascii; format=flowed Content-Transfer-Encoding: 7bit cc: freebsd-questions@freebsd.org Subject: Re: upgrading perl X-BeenThere: freebsd-questions@freebsd.org X-Mailman-Version: 2.1.1 Precedence: list List-Id: User questions List-Unsubscribe: , List-Archive: List-Post: List-Help: List-Subscribe: , X-List-Received-Date: Fri, 31 Dec 2004 11:46:15 -0000 Karl Agee wrote: > Freebsd 4.11-pre. I am working on learning perl, and have perl 5.00x > that is in the base system when I installed 4.10-Release. Since most of > the learning materials out there are based on later verisions esp since > 5.6.x some of the features arent in this older version. > > I am considering upgrading to 5.8.5 via ports, but, dont know if that > will break anything. It won't break anything. You can have the base install, 5.6.x and 5.8.x installed from ports simultaneously. After installing perl from ports you run /usr/local/bin/use.perl port This will create links to the port install, eg. /usr/bin/perl -> /usr/bin/perl5.8.5 And you can go back with /usr/local/bin/use.perl system Which will then replace the link with, eg. /usr/bin/perl -> /usr/bin/perl5 These are the limitations: use.perl can only switch between one installed port-version and the system perl. So if you want to use another port-version (ie. for some reason you want both 5.6.x and 5.8.x) you will have to do the linking manually. When you install perl-packages they will be installed into the package path of the currently selected perl. So if you use 5.8.5 and install say p5-DBI then this won't be available for the system perl. However, perl looks backward, so 5.8.5 sees packages installed for the system perl. I haven't found big differences between 5.6 and 5.8, so I'd suggest you use 5.8. The main reason to stick with an older version is that you might develop scripts for platforms where the newer are not available. Note: If/when you upgrade to 5.x there is no system perl, this is partly to avoid the mess with multiple versions of perl. Cheers, Erik -- Ph: +34.666334818 web: www.locolomo.org S/MIME Certificate: http://www.locolomo.org/crt/2004071206.crt Subject ID: A9:76:7A:ED:06:95:2B:8D:48:97:CE:F2:3F:42:C8:F2:22:DE:4C:B9 Fingerprint: 4A:E8:63:38:46:F6:9A:5D:B4:DC:29:41:3F:62:D3:0A:73:25:67:C2