README.vos(1)
NAME
README.vos - Perl for Stratus VOS
SYNOPSIS
This file contains notes for building perl on the Stratus VOS operating
system. Perl is a scripting or macro language that is popular on many
systems. See perlbook for a number of good books on Perl.
These are instructions for building Perl from source. Most people can
simply download a pre-compiled distribution from the VOS anonymous FTP
site. If you are running VOS Release 14.2.0 or earlier, download Perl
from ftp://ftp.stratus.com/pub/vos/posix/alpha/alpha.html If you are
running VOS Release 14.3.0 or later, download Perl from ftp://ftp.stra-
tus.com/pub/vos/posix/ga/ga.html Instructions for unbundling the Perl
distribution file are at ftp://ftp.stratus.com/pub/vos/utility/util-
ity.html
If you are running VOS Release 14.4.1 or later, you can obtain a
pre-compiled, supported copy of perl by purchasing Release 2.0.1 (or
later) of the VOS GNU C++ and GNU Tools product from Stratus Technolo-
gies.
Multiple methods to build perl for VOS
If you elect to build perl from its source code, you have several dif-
ferent ways that you can build perl. The method that you use depends
on the version of VOS that you are using and on the architecture of
your Stratus hardware platform.
1 If you have a Stratus XA2000 (Motorola 68k-based) platform, you
must build perl using the alpha version of VOS POSIX support and
using the VOS Standard C Cross-compiler. You must build perl on
VOS Release 14.1.0 (or later) on an XA/R or Continuum platform.
This version of perl is properly called "miniperl" because it does
not contain the complete perl functionality.
You must build perl with the compile_perl.cm command macro found
in the vos subdirectory.
2 If you have a Stratus XA/R (Intel i860-based) platform, you must
build perl using the alpha version of VOS POSIX support and using
the VOS Standard C compiler or cross-compiler. You must build
perl on VOS Release 14.1.0 (or later) on an XA/R or Continuum
platform.
This version of perl is properly called "miniperl" because it does
not contain the complete perl functionality.
You must build perl with the compile_perl.cm command macro found
in the vos subdirectory.
3 If you have a Stratus Continuum (PA-RISC-based) platform that is
running a version of VOS earlier than VOS 14.3.0, you must build
perl using the alpha version of VOS POSIX support and using the
VOS Standard C compiler or cross-compiler. You must build perl on
VOS Release 14.1.0 (or later) on an XA/R or Continuum platform.
This version of perl is properly called "miniperl" because it does
not contain the complete perl functionality.
You must build perl with the compile_perl.cm command macro found
in the vos subdirectory.
4 If you have a Stratus Continuum (PA-RISC-based) platform that is
running VOS Release 14.3.0 through VOS Release 14.4.1, you must
build perl using the generally-available version of VOS POSIX sup-
port, and using either the VOS Standard C compiler or the VOS GNU
C compiler. You must build perl on VOS Release 14.3.0 (or later)
on a Continuum platform.
This version of perl is properly called "miniperl" because it does
not contain the complete perl functionality.
You must build perl with the compile_perl.cm command macro found
in the vos subdirectory.
5 If you have a Stratus Continuum (PA-RISC-based) platform that is
running VOS Release 14.5.0 or later, you can either use the previ-
ous method to build "miniperl" or you can build "full perl", which
contains the complete functionality of perl. I strongly recommend
that you build full perl. To build full perl, you must use the
generally-available version of VOS POSIX support. You must use
the VOS GNU C compiler and the VOS GNU C/C++ and GNU Tools Release
2.0.1 (or later) product. You must build full perl on VOS Release
14.5.0 (or later) on a Continuum platform.
You must build full perl with the compile_full_perl.cm command
macro found in the vos subdirectory.
Stratus POSIX Support
Note that there are two different implementations of POSIX.1 support on
VOS. There is an alpha version of POSIX that is available from the
Stratus anonymous ftp site ( ftp://ftp.stra-
tus.com/pub/vos/posix/alpha/alpha.html ). There is a generally-avail-
able version of POSIX that comes with VOS Release 14.3.0 or higher.
This port of POSIX will compile and bind with either version of POSIX.
Most of the Perl features should work on VOS regardless of which ver-
sion of POSIX that you are using. However, the alpha version of POSIX
is missing a number of key functions, and therefore any attempt by
perl.pm to call the following unimplemented POSIX functions will result
in an error message and an immediate and fatal call to the VOS debug-
ger. They are "dup", "fork", and "waitpid". The lack of these func-
tions prevents you from starting VOS commands and grabbing their output
in perl. The workaround is to run the commands outside of perl, then
have perl process the output file. These functions are all available
in the generally-available version of POSIX.
INSTALLING PERL IN VOS
Compiling Perl 5 on VOS
Before you can build Perl 5 on VOS, you need to have or acquire the
following additional items.
1 The VOS Standard C Compiler (or the VOS Standard C Cross-Compiler)
and the VOS C Runtime. If you are using the generally-available
version of POSIX support, you may instead use the VOS GNU C/C++
Compiler. These are standard Stratus products.
2 Either the VOS OS TCP/IP or STCP product set. If you are building
with the alpha version of POSIX you need the OS TCP/IP product
set. If you are building with the generally-available version of
POSIX you need the STCP product set. These are standard Stratus
products.
3 Either the alpha or generally-available version of the VOS POSIX.1
environment.
The alpha version of POSIX.1 support is available on the Stratus
FTP site. Login anonymously to ftp.stratus.com and get the file
/pub/vos/posix/alpha/posix.save.evf.gz in binary file-transfer
mode. Or use the Uniform Resource Locator (URL) ftp://ftp.stra-
tus.com/pub/vos/posix/alpha/posix.save.evf.gz from your web
browser. Instructions for unbundling this file are at
ftp://ftp.stratus.com/pub/vos/utility/utility.html This is NOT a
standard Stratus product.
In VOS Release 14.3.0, the generally-available version of POSIX.1
support is bundled with the VOS Standard C compiler (or Standard C
Cross-Compiler). In VOS Release 14.4.0 or higher, it is also bun-
dled with the VOS C Runtime. These are standard Stratus products.
4 You must compile this version of Perl 5 on VOS Release 14.1.0 or
higher because some of the perl source files contain more than
32,767 source lines. Due to VOS release-compatibility rules, this
port of perl may not execute on VOS Release 12 or earlier.
5 If you are using the generally-available version of VOS POSIX sup-
port, then you should also acquire the VOS GNU C/C++ Compiler and
GNU Tools product. When perl is built with this version of POSIX
support, it assumes that it can find "bash", "sed" and other
POSIX-compatible commands in the directory /sys-
tem/gnu_library/bin.
To build perl using the supplied VOS command macros, change to the
"vos" subdirectory and type the command "compile_perl -processor X",
where X is the processor type (mc68020, i80860, pa7100, pa8000) that
you wish to use. Note that the generally-available version of POSIX.1
support is not available for the mc68020 or i80860 processors.
Use the "-version alpha" control argument to build perl with the alpha
version of POSIX support, and use the "-version ga" control argument to
build it with the generally-available version of POSIX. The default is
"ga".
Use the "-compiler cc" control argument to build perl with the VOS
Standard C compiler. Use the "-compiler gcc" control argument to build
it with the GNU GCC compiler. The default is "cc".
You must have purchased the VOS Standard C Cross Compiler in order to
compile perl for a processor type that is different from the processor
type of the module.
Note that code compiled for the pa7100 processor type can execute on
the PA7100, PA8000, PA8500 and PA8600 processors, and that code com-
piled for the pa8000 processor type can execute on the PA8000, PA8500
and PA8600 processors.
To build full perl using the supplied Configure script and makefiles,
change to the "vos" subdirectory and type the command "com-
pile_full_perl" or "start_process compile_full_perl". This will con-
figure, build, and test perl.
Installing Perl 5 on VOS
1 If you have built perl using the Configure script, ensure that you
have modify permission to ">system>ported" and type
gmake install
2 If you have built perl using any of the other methods, type
install_perl -processor PROCESSOR -name NAME
where PROCESSOR is mc68020, i80860, pa7100, or pa8000, as appropri-
ate, and NAME is perl or perl5, according to which name you wish to
use.
This command macro will install perl and all of its related files
in the proper directories.
3 While there are currently no architecture-specific extensions or
modules distributed with perl, the following directories can be
used to hold such files:
>system>ported>lib>perl5>5.8.0>68k
>system>ported>lib>perl5>5.8.0>860
>system>ported>lib>perl5>5.8.0>7100
>system>ported>lib>perl5>5.8.0>8000
4 Site-specific perl extensions and modules can be installed in one
of two places. Put architecture-independent files into:
>system>ported>lib>perl5>site_perl>5.8.0
Put site-specific architecture-dependent files into one of the fol-
lowing directories:
>system>ported>lib>perl5>site_perl>5.8.0>68k
>system>ported>lib>perl5>site_perl>5.8.0>860
>system>ported>lib>perl5>site_perl>5.8.0>7100
>system>ported>lib>perl5>site_perl>5.8.0>8000
5 You can examine the @INC variable from within a perl program to see
the order in which Perl searches these directories.
USING PERL IN VOS
Unimplemented Features of Perl on VOS
If perl is built with the alpha version of VOS POSIX.1 support and if
it attempts to call an unimplemented VOS POSIX.1 function, it will
print a fatal error message and enter the VOS debugger. This error is
not recoverable. See vos_dummies.c for a list of the unimplemented
POSIX.1 functions. To see what functions are unimplemented and what
the error message looks like, compile and execute "test_vos_dummies.c".
Restrictions of Perl on VOS
This port of Perl version 5 to VOS prefers Unix-style, slash-separated
pathnames over VOS-style greater-than-separated pathnames. VOS-style
pathnames should work in most contexts, but if you have trouble,
replace all greater-than characters by slash characters. Because the
slash character is used as a pathname delimiter, Perl cannot process
VOS pathnames containing a slash character in a directory or file name;
these must be renamed.
This port of Perl also uses Unix-epoch date values internally. As long
as you are dealing with ASCII character string representations of
dates, this should not be an issue. The supported epoch is January 1,
1980 to January 17, 2038.
See the file pod/perlport.pod for more information about the VOS port
of Perl.
Handling of underflow and overflow
Prior to VOS Release 14.7.0, VOS does not support automatically mapping
overflowed floating-point values to +infinity, nor automatically map-
ping underflowed floating-point values to zero, unlike many other plat-
forms. The Perl pack function has been modified to perform such map-
ping in software on VOS. Performing other floating-point computations
that underflow or overflow will probably result in SIGFPE. Don't push
your luck.
As of VOS Release 14.7.0, the VOS POSIX runtime sets up the PA-RISC
hardware floating-point status register so that the overflow and under-
flow exceptions do not trap, but instead automatically convert the
result to infinity or zero, as appropriate. As of this writing, there
are still floating-point operations that can trap, for example, sub-
tracting two infinite values. This is recorded as suggestion
posix-1022, which is not yet fixed.
TEST STATUS
When Perl 5.8.3 is built using the native build process on VOS Release
14.7.0 and GNU C++/GNU Tools 2.0.2a, all but three attempted tests
either pass or result in TODO (ignored) failures. The tests that fail
are:
t/io/tell.t, test 28 t/op/pack.t, test 39 lib/Net/ing/t/450_service.t,
test 8
SUPPORT STATUS
I'm offering this port "as is". You can ask me questions, but I can't
guarantee I'll be able to answer them. There are some excellent books
available on the Perl language; consult a book seller.
If you want a supported version of perl for VOS, purchase the VOS GNU
C++ and GNU Tools Release 2.0.1 (or later) product from Stratus Tech-
nologies, along with a support contract (or from anyone else who will
sell you support).
AUTHOR
Paul Green (Paul.Green@stratus.com)
LAST UPDATE
January 15, 2004
perl v5.8.8 2006-06-14 PERLVOS(1)
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