use Perl

Having produced a guide to setting up blead perl CPAN smoke testing, I thought it might be about time to produce something for stable perl.

First off install POE::Component::CPAN::YACSmoke in your system perl using either cpan or cpanp. It is advised that Proc::ProcessTable is installed when prompted. This will install the minismoker script which we will use later on.

Okay. Let's install perl-5.8.8

I usually install my testing perl in the home directory of a non-privileged user account.

$ mkdir -p perl588/bin
$ mkdir -p build/
$ cd build/
$ wget ftp://ftp.perl.org/pub/CPAN/src/perl-5.8.8.tar.gz
$ tar zxvf perl-5.8.8.tar.gz
$ rm perl-5.8.8.tar.gz
$ cd perl-5.8.8

Then run ./Configure. Take the defaults ( or change to taste, such as enabling threading, etc. ), except when prompted for the installation prefix.

$ ./Configure
Installation prefix to use? (~name ok) [/usr/local] /home/chris/perl588

Then compile, run the testsuite and install

$ make && make test && make install

Assuming everything went okay we should have perl-5.8.8 installed under /home/chris/perl588

$ cd
$ export APPDATA=/home/chris/perl588/

Setting APPDATA forces CPANPLUS to locate its .cpanplus directory under /home/chris/perl588/. Now let's configure cpan ( only answers different to the defaults are shown ):

$ /home/chris/perl588/bin/cpan
Would you like me to configure as much as possible automatically? [yes] no
CPAN build and cache directory? [/home/chris/.cpan] /home/chris/perl588/.cpan
Policy on building prerequisites (follow, ask or ignore)? [ask] follow
Parameters for the 'make install' command?
Your choice:  [] UNINST=1

Okay, cpan is configured. Let's install a few required modules:

cpan> install YAML
cpan> install LWP
cpan> install Test::Reporter
cpan> install CPANPLUS
cpan> quit

If CPANPLUS won't install because of a cyclic dependency, then we have to use CPANPLUS' boxed version to bootstrap install itself.

cpan> look CPANPLUS
$ /home/chris/perl588/bin/perl bin/cpanp-boxed -s selfupdate dependencies
$ /home/chris/perl588/bin/perl Makefile.PL
$ make && make test && make install
$ exit
cpan> quit

Okay, we are finished with cpan. Let's configure cpanp ( again only changes to the defaults are shown ):

$ /home/chris/perl588/bin/cpanp
CPAN Terminal> s reconfigure
Section to configure: [1]: 1
Type of configuration file [1]: 1
Section to configure: [1]: 2
Where can I find your 'sudo' utility? (Enter a single space to disable) [Path to your 'sudo'] <space>
Section to configure: [1]: 3
Section to configure: [1]: 4
Which email address shall I use? [1]: 3
Email address: myemail@domain.com
Section to configure: [1]: 5
Should I be verbose? [y/N]: y
Follow prerequisites? [3]: 2
Report test results? [y/N]: y
Shall I check module signatures? [Y/n]: n
Section to configure: [1]: 6
make flags? UNINST=1
Build.PL and Build flags? uninst=1
Section to configure: 9
CPAN Terminal> quit

If you need to configure cpanp to send test reports through a particular mail relay open up an editor and edit the file: /home/chris/perl588/.cpanplus/lib/CPANPLUS/Config/User.pm

Alter the line $conf->set_conf( cpantest_mx => '' ); to specify the dns name or IP address of a suitable relay. Save the file.

Right, back into cpanp and we'll install CPAN::YACSmoke. The current development release of CPAN::YACSmoke won't use our hacked .cpanplus directory so we have to install a hacked version.

$ /home/chris/perl588/bin/cpanp
CPAN Terminal> i http://gumbynet.org.uk/smoke/CPAN-YACSmoke-0.03_07.tar.gz
CPAN Terminal> quit

That's it. We're ready to smoke.

$ cd
$ mkdir tmp && cd tmp
$ minismoker --debug --perl /home/chris/perl588/bin/perl

And we are smoking!