Installing ActivePerl 5.8.8.822
Welcome, and thank you for choosing ActivePerl.
Note: The first three numbers of an ActivePerl release
correspond to the core Perl version. The fourth number is the ActivePerl build
number, which may be followed by a fifth number that specifies a modified build
for ActivePerl Enterprise Edition.
For example, this release of ActivePerl is 5.8.8.822, which corresponds to Perl 5.8.8.
Please note that ActivePerl 800 series builds are NOT binary-compatible with
the older 600 and 500 series builds. In particular, do not attempt to use
extensions or PPM packages built for the 500 and 600 series builds with
ActivePerl 800 series builds and vice versa.
Binaries for the following platforms are available:
- AIX rs6000 for AIX 5.1 or later
- Linux x86 for Red Hat 6.2 or later
- Linux x86 for Debian 2.2 or later
- Mac powerpc for Mac OS X 10.3 or later
- Mac x86 for Mac OS X 10.4 or later
- SunOS sparc for Solaris 2.6 or later
- SunOS x86 for Solaris 10 or later
- Windows x86 for Windows 9x, NT, Me, 2000, 2003 and XP
Binaries of
ActivePerl for HP-UX are available from HP:
There are currently two versions of ActivePerl that are supported. The most
significant differences between the two versions are that:
ActivePerl 5.6.x, build 6xx
- is smaller
- may be faster
- has a broken threading model
- does not have unicode support
ActivePerl 5.8.x, build 8xx:
- is larger
- may be slower
- has a working threading model
- has unicode support
ActivePerl 5.6.x is generally better for web hosting purposes and
high performance applications; however, ActiveState does not intend to continue
releasing builds of Perl 5.6.x, unless a major security vulnerability is
discovered.
ActivePerl 5.8.x is recommended for most Perl scripting needs.
It has better support for more recent developments such as XML, and the bundled
modules are much more up to date.
For more information, please refer to the release notes for latest release of each version:
- Hardware: 90 MB hard disk space for typical install
- Perl for ISAPI: requires an ISAPI-compatible web server,
such as IIS 4.0 or greater, or PWS 4.0 or greater
- PerlScript: requires an ActiveX scripting host such as
Internet Explorer 4.0 or greater or Windows Scripting Host
- Perl Environment Variables: if Perl environment variables
such as
PERLLIB, PERL5LIB or PERL5OPT
have been set on your system, you should unset them before installing
ActivePerl. Otherwise, these variables may cause incompatible versions of
Perl modules to be used during the installation process.
- System Account: (MSI Installer only) Do not launch the
installation package from a directory for which the "System" account does
not have read permission. If you do, the Windows Installer Service will not
be able to access the MSI file in order to perform the installation. You
may get an error message to this effect, or it may fail mysteriously.
- Administrative Privileges: On Windows NT/2000/XP/2003
systems ActivePerl installations must be performed by a privileged user
only. If you install ActivePerl without full administrator privileges, the
following problems occur:
- Environment variables are set only for the current user
- PerlScript file associations are not created
- The PerlScript feature will be unavailable
- Registry entries are created under HKEY_CURRENT_USER and not under
HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE
- IIS script mappings are not set
- ActivePerl applications will not write messages to the event log
- ActivePerl only appears in the Add/Remove Programs
list for the current user
- Internet Explorer: Ensure that you have at least IE 6.
If necessary, get an update from:
http://windowsupdate.microsoft.com
- Windows XP / Windows 2003 Server: no additional
requirements
- Windows 2000
- Windows Me
- Windows NT
- Windows 9x
Upgrading from ActivePerl version 5.6 requires that you delete the old
version of ActivePerl, and then install the 5.8.x version. This means that any
additional packages that were installed using PPM must be manually reinstalled
after the ActivePerl 5.8.x installation, so creating a list of these packages
is an important first step.
To upgrade from ActivePerl 5.6.x:
- Generate a list of modules using the following command (changed as
required to suit your system):
dir /b c:\perl\site\lib\ppm-conf\*.ppd > c:\ppm_modules.txt
- Uninstall the old version of ActivePerl.
- Manually delete the Perl directory (by default,
c:\perl).
- Reboot.
- Install ActivePerl 5.8.x using the downloaded installer from:
http://activestate.com/Products/Download/Download.plex?id=ActivePerl
- Use the version of PPM that was installed as part of the ActivePerl 5.8
installation to re-install the modules listed in
ppm_modules.txt.
If you have installed modules using the PPM included with earlier versions
of ActivePerl 5.8, use the following steps to upgrade ActivePerl. PPM modules
can only be migrated to later ActivePerl builds if you installed ActivePerl
using the MSI Installer.
- Use Window's Add / Remove Programs applet (accessible
from the Control Panel) to uninstall ActivePerl.
- Manually delete all directories beneath the Perl installation directory
(by default
C:\Perl) except the site\lib directory.
- Install ActivePerl to the same directory (i.e.,
C:\Perl).
- Use the ppm upgrade command to check for module updates.
If your site\lib has been created with ActivePerl 817
or earlier, then you need to completely remove the whole directory
tree, do a clean installation, and reinstall your modules with PPM.
This is necessary because in ActivePerl 818 the order of
lib and site\lib in @INC has
been reversed, and all bundled modules now reside in the
lib directory. Having older versions of these bundled
modules in site\lib at the front of @INC
results in a broken installation.
Alternatively, you can use PPM-Profile to help save
and restore your locally installed PPM packages. PPM-Profile
is available through PPM and allows you to save a profile of all the PPM packages
you have installed. For example, to save a profile before you upgrade, you can type:
ppm install PPM-Profile
ppmprofile save C:\profile.xml
Once you have saved this profile, you can proceed with the upgrade as explained
above. Once done, you can use the profile you saved to reinstall the same set of
PPM packages in your new installation by typing (add the --verbose flag for
more details on what is being installed) :
ppm install PPM-Profile
ppmprofile restore C:\profile.xml
If you are using ActivePerl to serve CGI / ASP scripts using IIS or another
Web server, stop the Web server before installing ActivePerl.
- MSI Installer Package
- To install the MSI package double-click on the MSI file in Windows
Explorer.
Do not install over a 500 or 600 series build of ActivePerl. This
package must be installed into a separate directory.
- MSI Package Installation from the Command Line
- You can install ActivePerl from the command line using the 'msiexec'
program. For example:
msiexec /i msi_file.msi
The ADDLOCAL command line property is used to specify which features
should be installed. (If ADDLOCAL is not specified, all features are
installed.) For example:
msiexec /i msi_file.msi ADDLOCAL="PERL_FEATURE,PERLIS"
The following features may be specified with the ADDLOCAL switch:
- PERL_FEATURE (the Perl core)
- PPM (the Programmer's Package Manager)
- PERLIS (the Perl for ISAPI interpreter)
- PERLSE (the Perl ActiveX Scripting Engine)
- EXAMPLES (some simple examples)
- DOCUMENTATION (the ActivePerl documentation)
A set of command-line properties can be used to configure the
installation. For example:
msiexec /i msi_file.msi TARGETDIR="c:\perl" PERL_PATH="Yes"
- TARGETDIR: Used to specify the absolute path where ActivePerl will
be installed. If not specified, ActivePerl will be installed in a
default location on the same drive as the Windows operating system.
If this option is used, a value is required.
Note: Ensure that the NT 'SYSTEM' user account that actually
runs the MSI installer has full access to the target directory.
Also, don't select a directory with spaces in its name. Perl will
likely work, but many scripts will not.
- PL_IISMAP: If this option is set to 'Yes', the installer will
create a global IIS script mapping for '.pl' and Perl. By default, the
installation does not create the script mapping.
- PLX_IISMAP: If this option is set to 'Yes', the installer will
create a global IIS script mapping for '.plx' and PerlIS. By default,
the installation does not create the script mapping.
- PERL_PATH: If this option is set to 'Yes', the Perl/bin directory
will be added to the system PATH environment variable. By default, the
directory is not added to the path.
The following command-line switches can be used:
- Silent Mode
- To run in silent mode, specify the '/q' command line option. The
installer will run with no UI.
- Logging
- To log the installation process, specify the '/l' command line
option and the name of the log file. For example:
msiexec /i msi_file.msi /l log.txt
To enable verbose logging, use the *v modifier with
the /l command line option. For example:
msiexec /i msi_file.msi /l*v log.txt
- AS Installer Package
- The AS package is a generic installation package that can be used on
systems where the MSI package is not supported. The AS package provides
no uninstall functionality. To install using the AS package, double-click
the installer file and follow the prompts.
If you run Perl at the command prompt, the script will be executed by the
first Perl.exe it encounters in the list of paths in the PATH
environment variable. To ensure the script is executed by the Perl interpreter
of your choice, specify the complete path to the Perl.exe you want
to use. (Typing perl -v at the command prompt will tell you which
version of Perl is currently first in your PATH)
Installing ActivePerl will change your Path environment variable and may
change registry settings, such as file associations, which may affect your Web
server. If you want to use a previously installed copy of Perl, you will need to
modify these settings.
ftype PerlScript=perl.exe %1 %*
assoc .pl=PerlScript
Windows 9x/Me
Piping doesn't work properly on older operating systems, such as Windows
9x/Me. Add the following patch to config.pm:
797 otherlibdirs=''
798 package='perl5'
799 # pager='more /e' NOTE: The " /e" does not work on WIN9x systems
800 pager='more'
801 passcat=''
- MSI Package
- If you installed ActivePerl using the MSI installer, uninstall using the
Windows Add / Remove Programs applet.
- AS Package
- If you installed ActivePerl using the AS installer, uninstall by
deleting the directory in which ActivePerl was installed.
- Manual Uninstall
- If you must uninstall ActivePerl manually, delete the Perl directory,
including all sub-directories, and the following registry entries:
- HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE/Software/ActiveState/ActivePerl
- HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE/Software/ActiveState/PerlScript
- HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE/Software/Microsoft/Windows/CurrentVersion/Uninstall/ActivePerl
- Hardware: 90 MB hard disk space for typical install
- Operating System: OS X 10.3 "Panther" or later
- Software: X11 - for use of ActivePerl's bundled Tk modules (optional)
- Installing the OS X Package
-
ActivePerl is distributed on Mac OS X as a disk image (.dmg
file). The disk image contains an installer package (.pkg bundle)
that installs ActivePerl.
- Download the
ActivePerl disk image
(
ActivePerl-<version>-<platform>.dmg).
- If the browser does not automatically mount the disk image and open the
mounted folder in Finder, double-click
ActivePerl-<version>-<platform>.dmg to do so.
- Double-click the ActivePerl installer package
(ActivePerl-<version>.pkg) to start the installation.
- Follow the Installer prompts. The installer will ask for administrative
authentication if the current user does not have administrative
priviledges.
- After installation is complete, you may eject the ActivePerl disk image and
move ActivePerl-version.dmg to the Trash.
OS X includes a non-interactive command line interface to Apple's
Installer. To install the ActivePerl Apple installer from the command
line:
$ sudo installer -pkg /Users/<username>/ActivePerl-<version>.pkg -target /
More information on the command line interface to Installer can be
found in its man page.
The Apple Installer package installs ActivePerl in
/usr/local/ActivePerl-5.8. To run the perl interpreter and PPM
package manager (without having to enter the full path), add
/usr/local/ActivePerl-5.8/bin to your PATH environment variable. For
example:
$ export PATH=/usr/local/ActivePerl-5.8/bin:$PATH
$ export PATH=/usr/local/ActivePerl-5.8/site/bin:$PATH
To permanently add the directory to your PATH, add it to the
.profile or .bash_profile file in the user's home
directory. For example:
PATH=/usr/local/ActivePerl-5.8/bin:$PATH
PATH=/usr/local/ActivePerl-5.8/site/bin:$PATH
export PATH
Alternatively, symbolic links to the binaries can be created in any
bin directory currently in the PATH. For example:
PATH=/Users/<username>/bin:$PATH
$ ln -s /usr/local/ActivePerl-5.8/bin/perl /Users/<username>/bin/perl
$ ln -s /usr/local/ActivePerl-5.8/bin/ppm /Users/<username>/bin/ppm
To uninstall ActivePerl, run the uninstall script:
$ /Library/Receipts/ActivePerl-5.8.pkg/Contents/Resources/uninstall
Removing ActivePerl will also remove perl modules manually installed using
PPM.
If neccessary, remove any symbolic links created during configuration. For
example:
$ rm /Users/<username>/bin/perl
- Hardware: 90 MB hard disk space for typical install
- Operating System: Red Hat 6.2 or later, Debian 2.2 or later
- Online Help: Web browser
- RPM Package
for Red Hat 6.2 or later
- The Red Hat compatible package is in RPM format. This should be
installed as root, using the following command:
% rpm -i ActivePerl-5.8.8.822-i686-linux.rpm
This will install ActivePerl into /opt/ActivePerl-5.8.
To uninstall ActivePerl, run:
% rpm -e ActivePerl
The RPM package has only been tested with Red Hat 6.2, but is expected to
be compatible with other Red Hat 6.2 compatible installations as well.
Note: Previous versions of ActivePerl were installed in
/usr/local. Upgrading using rpm will not remove
modules and documentation subsequently added using PPM or the CPAN shell,
nor will it move them to the new location in /opt. These
modules must be reinstalled after the upgrade. The old ActivePerl directory
in /usr/local can be removed.
- Dpkg Package
for Debian 2.2 or later
- The Debian-compatible package is in dpkg format. This should be
installed as root, using the following command:
% dpkg -i ActivePerl-5.8.8.822-i686-linux.deb
This will install ActivePerl into /opt/ActivePerl-5.8.
To uninstall ActivePerl, run:
% dpkg -r ActivePerl
The Debian package has only been tested with Debian 2.2, but is expected
to be compatible with other Debian 2.2 compatible installations as well.
- Generic AS Package for
Linux
- The generic installer allows installation as an unprivileged user into a
user-specified path. GNU tar is required for extracting the files. See
Known Issues in the ActivePerl
Release Notes for details.
Download the distribution to a temporary directory, extract the files,
chdir to the ActivePerl directory and then run the script install.sh.
The installation script will prompt you for the target installation
directory.
% tar zxf ActivePerl-5.8.8.822-i686-linux.tar.gz
% cd ActivePerl-5.8.8.822
% ./install.sh
If you share the system with other people, or if you do not have root access,
it is recommended that you install ActivePerl in your own user directory. For
example:
/home/<username>/ActivePerl-5.8
We suggest adding the following line to your .bash_profile file:
PATH=$PATH:/home/<username>/bin
Also, we suggest that you create symbolic links to the binaries:
ln -s /home/<username>/ActivePerl-5.8/bin/perl /home/<username>/bin/perl
ln -s /home/<username>/ActivePerl-5.8/bin/ppm /home/<username>/bin/ppm
This will allow you to call ActivePerl with a command like:
perl -le "Hello World!;"
The Red Hat and Debian packages are installed into the
/opt/ActivePerl-5.8 directory. Add the
/opt/ActivePerl-5.8/bin directory to your PATH environment
variable to conveniently access it. For example, in the C shell:
% setenv PATH /opt/ActivePerl-5.8/bin:$PATH
The ActivePerl Generic installer allows you to install the package anywhere
that the user has write permission. Add the bin directory to your PATH
environment variable to conveniently access it. For example, in the C shell
(assuming you installed into /home/<username>/ActivePerl-5.8):
% setenv PATH /home/<username>/ActivePerl-5.8/bin:$PATH
- Debian Package
- If you installed ActivePerl using the dpkg format installer, uninstall
as follows:
dpkg -r ActivePerl
- RPM Package
- If you installed ActivePerl using the RPM format installer, uninstall
as follows:
rpm -e ActivePerl
- AS Package
- If you installed ActivePerl using the AS format installer, remove the
directory into which ActivePerl was installed. For example:
/bin/rm -rf /opt/ActivePerl-5.8
- Hardware: 90 MB hard disk space for typical install
- Operating System: Solaris 2.6 or later for sparc, Solaris 10 or later for x86
- Online Help: Web browser
- PKGADD Package
- The Solaris package is in pkgadd format. This should be installed as
root, using the following commands:
% gunzip ActivePerl-5.8.8.822-sun4-solaris.pkg.gz
% pkgadd -d ActivePerl-5.8.8.822-sun4-solaris.pkg
This will install ActivePerl into /opt/ActivePerl-5.8.
To uninstall ActivePerl, run:
% pkgrm ASperl
This package has only been tested with Solaris 2.6, but is expected to be
compatible with other Solaris 2.6 compatible installations as well,
including Solaris 7 and Solaris 8.
- Generic AS Package for Solaris
- The Generic Installer allows installation as an unprivileged user, and
into a user-specified path. GNU tar is required for extracting the files.
See Known Issues in the ActivePerl
Release Notes for details.
Download the distribution to a temporary directory, extract the files,
chdir to the ActivePerl directory and then run the script
install.sh. The installation script will prompt you for the
target installation directory.
% tar zxf ActivePerl-5.8.8.822-sun4-solaris.tar.gz
% cd ActivePerl-5.8.8.822
% ./install.sh
The Solaris package is installed into the /opt/ActivePerl-5.8
directory. Add the /opt/ActivePerl-5.8/bin directory to your
PATH environment variable to conveniently access it. For example, in the C
shell:
% setenv PATH /opt/ActivePerl-5.8/bin:$PATH
The ActivePerl Generic installer allows you to install the package anywhere
that the user has write permission. Add the bin directory to your PATH
environment variable to conveniently access it. For example, in the C shell
(assuming you installed into /home/<username>/ActivePerl-5.8):
% setenv PATH /home/<username>/ActivePerl-5.8/bin:$PATH
- PKGADD Package
- If you installed ActivePerl using the PKGADD format installer, uninstall
as follows:
pkgrm -d ASperl
- AS Package
- If you installed ActivePerl using the AS format installer, remove the
directory into which ActivePerl was installed. For example:
/bin/rm -rf /opt/ActivePerl-5.8
- Hardware: 90 MB hard disk space for typical install
- Operating System: AIX 5.1
- Generic AS Package
for AIX
-
ActivePerl is distributed on AIX as a gzipped tarball containing an
installer. GNU tar is required for extracting the files (see Known Issues in the ActivePerl Release
Notes for details).
Download
the distribution to a temporary directory, extract the files, chdir to
the ActivePerl directory and run the script
install.sh.
$ tar zxf ActivePerl-5.8.8.822-aix-5.1-<seq>.tar.gz
$ cd ActivePerl-5.8.8.822
$ ./install.sh
The installation script will prompt you for a target installation
directory. If you share the system with other people, or if you do not
have root access, you may install ActivePerl in your own user directory.
For example:
/home/<username>/ActivePerl-5.8
We suggest adding the bin directory of the ActivePerl
installation to your .profile file. For example:
PATH=$PATH:/home/<username>/ActivePerl-5.8/bin
Alternatively, create symbolic links to the binaries in a directory
already in your path. For example:
$ ln -s /home/<username>/ActivePerl-5.8/bin/perl /home/<username>/bin/perl
$ ln -s /home/<username>/ActivePerl-5.8/bin/ppm /home/<username>/bin/ppm
To uninstall ActivePerl, remove the directory ActivePerl was installed in.
For example:
$ rm -rf /opt/ActivePerl-5.8
If neccessary, remove any symbolic links created during configuration. For
example:
$ rm /Users/<username>/bin/perl
Installation instructions for ActivePerl on HP-UX are available from
the HP website:
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