On Wed, 23 Feb 2005, Paul Ohashi wrote:
> I've upgraded to Perl 5.8 from 5.6 and I'm getting output I don't
> understand when I try to install the DBI module.
>
> I'm on Solaris 9 (Sparc) and I had Perl 5.0 and 5.6 installed as
> packages and I removed them with pkgrm. I then installed Perl 5.8 from
> ActiveState using ActivePerl-5.8.6.811-sun4-solaris.tar.gz.
>
> Now I'm trying to install the DBI module and when I execute 'perl
> Makefile.PL' the output returned says:
>
> I see you're using perl 5.008006 on sun4-solaris, okay.
>
> There's nothing in my environment that says perl 5.0. My question is
> two fold: Where is this Makefile.PL getting the Perl version from and
> how do I fix this?
Perl versioning is a little funny.
A while back, after Perl 5 came out, followup releases were seen as
merely patches to Perl5, not deserving major or even minor version
numbers, so they were denoted like 5.002 or 5.005_54.
Over time, it was realized that the language was in fact growing a lot,
and that these "trivial" revisions were actually significant. And that
the zeroes in 5.006 really shouldn't be there. So they came out.
Sort of.
For all purposes, a Perl version 5.00x00y is 5.x.y by more conventional
notation. Some things will still present the information to you in the
older format, which still lives on in Perl's deep, dark guts, but all
discussion of Perl will generally omit the zeroes, and most messages
from Perl will as well.
So. You installed ActivePerl-5.8.6.811-sun4-solaris.tar.gz (aka 5.8.6),
and are told by `perl Makefile.PL` that you have 5.008006. Squint your
eyes and you'll see that these are actually the same version.
If you're interested, this fills in *lots* of gaps:
<http://history.perl.org/PerlTimeline.html>
But anyway.
Yes, it's confusing.
Yes, it doesn't make sense even after being explained.
Yes, there are good reasons for the status quo, but they're weird.
Yes, supposedly Perl6 will fix this. Someday.
No, Perl 6 will not give you a pony. Sorry.
For now, just accept it as one of Perl's quirks.
Kind of like Java 1.4.5 being "Java Five", or whatever it is ... :-)
--
Chris Devers
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