Collaborative Computational Project Number 14
for Single Crystal and Powder Diffraction
CCP14
Compiling Perl
The CCP14 Homepage is at http://www.ccp14.ac.uk
NB: The following may be non-optimal as still working out nuances on different systems to get
a method that is psuedo bulletproof.
The free Perl is a scripting
language interpreter necessary for various applications including the world
wide web.
The present versions of Perl are quite easy to compile though it does have
a large number of questions during Configuring.
The stable version of perl used at the time of writing was 5.005_03 (18th November 1999). This was
compiled on an SGI O2 running IRIX 6.5.6.
The Perl website is at http://www.perl.org.
At the time of writing, the stable version of Perl was 5.005_03
To extract the distribution files:
- Type: gzip -d < stable.tar.gz | tar xvof -
This creates a subdirectory where the files are ready to configure and compile.
- If you are in the mood normally read the INSTALL or README files and try to figure things out.
- Run sh Configure -Dprefix=/usr/local -Dcc=gcc (it should detect your system, ensure gcc is used as the
compiler, ensure /usr/local is the install area (sometimes Perl prefers /opt/perl)
and ask a lot of questions as well as philosophise about the meaning of life.
Main thing is to ensure gcc is the compiler and the system will install into /usr/local.
Go with the defaults for the rest of the questions. While it is possible to tell configure not to bother
with any questions, it can be good to go through this as it can tell you about potential problems early on.)
- Type make to compile things up
- Type make test to test the compiled program
- Type make install to install the files into the correct /usr/local area on your system (if you have the
permissions).