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-
- Perl Kit, Version 5.0
-
- Copyright 1989-1997, Larry Wall
- All rights reserved.
-
- This program is free software; you can redistribute it and/or modify
- it under the terms of either:
-
- a) the GNU General Public License as published by the Free
- Software Foundation; either version 1, or (at your option) any
- later version, or
-
- b) the "Artistic License" which comes with this Kit.
-
- This program is distributed in the hope that it will be useful,
- but WITHOUT ANY WARRANTY; without even the implied warranty of
- MERCHANTABILITY or FITNESS FOR A PARTICULAR PURPOSE. See either
- the GNU General Public License or the Artistic License for more details.
-
- You should have received a copy of the Artistic License with this
- Kit, in the file named "Artistic". If not, I'll be glad to provide one.
-
- You should also have received a copy of the GNU General Public License
- along with this program; if not, write to the Free Software
- Foundation, Inc., 675 Mass Ave, Cambridge, MA 02139, USA.
-
- For those of you that choose to use the GNU General Public License,
- my interpretation of the GNU General Public License is that no Perl
- script falls under the terms of the GPL unless you explicitly put
- said script under the terms of the GPL yourself. Furthermore, any
- object code linked with perl does not automatically fall under the
- terms of the GPL, provided such object code only adds definitions
- of subroutines and variables, and does not otherwise impair the
- resulting interpreter from executing any standard Perl script. I
- consider linking in C subroutines in this manner to be the moral
- equivalent of defining subroutines in the Perl language itself. You
- may sell such an object file as proprietary provided that you provide
- or offer to provide the Perl source, as specified by the GNU General
- Public License. (This is merely an alternate way of specifying input
- to the program.) You may also sell a binary produced by the dumping of
- a running Perl script that belongs to you, provided that you provide or
- offer to provide the Perl source as specified by the GPL. (The
- fact that a Perl interpreter and your code are in the same binary file
- is, in this case, a form of mere aggregation.) This is my interpretation
- of the GPL. If you still have concerns or difficulties understanding
- my intent, feel free to contact me. Of course, the Artistic License
- spells all this out for your protection, so you may prefer to use that.
-
- --------------------------------------------------------------------------
-
- Perl is a language that combines some of the features of C, sed, awk
- and shell. See the manual page for more hype. There are also two Nutshell
- Handbooks published by O'Reilly & Assoc. See pod/perlbook.pod
- for more information.
-
- Please read all the directions below before you proceed any further, and
- then follow them carefully.
-
- After you have unpacked your kit, you should have all the files listed
- in MANIFEST.
-
- Installation
-
- 1) Detailed instructions are in the file INSTALL which you should read.
- In brief, the following should work on most systems:
- rm -f config.sh
- sh Configure
- make
- make test
- make install
- For most systems, it should be safe to accept all the Configure defaults.
- (It is recommended that you accept the defaults the first time you build
- or if you have any problems building.)
-
- 2) Read the manual entries before running perl.
-
- 3) IMPORTANT! Help save the world! Communicate any problems and suggested
- patches to perlbug@perl.com so we can keep the world in sync.
- If you have a problem, there's someone else out there who either has had
- or will have the same problem. It's usually helpful if you send the
- output of the "myconfig" script in the main perl directory.
-
- If you've succeeded in compiling perl, the perlbug script in the utils/
- subdirectory can be used to help mail in a bug report.
-
- If possible, send in patches such that the patch program will apply them.
- Context diffs are the best, then normal diffs. Don't send ed scripts--
- I've probably changed my copy since the version you have.
-
- Watch for perl patches in comp.lang.perl.announce. Patches will generally
- be in a form usable by the patch program. If you are just now bringing
- up perl and aren't sure how many patches there are, write to me and I'll
- send any you don't have. Your current patch level is shown in
- patchlevel.h.
-
-
- Just a personal note: I want you to know that I create nice things like this
- because it pleases the Author of my story. If this bothers you, then your
- notion of Authorship needs some revision. But you can use perl anyway. :-)
-
- The author.
-