Module::Install::FAQ(3User Contributed Perl DocumentatiModule::Install::FAQ(3)NAMEModule::Install::FAQ - Frequently Asked Questions for Module::Install
DESCRIPTION
Though Module::Install itself has a general FAQ section in the pod,
it's more for advocacy. Here's an incomplete and growing list of the
actual questions I have been frequently asked (or found on the net)
about Module::Install.
Do I also have to update my CPAN modules every time Module::Install is
updated?
The point of Module::Install is let module authors take care of
everything related to updating toolchains for the sake of module users.
So, if you choose to use Module::Install, it's you who should update
toolchains, i.e. Module::Install and other bundled modules. You should
check if there's any significant change/fix in your toolchains. You
should check if your toolchains go along with other tools users use to
install your distributions, or with the systems users are in, or
whatever that matters. In the end, you are expected to have much more
knowledge and willingness than average users.
That being said, practically, you don't have to update your
distributions if they are working well. But if you do find issues,
please update your distributions, even when you have nothing to change
in your own modules. Module::Install is not only a tool to write
better, but also a tool to encourage you to help others.
Do I really have to avoid auto_install()?
Not at all, using "auto_install()" is just fine. While it indeed
behaved erratically in older Module::Install versions, there have been
no reported issues since mid-2009. As far as compatbility with various
CPAN clients: several rather large projects on CPAN (including Catalyst
and DBIx::Class), are using "auto_install" without any issues reported
by their substantial userbases.
That said, if all you want to do is make it easy for a contributor to
checkout your code and quickly install necessary dependencies, there
are alternatives to "auto_install".
If your CPAN module is new enough, you can pass a dot to the cpan
command it provides, and it will install all the required distributions
from the CPAN:
$ cpan .
The same is true for the cpanm command from App::cpanminus, with which
you even can write like "cpanm --installdeps ."
Should I put an "inc" directory Module::Install automatically creates into
a repository for my projects?
Depends. If the repository is private and only for you, you usually
don't want to put it in your repository to let you always use the
latest Module::Install you have (the "inc" directory is recreated each
time you run "perl Makefile.PL").
If not, but you alone are the release manager and know what you have to
do when you release, putting the "inc" directory into your repository
may help other casual contributors, especially if you use minor (or
private) non-core extensions in your Makefile.PL.
However, if you generously allow other people to release, or you're not
so familiar with how Module::Install works and don't know what you have
to do in the above situation, don't put it in the repository. It may be
the cause of troubles including a wrong version in the "META.yml".
If you feel sorry about the inconvenience for your fellow contributors,
you may want to add explicitly "use
Module::Install::<ExtensionYouWantToUse>;" after "use
inc::Module::Install;" in your Makefile.PL. It doesn't do any harm, and
it makes clear which extensions they need to install.
What're there in the "inc" directory?
Module::Install puts its components (sometimes with extra modules)
under the "inc" directory to be released with a distribution. Those
modules will not be installed into your system, unless explicitly
copied into somewhere. They are only used to help configuration, tests,
and/or installation.
If there's no "inc" directory, Module::Install will automatically
create it when you run "perl Makefile.PL". And if that happens, a
directory (as of this writing, ".author") will also be created under
the "inc" directory. If the ".author" directory exists, the "inc"
directory will be recreated each time you run "perl Makefile.PL" to
make sure everything you need is included and up-to-date. This
".author" directory will not be included in a distribution.
"perl Makefile.PL" doesn't work or does a strange behavior for me. Why?
Module::Install uses an Autoloader magic to delegate command handling
to the extensions in the "inc" directory. This works while everything
is in order, but when it finds something it can't understands, it dies
with a compile error, or does what you don't expect.
To prevent the latter strange behavior, Module::Install 0.96 and above
dies when it tries to process unknown commands. In most cases (other
than typos), these unknown commands are from non-core extensions on the
CPAN, and they should hopefully have predictable names that you can
easily tell from which extension they come, though some may be a bit
hard to find.
If you are trying to contribute to some project, and having a trouble
to run "Makefile.PL", please contact the author of the project to learn
what you have to install. If the distribution is already on the CPAN,
you may also want to look into the MANIFEST file to see which
extensions are included in the "inc" directory before you ask.
This usually does not happen in the user land as distributions that use
Module::Install should have all the necessary extensions under the
"inc" directory. If this should happen, that's most probably because
the release manager shipped the distribution under a non-author mode.
Please contact the author to fix the issue.
Why can't I do <anything> with Module::Install that I can do with
ExtUtils::MakeMaker?
Module::Install is just a wrapper of ExtUtils::MakeMaker. You can do
almost everything you can do with ExtUtils::MakeMaker by passing
arbitrary attributes to ExtUtils::MakeMaker in the backend via
"makemaker_args" like this:
use inc::Module::Install;
all_from 'lib/Foo/Bar.pm';
makemaker_args(
dist => { PREOP => '...' },
PL_FILES => {'bin/foobar.PL' => 'bin/foobar'},
);
WriteAll;
However, by the singleton nature of Module::Install, it may fail to
process Makefile.PLs in subdirectories correctly now, and you may need
to override attributes explicitly in some cases where Module::Install
provides other default values than ExtUtils::MakeMaker does. Please see
also the ExtUtils::MakeMaker's pod for further instructions.
I added MyMakefile.PL to my distribution, but it doesn't work as I
expected. Why?
ExtUtils::MakeMaker (and Module::Build also) treats "*.PL" files in the
top level directory as something special to generate other files. So,
if you add something that has ".PL" extension like "MyMakefile.PL" in
the top level directory, it also runs automatically when you run
Makefile.PL.
If you don't like this behavior, use "makemaker_args" to pass an
anonymous hash to "PL_FILES".
makemaker_args(PL_FILES => {});
AUTHOR
Kenichi Ishigaki <ishigaki@cpan.org>
COPYRIGHT
Copyright 2010 Kenichi Ishigaki.
This program is free software; you can redistribute it and/or modify it
under the same terms as Perl itself.
perl v5.14.1 2011-04-27 Module::Install::FAQ(3)
