| 1 | =head1 NAME |
| 2 | |
| 3 | Inline-FAQ - The Inline FAQ |
| 4 | |
| 5 | =head1 DESCRIPTION |
| 6 | |
| 7 | Welcome to the official Inline FAQ. In this case, B<FAQ> means: |
| 8 | |
| 9 | Formerly Answered Questions |
| 10 | |
| 11 | This is a collection of old, long-winded emails that myself and others |
| 12 | have sent to the Inline mailing list. (inline@perl.org) They have been |
| 13 | reviewed and edited for general Inline edification. Some of them may be |
| 14 | related to a specific language. They are presented here in a traditional |
| 15 | FAQ layout. |
| 16 | |
| 17 | =head1 General Inline |
| 18 | |
| 19 | Since there is only a handful of content so far, all FAQs are currently |
| 20 | under this heading. |
| 21 | |
| 22 | =head2 How disposable is a .Inline or _Inline directory? |
| 23 | |
| 24 | I probably need to be more emphatic about the roll of _Inline/ cache |
| 25 | directories. Since they are created automatically, they are completely |
| 26 | disposable. I delete them all the time. And it is fine to have a |
| 27 | different one for each project. In fact as long as you don't have |
| 28 | ~/.Inline/ defined, Inline will create a new ./_Inline directory. You |
| 29 | can move that to ./.Inline and it will continue to work if you want to |
| 30 | give it more longevity and hide it from view. There is a long |
| 31 | complicated list of rules about how [_.]Inline/ directories are |
| 32 | used/created. But it was designed to give you the most |
| 33 | flexibility/ease-of-use. Never be afraid to nuke 'em. They'll just pop |
| 34 | right back next time. :) |
| 35 | |
| 36 | =head2 Whatever happened to the SITE_INSTALL option? |
| 37 | |
| 38 | SITE_INSTALL is gone. I was going to leave it in and change the |
| 39 | semantics, but thought it better to remove it, so people wouldn't try to |
| 40 | use it the old way. There is now _INSTALL_ (but you're not supposed to |
| 41 | know that :). It works magically through the use of Inline::MakeMaker. I |
| 42 | explained this earlier but it's worth going through again because it's |
| 43 | the biggest change for 0.40. Here's how to 'permanently' install an |
| 44 | Inline extension (Inline based module) with 0.40: |
| 45 | |
| 46 | 1) Create a module with Inline. |
| 47 | 2) Test it using the normal/local _Inline/ cache. |
| 48 | 3) Create a Makefile.PL (like the one produced by h2xs) |
| 49 | 4) Change 'use ExtUtils::MakeMaker' to 'use Inline::MakeMaker' |
| 50 | 5) Change your 'use Inline C => DATA' to 'use Inline C => DATA => NAME |
| 51 | => Foo => VERSION => 1.23' |
| 52 | 6) Make sure NAME matches your package name ('Foo'), or begins with |
| 53 | 'Foo::'. |
| 54 | 7) Make sure VERSION matches $Foo::VERSION. This must be a string (not a |
| 55 | number) matching /^\d\.\d\d$/ |
| 56 | 8) Do the perl/make/test/install dance (thanks binkley :) |
| 57 | |
| 58 | With Inline 0.41 (or thereabouts) you can skip steps 3 & 4, and just |
| 59 | say 'perl -MInline=INSTALL ./Foo.pm'. This will work for non-Inline |
| 60 | modules too. It will become the defacto standard (since there is no easy |
| 61 | standard) way of installing a Perl module. It will allow Makefile.PL |
| 62 | parameters 'perl -MInline=INSTALL ./Foo.pm - PREFIX=/home/ingy/perl' and |
| 63 | things like that. It will also make use of a MANIFEST if you provide |
| 64 | one. |
| 65 | |
| 66 | =head2 How do I create a binary distribution using Inline? |
| 67 | |
| 68 | I've figured out how to create and install a PPM binary distribution; |
| 69 | with or without distributing the C code! And I've decided to share it |
| 70 | with all of you :) |
| 71 | |
| 72 | NOTE: Future versions of Inline will make this process a one line |
| 73 | command. But for now just use this simple recipe. |
| 74 | |
| 75 | --- |
| 76 | |
| 77 | The Inline 0.40 distribution comes with a sample extension module called |
| 78 | Math::Simple. Theoretically you could distribute this module on CPAN. It |
| 79 | has all the necessary support for installation. You can find it in |
| 80 | Inline-0.40/modules/Math/Simple/. Here are the steps for converting this |
| 81 | into a binary distribution *without* C source code. |
| 82 | |
| 83 | NOTE: The recipient of this binary distribution will need to have the |
| 84 | PPM.pm module installed. This module requires a lot of other CPAN |
| 85 | modules. ActivePerl (available for Win32, Linux, and Solaris) has all of |
| 86 | these bundled. While ActivePerl isn't required, it makes things (a |
| 87 | lot) easier. |
| 88 | |
| 89 | 1) cd Inline-0.40/Math/Simple/ |
| 90 | |
| 91 | 2) Divide Simple.pm into two files: |
| 92 | |
| 93 | ---8<--- (Simple.pm) |
| 94 | package Math::Simple; |
| 95 | use strict; |
| 96 | require Exporter; |
| 97 | @Math::Simple::ISA = qw(Exporter); |
| 98 | @Math::Simple::EXPORT = qw(add subtract); |
| 99 | $Math::Simple::VERSION = '1.23'; |
| 100 | |
| 101 | use Inline (C => 'src/Simple.c' => |
| 102 | NAME => 'Math::Simple', |
| 103 | VERSION => '1.23', |
| 104 | ); |
| 105 | 1; |
| 106 | ---8<--- |
| 107 | ---8<--- (src/Simple.c) |
| 108 | int add (int x, int y) { |
| 109 | return x + y; |
| 110 | } |
| 111 | |
| 112 | int subtract (int x, int y) { |
| 113 | return x - y; |
| 114 | } |
| 115 | ---8<--- |
| 116 | |
| 117 | So now you have the Perl in one file and the C in the other. The C code |
| 118 | must be in a subdirectory. |
| 119 | |
| 120 | 3) |
| 121 | Note that I also changed the term 'DATA' to the name of the C file. This |
| 122 | will work just as if the C were still inline. |
| 123 | |
| 124 | 4) Run 'perl Makefile.PL' |
| 125 | |
| 126 | 5) Run 'make test' |
| 127 | |
| 128 | 6) Get the MD5 key from 'blib/arch/auto/Math/Simple/Simple.inl' |
| 129 | |
| 130 | 7) |
| 131 | Edit 'blib/lib/Math/Simple.pm'. Change 'src/Simple.c' to |
| 132 | '02c61710cab5b659efc343a9a830aa73' (the MD5 key) |
| 133 | |
| 134 | 8) Run 'make ppd' |
| 135 | |
| 136 | 9) |
| 137 | Edit 'Math-Simple.ppd'. Fill in AUTHOR and ABSTRACT if you wish. Then |
| 138 | change: |
| 139 | |
| 140 | <CODEBASE HREF="" /> |
| 141 | |
| 142 | to |
| 143 | |
| 144 | <CODEBASE HREF="Math-Simple.tar.gz" /> |
| 145 | |
| 146 | 10) Run: |
| 147 | |
| 148 | tar cvf Math-Simple.tar blib |
| 149 | gzip --best Math-Simple.tar |
| 150 | |
| 151 | 11) |
| 152 | Run: |
| 153 | |
| 154 | tar cvf Math-Simple-1.23.tar Math-Simple.ppd Math-Simple.tar.gz |
| 155 | gzip --best Math-Simple-1.23.tar |
| 156 | |
| 157 | 12) Distribute Math-Simple-1.23.tar.gz with the following instructions: |
| 158 | |
| 159 | A) Run: |
| 160 | |
| 161 | gzip -d Math-Simple-1.23.tar.gz |
| 162 | tar xvzf Math-Simple-1.23.tar |
| 163 | |
| 164 | B) Run 'ppm install Math-Simple.ppd' |
| 165 | |
| 166 | C) Delete Math-Simple.tar and Math-Simple.ppd. |
| 167 | |
| 168 | D) Test with: |
| 169 | |
| 170 | perl -MMath::Simple -le 'print add(37, 42)' |
| 171 | |
| 172 | --- |
| 173 | |
| 174 | That's it. The process should also work with zip instead of tar, but I |
| 175 | haven't tried it. |
| 176 | |
| 177 | The recipient of the binary must have Perl built with a matching |
| 178 | architecture. Luckily, ppm will catch this. |
| 179 | |
| 180 | For a binary dist *with* C source code, simply omit steps 2, 3, 6, and |
| 181 | 7. |
| 182 | |
| 183 | If this seems too hard, then in a future version you should be able to |
| 184 | just type: |
| 185 | |
| 186 | make ppm |
| 187 | |
| 188 | =cut |