| 1 | =head1 NAME |
| 2 | |
| 3 | perl570delta - what's new for perl v5.7.0 |
| 4 | |
| 5 | =head1 DESCRIPTION |
| 6 | |
| 7 | This document describes differences between the 5.6.0 release and |
| 8 | the 5.7.0 release. |
| 9 | |
| 10 | =head1 Security Vulnerability Closed |
| 11 | |
| 12 | A potential security vulnerability in the optional suidperl component |
| 13 | of Perl has been identified. suidperl is neither built nor installed |
| 14 | by default. As of September the 2nd, 2000, the only known vulnerable |
| 15 | platform is Linux, most likely all Linux distributions. CERT and |
| 16 | various vendors have been alerted about the vulnerability. |
| 17 | |
| 18 | The problem was caused by Perl trying to report a suspected security |
| 19 | exploit attempt using an external program, /bin/mail. On Linux |
| 20 | platforms the /bin/mail program had an undocumented feature which |
| 21 | when combined with suidperl gave access to a root shell, resulting in |
| 22 | a serious compromise instead of reporting the exploit attempt. If you |
| 23 | don't have /bin/mail, or if you have 'safe setuid scripts', or if |
| 24 | suidperl is not installed, you are safe. |
| 25 | |
| 26 | The exploit attempt reporting feature has been completely removed from |
| 27 | the Perl 5.7.0 release, so that particular vulnerability isn't there |
| 28 | anymore. However, further security vulnerabilities are, |
| 29 | unfortunately, always possible. The suidperl code is being reviewed |
| 30 | and if deemed too risky to continue to be supported, it may be |
| 31 | completely removed from future releases. In any case, suidperl should |
| 32 | only be used by security experts who know exactly what they are doing |
| 33 | and why they are using suidperl instead of some other solution such as |
| 34 | sudo ( see http://www.courtesan.com/sudo/ ). |
| 35 | |
| 36 | =head1 Incompatible Changes |
| 37 | |
| 38 | =over 4 |
| 39 | |
| 40 | =item * |
| 41 | |
| 42 | Arrays now always interpolate into double-quoted strings: |
| 43 | constructs like "foo@bar" now always assume C<@bar> is an array, |
| 44 | whether or not the compiler has seen use of C<@bar>. |
| 45 | |
| 46 | =item * |
| 47 | |
| 48 | The semantics of bless(REF, REF) were unclear and until someone proves |
| 49 | it to make some sense, it is forbidden. |
| 50 | |
| 51 | =item * |
| 52 | |
| 53 | A reference to a reference now stringify as "REF(0x81485ec)" instead |
| 54 | of "SCALAR(0x81485ec)" in order to be more consistent with the return |
| 55 | value of ref(). |
| 56 | |
| 57 | =item * |
| 58 | |
| 59 | The very dusty examples in the eg/ directory have been removed. |
| 60 | Suggestions for new shiny examples welcome but the main issue is that |
| 61 | the examples need to be documented, tested and (most importantly) |
| 62 | maintained. |
| 63 | |
| 64 | =item * |
| 65 | |
| 66 | The obsolete chat2 library that should never have been allowed |
| 67 | to escape the laboratory has been decommissioned. |
| 68 | |
| 69 | =item * |
| 70 | |
| 71 | The unimplemented POSIX regex features [[.cc.]] and [[=c=]] are still |
| 72 | recognised but now cause fatal errors. The previous behaviour of |
| 73 | ignoring them by default and warning if requested was unacceptable |
| 74 | since it, in a way, falsely promised that the features could be used. |
| 75 | |
| 76 | =item * |
| 77 | |
| 78 | The (bogus) escape sequences \8 and \9 now give an optional warning |
| 79 | ("Unrecognized escape passed through"). There is no need to \-escape |
| 80 | any C<\w> character. |
| 81 | |
| 82 | =item * |
| 83 | |
| 84 | lstat(FILEHANDLE) now gives a warning because the operation makes no sense. |
| 85 | In future releases this may become a fatal error. |
| 86 | |
| 87 | =item * |
| 88 | |
| 89 | The long deprecated uppercase aliases for the string comparison |
| 90 | operators (EQ, NE, LT, LE, GE, GT) have now been removed. |
| 91 | |
| 92 | =item * |
| 93 | |
| 94 | The regular expression captured submatches ($1, $2, ...) are now |
| 95 | more consistently unset if the match fails, instead of leaving false |
| 96 | data lying around in them. |
| 97 | |
| 98 | =item * |
| 99 | |
| 100 | The tr///C and tr///U features have been removed and will not return; |
| 101 | the interface was a mistake. Sorry about that. For similar |
| 102 | functionality, see pack('U0', ...) and pack('C0', ...). |
| 103 | |
| 104 | =back |
| 105 | |
| 106 | =head1 Core Enhancements |
| 107 | |
| 108 | =over 4 |
| 109 | |
| 110 | =item * |
| 111 | |
| 112 | C<perl -d:Module=arg,arg,arg> now works (previously one couldn't pass |
| 113 | in multiple arguments.) |
| 114 | |
| 115 | =item * |
| 116 | |
| 117 | my __PACKAGE__ $obj now works. |
| 118 | |
| 119 | =item * |
| 120 | |
| 121 | C<no Module;> now works even if there is no "sub unimport" in the Module. |
| 122 | |
| 123 | =item * |
| 124 | |
| 125 | The numerical comparison operators return C<undef> if either operand |
| 126 | is a NaN. Previously the behaviour was unspecified. |
| 127 | |
| 128 | =item * |
| 129 | |
| 130 | C<pack('U0a*', ...)> can now be used to force a string to UTF-8. |
| 131 | |
| 132 | =item * |
| 133 | |
| 134 | prototype(\&) is now available. |
| 135 | |
| 136 | =item * |
| 137 | |
| 138 | There is now an UNTIE method. |
| 139 | |
| 140 | =back |
| 141 | |
| 142 | =head1 Modules and Pragmata |
| 143 | |
| 144 | =head2 New Modules |
| 145 | |
| 146 | =over 4 |
| 147 | |
| 148 | =item * |
| 149 | |
| 150 | File::Temp allows one to create temporary files and directories in an |
| 151 | easy, portable, and secure way. |
| 152 | |
| 153 | =item * |
| 154 | |
| 155 | Storable gives persistence to Perl data structures by allowing the |
| 156 | storage and retrieval of Perl data to and from files in a fast and |
| 157 | compact binary format. |
| 158 | |
| 159 | =back |
| 160 | |
| 161 | =head2 Updated And Improved Modules and Pragmata |
| 162 | |
| 163 | =over 4 |
| 164 | |
| 165 | =item * |
| 166 | |
| 167 | The following independently supported modules have been updated to |
| 168 | newer versions from CPAN: CGI, CPAN, DB_File, File::Spec, Getopt::Long, |
| 169 | the podlators bundle, Pod::LaTeX, Pod::Parser, Term::ANSIColor, Test. |
| 170 | |
| 171 | =item * |
| 172 | |
| 173 | Bug fixes and minor enhancements have been applied to B::Deparse, |
| 174 | Data::Dumper, IO::Poll, IO::Socket::INET, Math::BigFloat, |
| 175 | Math::Complex, Math::Trig, Net::protoent, the re pragma, SelfLoader, |
| 176 | Sys::SysLog, Test::Harness, Text::Wrap, UNIVERSAL, and the warnings |
| 177 | pragma. |
| 178 | |
| 179 | =item * |
| 180 | |
| 181 | The attributes::reftype() now works on tied arguments. |
| 182 | |
| 183 | =item * |
| 184 | |
| 185 | AutoLoader can now be disabled with C<no AutoLoader;>, |
| 186 | |
| 187 | =item * |
| 188 | |
| 189 | The English module can now be used without the infamous performance |
| 190 | hit by saying |
| 191 | |
| 192 | use English '-no_performance_hit'; |
| 193 | |
| 194 | (Assuming, of course, that one doesn't need the troublesome variables |
| 195 | C<$`>, C<$&>, or C<$'>.) Also, introduced C<@LAST_MATCH_START> and |
| 196 | C<@LAST_MATCH_END> English aliases for C<@-> and C<@+>. |
| 197 | |
| 198 | =item * |
| 199 | |
| 200 | File::Find now has pre- and post-processing callbacks. It also |
| 201 | correctly changes directories when chasing symbolic links. Callbacks |
| 202 | (naughtily) exiting with "next;" instead of "return;" now work. |
| 203 | |
| 204 | =item * |
| 205 | |
| 206 | File::Glob::glob() renamed to File::Glob::bsd_glob() to avoid |
| 207 | prototype mismatch with CORE::glob(). |
| 208 | |
| 209 | =item * |
| 210 | |
| 211 | IPC::Open3 now allows the use of numeric file descriptors. |
| 212 | |
| 213 | =item * |
| 214 | |
| 215 | use lib now works identically to @INC. Removing directories |
| 216 | with 'no lib' now works. |
| 217 | |
| 218 | =item * |
| 219 | |
| 220 | C<%INC> now localised in a Safe compartment so that use/require work. |
| 221 | |
| 222 | =item * |
| 223 | |
| 224 | The Shell module now has an OO interface. |
| 225 | |
| 226 | =back |
| 227 | |
| 228 | =head1 Utility Changes |
| 229 | |
| 230 | =over 4 |
| 231 | |
| 232 | =item * |
| 233 | |
| 234 | The Emacs perl mode (emacs/cperl-mode.el) has been updated to version |
| 235 | 4.31. |
| 236 | |
| 237 | =item * |
| 238 | |
| 239 | Perlbug is now much more robust. It also sends the bug report to |
| 240 | perl.org, not perl.com. |
| 241 | |
| 242 | =item * |
| 243 | |
| 244 | The perlcc utility has been rewritten and its user interface (that is, |
| 245 | command line) is much more like that of the UNIX C compiler, cc. |
| 246 | |
| 247 | =item * |
| 248 | |
| 249 | The xsubpp utility for extension writers now understands POD |
| 250 | documentation embedded in the *.xs files. |
| 251 | |
| 252 | =back |
| 253 | |
| 254 | =head1 New Documentation |
| 255 | |
| 256 | =over 4 |
| 257 | |
| 258 | =item * |
| 259 | |
| 260 | perl56delta details the changes between the 5.005 release and the |
| 261 | 5.6.0 release. |
| 262 | |
| 263 | =item * |
| 264 | |
| 265 | perldebtut is a Perl debugging tutorial. |
| 266 | |
| 267 | =item * |
| 268 | |
| 269 | perlebcdic contains considerations for running Perl on EBCDIC platforms. |
| 270 | Note that unfortunately EBCDIC platforms that used to supported back in |
| 271 | Perl 5.005 are still unsupported by Perl 5.7.0; the plan, however, is to |
| 272 | bring them back to the fold. |
| 273 | |
| 274 | =item * |
| 275 | |
| 276 | perlnewmod tells about writing and submitting a new module. |
| 277 | |
| 278 | =item * |
| 279 | |
| 280 | perlposix-bc explains using Perl on the POSIX-BC platform |
| 281 | (an EBCDIC mainframe platform). |
| 282 | |
| 283 | =item * |
| 284 | |
| 285 | perlretut is a regular expression tutorial. |
| 286 | |
| 287 | =item * |
| 288 | |
| 289 | perlrequick is a regular expressions quick-start guide. |
| 290 | Yes, much quicker than perlretut. |
| 291 | |
| 292 | =item * |
| 293 | |
| 294 | perlutil explains the command line utilities packaged with the Perl |
| 295 | distribution. |
| 296 | |
| 297 | =back |
| 298 | |
| 299 | =head1 Performance Enhancements |
| 300 | |
| 301 | =over 4 |
| 302 | |
| 303 | =item * |
| 304 | |
| 305 | map() that changes the size of the list should now work faster. |
| 306 | |
| 307 | =item * |
| 308 | |
| 309 | sort() has been changed to use mergesort internally as opposed to the |
| 310 | earlier quicksort. For very small lists this may result in slightly |
| 311 | slower sorting times, but in general the speedup should be at least |
| 312 | 20%. Additional bonuses are that the worst case behaviour of sort() |
| 313 | is now better (in computer science terms it now runs in time O(N log N), |
| 314 | as opposed to quicksort's Theta(N**2) worst-case run time behaviour), |
| 315 | and that sort() is now stable (meaning that elements with identical |
| 316 | keys will stay ordered as they were before the sort). |
| 317 | |
| 318 | =back |
| 319 | |
| 320 | =head1 Installation and Configuration Improvements |
| 321 | |
| 322 | =head2 Generic Improvements |
| 323 | |
| 324 | =over 4 |
| 325 | |
| 326 | =item * |
| 327 | |
| 328 | INSTALL now explains how you can configure Perl to use 64-bit |
| 329 | integers even on non-64-bit platforms. |
| 330 | |
| 331 | =item * |
| 332 | |
| 333 | Policy.sh policy change: if you are reusing a Policy.sh file |
| 334 | (see INSTALL) and you use Configure -Dprefix=/foo/bar and in the old |
| 335 | Policy $prefix eq $siteprefix and $prefix eq $vendorprefix, all of |
| 336 | them will now be changed to the new prefix, /foo/bar. (Previously |
| 337 | only $prefix changed.) If you do not like this new behaviour, |
| 338 | specify prefix, siteprefix, and vendorprefix explicitly. |
| 339 | |
| 340 | =item * |
| 341 | |
| 342 | A new optional location for Perl libraries, otherlibdirs, is available. |
| 343 | It can be used for example for vendor add-ons without disturbing Perl's |
| 344 | own library directories. |
| 345 | |
| 346 | =item * |
| 347 | |
| 348 | In many platforms the vendor-supplied 'cc' is too stripped-down to |
| 349 | build Perl (basically, 'cc' doesn't do ANSI C). If this seems |
| 350 | to be the case and 'cc' does not seem to be the GNU C compiler |
| 351 | 'gcc', an automatic attempt is made to find and use 'gcc' instead. |
| 352 | |
| 353 | =item * |
| 354 | |
| 355 | gcc needs to closely track the operating system release to avoid |
| 356 | build problems. If Configure finds that gcc was built for a different |
| 357 | operating system release than is running, it now gives a clearly visible |
| 358 | warning that there may be trouble ahead. |
| 359 | |
| 360 | =item * |
| 361 | |
| 362 | If binary compatibility with the 5.005 release is not wanted, Configure |
| 363 | no longer suggests including the 5.005 modules in @INC. |
| 364 | |
| 365 | =item * |
| 366 | |
| 367 | Configure C<-S> can now run non-interactively. |
| 368 | |
| 369 | =item * |
| 370 | |
| 371 | configure.gnu now works with options with whitespace in them. |
| 372 | |
| 373 | =item * |
| 374 | |
| 375 | installperl now outputs everything to STDERR. |
| 376 | |
| 377 | =item * |
| 378 | |
| 379 | $Config{byteorder} is now computed dynamically (this is more robust |
| 380 | with "fat binaries" where an executable image contains binaries for |
| 381 | more than one binary platform.) |
| 382 | |
| 383 | =back |
| 384 | |
| 385 | =head1 Selected Bug Fixes |
| 386 | |
| 387 | =over 4 |
| 388 | |
| 389 | =item * |
| 390 | |
| 391 | Several debugger fixes: exit code now reflects the script exit code, |
| 392 | condition C<"0"> now treated correctly, the C<d> command now checks |
| 393 | line number, the C<$.> no longer gets corrupted, all debugger output now |
| 394 | goes correctly to the socket if RemotePort is set. |
| 395 | |
| 396 | =item * |
| 397 | |
| 398 | C<*foo{FORMAT}> now works. |
| 399 | |
| 400 | =item * |
| 401 | |
| 402 | Lexical warnings now propagating correctly between scopes. |
| 403 | |
| 404 | =item * |
| 405 | |
| 406 | Line renumbering with eval and C<#line> now works. |
| 407 | |
| 408 | =item * |
| 409 | |
| 410 | Fixed numerous memory leaks, especially in eval "". |
| 411 | |
| 412 | =item * |
| 413 | |
| 414 | Modulus of unsigned numbers now works (4063328477 % 65535 used to |
| 415 | return 27406, instead of 27047). |
| 416 | |
| 417 | =item * |
| 418 | |
| 419 | Some "not a number" warnings introduced in 5.6.0 eliminated to be |
| 420 | more compatible with 5.005. Infinity is now recognised as a number. |
| 421 | |
| 422 | =item * |
| 423 | |
| 424 | our() variables will not cause "will not stay shared" warnings. |
| 425 | |
| 426 | =item * |
| 427 | |
| 428 | pack "Z" now correctly terminates the string with "\0". |
| 429 | |
| 430 | =item * |
| 431 | |
| 432 | Fix password routines which in some shadow password platforms |
| 433 | (e.g. HP-UX) caused getpwent() to return every other entry. |
| 434 | |
| 435 | =item * |
| 436 | |
| 437 | printf() no longer resets the numeric locale to "C". |
| 438 | |
| 439 | =item * |
| 440 | |
| 441 | C<q(a\\b)> now parses correctly as C<'a\\b'>. |
| 442 | |
| 443 | =item * |
| 444 | |
| 445 | Printing quads (64-bit integers) with printf/sprintf now works |
| 446 | without the q L ll prefixes (assuming you are on a quad-capable platform). |
| 447 | |
| 448 | =item * |
| 449 | |
| 450 | Regular expressions on references and overloaded scalars now work. |
| 451 | |
| 452 | =item * |
| 453 | |
| 454 | scalar() now forces scalar context even when used in void context. |
| 455 | |
| 456 | =item * |
| 457 | |
| 458 | sort() arguments are now compiled in the right wantarray context |
| 459 | (they were accidentally using the context of the sort() itself). |
| 460 | |
| 461 | =item * |
| 462 | |
| 463 | Changed the POSIX character class C<[[:space:]]> to include the (very |
| 464 | rare) vertical tab character. Added a new POSIX-ish character class |
| 465 | C<[[:blank:]]> which stands for horizontal whitespace (currently, |
| 466 | the space and the tab). |
| 467 | |
| 468 | =item * |
| 469 | |
| 470 | $AUTOLOAD, sort(), lock(), and spawning subprocesses |
| 471 | in multiple threads simultaneously are now thread-safe. |
| 472 | |
| 473 | =item * |
| 474 | |
| 475 | Allow read-only string on left hand side of non-modifying tr///. |
| 476 | |
| 477 | =item * |
| 478 | |
| 479 | Several Unicode fixes (but still not perfect). |
| 480 | |
| 481 | =over 8 |
| 482 | |
| 483 | =item * |
| 484 | |
| 485 | BOMs (byte order marks) in the beginning of Perl files |
| 486 | (scripts, modules) should now be transparently skipped. |
| 487 | UTF-16 (UCS-2) encoded Perl files should now be read correctly. |
| 488 | |
| 489 | =item * |
| 490 | |
| 491 | The character tables have been updated to Unicode 3.0.1. |
| 492 | |
| 493 | =item * |
| 494 | |
| 495 | chr() for values greater than 127 now create utf8 when under use |
| 496 | utf8. |
| 497 | |
| 498 | =item * |
| 499 | |
| 500 | Comparing with utf8 data does not magically upgrade non-utf8 data into |
| 501 | utf8. |
| 502 | |
| 503 | =item * |
| 504 | |
| 505 | C<IsAlnum>, C<IsAlpha>, and C<IsWord> now match titlecase. |
| 506 | |
| 507 | =item * |
| 508 | |
| 509 | Concatenation with the C<.> operator or via variable interpolation, |
| 510 | C<eq>, C<substr>, C<reverse>, C<quotemeta>, the C<x> operator, |
| 511 | substitution with C<s///>, single-quoted UTF-8, should now work--in |
| 512 | theory. |
| 513 | |
| 514 | =item * |
| 515 | |
| 516 | The C<tr///> operator now works I<slightly> better but is still rather |
| 517 | broken. Note that the C<tr///CU> functionality has been removed (but |
| 518 | see pack('U0', ...)). |
| 519 | |
| 520 | =item * |
| 521 | |
| 522 | vec() now refuses to deal with characters >255. |
| 523 | |
| 524 | =item * |
| 525 | |
| 526 | Zero entries were missing from the Unicode classes like C<IsDigit>. |
| 527 | |
| 528 | =back |
| 529 | |
| 530 | =item * |
| 531 | |
| 532 | UNIVERSAL::isa no longer caches methods incorrectly. (This broke |
| 533 | the Tk extension with 5.6.0.) |
| 534 | |
| 535 | =back |
| 536 | |
| 537 | =head2 Platform Specific Changes and Fixes |
| 538 | |
| 539 | =over 4 |
| 540 | |
| 541 | =item * |
| 542 | |
| 543 | BSDI 4.* |
| 544 | |
| 545 | Perl now works on post-4.0 BSD/OSes. |
| 546 | |
| 547 | =item * |
| 548 | |
| 549 | All BSDs |
| 550 | |
| 551 | Setting C<$0> now works (as much as possible; see perlvar for details). |
| 552 | |
| 553 | =item * |
| 554 | |
| 555 | Cygwin |
| 556 | |
| 557 | Numerous updates; currently synchronised with Cygwin 1.1.4. |
| 558 | |
| 559 | =item * |
| 560 | |
| 561 | EPOC |
| 562 | |
| 563 | EPOC update after Perl 5.6.0. See README.epoc. |
| 564 | |
| 565 | =item * |
| 566 | |
| 567 | FreeBSD 3.* |
| 568 | |
| 569 | Perl now works on post-3.0 FreeBSDs. |
| 570 | |
| 571 | =item * |
| 572 | |
| 573 | HP-UX |
| 574 | |
| 575 | README.hpux updated; C<Configure -Duse64bitall> now almost works. |
| 576 | |
| 577 | =item * |
| 578 | |
| 579 | IRIX |
| 580 | |
| 581 | Numerous compilation flag and hint enhancements; accidental mixing |
| 582 | of 32-bit and 64-bit libraries (a doomed attempt) made much harder. |
| 583 | |
| 584 | =item * |
| 585 | |
| 586 | Linux |
| 587 | |
| 588 | Long doubles should now work (see INSTALL). |
| 589 | |
| 590 | =item * |
| 591 | |
| 592 | Mac OS Classic |
| 593 | |
| 594 | Compilation of the standard Perl distribution in Mac OS Classic should |
| 595 | now work if you have the Metrowerks development environment and the |
| 596 | missing Mac-specific toolkit bits. Contact the macperl mailing list |
| 597 | for details. |
| 598 | |
| 599 | =item * |
| 600 | |
| 601 | MPE/iX |
| 602 | |
| 603 | MPE/iX update after Perl 5.6.0. See README.mpeix. |
| 604 | |
| 605 | =item * |
| 606 | |
| 607 | NetBSD/sparc |
| 608 | |
| 609 | Perl now works on NetBSD/sparc. |
| 610 | |
| 611 | =item * |
| 612 | |
| 613 | OS/2 |
| 614 | |
| 615 | Now works with usethreads (see INSTALL). |
| 616 | |
| 617 | =item * |
| 618 | |
| 619 | Solaris |
| 620 | |
| 621 | 64-bitness using the Sun Workshop compiler now works. |
| 622 | |
| 623 | =item * |
| 624 | |
| 625 | Tru64 (aka Digital UNIX, aka DEC OSF/1) |
| 626 | |
| 627 | The operating system version letter now recorded in $Config{osvers}. |
| 628 | Allow compiling with gcc (previously explicitly forbidden). Compiling |
| 629 | with gcc still not recommended because buggy code results, even with |
| 630 | gcc 2.95.2. |
| 631 | |
| 632 | =item * |
| 633 | |
| 634 | Unicos |
| 635 | |
| 636 | Fixed various alignment problems that lead into core dumps either |
| 637 | during build or later; no longer dies on math errors at runtime; |
| 638 | now using full quad integers (64 bits), previously was using |
| 639 | only 46 bit integers for speed. |
| 640 | |
| 641 | =item * |
| 642 | |
| 643 | VMS |
| 644 | |
| 645 | chdir() now works better despite a CRT bug; now works with MULTIPLICITY |
| 646 | (see INSTALL); now works with Perl's malloc. |
| 647 | |
| 648 | =item * |
| 649 | |
| 650 | Windows |
| 651 | |
| 652 | =over 8 |
| 653 | |
| 654 | =item * |
| 655 | |
| 656 | accept() no longer leaks memory. |
| 657 | |
| 658 | =item * |
| 659 | |
| 660 | Better chdir() return value for a non-existent directory. |
| 661 | |
| 662 | =item * |
| 663 | |
| 664 | New %ENV entries now propagate to subprocesses. |
| 665 | |
| 666 | =item * |
| 667 | |
| 668 | $ENV{LIB} now used to search for libs under Visual C. |
| 669 | |
| 670 | =item * |
| 671 | |
| 672 | A failed (pseudo)fork now returns undef and sets errno to EAGAIN. |
| 673 | |
| 674 | =item * |
| 675 | |
| 676 | Allow REG_EXPAND_SZ keys in the registry. |
| 677 | |
| 678 | =item * |
| 679 | |
| 680 | Can now send() from all threads, not just the first one. |
| 681 | |
| 682 | =item * |
| 683 | |
| 684 | Fake signal handling reenabled, bugs and all. |
| 685 | |
| 686 | =item * |
| 687 | |
| 688 | Less stack reserved per thread so that more threads can run |
| 689 | concurrently. (Still 16M per thread.) |
| 690 | |
| 691 | =item * |
| 692 | |
| 693 | C<< File::Spec->tmpdir() >> now prefers C:/temp over /tmp |
| 694 | (works better when perl is running as service). |
| 695 | |
| 696 | =item * |
| 697 | |
| 698 | Better UNC path handling under ithreads. |
| 699 | |
| 700 | =item * |
| 701 | |
| 702 | wait() and waitpid() now work much better. |
| 703 | |
| 704 | =item * |
| 705 | |
| 706 | winsock handle leak fixed. |
| 707 | |
| 708 | =back |
| 709 | |
| 710 | =back |
| 711 | |
| 712 | =head1 New or Changed Diagnostics |
| 713 | |
| 714 | All regular expression compilation error messages are now hopefully |
| 715 | easier to understand both because the error message now comes before |
| 716 | the failed regex and because the point of failure is now clearly |
| 717 | marked. |
| 718 | |
| 719 | The various "opened only for", "on closed", "never opened" warnings |
| 720 | drop the C<main::> prefix for filehandles in the C<main> package, |
| 721 | for example C<STDIN> instead of <main::STDIN>. |
| 722 | |
| 723 | The "Unrecognized escape" warning has been extended to include C<\8>, |
| 724 | C<\9>, and C<\_>. There is no need to escape any of the C<\w> characters. |
| 725 | |
| 726 | =head1 Changed Internals |
| 727 | |
| 728 | =over 4 |
| 729 | |
| 730 | =item * |
| 731 | |
| 732 | perlapi.pod (a companion to perlguts) now attempts to document the |
| 733 | internal API. |
| 734 | |
| 735 | =item * |
| 736 | |
| 737 | You can now build a really minimal perl called microperl. |
| 738 | Building microperl does not require even running Configure; |
| 739 | C<make -f Makefile.micro> should be enough. Beware: microperl makes |
| 740 | many assumptions, some of which may be too bold; the resulting |
| 741 | executable may crash or otherwise misbehave in wondrous ways. |
| 742 | For careful hackers only. |
| 743 | |
| 744 | =item * |
| 745 | |
| 746 | Added rsignal(), whichsig(), do_join() to the publicised API. |
| 747 | |
| 748 | =item * |
| 749 | |
| 750 | Made possible to propagate customised exceptions via croak()ing. |
| 751 | |
| 752 | =item * |
| 753 | |
| 754 | Added is_utf8_char(), is_utf8_string(), bytes_to_utf8(), and utf8_to_bytes(). |
| 755 | |
| 756 | =item * |
| 757 | |
| 758 | Now xsubs can have attributes just like subs. |
| 759 | |
| 760 | =back |
| 761 | |
| 762 | =head1 Known Problems |
| 763 | |
| 764 | =head2 Unicode Support Still Far From Perfect |
| 765 | |
| 766 | We're working on it. Stay tuned. |
| 767 | |
| 768 | =head2 EBCDIC Still A Lost Platform |
| 769 | |
| 770 | The plan is to bring them back. |
| 771 | |
| 772 | =head2 Building Extensions Can Fail Because Of Largefiles |
| 773 | |
| 774 | Certain extensions like mod_perl and BSD::Resource are known to have |
| 775 | issues with `largefiles', a change brought by Perl 5.6.0 in which file |
| 776 | offsets default to 64 bits wide, where supported. Modules may fail to |
| 777 | compile at all or compile and work incorrectly. Currently there is no |
| 778 | good solution for the problem, but Configure now provides appropriate |
| 779 | non-largefile ccflags, ldflags, libswanted, and libs in the %Config |
| 780 | hash (e.g., $Config{ccflags_nolargefiles}) so the extensions that are |
| 781 | having problems can try configuring themselves without the |
| 782 | largefileness. This is admittedly not a clean solution, and the |
| 783 | solution may not even work at all. One potential failure is whether |
| 784 | one can (or, if one can, whether it's a good idea) link together at |
| 785 | all binaries with different ideas about file offsets, all this is |
| 786 | platform-dependent. |
| 787 | |
| 788 | =head2 ftmp-security tests warn 'system possibly insecure' |
| 789 | |
| 790 | Don't panic. Read INSTALL 'make test' section instead. |
| 791 | |
| 792 | =head2 Test lib/posix Subtest 9 Fails In LP64-Configured HP-UX |
| 793 | |
| 794 | If perl is configured with -Duse64bitall, the successful result of the |
| 795 | subtest 10 of lib/posix may arrive before the successful result of the |
| 796 | subtest 9, which confuses the test harness so much that it thinks the |
| 797 | subtest 9 failed. |
| 798 | |
| 799 | =head2 Long Doubles Still Don't Work In Solaris |
| 800 | |
| 801 | The experimental long double support is still very much so in Solaris. |
| 802 | (Other platforms like Linux and Tru64 are beginning to solidify in |
| 803 | this area.) |
| 804 | |
| 805 | =head2 Linux With Sfio Fails op/misc Test 48 |
| 806 | |
| 807 | No known fix. |
| 808 | |
| 809 | =head2 Storable tests fail in some platforms |
| 810 | |
| 811 | If any Storable tests fail the use of Storable is not advisable. |
| 812 | |
| 813 | =over 4 |
| 814 | |
| 815 | =item * |
| 816 | |
| 817 | Many Storable tests fail on AIX configured with 64 bit integers. |
| 818 | |
| 819 | So far unidentified problems break Storable in AIX if Perl is |
| 820 | configured to use 64 bit integers. AIX in 32-bit mode works and |
| 821 | other 64-bit platforms work with Storable. |
| 822 | |
| 823 | =item * |
| 824 | |
| 825 | DOS DJGPP may hang when testing Storable. |
| 826 | |
| 827 | =item * |
| 828 | |
| 829 | st-06compat fails in UNICOS and UNICOS/mk. |
| 830 | |
| 831 | This means that you cannot read old (pre-Storable-0.7) Storable images |
| 832 | made in other platforms. |
| 833 | |
| 834 | =item * |
| 835 | |
| 836 | st-store.t and st-retrieve may fail with Compaq C 6.2 on OpenVMS Alpha 7.2. |
| 837 | |
| 838 | =back |
| 839 | |
| 840 | =head2 Threads Are Still Experimental |
| 841 | |
| 842 | Multithreading is still an experimental feature. Some platforms |
| 843 | emit the following message for lib/thr5005 |
| 844 | |
| 845 | # |
| 846 | # This is a KNOWN FAILURE, and one of the reasons why threading |
| 847 | # is still an experimental feature. It is here to stop people |
| 848 | # from deploying threads in production. ;-) |
| 849 | # |
| 850 | |
| 851 | and another known thread-related warning is |
| 852 | |
| 853 | pragma/overload......Unbalanced saves: 3 more saves than restores |
| 854 | panic: magic_mutexfree during global destruction. |
| 855 | ok |
| 856 | lib/selfloader.......Unbalanced saves: 3 more saves than restores |
| 857 | panic: magic_mutexfree during global destruction. |
| 858 | ok |
| 859 | lib/st-dclone........Unbalanced saves: 3 more saves than restores |
| 860 | panic: magic_mutexfree during global destruction. |
| 861 | ok |
| 862 | |
| 863 | =head2 The Compiler Suite Is Still Experimental |
| 864 | |
| 865 | The compiler suite is slowly getting better but is nowhere near |
| 866 | working order yet. The backend part that has seen perhaps the most |
| 867 | progress is the bytecode compiler. |
| 868 | |
| 869 | =head1 Reporting Bugs |
| 870 | |
| 871 | If you find what you think is a bug, you might check the articles |
| 872 | recently posted to the comp.lang.perl.misc newsgroup and the perl |
| 873 | bug database at http://bugs.perl.org/ There may also be |
| 874 | information at http://www.perl.com/perl/ , the Perl Home Page. |
| 875 | |
| 876 | If you believe you have an unreported bug, please run the B<perlbug> |
| 877 | program included with your release. Be sure to trim your bug down |
| 878 | to a tiny but sufficient test case. Your bug report, along with the |
| 879 | output of C<perl -V>, will be sent off to perlbug@perl.org to be |
| 880 | analysed by the Perl porting team. |
| 881 | |
| 882 | =head1 SEE ALSO |
| 883 | |
| 884 | The F<Changes> file for exhaustive details on what changed. |
| 885 | |
| 886 | The F<INSTALL> file for how to build Perl. |
| 887 | |
| 888 | The F<README> file for general stuff. |
| 889 | |
| 890 | The F<Artistic> and F<Copying> files for copyright information. |
| 891 | |
| 892 | =head1 HISTORY |
| 893 | |
| 894 | Written by Jarkko Hietaniemi <F<jhi@iki.fi>>, with many contributions |
| 895 | from The Perl Porters and Perl Users submitting feedback and patches. |
| 896 | |
| 897 | Send omissions or corrections to <F<perlbug@perl.org>>. |
| 898 | |
| 899 | =cut |