[Pdx-pm] CPAN

[Erik Hollensbe]

On 1/6/2010 9:48 PM, Michael G Schwern wrote:
> paul rogers wrote:
>> My system is one I built under guidance of LFS. It's essentially a 
>> user workstation. I'm not developing anything, i.e. don't need SVN, 
>> just keeping this "useful". It has perl-5.8.7, and whatever 
>> "standard" modules it comes with. I got a digital camera for Xmas, so 
>> I'm adding support. GIMP seems necessary, and I can't build that 
>> without XML::Parse. Once upon a time, maybe 5 years ago, I had a CPAN 
>> "bundle" which I apparently lost on a flakey drive. I took a look at 
>> CPAN today, and it's grown out of hand! ;-) I really don't want to 
>> hunt and peck downloading modules one at a time, I don't need it all, 
>> and I've got a slow dialup, 40Kbps. I see a few "bundles" at OSL, but 
>> none seem to be what I need--a collection of ubiquitous source 
>> modules that cover most of the common general needs and the 
>> prerequisites. Is there such a thing? Can somebody point me to a 
>> tarball?
>
> Many have tried, all have failed.  The greatest hurdle is defining 
> what is "common" for a general purpose programming language.
>
> The closest anyone has come is this attempt to list recommended 
> modules for various uses.
> http://www.perlfoundation.org/perl5/index.cgi?recommended_cpan_modules
>
>
>> I suppose there's a module for dynamically downloading modules. Seems 
>> to me I might find that useful or "bits & bobs! " but I'd like to NOT 
>> have to use that from this position. Any recommendations? TIA
>
> You have two practical choices:
>
> * Install CPAN modules using the package manager that comes with your 
> operating system.  This is the least work for the casual user.
>
> * Install them with the CPAN shell.  Here is a good tutorial.
> http://learnperl.scratchcomputing.com/tutorials/configuration/
>
> What you do not want to do is try to install them "by hand".  This is 
> because the dependency chains for even for the most trivial CPAN 
> module tend to be long.  Let either the CPAN shell or your package 
> manager deal with this.
>
>

If you wish to script this process, I've had good success automating dev 
environment setup with Module::Install (and 
Module::Install::AutoInstall). You still have to do first-time 
configuration of CPAN, though.

-Erik