SPUG: perldoc failures on OS X

Bill Campbell bill at celestial.com
Sun Dec 7 18:15:43 PST 2008


On Sun, Dec 07, 2008, Michael R. Wolf wrote:
>
> On Dec 7, 2008, at 4:58 PM, Bill Campbell wrote:
>
>> On Sun, Dec 07, 2008, Michael R. Wolf wrote:
>>>
> [...]
>>>
>>> Since my old #1 problem (no portable computing) is solved, a new #1
>>> problem has emerged: perldoc(1) is installed, but doesn't work.
>>
>> I suggest installing the xcode package from the original
>> installation DVS, then pick up the on-line update.  I think the
>> one must sign up to Apple's free developer program to get to the
>> on-line updates.
>>
>
> The MacBook that I just purchased does *not* have a DVD with Xcode on  
> it, contrary to years of queried, historical postings to the contrary.  
> This was confirmed with an 800-apple-techie conversation last week.  All 
> Xcode must now be downloaded from the net.  It's chugging away as I 
> type...

Since I tend to keep updating old machines (e.g. the Titanium
Powerbook) all my experience is with purchased OS packages, not
with new machines running Leopard :-).

>> The update includes fixes to gcc that caused gnu-tar to fail
>> building, but I don't remember the exact details.
>
>  gcc(1) isn't *broken*, it's *missing*!!!.  (That's just one of many  
> other tools that cpan(1) looks for -- make(1), lynx(1), wget(1),  
> ncftp(1), gpg(1)).  I expect that Xcode will solve that, too.

Some of them certainly, but you may also want to look at macports
or fink.  As I understand it, macports works like FreeBSD ports,
building packages from source while fink primarily provides
binary packages.

When I started building the OpenPKG system on my PPC leopard box,
and found Apple's gcc broken, I first built gcc from macports,
then bootstrapped OpenPKG with that.  Shortly after that I found
the Xcode update, and restarted using that.

Bill
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