| =head1 NAME |
| |
| perl589delta - what is new for perl v5.8.9 |
| |
| =head1 DESCRIPTION |
| |
| This document describes differences between the 5.8.8 release and |
| the 5.8.9 release. |
| |
| =head1 Notice |
| |
| The 5.8.9 release will be the last significant release of the 5.8.x |
| series. Any future releases of 5.8.x will likely only be to deal with |
| security issues, and platform build failures. Hence you should look to |
| migrating to 5.10.x, if you have not started already. |
| See L</"Known Problems"> for more information. |
| |
| =head1 Incompatible Changes |
| |
| A particular construction in the source code of extensions written in C++ |
| may need changing. See L</"Changed Internals"> for more details. All |
| extensions written in C, most written in C++, and all existing compiled |
| extensions are unaffected. This was necessary to improve C++ support. |
| |
| Other than this, there are no changes intentionally incompatible with 5.8.8. |
| If any exist, they are bugs and reports are welcome. |
| |
| =head1 Core Enhancements |
| |
| =head2 Unicode Character Database 5.1.0. |
| |
| The copy of the Unicode Character Database included in Perl 5.8 has |
| been updated to 5.1.0 from 4.1.0. See |
| L<http://www.unicode.org/versions/Unicode5.1.0/#NotableChanges> for the |
| notable changes. |
| |
| =head2 stat and -X on directory handles |
| |
| It is now possible to call C<stat> and the C<-X> filestat operators on |
| directory handles. As both directory and file handles are barewords, there |
| can be ambiguities over which was intended. In these situations the file |
| handle semantics are preferred. Both also treat C<*FILE{IO}> filehandles |
| like C<*FILE> filehandles. |
| |
| =head2 Source filters in @INC |
| |
| It's possible to enhance the mechanism of subroutine hooks in @INC by |
| adding a source filter on top of the filehandle opened and returned by the |
| hook. This feature was planned a long time ago, but wasn't quite working |
| until now. See L<perlfunc/require> for details. (Nicholas Clark) |
| |
| =head2 Exceptions in constant folding |
| |
| The constant folding routine is now wrapped in an exception handler, and |
| if folding throws an exception (such as attempting to evaluate 0/0), perl |
| now retains the current optree, rather than aborting the whole program. |
| Without this change, programs would not compile if they had expressions that |
| happened to generate exceptions, even though those expressions were in code |
| that could never be reached at runtime. (Nicholas Clark, Dave Mitchell) |
| |
| =head2 C<no VERSION> |
| |
| You can now use C<no> followed by a version number to specify that you |
| want to use a version of perl older than the specified one. |
| |
| =head2 Improved internal UTF-8 caching code |
| |
| The code that caches calculated UTF-8 byte offsets for character offsets for |
| a string has been re-written. Several bugs have been located and eliminated, |
| and the code now makes better use of the information it has, so should be |
| faster. In particular, it doesn't scan to the end of a string before |
| calculating an offset within the string, which should speed up some operations |
| on long strings. It is now possible to disable the caching code at run time, |
| to verify that it is not the cause of suspected problems. |
| |
| =head2 Runtime relocatable installations |
| |
| There is now F<Configure> support for creating a perl tree that is relocatable |
| at run time. see L</Relocatable installations>. |
| |
| =head2 New internal variables |
| |
| =over 4 |
| |
| =item C<${^CHILD_ERROR_NATIVE}> |
| |
| This variable gives the native status returned by the last pipe close, |
| backtick command, successful call to C<wait> or C<waitpid>, or from the |
| C<system> operator. See L<perlvar> for details. (Contributed by Gisle Aas.) |
| |
| =item C<${^UTF8CACHE}> |
| |
| This variable controls the state of the internal UTF-8 offset caching code. |
| 1 for on (the default), 0 for off, -1 to debug the caching code by checking |
| all its results against linear scans, and panicking on any discrepancy. |
| |
| =back |
| |
| =head2 C<readpipe> is now overridable |
| |
| The built-in function C<readpipe> is now overridable. Overriding it permits |
| also to override its operator counterpart, C<qx//> (also known as C<``>). |
| |
| =head2 simple exception handling macros |
| |
| Perl 5.8.9 (and 5.10.0 onwards) now provides a couple of macros to do very |
| basic exception handling in XS modules. You can use these macros if you call |
| code that may C<croak>, but you need to do some cleanup before giving control |
| back to Perl. See L<perlguts/Exception Handling> for more details. |
| |
| =head2 -D option enhancements |
| |
| =over |
| |
| =item * |
| |
| C<-Dq> suppresses the I<EXECUTING...> message when running under C<-D> |
| |
| =item * |
| |
| C<-Dl> logs runops loop entry and exit, and jump level popping. |
| |
| =item * |
| |
| C<-Dv> displays the process id as part of the trace output. |
| |
| =back |
| |
| =head2 XS-assisted SWASHGET |
| |
| Some pure-perl code that the regexp engine was using to retrieve Unicode |
| properties and transliteration mappings has been reimplemented in XS |
| for faster execution. |
| (SADAHIRO Tomoyuki) |
| |
| =head2 Constant subroutines |
| |
| The interpreter internals now support a far more memory efficient form of |
| inlineable constants. Storing a reference to a constant value in a symbol |
| table is equivalent to a full typeglob referencing a constant subroutine, |
| but using about 400 bytes less memory. This proxy constant subroutine is |
| automatically upgraded to a real typeglob with subroutine if necessary. |
| The approach taken is analogous to the existing space optimisation for |
| subroutine stub declarations, which are stored as plain scalars in place |
| of the full typeglob. |
| |
| However, to aid backwards compatibility of existing code, which (wrongly) |
| does not expect anything other than typeglobs in symbol tables, nothing in |
| core uses this feature, other than the regression tests. |
| |
| Stubs for prototyped subroutines have been stored in symbol tables as plain |
| strings, and stubs for unprototyped subroutines as the number -1, since 5.005, |
| so code which assumes that the core only places typeglobs in symbol tables |
| has been making incorrect assumptions for over 10 years. |
| |
| =head1 New Platforms |
| |
| Compile support added for: |
| |
| =over |
| |
| =item * |
| |
| DragonFlyBSD |
| |
| =item * |
| |
| MidnightBSD |
| |
| =item * |
| |
| MirOS BSD |
| |
| =item * |
| |
| RISC OS |
| |
| =item * |
| |
| Cray XT4/Catamount |
| |
| =back |
| |
| =head1 Modules and Pragmata |
| |
| =head2 New Modules |
| |
| =over |
| |
| =item * |
| |
| C<Module::Pluggable> is a simple framework to create modules that accept |
| pluggable sub-modules. The bundled version is 3.8 |
| |
| =item * |
| |
| C<Module::CoreList> is a hash of hashes that is keyed on perl version as |
| indicated in C<$]>. The bundled version is 2.17 |
| |
| =item * |
| |
| C<Win32API::File> now available in core on Microsoft Windows. The bundled |
| version is 0.1001_01 |
| |
| =item * |
| |
| C<Devel::InnerPackage> finds all the packages defined by a single file. It is |
| part of the C<Module::Pluggable> distribution. The bundled version is 0.3 |
| |
| =back |
| |
| =head2 Updated Modules |
| |
| =over |
| |
| =item * |
| |
| C<attributes> upgraded to version 0.09 |
| |
| =item * |
| |
| C<AutoLoader> upgraded to version 5.67 |
| |
| =item * |
| |
| C<AutoSplit> upgraded to 1.06 |
| |
| =item * |
| |
| C<autouse> upgraded to version 1.06 |
| |
| =item * |
| |
| C<B> upgraded from 1.09_01 to 1.19 |
| |
| =over |
| |
| =item * |
| |
| provides new pad related abstraction macros C<B::NV::COP_SEQ_RANGE_LOW>, |
| C<B::NV::COP_SEQ_RANGE_HIGH>, C<B::NV::PARENT_PAD_INDEX>, |
| C<B::NV::PARENT_FAKELEX_FLAGS>, which hides the difference in storage in |
| 5.10.0 and later. |
| |
| =item * |
| |
| provides C<B::sub_generation>, which exposes C<PL_sub_generation> |
| |
| =item * |
| |
| provides C<B::GV::isGV_with_GP>, which on pre-5.10 perls always returns true. |
| |
| =item * |
| |
| New type C<B::HE> added with methods C<VAL>, C<HASH> and C<SVKEY_force> |
| |
| =item * |
| |
| The C<B::GVf_IMPORTED_CV> flag is now set correctly when a proxy |
| constant subroutine is imported. |
| |
| =item * |
| |
| bugs fixed in the handling of C<PMOP>s. |
| |
| =item * |
| |
| C<B::BM::PREVIOUS> returns now C<U32>, not C<U16>. |
| C<B::CV::START> and C<B:CV::ROOT> return now C<NULL> on an XSUB, |
| C<B::CV::XSUB> and C<B::CV::XSUBANY> return 0 on a non-XSUB. |
| |
| =back |
| |
| =item * |
| |
| C<B::C> upgraded to 1.05 |
| |
| =item * |
| |
| C<B::Concise> upgraded to 0.76 |
| |
| =over |
| |
| =item * |
| |
| new option C<-src> causes the rendering of each statement (starting with |
| the nextstate OP) to be preceded by the first line of source code that |
| generates it. |
| |
| =item * |
| |
| new option C<-stash="somepackage">, C<require>s "somepackage", and then renders |
| each function defined in its namespace. |
| |
| =item * |
| |
| now has documentation of detailed hint symbols. |
| |
| =back |
| |
| =item * |
| |
| C<B::Debug> upgraded to version 1.05 |
| |
| =item * |
| |
| C<B::Deparse> upgraded to version 0.87 |
| |
| =over 4 |
| |
| =item * |
| |
| properly deparse C<print readpipe $x, $y>. |
| |
| =item * |
| |
| now handles C<''->()>, C<::()>, C<sub :: {}>, I<etc.> correctly [RT #43010]. |
| All bugs in parsing these kinds of syntax are now fixed: |
| |
| perl -MO=Deparse -e '"my %h = "->()' |
| perl -MO=Deparse -e '::->()' |
| perl -MO=Deparse -e 'sub :: {}' |
| perl -MO=Deparse -e 'package a; sub a::b::c {}' |
| perl -MO=Deparse -e 'sub the::main::road {}' |
| |
| =item * |
| |
| does B<not> deparse C<$^H{v_string}>, which is automatically set by the |
| internals. |
| |
| =back |
| |
| =item * |
| |
| C<B::Lint> upgraded to version 1.11 |
| |
| =item * |
| |
| C<B::Terse> upgraded to version 1.05 |
| |
| =item * |
| |
| C<base> upgraded to version 2.13 |
| |
| =over 4 |
| |
| =item * |
| |
| loading a module via base.pm would mask a global C<$SIG{__DIE__}> in that |
| module. |
| |
| =item * |
| |
| push all classes at once in C<@ISA> |
| |
| =back |
| |
| =item * |
| |
| C<Benchmark> upgraded to version 1.10 |
| |
| =item * |
| |
| C<bigint> upgraded to 0.23 |
| |
| =item * |
| |
| C<bignum> upgraded to 0.23 |
| |
| =item * |
| |
| C<bigrat> upgraded to 0.23 |
| |
| =item * |
| |
| C<blib> upgraded to 0.04 |
| |
| =item * |
| |
| C<Carp> upgraded to version 1.10 |
| |
| The argument backtrace code now shows C<undef> as C<undef>, |
| instead of a string I<"undef">. |
| |
| =item * |
| |
| C<CGI> upgraded to version 3.42 |
| |
| =item * |
| |
| C<charnames> upgraded to 1.06 |
| |
| =item * |
| |
| C<constant> upgraded to version 1.17 |
| |
| =item * |
| |
| C<CPAN> upgraded to version 1.9301 |
| |
| =item * |
| |
| C<Cwd> upgraded to version 3.29 with some platform specific |
| improvements (including for VMS). |
| |
| =item * |
| |
| C<Data::Dumper> upgraded to version 2.121_17 |
| |
| =over |
| |
| =item * |
| |
| Fixes hash iterator current position with the pure Perl version [RT #40668] |
| |
| =item * |
| |
| Performance enhancements, which will be most evident on platforms where |
| repeated calls to C's C<realloc()> are slow, such as Win32. |
| |
| =back |
| |
| =item * |
| |
| C<DB_File> upgraded to version 1.817 |
| |
| =item * |
| |
| C<DB_Filter> upgraded to version 0.02 |
| |
| =item * |
| |
| C<Devel::DProf> upgraded to version 20080331.00 |
| |
| =item * |
| |
| C<Devel::Peek> upgraded to version 1.04 |
| |
| =item * |
| |
| C<Devel::PPPort> upgraded to version 3.14 |
| |
| =item * |
| |
| C<diagnostics> upgraded to version 1.16 |
| |
| =item * |
| |
| C<Digest> upgraded to version 1.15 |
| |
| =item * |
| |
| C<Digest::MD5> upgraded to version 2.37 |
| |
| =item * |
| |
| C<DirHandle> upgraded to version 1.02 |
| |
| =over |
| |
| =item * |
| |
| now localises C<$.>, C<$@>, C<$!>, C<$^E>, and C<$?> before closing the |
| directory handle to suppress leaking any side effects of warnings about it |
| already being closed. |
| |
| =back |
| |
| =item * |
| |
| C<DynaLoader> upgraded to version 1.09 |
| |
| C<DynaLoader> can now dynamically load a loadable object from a file with a |
| non-default file extension. |
| |
| =item * |
| |
| C<Encode> upgraded to version 2.26 |
| |
| C<Encode::Alias> includes a fix for encoding "646" on Solaris (better known as |
| ASCII). |
| |
| =item * |
| |
| C<English> upgraded to version 1.03 |
| |
| =item * |
| |
| C<Errno> upgraded to version 1.10 |
| |
| =item * |
| |
| C<Exporter> upgraded to version 5.63 |
| |
| =item * |
| |
| C<ExtUtils::Command> upgraded to version 1.15 |
| |
| =item * |
| |
| C<ExtUtils::Constant> upgraded to version 0.21 |
| |
| =item * |
| |
| C<ExtUtils::Embed> upgraded to version 1.28 |
| |
| =item * |
| |
| C<ExtUtils::Install> upgraded to version 1.50_01 |
| |
| =item * |
| |
| C<ExtUtils::Installed> upgraded to version 1.43 |
| |
| =item * |
| |
| C<ExtUtils::MakeMaker> upgraded to version 6.48 |
| |
| =over |
| |
| =item * |
| |
| support for C<INSTALLSITESCRIPT> and C<INSTALLVENDORSCRIPT> |
| configuration. |
| |
| =back |
| |
| =item * |
| |
| C<ExtUtils::Manifest> upgraded to version 1.55 |
| |
| =item * |
| |
| C<ExtUtils::ParseXS> upgraded to version 2.19 |
| |
| =item * |
| |
| C<Fatal> upgraded to version 1.06 |
| |
| =over |
| |
| =item * |
| |
| allows built-ins in C<CORE::GLOBAL> to be made fatal. |
| |
| =back |
| |
| =item * |
| |
| C<Fcntl> upgraded to version 1.06 |
| |
| =item * |
| |
| C<fields> upgraded to version 2.12 |
| |
| =item * |
| |
| C<File::Basename> upgraded to version 2.77 |
| |
| =item * |
| |
| C<FileCache> upgraded to version 1.07 |
| |
| =item * |
| |
| C<File::Compare> upgraded to 1.1005 |
| |
| =item * |
| |
| C<File::Copy> upgraded to 2.13 |
| |
| =over 4 |
| |
| =item * |
| |
| now uses 3-arg open. |
| |
| =back |
| |
| =item * |
| |
| C<File::DosGlob> upgraded to 1.01 |
| |
| =item * |
| |
| C<File::Find> upgraded to version 1.13 |
| |
| =item * |
| |
| C<File::Glob> upgraded to version 1.06 |
| |
| =over |
| |
| =item * |
| |
| fixes spurious results with brackets inside braces. |
| |
| =back |
| |
| =item * |
| |
| C<File::Path> upgraded to version 2.07_02 |
| |
| =item * |
| |
| C<File::Spec> upgraded to version 3.29 |
| |
| =over 4 |
| |
| =item * |
| |
| improved handling of bad arguments. |
| |
| =item * |
| |
| some platform specific improvements (including for VMS and Cygwin), with |
| an optimisation on C<abs2rel> when handling both relative arguments. |
| |
| =back |
| |
| =item * |
| |
| C<File::stat> upgraded to version 1.01 |
| |
| =item * |
| |
| C<File::Temp> upgraded to version 0.20 |
| |
| =item * |
| |
| C<filetest> upgraded to version 1.02 |
| |
| =item * |
| |
| C<Filter::Util::Call> upgraded to version 1.07 |
| |
| =item * |
| |
| C<Filter::Simple> upgraded to version 0.83 |
| |
| =item * |
| |
| C<FindBin> upgraded to version 1.49 |
| |
| =item * |
| |
| C<GDBM_File> upgraded to version 1.09 |
| |
| =item * |
| |
| C<Getopt::Long> upgraded to version 2.37 |
| |
| =item * |
| |
| C<Getopt::Std> upgraded to version 1.06 |
| |
| =item * |
| |
| C<Hash::Util> upgraded to version 0.06 |
| |
| =item * |
| |
| C<if> upgraded to version 0.05 |
| |
| =item * |
| |
| C<IO> upgraded to version 1.23 |
| |
| Reduced number of calls to C<getpeername> in C<IO::Socket> |
| |
| =item * |
| |
| C<IPC::Open> upgraded to version 1.03 |
| |
| =item * |
| |
| C<IPC::Open3> upgraded to version 1.03 |
| |
| =item * |
| |
| C<IPC::SysV> upgraded to version 2.00 |
| |
| =item * |
| |
| C<lib> upgraded to version 0.61 |
| |
| =over |
| |
| =item * |
| |
| avoid warning about loading F<.par> files. |
| |
| =back |
| |
| =item * |
| |
| C<libnet> upgraded to version 1.22 |
| |
| =item * |
| |
| C<List::Util> upgraded to 1.19 |
| |
| =item * |
| |
| C<Locale::Maketext> upgraded to 1.13 |
| |
| =item * |
| |
| C<Math::BigFloat> upgraded to version 1.60 |
| |
| =item * |
| |
| C<Math::BigInt> upgraded to version 1.89 |
| |
| =item * |
| |
| C<Math::BigRat> upgraded to version 0.22 |
| |
| =over 4 |
| |
| =item * |
| |
| implements new C<as_float> method. |
| |
| =back |
| |
| =item * |
| |
| C<Math::Complex> upgraded to version 1.54. |
| |
| =item * |
| |
| C<Math::Trig> upgraded to version 1.18. |
| |
| =item * |
| |
| C<NDBM_File> upgraded to version 1.07 |
| |
| =over |
| |
| =item * |
| |
| improve F<g++> handling for systems using GDBM compatibility headers. |
| |
| =back |
| |
| =item * |
| |
| C<Net::Ping> upgraded to version 2.35 |
| |
| =item * |
| |
| C<NEXT> upgraded to version 0.61 |
| |
| =over |
| |
| =item * |
| |
| fix several bugs with C<NEXT> when working with C<AUTOLOAD>, C<eval> block, and |
| within overloaded stringification. |
| |
| =back |
| |
| =item * |
| |
| C<ODBM_File> upgraded to 1.07 |
| |
| =item * |
| |
| C<open> upgraded to 1.06 |
| |
| =item * |
| |
| C<ops> upgraded to 1.02 |
| |
| =item * |
| |
| C<PerlIO::encoding> upgraded to version 0.11 |
| |
| =item * |
| |
| C<PerlIO::scalar> upgraded to version 0.06 |
| |
| =over 4 |
| |
| =item * |
| |
| [RT #40267] C<PerlIO::scalar> doesn't respect readonly-ness. |
| |
| =back |
| |
| =item * |
| |
| C<PerlIO::via> upgraded to version 0.05 |
| |
| =item * |
| |
| C<Pod::Html> upgraded to version 1.09 |
| |
| =item * |
| |
| C<Pod::Parser> upgraded to version 1.35 |
| |
| =item * |
| |
| C<Pod::Usage> upgraded to version 1.35 |
| |
| =item * |
| |
| C<POSIX> upgraded to version 1.15 |
| |
| =over |
| |
| =item * |
| |
| C<POSIX> constants that duplicate those in C<Fcntl> are now imported from |
| C<Fcntl> and re-exported, rather than being duplicated by C<POSIX> |
| |
| =item * |
| |
| C<POSIX::remove> can remove empty directories. |
| |
| =item * |
| |
| C<POSIX::setlocale> safer to call multiple times. |
| |
| =item * |
| |
| C<POSIX::SigRt> added, which provides access to POSIX realtime signal |
| functionality on systems that support it. |
| |
| =back |
| |
| =item * |
| |
| C<re> upgraded to version 0.06_01 |
| |
| =item * |
| |
| C<Safe> upgraded to version 2.16 |
| |
| =item * |
| |
| C<Scalar::Util> upgraded to 1.19 |
| |
| =item * |
| |
| C<SDBM_File> upgraded to version 1.06 |
| |
| =item * |
| |
| C<SelfLoader> upgraded to version 1.17 |
| |
| =item * |
| |
| C<Shell> upgraded to version 0.72 |
| |
| =item * |
| |
| C<sigtrap> upgraded to version 1.04 |
| |
| =item * |
| |
| C<Socket> upgraded to version 1.81 |
| |
| =over |
| |
| =item * |
| |
| this fixes an optimistic use of C<gethostbyname> |
| |
| =back |
| |
| =item * |
| |
| C<Storable> upgraded to 2.19 |
| |
| =item * |
| |
| C<Switch> upgraded to version 2.13 |
| |
| =item * |
| |
| C<Sys::Syslog> upgraded to version 0.27 |
| |
| =item * |
| |
| C<Term::ANSIColor> upgraded to version 1.12 |
| |
| =item * |
| |
| C<Term::Cap> upgraded to version 1.12 |
| |
| =item * |
| |
| C<Term::ReadLine> upgraded to version 1.03 |
| |
| =item * |
| |
| C<Test::Builder> upgraded to version 0.80 |
| |
| =item * |
| |
| C<Test::Harness> upgraded version to 2.64 |
| |
| =over |
| |
| =item * |
| |
| this makes it able to handle newlines. |
| |
| =back |
| |
| =item * |
| |
| C<Test::More> upgraded to version 0.80 |
| |
| =item * |
| |
| C<Test::Simple> upgraded to version 0.80 |
| |
| =item * |
| |
| C<Text::Balanced> upgraded to version 1.98 |
| |
| =item * |
| |
| C<Text::ParseWords> upgraded to version 3.27 |
| |
| =item * |
| |
| C<Text::Soundex> upgraded to version 3.03 |
| |
| =item * |
| |
| C<Text::Tabs> upgraded to version 2007.1117 |
| |
| =item * |
| |
| C<Text::Wrap> upgraded to version 2006.1117 |
| |
| =item * |
| |
| C<Thread> upgraded to version 2.01 |
| |
| =item * |
| |
| C<Thread::Semaphore> upgraded to version 2.09 |
| |
| =item * |
| |
| C<Thread::Queue> upgraded to version 2.11 |
| |
| =over |
| |
| =item * |
| |
| added capability to add complex structures (e.g., hash of hashes) to queues. |
| |
| =item * |
| |
| added capability to dequeue multiple items at once. |
| |
| =item * |
| |
| added new methods to inspect and manipulate queues: C<peek>, C<insert> and |
| C<extract> |
| |
| =back |
| |
| =item * |
| |
| C<Tie::Handle> upgraded to version 4.2 |
| |
| =item * |
| |
| C<Tie::Hash> upgraded to version 1.03 |
| |
| =item * |
| |
| C<Tie::Memoize> upgraded to version 1.1 |
| |
| =over |
| |
| =item * |
| |
| C<Tie::Memoize::EXISTS> now correctly caches its results. |
| |
| =back |
| |
| =item * |
| |
| C<Tie::RefHash> upgraded to version 1.38 |
| |
| =item * |
| |
| C<Tie::Scalar> upgraded to version 1.01 |
| |
| =item * |
| |
| C<Tie::StdHandle> upgraded to version 4.2 |
| |
| =item * |
| |
| C<Time::gmtime> upgraded to version 1.03 |
| |
| =item * |
| |
| C<Time::Local> upgraded to version 1.1901 |
| |
| =item * |
| |
| C<Time::HiRes> upgraded to version 1.9715 with various build improvements |
| (including VMS) and minor platform-specific bug fixes (including |
| for HP-UX 11 ia64). |
| |
| =item * |
| |
| C<threads> upgraded to 1.71 |
| |
| =over |
| |
| =item * |
| |
| new thread state information methods: C<is_running>, C<is_detached> |
| and C<is_joinable>. C<list> method enhanced to return running or joinable |
| threads. |
| |
| =item * |
| |
| new thread signal method: C<kill> |
| |
| =item * |
| |
| added capability to specify thread stack size. |
| |
| =item * |
| |
| added capability to control thread exiting behavior. Added a new C<exit> |
| method. |
| |
| =back |
| |
| =item * |
| |
| C<threads::shared> upgraded to version 1.27 |
| |
| =over |
| |
| =item * |
| |
| smaller and faster implementation that eliminates one internal structure and |
| the consequent level of indirection. |
| |
| =item * |
| |
| user locks are now stored in a safer manner. |
| |
| =item * |
| |
| new function C<shared_clone> creates a copy of an object leaving |
| shared elements as-is and deep-cloning non-shared elements. |
| |
| =item * |
| |
| added new C<is_shared> method. |
| |
| =back |
| |
| =item * |
| |
| C<Unicode::Normalize> upgraded to version 1.02 |
| |
| =item * |
| |
| C<Unicode::UCD> upgraded to version 0.25 |
| |
| =item * |
| |
| C<warnings> upgraded to version 1.05_01 |
| |
| =item * |
| |
| C<Win32> upgraded to version 0.38 |
| |
| =over 4 |
| |
| =item * |
| |
| added new function C<GetCurrentProcessId> which returns the regular Windows |
| process identifier of the current process, even when called from within a fork. |
| |
| =back |
| |
| =item * |
| |
| C<XSLoader> upgraded to version 0.10 |
| |
| =item * |
| |
| C<XS::APItest> and C<XS::Typemap> are for internal use only and hence |
| no longer installed. Many more tests have been added to C<XS::APItest>. |
| |
| =back |
| |
| =head1 Utility Changes |
| |
| =head2 debugger upgraded to version 1.31 |
| |
| =over 4 |
| |
| =item * |
| |
| Andreas KE<ouml>nig contributed two functions to save and load the debugger |
| history. |
| |
| =item * |
| |
| C<NEXT::AUTOLOAD> no longer emits warnings under the debugger. |
| |
| =item * |
| |
| The debugger should now correctly find tty the device on OS X 10.5 and VMS |
| when the program C<fork>s. |
| |
| =item * |
| |
| LVALUE subs now work inside the debugger. |
| |
| =back |
| |
| =head2 F<perlthanks> |
| |
| Perl 5.8.9 adds a new utility F<perlthanks>, which is a variant of F<perlbug>, |
| but for sending non-bug-reports to the authors and maintainers of Perl. |
| Getting nothing but bug reports can become a bit demoralising - we'll see if |
| this changes things. |
| |
| =head2 F<perlbug> |
| |
| F<perlbug> now checks if you're reporting about a non-core module and suggests |
| you report it to the CPAN author instead. |
| |
| =head2 F<h2xs> |
| |
| =over |
| |
| =item * |
| |
| won't define an empty string as a constant [RT #25366] |
| |
| =item * |
| |
| has examples for C<h2xs -X> |
| |
| =back |
| |
| =head2 F<h2ph> |
| |
| =over 4 |
| |
| =item * |
| |
| now attempts to deal sensibly with the difference in path implications |
| between C<""> and C<< E<lt>E<gt> >> quoting in C<#include> statements. |
| |
| =item * |
| |
| now generates correct code for C<#if defined A || defined B> |
| [RT #39130] |
| |
| =back |
| |
| =head1 New Documentation |
| |
| As usual, the documentation received its share of corrections, clarifications |
| and other nitfixes. More C<< X<...> >> tags were added for indexing. |
| |
| L<perlunitut> is a tutorial written by Juerd Waalboer on Unicode-related |
| terminology and how to correctly handle Unicode in Perl scripts. |
| |
| L<perlunicode> is updated in section user defined properties. |
| |
| L<perluniintro> has been updated in the example of detecting data that is not |
| valid in particular encoding. |
| |
| L<perlcommunity> provides an overview of the Perl Community along with further |
| resources. |
| |
| L<CORE> documents the pseudo-namespace for Perl's core routines. |
| |
| =head1 Changes to Existing Documentation |
| |
| L<perlglossary> adds I<deprecated modules and features> and I<to be dropped modules>. |
| |
| L<perlhack> has been updated and added resources on smoke testing. |
| |
| The Perl FAQs (F<perlfaq1>..F<perlfaq9>) have been updated. |
| |
| L<perlcheat> is updated with better details on C<\w>, C<\d>, and C<\s>. |
| |
| L<perldebug> is updated with information on how to call the debugger. |
| |
| L<perldiag> documentation updated with I<subroutine with an ampersand> on the |
| argument to C<exists> and C<delete> and also several terminology updates on |
| warnings. |
| |
| L<perlfork> documents the limitation of C<exec> inside pseudo-processes. |
| |
| L<perlfunc>: |
| |
| =over |
| |
| =item * |
| |
| Documentation is fixed in section C<caller> and C<pop>. |
| |
| =item * |
| |
| Function C<alarm> now mentions C<Time::HiRes::ualarm> in preference |
| to C<select>. |
| |
| =item * |
| |
| Regarding precedence in C<-X>, filetest operators are the same as unary |
| operators, but not regarding parsing and parentheses (spotted by Eirik Berg |
| Hanssen). |
| |
| =item * |
| |
| C<reverse> function documentation received scalar context examples. |
| |
| =back |
| |
| L<perllocale> documentation is adjusted for number localization and |
| C<POSIX::setlocale> to fix Debian bug #379463. |
| |
| L<perlmodlib> is updated with C<CPAN::API::HOWTO> and |
| C<Sys::Syslog::win32::Win32> |
| |
| L<perlre> documentation updated to reflect the differences between |
| C<[[:xxxxx:]]> and C<\p{IsXxxxx}> matches. Also added section on C</g> and |
| C</c> modifiers. |
| |
| L<perlreguts> describe the internals of the regular expressions engine. It has |
| been contributed by Yves Orton. |
| |
| L<perlrebackslash> describes all perl regular expression backslash and escape |
| sequences. |
| |
| L<perlrecharclass> describes the syntax and use of character classes in |
| Perl Regular Expressions. |
| |
| L<perlrun> is updated to clarify on the hash seed I<PERL_HASH_SEED>. Also more |
| information in options C<-x> and C<-u>. |
| |
| L<perlsub> example is updated to use a lexical variable for C<opendir> syntax. |
| |
| L<perlvar> fixes confusion about real GID C<$(> and effective GID C<$)>. |
| |
| Perl thread tutorial example is fixed in section |
| L<perlthrtut/Queues: Passing Data Around> and L<perlthrtut>. |
| |
| L<perlhack> documentation extensively improved by Jarkko Hietaniemi and others. |
| |
| L<perltoot> provides information on modifying C<@UNIVERSAL::ISA>. |
| |
| L<perlport> documentation extended to include different C<kill(-9, ...)> |
| semantics on Windows. It also clearly states C<dump> is not supported on Win32 |
| and cygwin. |
| |
| F<INSTALL> has been updated and modernised. |
| |
| =head1 Performance Enhancements |
| |
| =over |
| |
| =item * |
| |
| The default since perl 5.000 has been for perl to create an empty scalar |
| with every new typeglob. The increased use of lexical variables means that |
| most are now unused. Thanks to Nicholas Clark's efforts, Perl can now be |
| compiled with C<-DPERL_DONT_CREATE_GVSV> to avoid creating these empty scalars. |
| This will significantly decrease the number of scalars allocated for all |
| configurations, and the number of scalars that need to be copied for ithread |
| creation. Whilst this option is binary compatible with existing perl |
| installations, it does change a long-standing assumption about the |
| internals, hence it is not enabled by default, as some third party code may |
| rely on the old behaviour. |
| |
| We would recommend testing with this configuration on new deployments of |
| perl, particularly for multi-threaded servers, to see whether all third party |
| code is compatible with it, as this configuration may give useful performance |
| improvements. For existing installations we would not recommend changing to |
| this configuration unless thorough testing is performed before deployment. |
| |
| =item * |
| |
| C<diagnostics> no longer uses C<$&>, which results in large speedups |
| for regexp matching in all code using it. |
| |
| =item * |
| |
| Regular expressions classes of a single character are now treated the same as |
| if the character had been used as a literal, meaning that code that uses |
| char-classes as an escaping mechanism will see a speedup. (Yves Orton) |
| |
| =item * |
| |
| Creating anonymous array and hash references (ie. C<[]> and C<{}>) now incurs |
| no more overhead than creating an anonymous list or hash. Nicholas Clark |
| provided changes with a saving of two ops and one stack push, which was measured |
| as a slightly better than 5% improvement for these operations. |
| |
| =item * |
| |
| Many calls to C<strlen()> have been eliminated, either because the length was |
| already known, or by adopting or enhancing APIs that pass lengths. This has |
| been aided by the adoption of a C<my_sprintf()> wrapper, which returns the |
| correct C89 value - the length of the formatted string. Previously we could |
| not rely on the return value of C<sprintf()>, because on some ancient but |
| extant platforms it still returns C<char *>. |
| |
| =item * |
| |
| C<index> is now faster if the search string is stored in UTF-8 but only contains |
| characters in the Latin-1 range. |
| |
| =item * |
| |
| The Unicode swatch cache inside the regexp engine is now used. (the lookup had |
| a key mismatch, present since the initial implementation). [RT #42839] |
| |
| =back |
| |
| =head1 Installation and Configuration Improvements |
| |
| =head2 Relocatable installations |
| |
| There is now F<Configure> support for creating a relocatable perl tree. If |
| you F<Configure> with C<-Duserelocatableinc>, then the paths in C<@INC> (and |
| everything else in C<%Config>) can be optionally located via the path of the |
| F<perl> executable. |
| |
| At start time, if any paths in C<@INC> or C<Config> that F<Configure> marked |
| as relocatable (by starting them with C<".../">), then they are prefixed the |
| directory of C<$^X>. This allows the relocation can be configured on a |
| per-directory basis, although the default with C<-Duserelocatableinc> is that |
| everything is relocated. The initial install is done to the original configured |
| prefix. |
| |
| =head2 Configuration improvements |
| |
| F<Configure> is now better at removing temporary files. Tom Callaway |
| (from RedHat) also contributed patches that complete the set of flags |
| passed to the compiler and the linker, in particular that C<-fPIC> is now |
| enabled on Linux. It will also croak when your F</dev/null> isn't a device. |
| |
| A new configuration variable C<d_pseudofork> has been to F<Configure>, and is |
| available as C<$Config{d_pseudofork}> in the C<Config> module. This |
| distinguishes real C<fork> support from the pseudofork emulation used on |
| Windows platforms. |
| |
| F<Config.pod> and F<config.sh> are now placed correctly for cross-compilation. |
| |
| C<$Config{useshrplib}> is now 'true' rather than 'yes' when using a shared perl |
| library. |
| |
| =head2 Compilation improvements |
| |
| Parallel makes should work properly now, although there may still be problems |
| if C<make test> is instructed to run in parallel. |
| |
| Many compilation warnings have been cleaned up. A very stubborn compiler |
| warning in C<S_emulate_eaccess()> was killed after six attempts. |
| F<g++> support has been tuned, especially for FreeBSD. |
| |
| F<mkppport> has been integrated, and all F<ppport.h> files in the core will now |
| be autogenerated at build time (and removed during cleanup). |
| |
| =head2 Installation improvements. |
| |
| F<installman> now works with C<-Duserelocatableinc> and C<DESTDIR>. |
| |
| F<installperl> no longer installs: |
| |
| =over 4 |
| |
| =item * |
| |
| static library files of statically linked extensions when a shared perl library |
| is being used. (They are not needed. See L</Windows> below). |
| |
| =item * |
| |
| F<SIGNATURE> and F<PAUSE*.pub> (CPAN files) |
| |
| =item * |
| |
| F<NOTES> and F<PATCHING> (ExtUtils files) |
| |
| =item * |
| |
| F<perlld> and F<ld2> (Cygwin files) |
| |
| =back |
| |
| =head2 Platform Specific Changes |
| |
| There are improved hints for AIX, Cygwin, DEC/OSF, FreeBSD, HP/UX, Irix 6 |
| Linux, MachTen, NetBSD, OS/390, QNX, SCO, Solaris, SunOS, System V Release 5.x |
| (UnixWare 7, OpenUNIX 8), Ultrix, UMIPS, uts and VOS. |
| |
| =head3 FreeBSD |
| |
| =over 4 |
| |
| =item * |
| |
| Drop C<-std=c89> and C<-ansi> if using C<long long> as the main integral type, |
| else in FreeBSD 6.2 (and perhaps other releases), system headers do not |
| declare some functions required by perl. |
| |
| =back |
| |
| =head3 Solaris |
| |
| =over 4 |
| |
| =item * |
| |
| Starting with Solaris 10, we do not want versioned shared libraries, because |
| those often indicate a private use only library. These problems could often |
| be triggered when L<SUNWbdb> (Berkeley DB) was installed. Hence if Solaris 10 |
| is detected set C<ignore_versioned_solibs=y>. |
| |
| =back |
| |
| =head3 VMS |
| |
| =over 4 |
| |
| =item * |
| |
| Allow IEEE math to be deselected on OpenVMS I64 (but it remains the default). |
| |
| =item * |
| |
| Record IEEE usage in C<config.h> |
| |
| =item * |
| |
| Help older VMS compilers by using C<ccflags> when building C<munchconfig.exe>. |
| |
| =item * |
| |
| Don't try to build old C<Thread> extension on VMS when C<-Duseithreads> has |
| been chosen. |
| |
| =item * |
| |
| Passing a raw string of "NaN" to F<nawk> causes a core dump - so the string |
| has been changed to "*NaN*" |
| |
| =item * |
| |
| F<t/op/stat.t> tests will now test hard links on VMS if they are supported. |
| |
| =back |
| |
| =head3 Windows |
| |
| =over 4 |
| |
| =item * |
| |
| When using a shared perl library F<installperl> no longer installs static |
| library files, import library files and export library files (of statically |
| linked extensions) and empty bootstrap files (of dynamically linked |
| extensions). This fixes a problem building PAR-Packer on Win32 with a debug |
| build of perl. |
| |
| =item * |
| |
| Various improvements to the win32 build process, including support for Visual |
| C++ 2005 Express Edition (aka Visual C++ 8.x). |
| |
| =item * |
| |
| F<perl.exe> will now have an icon if built with MinGW or Borland. |
| |
| =item * |
| |
| Improvements to the perl-static.exe build process. |
| |
| =item * |
| |
| Add Win32 makefile option to link all extensions statically. |
| |
| =item * |
| |
| The F<WinCE> directory has been merged into the F<Win32> directory. |
| |
| =item * |
| |
| C<setlocale> tests have been re-enabled for Windows XP onwards. |
| |
| =back |
| |
| =head1 Selected Bug Fixes |
| |
| =head2 Unicode |
| |
| Many many bugs related to the internal Unicode implementation (UTF-8) have |
| been fixed. In particular, long standing bugs related to returning Unicode |
| via C<tie>, overloading or C<$@> are now gone, some of which were never |
| reported. |
| |
| C<unpack> will internally convert the string back from UTF-8 on numeric types. |
| This is a compromise between the full consistency now in 5.10, and the current |
| behaviour, which is often used as a "feature" on string types. |
| |
| Using C<:crlf> and C<UTF-16> IO layers together will now work. |
| |
| Fixed problems with C<split>, Unicode C</\s+/> and C</ \0/>. |
| |
| Fixed bug RT #40641 - encoding of Unicode characters in regular expressions. |
| |
| Fixed a bug where using certain patterns in a regexp led to a panic. |
| [RT #45337] |
| |
| Perl no longer segfaults (due to infinite internal recursion) if the locale's |
| character is not UTF-8 [RT #41442]: |
| |
| use open ':locale'; |
| print STDERR "\x{201e}"; # „ |
| |
| =head2 PerlIO |
| |
| Inconsistencies have been fixed in the reference counting PerlIO uses to keep |
| track of Unix file descriptors, and the API used by XS code to manage getting |
| and releasing C<FILE *>s |
| |
| =head2 Magic |
| |
| Several bugs have been fixed in Magic, the internal system used to implement |
| features such as C<tie>, tainting and threads sharing. |
| |
| C<undef @array> on a tied array now correctly calls the C<CLEAR> method. |
| |
| Some of the bitwise ops were not checking whether their arguments were magical |
| before using them. [RT #24816] |
| |
| Magic is no longer invoked twice by the expression C<\&$x> |
| |
| A bug with assigning large numbers and tainting has been resolved. |
| [RT #40708] |
| |
| A new entry has been added to the MAGIC vtable - C<svt_local>. This is used |
| when copying magic to the new value during C<local>, allowing certain problems |
| with localising shared variables to be resolved. |
| |
| For the implementation details, see L<perlguts/Magic Virtual Tables>. |
| |
| =head2 Reblessing overloaded objects now works |
| |
| Internally, perl object-ness is on the referent, not the reference, even |
| though methods can only be called via a reference. However, the original |
| implementation of overloading stored flags related to overloading on the |
| reference, relying on the flags being copied when the reference was copied, |
| or set at the creation of a new reference. This manifests in a bug - if you |
| rebless an object from a class that has overloading, into one that does not, |
| then any other existing references think that they (still) point to an |
| overloaded object, choose these C code paths, and then throw errors. |
| Analogously, blessing into an overloaded class when other references exist will |
| result in them not using overloading. |
| |
| The implementation has been fixed for 5.10, but this fix changes the semantics |
| of flag bits, so is not binary compatible, so can't be applied to 5.8.9. |
| However, 5.8.9 has a work-around that implements the same bug fix. If the |
| referent has multiple references, then all the other references are located and |
| corrected. A full search is avoided whenever possible by scanning lexicals |
| outwards from the current subroutine, and the argument stack. |
| |
| A certain well known Linux vendor applied incomplete versions of this bug fix |
| to their F</usr/bin/perl> and then prematurely closed bug reports about |
| performance issues without consulting back upstream. This not being enough, |
| they then proceeded to ignore the necessary fixes to these unreleased changes |
| for 11 months, until massive pressure was applied by their long-suffering |
| paying customers, catalysed by the failings being featured on a prominent blog |
| and Slashdot. |
| |
| =head2 C<strict> now propagates correctly into string evals |
| |
| Under 5.8.8 and earlier: |
| |
| $ perl5.8.8 -e 'use strict; eval "use foo bar" or die $@' |
| Can't locate foo.pm in @INC (@INC contains: ... .) at (eval 1) line 2. |
| BEGIN failed--compilation aborted at (eval 1) line 2. |
| |
| Under 5.8.9 and later: |
| |
| $ perl5.8.9 -e 'use strict; eval "use foo bar" or die $@' |
| Bareword "bar" not allowed while "strict subs" in use at (eval 1) line 1. |
| |
| This may cause problems with programs that parse the error message and rely |
| on the buggy behaviour. |
| |
| =head2 Other fixes |
| |
| =over |
| |
| =item * |
| |
| The tokenizer no longer treats C<=cute> (and other words beginning |
| with C<=cut>) as a synonym for C<=cut>. |
| |
| =item * |
| |
| Calling C<CORE::require> |
| |
| C<CORE::require> and C<CORE::do> were always parsed as C<require> and C<do> |
| when they were overridden. This is now fixed. |
| |
| =item * |
| |
| Stopped memory leak on long F</etc/groups> entries. |
| |
| =item * |
| |
| C<while (my $x ...) { ...; redo }> shouldn't C<undef $x>. |
| |
| In the presence of C<my> in the conditional of a C<while()>, C<until()>, |
| or C<for(;;)> loop, we now add an extra scope to the body so that C<redo> |
| doesn't C<undef> the lexical. |
| |
| =item * |
| |
| The C<encoding> pragma now correctly ignores anything following an C<@> |
| character in the C<LC_ALL> and C<LANG> environment variables. [RT # 49646] |
| |
| =item * |
| |
| A segfault observed with some F<gcc> 3.3 optimisations is resolved. |
| |
| =item * |
| |
| A possible segfault when C<unpack> used in scalar context with C<()> groups |
| is resolved. [RT #50256] |
| |
| =item * |
| |
| Resolved issue where C<$!> could be changed by a signal handler interrupting |
| a C<system> call. |
| |
| =item * |
| |
| Fixed bug RT #37886, symbolic dereferencing was allowed in the argument of |
| C<defined> even under the influence of C<use strict 'refs'>. |
| |
| =item * |
| |
| Fixed bug RT #43207, where C<lc>/C<uc> inside C<sort> affected the return |
| value. |
| |
| =item * |
| |
| Fixed bug RT #45607, where C<*{"BONK"} = \&{"BONK"}> didn't work correctly. |
| |
| =item * |
| |
| Fixed bug RT #35878, croaking from a XSUB called via C<goto &xsub> corrupts perl |
| internals. |
| |
| =item * |
| |
| Fixed bug RT #32539, F<DynaLoader.o> is moved into F<libperl.so> to avoid the |
| need to statically link DynaLoader into the stub perl executable. With this |
| F<libperl.so> provides everything needed to get a functional embedded perl |
| interpreter to run. |
| |
| =item * |
| |
| Fix bug RT #36267 so that assigning to a tied hash doesn't change the |
| underlying hash. |
| |
| =item * |
| |
| Fix bug RT #6006, regexp replaces using large replacement variables |
| fail some of the time, I<i.e.> when substitution contains something |
| like C<${10}> (note the bracket) instead of just C<$10>. |
| |
| =item * |
| |
| Fix bug RT #45053, C<Perl_newCONSTSUB()> is now thread safe. |
| |
| =back |
| |
| =head2 Platform Specific Fixes |
| |
| =head3 Darwin / MacOS X |
| |
| =over 4 |
| |
| =item * |
| |
| Various improvements to 64 bit builds. |
| |
| =item * |
| |
| Mutex protection added in C<PerlIOStdio_close()> to avoid race conditions. |
| Hopefully this fixes failures in the threads tests F<free.t> and F<blocks.t>. |
| |
| =item * |
| |
| Added forked terminal support to the debugger, with the ability to update the |
| window title. |
| |
| =back |
| |
| =head3 OS/2 |
| |
| =over 4 |
| |
| =item * |
| |
| A build problem with specifying C<USE_MULTI> and C<USE_ITHREADS> but without |
| C<USE_IMP_SYS> has been fixed. |
| |
| =item * |
| |
| C<OS2::REXX> upgraded to version 1.04 |
| |
| =back |
| |
| =head3 Tru64 |
| |
| =over 4 |
| |
| =item * |
| |
| Aligned floating point build policies for F<cc> and F<gcc>. |
| |
| =back |
| |
| =head3 RedHat Linux |
| |
| =over 4 |
| |
| =item * |
| |
| Revisited a patch from 5.6.1 for RH7.2 for Intel's F<icc> [RT #7916], added an |
| additional check for C<$Config{gccversion}>. |
| |
| =back |
| |
| =head3 Solaris/i386 |
| |
| =over 4 |
| |
| =item * |
| |
| Use C<-DPTR_IS_LONG> when using 64 bit integers |
| |
| =back |
| |
| =head3 VMS |
| |
| =over 4 |
| |
| =item * |
| |
| Fixed C<PerlIO::Scalar> in-memory file record-style reads. |
| |
| =item * |
| |
| pipe shutdown at process exit should now be more robust. |
| |
| =item * |
| |
| Bugs in VMS exit handling tickled by C<Test::Harness> 2.64 have been fixed. |
| |
| =item * |
| |
| Fix C<fcntl()> locking capability test in F<configure.com>. |
| |
| =item * |
| |
| Replaced C<shrplib='define'> with C<useshrplib='true'> on VMS. |
| |
| =back |
| |
| =head3 Windows |
| |
| =over 4 |
| |
| =item * |
| |
| C<File::Find> used to fail when the target directory is a bare drive letter and |
| C<no_chdir> is 1 (the default is 0). [RT #41555] |
| |
| =item * |
| |
| A build problem with specifying C<USE_MULTI> and C<USE_ITHREADS> but without |
| C<USE_IMP_SYS> has been fixed. |
| |
| =item * |
| |
| The process id is no longer truncated to 16 bits on some Windows platforms |
| ( http://bugs.activestate.com/show_bug.cgi?id=72443 ) |
| |
| =item * |
| |
| Fixed bug RT #54828 in F<perlio.c> where calling C<binmode> on Win32 and Cygwin |
| may cause a segmentation fault. |
| |
| =back |
| |
| =head2 Smaller fixes |
| |
| =over 4 |
| |
| =item * |
| |
| It is now possible to overload C<eq> when using C<nomethod>. |
| |
| =item * |
| |
| Various problems using C<overload> with 64 bit integers corrected. |
| |
| =item * |
| |
| The reference count of C<PerlIO> file descriptors is now correctly handled. |
| |
| =item * |
| |
| On VMS, escaped dots will be preserved when converted to Unix syntax. |
| |
| =item * |
| |
| C<keys %+> no longer throws an C<'ambiguous'> warning. |
| |
| =item * |
| |
| Using C<#!perl -d> could trigger an assertion, which has been fixed. |
| |
| =item * |
| |
| Don't stringify tied code references in C<@INC> when calling C<require>. |
| |
| =item * |
| |
| Code references in C<@INC> report the correct file name when C<__FILE__> is |
| used. |
| |
| =item * |
| |
| Width and precision in sprintf didn't handle characters above 255 correctly. |
| [RT #40473] |
| |
| =item * |
| |
| List slices with indices out of range now work more consistently. |
| [RT #39882] |
| |
| =item * |
| |
| A change introduced with perl 5.8.1 broke the parsing of arguments of the form |
| C<-foo=bar> with the C<-s> on the <#!> line. This has been fixed. See |
| http://bugs.activestate.com/show_bug.cgi?id=43483 |
| |
| =item * |
| |
| C<tr///> is now threadsafe. Previously it was storing a swash inside its OP, |
| rather than in a pad. |
| |
| =item * |
| |
| F<pod2html> labels anchors more consistently and handles nested definition |
| lists better. |
| |
| =item * |
| |
| C<threads> cleanup veto has been extended to include C<perl_free()> and |
| C<perl_destruct()> |
| |
| =item * |
| |
| On some systems, changes to C<$ENV{TZ}> would not always be |
| respected by the underlying calls to C<localtime_r()>. Perl now |
| forces the inspection of the environment on these systems. |
| |
| =item * |
| |
| The special variable C<$^R> is now more consistently set when executing |
| regexps using the C<(?{...})> construct. In particular, it will still |
| be set even if backreferences or optional sub-patterns C<(?:...)?> are |
| used. |
| |
| =back |
| |
| =head1 New or Changed Diagnostics |
| |
| =head2 panic: sv_chop %s |
| |
| This new fatal error occurs when the C routine C<Perl_sv_chop()> was passed a |
| position that is not within the scalar's string buffer. This is caused by |
| buggy XS code, and at this point recovery is not possible. |
| |
| =head2 Maximal count of pending signals (%s) exceeded |
| |
| This new fatal error occurs when the perl process has to abort due to |
| too many pending signals, which is bound to prevent perl from being |
| able to handle further incoming signals safely. |
| |
| =head2 panic: attempt to call %s in %s |
| |
| This new fatal error occurs when the ACL version file test operator is used |
| where it is not available on the current platform. Earlier checks mean that |
| it should never be possible to get this. |
| |
| =head2 FETCHSIZE returned a negative value |
| |
| New error indicating that a tied array has claimed to have a negative |
| number of elements. |
| |
| =head2 Can't upgrade %s (%d) to %d |
| |
| Previously the internal error from the SV upgrade code was the less informative |
| I<Can't upgrade that kind of scalar>. It now reports the current internal type, |
| and the new type requested. |
| |
| =head2 %s argument is not a HASH or ARRAY element or a subroutine |
| |
| This error, thrown if an invalid argument is provided to C<exists> now |
| correctly includes "or a subroutine". [RT #38955] |
| |
| =head2 Cannot make the non-overridable builtin %s fatal |
| |
| This error in C<Fatal> previously did not show the name of the builtin in |
| question (now represented by %s above). |
| |
| =head2 Unrecognized character '%s' in column %d |
| |
| This error previously did not state the column. |
| |
| =head2 Offset outside string |
| |
| This can now also be generated by a C<seek> on a file handle using |
| C<PerlIO::scalar>. |
| |
| =head2 Invalid escape in the specified encoding in regexp; marked by <-- HERE in m/%s/ |
| |
| New error, introduced as part of the fix to RT #40641 to handle encoding |
| of Unicode characters in regular expression comments. |
| |
| =head2 Your machine doesn't support dump/undump. |
| |
| A more informative fatal error issued when calling C<dump> on Win32 and |
| Cygwin. (Given that the purpose of C<dump> is to abort with a core dump, |
| and core dumps can't be produced on these platforms, this is more useful than |
| silently exiting.) |
| |
| =head1 Changed Internals |
| |
| The perl sources can now be compiled with a C++ compiler instead of a C |
| compiler. A necessary implementation details is that under C++, the macro |
| C<XS> used to define XSUBs now includes an C<extern "C"> definition. A side |
| effect of this is that B<C++> code that used the construction |
| |
| typedef XS(SwigPerlWrapper); |
| |
| now needs to be written |
| |
| typedef XSPROTO(SwigPerlWrapper); |
| |
| using the new C<XSPROTO> macro, in order to compile. C extensions are |
| unaffected, although C extensions are encouraged to use C<XSPROTO> too. |
| This change was present in the 5.10.0 release of perl, so any actively |
| maintained code that happened to use this construction should already have |
| been adapted. Code that needs changing will fail with a compilation error. |
| |
| C<set> magic on localizing/assigning to a magic variable will now only |
| trigger for I<container magics>, i.e. it will for C<%ENV> or C<%SIG> |
| but not for C<$#array>. |
| |
| The new API macro C<newSVpvs()> can be used in place of constructions such as |
| C<newSVpvn("ISA", 3)>. It takes a single string constant, and at C compile |
| time determines its length. |
| |
| The new API function C<Perl_newSV_type()> can be used as a more efficient |
| replacement of the common idiom |
| |
| sv = newSV(0); |
| sv_upgrade(sv, type); |
| |
| Similarly C<Perl_newSVpvn_flags()> can be used to combine |
| C<Perl_newSVpv()> with C<Perl_sv_2mortal()> or the equivalent |
| C<Perl_sv_newmortal()> with C<Perl_sv_setpvn()> |
| |
| Two new macros C<mPUSHs()> and C<mXPUSHs()> are added, to make it easier to |
| push mortal SVs onto the stack. They were then used to fix several bugs where |
| values on the stack had not been mortalised. |
| |
| A C<Perl_signbit()> function was added to test the sign of an C<NV>. It |
| maps to the system one when available. |
| |
| C<Perl_av_reify()>, C<Perl_lex_end()>, C<Perl_mod()>, C<Perl_op_clear()>, |
| C<Perl_pop_return()>, C<Perl_qerror()>, C<Perl_setdefout()>, |
| C<Perl_vivify_defelem()> and C<Perl_yylex()> are now visible to extensions. |
| This was required to allow C<Data::Alias> to work on Windows. |
| |
| C<Perl_find_runcv()> is now visible to perl core extensions. This was required |
| to allow C<Sub::Current> to work on Windows. |
| |
| C<ptr_table*> functions are now available in unthreaded perl. C<Storable> |
| takes advantage of this. |
| |
| There have been many small cleanups made to the internals. In particular, |
| C<Perl_sv_upgrade()> has been simplified considerably, with a straight-through |
| code path that uses C<memset()> and C<memcpy()> to initialise the new body, |
| rather than assignment via multiple temporary variables. It has also |
| benefited from simplification and de-duplication of the arena management |
| code. |
| |
| A lot of small improvements in the code base were made due to reports from |
| the Coverity static code analyzer. |
| |
| Corrected use and documentation of C<Perl_gv_stashpv()>, C<Perl_gv_stashpvn()>, |
| C<Perl_gv_stashsv()> functions (last parameter is a bitmask, not boolean). |
| |
| C<PERL_SYS_INIT>, C<PERL_SYS_INIT3> and C<PERL_SYS_TERM> macros have been |
| changed into functions. |
| |
| C<PERLSYS_TERM> no longer requires a context. C<PerlIO_teardown()> |
| is now called without a context, and debugging output in this function has |
| been disabled because that required that an interpreter was present, an invalid |
| assumption at termination time. |
| |
| All compile time options which affect binary compatibility have been grouped |
| together into a global variable (C<PL_bincompat_options>). |
| |
| The values of C<PERL_REVISION>, C<PERL_VERSION> and C<PERL_SUBVERSION> are |
| now baked into global variables (and hence into any shared perl library). |
| Additionally under C<MULTIPLICITY>, the perl executable now records the size of |
| the interpreter structure (total, and for this version). Coupled with |
| C<PL_bincompat_options> this will allow 5.8.10 (and later), when compiled with a |
| shared perl library, to perform sanity checks in C<main()> to verify that the |
| shared library is indeed binary compatible. |
| |
| Symbolic references can now have embedded NULs. The new public function |
| C<Perl_get_cvn_flags()> can be used in extensions if you have to handle them. |
| |
| =head2 Macro cleanups |
| |
| The core code, and XS code in F<ext> that is not dual-lived on CPAN, no longer |
| uses the macros C<PL_na>, C<NEWSV()>, C<Null()>, C<Nullav>, C<Nullcv>, |
| C<Nullhv>, C<Nullhv> I<etc>. Their use is discouraged in new code, |
| particularly C<PL_na>, which is a small performance hit. |
| |
| =head1 New Tests |
| |
| Many modules updated from CPAN incorporate new tests. Some core specific |
| tests have been added: |
| |
| =over 4 |
| |
| =item ext/DynaLoader/t/DynaLoader.t |
| |
| Tests for the C<DynaLoader> module. |
| |
| =item t/comp/fold.t |
| |
| Tests for compile-time constant folding. |
| |
| =item t/io/pvbm.t |
| |
| Tests incorporated from 5.10.0 which check that there is no unexpected |
| interaction between the internal types C<PVBM> and C<PVGV>. |
| |
| =item t/lib/proxy_constant_subs.t |
| |
| Tests for the new form of constant subroutines. |
| |
| =item t/op/attrhand.t |
| |
| Tests for C<Attribute::Handlers>. |
| |
| =item t/op/dbm.t |
| |
| Tests for C<dbmopen>. |
| |
| =item t/op/inccode-tie.t |
| |
| Calls all tests in F<t/op/inccode.t> after first tying C<@INC>. |
| |
| =item t/op/incfilter.t |
| |
| Tests for source filters returned from code references in C<@INC>. |
| |
| =item t/op/kill0.t |
| |
| Tests for RT #30970. |
| |
| =item t/op/qrstack.t |
| |
| Tests for RT #41484. |
| |
| =item t/op/qr.t |
| |
| Tests for the C<qr//> construct. |
| |
| =item t/op/regexp_qr_embed.t |
| |
| Tests for the C<qr//> construct within another regexp. |
| |
| =item t/op/regexp_qr.t |
| |
| Tests for the C<qr//> construct. |
| |
| =item t/op/rxcode.t |
| |
| Tests for RT #32840. |
| |
| =item t/op/studytied.t |
| |
| Tests for C<study> on tied scalars. |
| |
| =item t/op/substT.t |
| |
| Tests for C<subst> run under C<-T> mode. |
| |
| =item t/op/symbolcache.t |
| |
| Tests for C<undef> and C<delete> on stash entries that are bound to |
| subroutines or methods. |
| |
| =item t/op/upgrade.t |
| |
| Tests for C<Perl_sv_upgrade()>. |
| |
| =item t/mro/package_aliases.t |
| |
| MRO tests for C<isa> and package aliases. |
| |
| =item t/pod/twice.t |
| |
| Tests for calling C<Pod::Parser> twice. |
| |
| =item t/run/cloexec.t |
| |
| Tests for inheriting file descriptors across C<exec> (close-on-exec). |
| |
| =item t/uni/cache.t |
| |
| Tests for the UTF-8 caching code. |
| |
| =item t/uni/chr.t |
| |
| Test that strange encodings do not upset C<Perl_pp_chr()>. |
| |
| =item t/uni/greek.t |
| |
| Tests for RT #40641. |
| |
| =item t/uni/latin2.t |
| |
| Tests for RT #40641. |
| |
| =item t/uni/overload.t |
| |
| Tests for returning Unicode from overloaded values. |
| |
| =item t/uni/tie.t |
| |
| Tests for returning Unicode from tied variables. |
| |
| =back |
| |
| =head1 Known Problems |
| |
| There are no known new bugs. |
| |
| However, programs that rely on bugs that have been fixed will have problems. |
| Also, many bug fixes present in 5.10.0 can't be back-ported to the 5.8.x |
| branch, because they require changes that are binary incompatible, or because |
| the code changes are too large and hence too risky to incorporate. |
| |
| We have only limited volunteer labour, and the maintenance burden is |
| getting increasingly complex. Hence this will be the last significant |
| release of the 5.8.x series. Any future releases of 5.8.x will likely |
| only be to deal with security issues, and platform build |
| failures. Hence you should look to migrating to 5.10.x, if you have |
| not started already. Alternatively, if business requirements constrain |
| you to continue to use 5.8.x, you may wish to consider commercial |
| support from firms such as ActiveState. |
| |
| =head1 Platform Specific Notes |
| |
| =head2 Win32 |
| |
| C<readdir()>, C<cwd()>, C<$^X> and C<@INC> now use the alternate (short) |
| filename if the long name is outside the current codepage (Jan Dubois). |
| |
| =head3 Updated Modules |
| |
| =over 4 |
| |
| =item * |
| |
| C<Win32> upgraded to version 0.38. Now has a documented 'WinVista' response |
| from C<GetOSName> and support for Vista's privilege elevation in C<IsAdminUser>. |
| Support for Unicode characters in path names. Improved cygwin and Win64 |
| compatibility. |
| |
| =item * |
| |
| C<Win32API> updated to 0.1001_01 |
| |
| =item * |
| |
| C<killpg()> support added to C<MSWin32> (Jan Dubois). |
| |
| =item * |
| |
| C<File::Spec::Win32> upgraded to version 3.2701 |
| |
| =back |
| |
| =head2 OS/2 |
| |
| =head3 Updated Modules |
| |
| =over 4 |
| |
| =item * |
| |
| C<OS2::Process> upgraded to 1.03 |
| |
| Ilya Zakharevich has added and documented several C<Window*> and C<Clipbrd*> |
| functions. |
| |
| =item * |
| |
| C<OS2::REXX::DLL>, C<OS2::REXX> updated to version 1.03 |
| |
| =back |
| |
| =head2 VMS |
| |
| =head3 Updated Modules |
| |
| =over 4 |
| |
| =item * |
| |
| C<DCLsym> upgraded to version 1.03 |
| |
| =item * |
| |
| C<Stdio> upgraded to version 2.4 |
| |
| =item * |
| |
| C<VMS::XSSymSet> upgraded to 1.1. |
| |
| =back |
| |
| =head1 Obituary |
| |
| Nick Ing-Simmons, long time Perl hacker, author of the C<Tk> and C<Encode> |
| modules, F<perlio.c> in the core, and 5.003_02 pumpking, died of a heart |
| attack on 25th September 2006. He will be missed. |
| |
| =head1 Acknowledgements |
| |
| Some of the work in this release was funded by a TPF grant. |
| |
| Steve Hay worked behind the scenes working out the causes of the differences |
| between core modules, their CPAN releases, and previous core releases, and |
| the best way to rectify them. He doesn't want to do it again. I know this |
| feeling, and I'm very glad he did it this time, instead of me. |
| |
| Paul Fenwick assembled a team of 18 volunteers, who broke the back of writing |
| this document. In particular, Bradley Dean, Eddy Tan, and Vincent Pit |
| provided half the team's contribution. |
| |
| Schwern verified the list of updated module versions, correcting quite a few |
| errors that I (and everyone else) had missed, both wrongly stated module |
| versions, and changed modules that had not been listed. |
| |
| The crack Berlin-based QA team of Andreas KE<ouml>nig and Slaven Rezic |
| tirelessly re-built snapshots, tested most everything CPAN against |
| them, and then identified the changes responsible for any module regressions, |
| ensuring that several show-stopper bugs were stomped before the first release |
| candidate was cut. |
| |
| The other core committers contributed most of the changes, and applied most |
| of the patches sent in by the hundreds of contributors listed in F<AUTHORS>. |
| |
| And obviously, Larry Wall, without whom we wouldn't have Perl. |
| |
| =head1 Reporting Bugs |
| |
| If you find what you think is a bug, you might check the articles |
| recently posted to the comp.lang.perl.misc newsgroup and the perl |
| bug database at http://bugs.perl.org. There may also be |
| information at http://www.perl.org, the Perl Home Page. |
| |
| If you believe you have an unreported bug, please run the B<perlbug> |
| program included with your release. Be sure to trim your bug down |
| to a tiny but sufficient test case. Your bug report, along with the |
| output of C<perl -V>, will be sent off to perlbug@perl.org to be |
| analysed by the Perl porting team. You can browse and search |
| the Perl 5 bugs at http://bugs.perl.org/ |
| |
| If the bug you are reporting has security implications, which make it |
| inappropriate to send to a publicly archived mailing list, then please send |
| it to perl5-security-report@perl.org. This points to a closed subscription |
| unarchived mailing list, which includes |
| all the core committers, who will be able |
| to help assess the impact of issues, figure out a resolution, and help |
| co-ordinate the release of patches to mitigate or fix the problem across all |
| platforms on which Perl is supported. Please only use this address for security |
| issues in the Perl core, not for modules independently distributed on CPAN. |
| |
| =head1 SEE ALSO |
| |
| The F<Changes> file for exhaustive details on what changed. |
| |
| The F<INSTALL> file for how to build Perl. |
| |
| The F<README> file for general stuff. |
| |
| The F<Artistic> and F<Copying> files for copyright information. |
| |
| =cut |