Provided by: perl-doc_5.30.0-9ubuntu0.5_all bug

NAME

       perl5004delta - what's new for perl5.004

DESCRIPTION

       This document describes differences between the 5.003 release (as documented in
       Programming Perl, second edition--the Camel Book) and this one.

Supported Environments

       Perl5.004 builds out of the box on Unix, Plan 9, LynxOS, VMS, OS/2, QNX, AmigaOS, and
       Windows NT.  Perl runs on Windows 95 as well, but it cannot be built there, for lack of a
       reasonable command interpreter.

Core Changes

       Most importantly, many bugs were fixed, including several security problems.  See the
       Changes file in the distribution for details.

   List assignment to %ENV works
       "%ENV = ()" and "%ENV = @list" now work as expected (except on VMS where it generates a
       fatal error).

   Change to "Can't locate Foo.pm in @INC" error
       The error "Can't locate Foo.pm in @INC" now lists the contents of @INC for easier
       debugging.

   Compilation option: Binary compatibility with 5.003
       There is a new Configure question that asks if you want to maintain binary compatibility
       with Perl 5.003.  If you choose binary compatibility, you do not have to recompile your
       extensions, but you might have symbol conflicts if you embed Perl in another application,
       just as in the 5.003 release.  By default, binary compatibility is preserved at the
       expense of symbol table pollution.

   $PERL5OPT environment variable
       You may now put Perl options in the $PERL5OPT environment variable.  Unless Perl is
       running with taint checks, it will interpret this variable as if its contents had appeared
       on a "#!perl" line at the beginning of your script, except that hyphens are optional.
       PERL5OPT may only be used to set the following switches: -[DIMUdmw].

   Limitations on -M, -m, and -T options
       The "-M" and "-m" options are no longer allowed on the "#!" line of a script.  If a script
       needs a module, it should invoke it with the "use" pragma.

       The -T option is also forbidden on the "#!" line of a script, unless it was present on the
       Perl command line.  Due to the way "#!"  works, this usually means that -T must be in the
       first argument.  Thus:

           #!/usr/bin/perl -T -w

       will probably work for an executable script invoked as "scriptname", while:

           #!/usr/bin/perl -w -T

       will probably fail under the same conditions.  (Non-Unix systems will probably not follow
       this rule.)  But "perl scriptname" is guaranteed to fail, since then there is no chance of
       -T being found on the command line before it is found on the "#!" line.

   More precise warnings
       If you removed the -w option from your Perl 5.003 scripts because it made Perl too
       verbose, we recommend that you try putting it back when you upgrade to Perl 5.004.  Each
       new perl version tends to remove some undesirable warnings, while adding new warnings that
       may catch bugs in your scripts.

   Deprecated: Inherited "AUTOLOAD" for non-methods
       Before Perl 5.004, "AUTOLOAD" functions were looked up as methods (using the @ISA
       hierarchy), even when the function to be autoloaded was called as a plain function (e.g.
       "Foo::bar()"), not a method (e.g. "Foo->bar()" or "$obj->bar()").

       Perl 5.005 will use method lookup only for methods' "AUTOLOAD"s.  However, there is a
       significant base of existing code that may be using the old behavior.  So, as an interim
       step, Perl 5.004 issues an optional warning when a non-method uses an inherited
       "AUTOLOAD".

       The simple rule is:  Inheritance will not work when autoloading non-methods.  The simple
       fix for old code is:  In any module that used to depend on inheriting "AUTOLOAD" for non-
       methods from a base class named "BaseClass", execute "*AUTOLOAD = \&BaseClass::AUTOLOAD"
       during startup.

   Previously deprecated %OVERLOAD is no longer usable
       Using %OVERLOAD to define overloading was deprecated in 5.003.  Overloading is now defined
       using the overload pragma. %OVERLOAD is still used internally but should not be used by
       Perl scripts. See overload for more details.

   Subroutine arguments created only when they're modified
       In Perl 5.004, nonexistent array and hash elements used as subroutine parameters are
       brought into existence only if they are actually assigned to (via @_).

       Earlier versions of Perl vary in their handling of such arguments.  Perl versions 5.002
       and 5.003 always brought them into existence.  Perl versions 5.000 and 5.001 brought them
       into existence only if they were not the first argument (which was almost certainly a
       bug).  Earlier versions of Perl never brought them into existence.

       For example, given this code:

            undef @a; undef %a;
            sub show { print $_[0] };
            sub change { $_[0]++ };
            show($a[2]);
            change($a{b});

       After this code executes in Perl 5.004, $a{b} exists but $a[2] does not.  In Perl 5.002
       and 5.003, both $a{b} and $a[2] would have existed (but $a[2]'s value would have been
       undefined).

   Group vector changeable with $)
       The $) special variable has always (well, in Perl 5, at least) reflected not only the
       current effective group, but also the group list as returned by the "getgroups()" C
       function (if there is one).  However, until this release, there has not been a way to call
       the "setgroups()" C function from Perl.

       In Perl 5.004, assigning to $) is exactly symmetrical with examining it: The first number
       in its string value is used as the effective gid; if there are any numbers after the first
       one, they are passed to the "setgroups()" C function (if there is one).

   Fixed parsing of $$<digit>, &$<digit>, etc.
       Perl versions before 5.004 misinterpreted any type marker followed by "$" and a digit.
       For example, "$$0" was incorrectly taken to mean "${$}0" instead of "${$0}".  This bug is
       (mostly) fixed in Perl 5.004.

       However, the developers of Perl 5.004 could not fix this bug completely, because at least
       two widely-used modules depend on the old meaning of "$$0" in a string.  So Perl 5.004
       still interprets "$$<digit>" in the old (broken) way inside strings; but it generates this
       message as a warning.  And in Perl 5.005, this special treatment will cease.

   Fixed localization of $<digit>, $&, etc.
       Perl versions before 5.004 did not always properly localize the regex-related special
       variables.  Perl 5.004 does localize them, as the documentation has always said it should.
       This may result in $1, $2, etc. no longer being set where existing programs use them.

   No resetting of $. on implicit close
       The documentation for Perl 5.0 has always stated that $. is not reset when an already-open
       file handle is reopened with no intervening call to "close".  Due to a bug, perl versions
       5.000 through 5.003 did reset $. under that circumstance; Perl 5.004 does not.

   "wantarray" may return undef
       The "wantarray" operator returns true if a subroutine is expected to return a list, and
       false otherwise.  In Perl 5.004, "wantarray" can also return the undefined value if a
       subroutine's return value will not be used at all, which allows subroutines to avoid a
       time-consuming calculation of a return value if it isn't going to be used.

   "eval EXPR" determines value of EXPR in scalar context
       Perl (version 5) used to determine the value of EXPR inconsistently, sometimes incorrectly
       using the surrounding context for the determination.  Now, the value of EXPR (before being
       parsed by eval) is always determined in a scalar context.  Once parsed, it is executed as
       before, by providing the context that the scope surrounding the eval provided.  This
       change makes the behavior Perl4 compatible, besides fixing bugs resulting from the
       inconsistent behavior.  This program:

           @a = qw(time now is time);
           print eval @a;
           print '|', scalar eval @a;

       used to print something like "timenowis881399109|4", but now (and in perl4) prints "4|4".

   Changes to tainting checks
       A bug in previous versions may have failed to detect some insecure conditions when taint
       checks are turned on.  (Taint checks are used in setuid or setgid scripts, or when
       explicitly turned on with the "-T" invocation option.)  Although it's unlikely, this may
       cause a previously-working script to now fail, which should be construed as a blessing
       since that indicates a potentially-serious security hole was just plugged.

       The new restrictions when tainting include:

       No glob() or <*>
           These operators may spawn the C shell (csh), which cannot be made safe.  This
           restriction will be lifted in a future version of Perl when globbing is implemented
           without the use of an external program.

       No spawning if tainted $CDPATH, $ENV, $BASH_ENV
           These environment variables may alter the behavior of spawned programs (especially
           shells) in ways that subvert security.  So now they are treated as dangerous, in the
           manner of $IFS and $PATH.

       No spawning if tainted $TERM doesn't look like a terminal name
           Some termcap libraries do unsafe things with $TERM.  However, it would be
           unnecessarily harsh to treat all $TERM values as unsafe, since only shell
           metacharacters can cause trouble in $TERM.  So a tainted $TERM is considered to be
           safe if it contains only alphanumerics, underscores, dashes, and colons, and unsafe if
           it contains other characters (including whitespace).

   New Opcode module and revised Safe module
       A new Opcode module supports the creation, manipulation and application of opcode masks.
       The revised Safe module has a new API and is implemented using the new Opcode module.
       Please read the new Opcode and Safe documentation.

   Embedding improvements
       In older versions of Perl it was not possible to create more than one Perl interpreter
       instance inside a single process without leaking like a sieve and/or crashing.  The bugs
       that caused this behavior have all been fixed.  However, you still must take care when
       embedding Perl in a C program.  See the updated perlembed manpage for tips on how to
       manage your interpreters.

   Internal change: FileHandle class based on IO::* classes
       File handles are now stored internally as type IO::Handle.  The FileHandle module is still
       supported for backwards compatibility, but it is now merely a front end to the IO::*
       modules, specifically IO::Handle, IO::Seekable, and IO::File.  We suggest, but do not
       require, that you use the IO::* modules in new code.

       In harmony with this change, *GLOB{FILEHANDLE} is now just a backward-compatible synonym
       for *GLOB{IO}.

   Internal change: PerlIO abstraction interface
       It is now possible to build Perl with AT&T's sfio IO package instead of stdio.  See
       perlapio for more details, and the INSTALL file for how to use it.

   New and changed syntax
       $coderef->(PARAMS)
           A subroutine reference may now be suffixed with an arrow and a (possibly empty)
           parameter list.  This syntax denotes a call of the referenced subroutine, with the
           given parameters (if any).

           This new syntax follows the pattern of "$hashref->{FOO}" and "$aryref->[$foo]": You
           may now write "&$subref($foo)" as "$subref->($foo)".  All these arrow terms may be
           chained; thus, "&{$table->{FOO}}($bar)" may now be written "$table->{FOO}->($bar)".

   New and changed builtin constants
       __PACKAGE__
           The current package name at compile time, or the undefined value if there is no
           current package (due to a "package;" directive).  Like "__FILE__" and "__LINE__",
           "__PACKAGE__" does not interpolate into strings.

   New and changed builtin variables
       $^E Extended error message on some platforms.  (Also known as $EXTENDED_OS_ERROR if you
           "use English").

       $^H The current set of syntax checks enabled by "use strict".  See the documentation of
           "strict" for more details.  Not actually new, but newly documented.  Because it is
           intended for internal use by Perl core components, there is no "use English" long name
           for this variable.

       $^M By default, running out of memory it is not trappable.  However, if compiled for this,
           Perl may use the contents of $^M as an emergency pool after die()ing with this
           message.  Suppose that your Perl were compiled with -DPERL_EMERGENCY_SBRK and used
           Perl's malloc.  Then

               $^M = 'a' x (1<<16);

           would allocate a 64K buffer for use when in emergency.  See the INSTALL file for
           information on how to enable this option.  As a disincentive to casual use of this
           advanced feature, there is no "use English" long name for this variable.

   New and changed builtin functions
       delete on slices
           This now works.  (e.g. "delete @ENV{'PATH', 'MANPATH'}")

       flock
           is now supported on more platforms, prefers fcntl to lockf when emulating, and always
           flushes before (un)locking.

       printf and sprintf
           Perl now implements these functions itself; it doesn't use the C library function
           sprintf() any more, except for floating-point numbers, and even then only known flags
           are allowed.  As a result, it is now possible to know which conversions and flags will
           work, and what they will do.

           The new conversions in Perl's sprintf() are:

              %i   a synonym for %d
              %p   a pointer (the address of the Perl value, in hexadecimal)
              %n   special: *stores* the number of characters output so far
                   into the next variable in the parameter list

           The new flags that go between the "%" and the conversion are:

              #    prefix octal with "0", hex with "0x"
              h    interpret integer as C type "short" or "unsigned short"
              V    interpret integer as Perl's standard integer type

           Also, where a number would appear in the flags, an asterisk ("*") may be used instead,
           in which case Perl uses the next item in the parameter list as the given number (that
           is, as the field width or precision).  If a field width obtained through "*" is
           negative, it has the same effect as the '-' flag: left-justification.

           See "sprintf" in perlfunc for a complete list of conversion and flags.

       keys as an lvalue
           As an lvalue, "keys" allows you to increase the number of hash buckets allocated for
           the given hash.  This can gain you a measure of efficiency if you know the hash is
           going to get big.  (This is similar to pre-extending an array by assigning a larger
           number to $#array.)  If you say

               keys %hash = 200;

           then %hash will have at least 200 buckets allocated for it.  These buckets will be
           retained even if you do "%hash = ()"; use "undef %hash" if you want to free the
           storage while %hash is still in scope.  You can't shrink the number of buckets
           allocated for the hash using "keys" in this way (but you needn't worry about doing
           this by accident, as trying has no effect).

       my() in Control Structures
           You can now use my() (with or without the parentheses) in the control expressions of
           control structures such as:

               while (defined(my $line = <>)) {
                   $line = lc $line;
               } continue {
                   print $line;
               }

               if ((my $answer = <STDIN>) =~ /^y(es)?$/i) {
                   user_agrees();
               } elsif ($answer =~ /^n(o)?$/i) {
                   user_disagrees();
               } else {
                   chomp $answer;
                   die "`$answer' is neither `yes' nor `no'";
               }

           Also, you can declare a foreach loop control variable as lexical by preceding it with
           the word "my".  For example, in:

               foreach my $i (1, 2, 3) {
                   some_function();
               }

           $i is a lexical variable, and the scope of $i extends to the end of the loop, but not
           beyond it.

           Note that you still cannot use my() on global punctuation variables such as $_ and the
           like.

       pack() and unpack()
           A new format 'w' represents a BER compressed integer (as defined in ASN.1).  Its
           format is a sequence of one or more bytes, each of which provides seven bits of the
           total value, with the most significant first.  Bit eight of each byte is set, except
           for the last byte, in which bit eight is clear.

           If 'p' or 'P' are given undef as values, they now generate a NULL pointer.

           Both pack() and unpack() now fail when their templates contain invalid types.
           (Invalid types used to be ignored.)

       sysseek()
           The new sysseek() operator is a variant of seek() that sets and gets the file's system
           read/write position, using the lseek(2) system call.  It is the only reliable way to
           seek before using sysread() or syswrite().  Its return value is the new position, or
           the undefined value on failure.

       use VERSION
           If the first argument to "use" is a number, it is treated as a version number instead
           of a module name.  If the version of the Perl interpreter is less than VERSION, then
           an error message is printed and Perl exits immediately.  Because "use" occurs at
           compile time, this check happens immediately during the compilation process, unlike
           "require VERSION", which waits until runtime for the check.  This is often useful if
           you need to check the current Perl version before "use"ing library modules which have
           changed in incompatible ways from older versions of Perl.  (We try not to do this more
           than we have to.)

       use Module VERSION LIST
           If the VERSION argument is present between Module and LIST, then the "use" will call
           the VERSION method in class Module with the given version as an argument.  The default
           VERSION method, inherited from the UNIVERSAL class, croaks if the given version is
           larger than the value of the variable $Module::VERSION.  (Note that there is not a
           comma after VERSION!)

           This version-checking mechanism is similar to the one currently used in the Exporter
           module, but it is faster and can be used with modules that don't use the Exporter.  It
           is the recommended method for new code.

       prototype(FUNCTION)
           Returns the prototype of a function as a string (or "undef" if the function has no
           prototype).  FUNCTION is a reference to or the name of the function whose prototype
           you want to retrieve.  (Not actually new; just never documented before.)

       srand
           The default seed for "srand", which used to be "time", has been changed.  Now it's a
           heady mix of difficult-to-predict system-dependent values, which should be sufficient
           for most everyday purposes.

           Previous to version 5.004, calling "rand" without first calling "srand" would yield
           the same sequence of random numbers on most or all machines.  Now, when perl sees that
           you're calling "rand" and haven't yet called "srand", it calls "srand" with the
           default seed. You should still call "srand" manually if your code might ever be run on
           a pre-5.004 system, of course, or if you want a seed other than the default.

       $_ as Default
           Functions documented in the Camel to default to $_ now in fact do, and all those that
           do are so documented in perlfunc.

       "m//gc" does not reset search position on failure
           The "m//g" match iteration construct has always reset its target string's search
           position (which is visible through the "pos" operator) when a match fails; as a
           result, the next "m//g" match after a failure starts again at the beginning of the
           string.  With Perl 5.004, this reset may be disabled by adding the "c" (for
           "continue") modifier, i.e. "m//gc".  This feature, in conjunction with the "\G" zero-
           width assertion, makes it possible to chain matches together.  See perlop and perlre.

       "m//x" ignores whitespace before ?*+{}
           The "m//x" construct has always been intended to ignore all unescaped whitespace.
           However, before Perl 5.004, whitespace had the effect of escaping repeat modifiers
           like "*" or "?"; for example, "/a *b/x" was (mis)interpreted as "/a\*b/x".  This bug
           has been fixed in 5.004.

       nested "sub{}" closures work now
           Prior to the 5.004 release, nested anonymous functions didn't work right.  They do
           now.

       formats work right on changing lexicals
           Just like anonymous functions that contain lexical variables that change (like a
           lexical index variable for a "foreach" loop), formats now work properly.  For example,
           this silently failed before (printed only zeros), but is fine now:

               my $i;
               foreach $i ( 1 .. 10 ) {
                   write;
               }
               format =
                   my i is @#
                   $i
               .

           However, it still fails (without a warning) if the foreach is within a subroutine:

               my $i;
               sub foo {
                 foreach $i ( 1 .. 10 ) {
                   write;
                 }
               }
               foo;
               format =
                   my i is @#
                   $i
               .

   New builtin methods
       The "UNIVERSAL" package automatically contains the following methods that are inherited by
       all other classes:

       isa(CLASS)
           "isa" returns true if its object is blessed into a subclass of "CLASS"

           "isa" is also exportable and can be called as a sub with two arguments. This allows
           the ability to check what a reference points to. Example:

               use UNIVERSAL qw(isa);

               if(isa($ref, 'ARRAY')) {
                  ...
               }

       can(METHOD)
           "can" checks to see if its object has a method called "METHOD", if it does then a
           reference to the sub is returned; if it does not then undef is returned.

       VERSION( [NEED] )
           "VERSION" returns the version number of the class (package).  If the NEED argument is
           given then it will check that the current version (as defined by the $VERSION variable
           in the given package) not less than NEED; it will die if this is not the case.  This
           method is normally called as a class method.  This method is called automatically by
           the "VERSION" form of "use".

               use A 1.2 qw(some imported subs);
               # implies:
               A->VERSION(1.2);

       NOTE: "can" directly uses Perl's internal code for method lookup, and "isa" uses a very
       similar method and caching strategy. This may cause strange effects if the Perl code
       dynamically changes @ISA in any package.

       You may add other methods to the UNIVERSAL class via Perl or XS code.  You do not need to
       "use UNIVERSAL" in order to make these methods available to your program.  This is
       necessary only if you wish to have "isa" available as a plain subroutine in the current
       package.

   TIEHANDLE now supported
       See perltie for other kinds of tie()s.

       TIEHANDLE classname, LIST
           This is the constructor for the class.  That means it is expected to return an object
           of some sort. The reference can be used to hold some internal information.

               sub TIEHANDLE {
                   print "<shout>\n";
                   my $i;
                   return bless \$i, shift;
               }

       PRINT this, LIST
           This method will be triggered every time the tied handle is printed to.  Beyond its
           self reference it also expects the list that was passed to the print function.

               sub PRINT {
                   $r = shift;
                   $$r++;
                   return print join( $, => map {uc} @_), $\;
               }

       PRINTF this, LIST
           This method will be triggered every time the tied handle is printed to with the
           "printf()" function.  Beyond its self reference it also expects the format and list
           that was passed to the printf function.

               sub PRINTF {
                   shift;
                     my $fmt = shift;
                   print sprintf($fmt, @_)."\n";
               }

       READ this LIST
           This method will be called when the handle is read from via the "read" or "sysread"
           functions.

               sub READ {
                   $r = shift;
                   my($buf,$len,$offset) = @_;
                   print "READ called, \$buf=$buf, \$len=$len, \$offset=$offset";
               }

       READLINE this
           This method will be called when the handle is read from. The method should return
           undef when there is no more data.

               sub READLINE {
                   $r = shift;
                   return "PRINT called $$r times\n"
               }

       GETC this
           This method will be called when the "getc" function is called.

               sub GETC { print "Don't GETC, Get Perl"; return "a"; }

       DESTROY this
           As with the other types of ties, this method will be called when the tied handle is
           about to be destroyed. This is useful for debugging and possibly for cleaning up.

               sub DESTROY {
                   print "</shout>\n";
               }

   Malloc enhancements
       If perl is compiled with the malloc included with the perl distribution (that is, if "perl
       -V:d_mymalloc" is 'define') then you can print memory statistics at runtime by running
       Perl thusly:

         env PERL_DEBUG_MSTATS=2 perl your_script_here

       The value of 2 means to print statistics after compilation and on exit; with a value of 1,
       the statistics are printed only on exit.  (If you want the statistics at an arbitrary
       time, you'll need to install the optional module Devel::Peek.)

       Three new compilation flags are recognized by malloc.c.  (They have no effect if perl is
       compiled with system malloc().)

       -DPERL_EMERGENCY_SBRK
           If this macro is defined, running out of memory need not be a fatal error: a memory
           pool can allocated by assigning to the special variable $^M.  See "$^M".

       -DPACK_MALLOC
           Perl memory allocation is by bucket with sizes close to powers of two.  Because of
           these malloc overhead may be big, especially for data of size exactly a power of two.
           If "PACK_MALLOC" is defined, perl uses a slightly different algorithm for small
           allocations (up to 64 bytes long), which makes it possible to have overhead down to 1
           byte for allocations which are powers of two (and appear quite often).

           Expected memory savings (with 8-byte alignment in "alignbytes") is about 20% for
           typical Perl usage.  Expected slowdown due to additional malloc overhead is in
           fractions of a percent (hard to measure, because of the effect of saved memory on
           speed).

       -DTWO_POT_OPTIMIZE
           Similarly to "PACK_MALLOC", this macro improves allocations of data with size close to
           a power of two; but this works for big allocations (starting with 16K by default).
           Such allocations are typical for big hashes and special-purpose scripts, especially
           image processing.

           On recent systems, the fact that perl requires 2M from system for 1M allocation will
           not affect speed of execution, since the tail of such a chunk is not going to be
           touched (and thus will not require real memory).  However, it may result in a
           premature out-of-memory error.  So if you will be manipulating very large blocks with
           sizes close to powers of two, it would be wise to define this macro.

           Expected saving of memory is 0-100% (100% in applications which require most memory in
           such 2**n chunks); expected slowdown is negligible.

   Miscellaneous efficiency enhancements
       Functions that have an empty prototype and that do nothing but return a fixed value are
       now inlined (e.g. "sub PI () { 3.14159 }").

       Each unique hash key is only allocated once, no matter how many hashes have an entry with
       that key.  So even if you have 100 copies of the same hash, the hash keys never have to be
       reallocated.

Support for More Operating Systems

       Support for the following operating systems is new in Perl 5.004.

   Win32
       Perl 5.004 now includes support for building a "native" perl under Windows NT, using the
       Microsoft Visual C++ compiler (versions 2.0 and above) or the Borland C++ compiler
       (versions 5.02 and above).  The resulting perl can be used under Windows 95 (if it is
       installed in the same directory locations as it got installed in Windows NT).  This port
       includes support for perl extension building tools like ExtUtils::MakeMaker and h2xs, so
       that many extensions available on the Comprehensive Perl Archive Network (CPAN) can now be
       readily built under Windows NT.  See http://www.perl.com/ for more information on CPAN and
       README.win32 in the perl distribution for more details on how to get started with building
       this port.

       There is also support for building perl under the Cygwin32 environment.  Cygwin32 is a set
       of GNU tools that make it possible to compile and run many Unix programs under Windows NT
       by providing a mostly Unix-like interface for compilation and execution.  See
       README.cygwin32 in the perl distribution for more details on this port and how to obtain
       the Cygwin32 toolkit.

   Plan 9
       See README.plan9 in the perl distribution.

   QNX
       See README.qnx in the perl distribution.

   AmigaOS
       See README.amigaos in the perl distribution.

Pragmata

       Six new pragmatic modules exist:

       use autouse MODULE => qw(sub1 sub2 sub3)
           Defers "require MODULE" until someone calls one of the specified subroutines (which
           must be exported by MODULE).  This pragma should be used with caution, and only when
           necessary.

       use blib
       use blib 'dir'
           Looks for MakeMaker-like 'blib' directory structure starting in dir (or current
           directory) and working back up to five levels of parent directories.

           Intended for use on command line with -M option as a way of testing arbitrary scripts
           against an uninstalled version of a package.

       use constant NAME => VALUE
           Provides a convenient interface for creating compile-time constants, See "Constant
           Functions" in perlsub.

       use locale
           Tells the compiler to enable (or disable) the use of POSIX locales for builtin
           operations.

           When "use locale" is in effect, the current LC_CTYPE locale is used for regular
           expressions and case mapping; LC_COLLATE for string ordering; and LC_NUMERIC for
           numeric formatting in printf and sprintf (but not in print).  LC_NUMERIC is always
           used in write, since lexical scoping of formats is problematic at best.

           Each "use locale" or "no locale" affects statements to the end of the enclosing BLOCK
           or, if not inside a BLOCK, to the end of the current file.  Locales can be switched
           and queried with POSIX::setlocale().

           See perllocale for more information.

       use ops
           Disable unsafe opcodes, or any named opcodes, when compiling Perl code.

       use vmsish
           Enable VMS-specific language features.  Currently, there are three VMS-specific
           features available: 'status', which makes $? and "system" return genuine VMS status
           values instead of emulating POSIX; 'exit', which makes "exit" take a genuine VMS
           status value instead of assuming that "exit 1" is an error; and 'time', which makes
           all times relative to the local time zone, in the VMS tradition.

Modules

   Required Updates
       Though Perl 5.004 is compatible with almost all modules that work with Perl 5.003, there
       are a few exceptions:

           Module   Required Version for Perl 5.004
           ------   -------------------------------
           Filter   Filter-1.12
           LWP      libwww-perl-5.08
           Tk       Tk400.202 (-w makes noise)

       Also, the majordomo mailing list program, version 1.94.1, doesn't work with Perl 5.004
       (nor with perl 4), because it executes an invalid regular expression.  This bug is fixed
       in majordomo version 1.94.2.

   Installation directories
       The installperl script now places the Perl source files for extensions in the
       architecture-specific library directory, which is where the shared libraries for
       extensions have always been.  This change is intended to allow administrators to keep the
       Perl 5.004 library directory unchanged from a previous version, without running the risk
       of binary incompatibility between extensions' Perl source and shared libraries.

   Module information summary
       Brand new modules, arranged by topic rather than strictly alphabetically:

           CGI.pm               Web server interface ("Common Gateway Interface")
           CGI/Apache.pm        Support for Apache's Perl module
           CGI/Carp.pm          Log server errors with helpful context
           CGI/Fast.pm          Support for FastCGI (persistent server process)
           CGI/Push.pm          Support for server push
           CGI/Switch.pm        Simple interface for multiple server types

           CPAN                 Interface to Comprehensive Perl Archive Network
           CPAN::FirstTime      Utility for creating CPAN configuration file
           CPAN::Nox            Runs CPAN while avoiding compiled extensions

           IO.pm                Top-level interface to IO::* classes
           IO/File.pm           IO::File extension Perl module
           IO/Handle.pm         IO::Handle extension Perl module
           IO/Pipe.pm           IO::Pipe extension Perl module
           IO/Seekable.pm       IO::Seekable extension Perl module
           IO/Select.pm         IO::Select extension Perl module
           IO/Socket.pm         IO::Socket extension Perl module

           Opcode.pm            Disable named opcodes when compiling Perl code

           ExtUtils/Embed.pm    Utilities for embedding Perl in C programs
           ExtUtils/testlib.pm  Fixes up @INC to use just-built extension

           FindBin.pm           Find path of currently executing program

           Class/Struct.pm      Declare struct-like datatypes as Perl classes
           File/stat.pm         By-name interface to Perl's builtin stat
           Net/hostent.pm       By-name interface to Perl's builtin gethost*
           Net/netent.pm        By-name interface to Perl's builtin getnet*
           Net/protoent.pm      By-name interface to Perl's builtin getproto*
           Net/servent.pm       By-name interface to Perl's builtin getserv*
           Time/gmtime.pm       By-name interface to Perl's builtin gmtime
           Time/localtime.pm    By-name interface to Perl's builtin localtime
           Time/tm.pm           Internal object for Time::{gm,local}time
           User/grent.pm        By-name interface to Perl's builtin getgr*
           User/pwent.pm        By-name interface to Perl's builtin getpw*

           Tie/RefHash.pm       Base class for tied hashes with references as keys

           UNIVERSAL.pm         Base class for *ALL* classes

   Fcntl
       New constants in the existing Fcntl modules are now supported, provided that your
       operating system happens to support them:

           F_GETOWN F_SETOWN
           O_ASYNC O_DEFER O_DSYNC O_FSYNC O_SYNC
           O_EXLOCK O_SHLOCK

       These constants are intended for use with the Perl operators sysopen() and fcntl() and the
       basic database modules like SDBM_File.  For the exact meaning of these and other Fcntl
       constants please refer to your operating system's documentation for fcntl() and open().

       In addition, the Fcntl module now provides these constants for use with the Perl operator
       flock():

               LOCK_SH LOCK_EX LOCK_NB LOCK_UN

       These constants are defined in all environments (because where there is no flock() system
       call, Perl emulates it).  However, for historical reasons, these constants are not
       exported unless they are explicitly requested with the ":flock" tag (e.g. "use Fcntl
       ':flock'").

   IO
       The IO module provides a simple mechanism to load all the IO modules at one go.  Currently
       this includes:

            IO::Handle
            IO::Seekable
            IO::File
            IO::Pipe
            IO::Socket

       For more information on any of these modules, please see its respective documentation.

   Math::Complex
       The Math::Complex module has been totally rewritten, and now supports more operations.
       These are overloaded:

            + - * / ** <=> neg ~ abs sqrt exp log sin cos atan2 "" (stringify)

       And these functions are now exported:

           pi i Re Im arg
           log10 logn ln cbrt root
           tan
           csc sec cot
           asin acos atan
           acsc asec acot
           sinh cosh tanh
           csch sech coth
           asinh acosh atanh
           acsch asech acoth
           cplx cplxe

   Math::Trig
       This new module provides a simpler interface to parts of Math::Complex for those who need
       trigonometric functions only for real numbers.

   DB_File
       There have been quite a few changes made to DB_File. Here are a few of the highlights:

       •   Fixed a handful of bugs.

       •   By public demand, added support for the standard hash function exists().

       •   Made it compatible with Berkeley DB 1.86.

       •   Made negative subscripts work with RECNO interface.

       •   Changed the default flags from O_RDWR to O_CREAT|O_RDWR and the default mode from 0640
           to 0666.

       •   Made DB_File automatically import the open() constants (O_RDWR, O_CREAT etc.) from
           Fcntl, if available.

       •   Updated documentation.

       Refer to the HISTORY section in DB_File.pm for a complete list of changes. Everything
       after DB_File 1.01 has been added since 5.003.

   Net::Ping
       Major rewrite - support added for both udp echo and real icmp pings.

   Object-oriented overrides for builtin operators
       Many of the Perl builtins returning lists now have object-oriented overrides.  These are:

           File::stat
           Net::hostent
           Net::netent
           Net::protoent
           Net::servent
           Time::gmtime
           Time::localtime
           User::grent
           User::pwent

       For example, you can now say

           use File::stat;
           use User::pwent;
           $his = (stat($filename)->st_uid == pwent($whoever)->pw_uid);

Utility Changes

   pod2html
       Sends converted HTML to standard output
           The pod2html utility included with Perl 5.004 is entirely new.  By default, it sends
           the converted HTML to its standard output, instead of writing it to a file like Perl
           5.003's pod2html did.  Use the --outfile=FILENAME option to write to a file.

   xsubpp
       "void" XSUBs now default to returning nothing
           Due to a documentation/implementation bug in previous versions of Perl, XSUBs with a
           return type of "void" have actually been returning one value.  Usually that value was
           the GV for the XSUB, but sometimes it was some already freed or reused value, which
           would sometimes lead to program failure.

           In Perl 5.004, if an XSUB is declared as returning "void", it actually returns no
           value, i.e. an empty list (though there is a backward-compatibility exception; see
           below).  If your XSUB really does return an SV, you should give it a return type of
           "SV *".

           For backward compatibility, xsubpp tries to guess whether a "void" XSUB is really
           "void" or if it wants to return an "SV *".  It does so by examining the text of the
           XSUB: if xsubpp finds what looks like an assignment to ST(0), it assumes that the
           XSUB's return type is really "SV *".

C Language API Changes

       "gv_fetchmethod" and "perl_call_sv"
           The "gv_fetchmethod" function finds a method for an object, just like in Perl 5.003.
           The GV it returns may be a method cache entry.  However, in Perl 5.004, method cache
           entries are not visible to users; therefore, they can no longer be passed directly to
           "perl_call_sv".  Instead, you should use the "GvCV" macro on the GV to extract its CV,
           and pass the CV to "perl_call_sv".

           The most likely symptom of passing the result of "gv_fetchmethod" to "perl_call_sv" is
           Perl's producing an "Undefined subroutine called" error on the second call to a given
           method (since there is no cache on the first call).

       "perl_eval_pv"
           A new function handy for eval'ing strings of Perl code inside C code.  This function
           returns the value from the eval statement, which can be used instead of fetching
           globals from the symbol table.  See perlguts, perlembed and perlcall for details and
           examples.

       Extended API for manipulating hashes
           Internal handling of hash keys has changed.  The old hashtable API is still fully
           supported, and will likely remain so.  The additions to the API allow passing keys as
           "SV*"s, so that "tied" hashes can be given real scalars as keys rather than plain
           strings (nontied hashes still can only use strings as keys).  New extensions must use
           the new hash access functions and macros if they wish to use "SV*" keys.  These
           additions also make it feasible to manipulate "HE*"s (hash entries), which can be more
           efficient.  See perlguts for details.

Documentation Changes

       Many of the base and library pods were updated.  These new pods are included in section 1:

       perldelta
           This document.

       perlfaq
           Frequently asked questions.

       perllocale
           Locale support (internationalization and localization).

       perltoot
           Tutorial on Perl OO programming.

       perlapio
           Perl internal IO abstraction interface.

       perlmodlib
           Perl module library and recommended practice for module creation.  Extracted from
           perlmod (which is much smaller as a result).

       perldebug
           Although not new, this has been massively updated.

       perlsec
           Although not new, this has been massively updated.

New Diagnostics

       Several new conditions will trigger warnings that were silent before.  Some only affect
       certain platforms.  The following new warnings and errors outline these.  These messages
       are classified as follows (listed in increasing order of desperation):

          (W) A warning (optional).
          (D) A deprecation (optional).
          (S) A severe warning (mandatory).
          (F) A fatal error (trappable).
          (P) An internal error you should never see (trappable).
          (X) A very fatal error (nontrappable).
          (A) An alien error message (not generated by Perl).

       "my" variable %s masks earlier declaration in same scope
           (W) A lexical variable has been redeclared in the same scope, effectively eliminating
           all access to the previous instance.  This is almost always a typographical error.
           Note that the earlier variable will still exist until the end of the scope or until
           all closure referents to it are destroyed.

       %s argument is not a HASH element or slice
           (F) The argument to delete() must be either a hash element, such as

               $foo{$bar}
               $ref->[12]->{"susie"}

           or a hash slice, such as

               @foo{$bar, $baz, $xyzzy}
               @{$ref->[12]}{"susie", "queue"}

       Allocation too large: %lx
           (X) You can't allocate more than 64K on an MS-DOS machine.

       Allocation too large
           (F) You can't allocate more than 2^31+"small amount" bytes.

       Applying %s to %s will act on scalar(%s)
           (W) The pattern match (//), substitution (s///), and transliteration (tr///) operators
           work on scalar values.  If you apply one of them to an array or a hash, it will
           convert the array or hash to a scalar value (the length of an array or the population
           info of a hash) and then work on that scalar value.  This is probably not what you
           meant to do.  See "grep" in perlfunc and "map" in perlfunc for alternatives.

       Attempt to free nonexistent shared string
           (P) Perl maintains a reference counted internal table of strings to optimize the
           storage and access of hash keys and other strings.  This indicates someone tried to
           decrement the reference count of a string that can no longer be found in the table.

       Attempt to use reference as lvalue in substr
           (W) You supplied a reference as the first argument to substr() used as an lvalue,
           which is pretty strange.  Perhaps you forgot to dereference it first.  See "substr" in
           perlfunc.

       Bareword "%s" refers to nonexistent package
           (W) You used a qualified bareword of the form "Foo::", but the compiler saw no other
           uses of that namespace before that point.  Perhaps you need to predeclare a package?

       Can't redefine active sort subroutine %s
           (F) Perl optimizes the internal handling of sort subroutines and keeps pointers into
           them.  You tried to redefine one such sort subroutine when it was currently active,
           which is not allowed.  If you really want to do this, you should write "sort { &func }
           @x" instead of "sort func @x".

       Can't use bareword ("%s") as %s ref while "strict refs" in use
           (F) Only hard references are allowed by "strict refs".  Symbolic references are
           disallowed.  See perlref.

       Cannot resolve method `%s' overloading `%s' in package `%s'
           (P) Internal error trying to resolve overloading specified by a method name (as
           opposed to a subroutine reference).

       Constant subroutine %s redefined
           (S) You redefined a subroutine which had previously been eligible for inlining.  See
           "Constant Functions" in perlsub for commentary and workarounds.

       Constant subroutine %s undefined
           (S) You undefined a subroutine which had previously been eligible for inlining.  See
           "Constant Functions" in perlsub for commentary and workarounds.

       Copy method did not return a reference
           (F) The method which overloads "=" is buggy. See "Copy Constructor" in overload.

       Died
           (F) You passed die() an empty string (the equivalent of "die """) or you called it
           with no args and both $@ and $_ were empty.

       Exiting pseudo-block via %s
           (W) You are exiting a rather special block construct (like a sort block or subroutine)
           by unconventional means, such as a goto, or a loop control statement.  See "sort" in
           perlfunc.

       Identifier too long
           (F) Perl limits identifiers (names for variables, functions, etc.) to 252 characters
           for simple names, somewhat more for compound names (like $A::B).  You've exceeded
           Perl's limits.  Future versions of Perl are likely to eliminate these arbitrary
           limitations.

       Illegal character %s (carriage return)
           (F) A carriage return character was found in the input.  This is an error, and not a
           warning, because carriage return characters can break multi-line strings, including
           here documents (e.g., "print <<EOF;").

       Illegal switch in PERL5OPT: %s
           (X) The PERL5OPT environment variable may only be used to set the following switches:
           -[DIMUdmw].

       Integer overflow in hex number
           (S) The literal hex number you have specified is too big for your architecture. On a
           32-bit architecture the largest hex literal is 0xFFFFFFFF.

       Integer overflow in octal number
           (S) The literal octal number you have specified is too big for your architecture. On a
           32-bit architecture the largest octal literal is 037777777777.

       internal error: glob failed
           (P) Something went wrong with the external program(s) used for "glob" and "<*.c>".
           This may mean that your csh (C shell) is broken.  If so, you should change all of the
           csh-related variables in config.sh:  If you have tcsh, make the variables refer to it
           as if it were csh (e.g. "full_csh='/usr/bin/tcsh'"); otherwise, make them all empty
           (except that "d_csh" should be 'undef') so that Perl will think csh is missing.  In
           either case, after editing config.sh, run "./Configure -S" and rebuild Perl.

       Invalid conversion in %s: "%s"
           (W) Perl does not understand the given format conversion.  See "sprintf" in perlfunc.

       Invalid type in pack: '%s'
           (F) The given character is not a valid pack type.  See "pack" in perlfunc.

       Invalid type in unpack: '%s'
           (F) The given character is not a valid unpack type.  See "unpack" in perlfunc.

       Name "%s::%s" used only once: possible typo
           (W) Typographical errors often show up as unique variable names.  If you had a good
           reason for having a unique name, then just mention it again somehow to suppress the
           message (the "use vars" pragma is provided for just this purpose).

       Null picture in formline
           (F) The first argument to formline must be a valid format picture specification.  It
           was found to be empty, which probably means you supplied it an uninitialized value.
           See perlform.

       Offset outside string
           (F) You tried to do a read/write/send/recv operation with an offset pointing outside
           the buffer.  This is difficult to imagine.  The sole exception to this is that
           "sysread()"ing past the buffer will extend the buffer and zero pad the new area.

       Out of memory!
           (X|F) The malloc() function returned 0, indicating there was insufficient remaining
           memory (or virtual memory) to satisfy the request.

           The request was judged to be small, so the possibility to trap it depends on the way
           Perl was compiled.  By default it is not trappable.  However, if compiled for this,
           Perl may use the contents of $^M as an emergency pool after die()ing with this
           message.  In this case the error is trappable once.

       Out of memory during request for %s
           (F) The malloc() function returned 0, indicating there was insufficient remaining
           memory (or virtual memory) to satisfy the request. However, the request was judged
           large enough (compile-time default is 64K), so a possibility to shut down by trapping
           this error is granted.

       panic: frexp
           (P) The library function frexp() failed, making printf("%f") impossible.

       Possible attempt to put comments in qw() list
           (W) qw() lists contain items separated by whitespace; as with literal strings, comment
           characters are not ignored, but are instead treated as literal data.  (You may have
           used different delimiters than the parentheses shown here; braces are also frequently
           used.)

           You probably wrote something like this:

               @list = qw(
                   a # a comment
                   b # another comment
               );

           when you should have written this:

               @list = qw(
                   a
                   b
               );

           If you really want comments, build your list the old-fashioned way, with quotes and
           commas:

               @list = (
                   'a',    # a comment
                   'b',    # another comment
               );

       Possible attempt to separate words with commas
           (W) qw() lists contain items separated by whitespace; therefore commas aren't needed
           to separate the items. (You may have used different delimiters than the parentheses
           shown here; braces are also frequently used.)

           You probably wrote something like this:

               qw! a, b, c !;

           which puts literal commas into some of the list items.  Write it without commas if you
           don't want them to appear in your data:

               qw! a b c !;

       Scalar value @%s{%s} better written as $%s{%s}
           (W) You've used a hash slice (indicated by @) to select a single element of a hash.
           Generally it's better to ask for a scalar value (indicated by $).  The difference is
           that $foo{&bar} always behaves like a scalar, both when assigning to it and when
           evaluating its argument, while @foo{&bar} behaves like a list when you assign to it,
           and provides a list context to its subscript, which can do weird things if you're
           expecting only one subscript.

       Stub found while resolving method `%s' overloading `%s' in %s
           (P) Overloading resolution over @ISA tree may be broken by importing stubs.  Stubs
           should never be implicitly created, but explicit calls to "can" may break this.

       Too late for "-T" option
           (X) The #! line (or local equivalent) in a Perl script contains the -T option, but
           Perl was not invoked with -T in its argument list.  This is an error because, by the
           time Perl discovers a -T in a script, it's too late to properly taint everything from
           the environment.  So Perl gives up.

       untie attempted while %d inner references still exist
           (W) A copy of the object returned from "tie" (or "tied") was still valid when "untie"
           was called.

       Unrecognized character %s
           (F) The Perl parser has no idea what to do with the specified character in your Perl
           script (or eval).  Perhaps you tried to run a compressed script, a binary program, or
           a directory as a Perl program.

       Unsupported function fork
           (F) Your version of executable does not support forking.

           Note that under some systems, like OS/2, there may be different flavors of Perl
           executables, some of which may support fork, some not. Try changing the name you call
           Perl by to "perl_", "perl__", and so on.

       Use of "$$<digit>" to mean "${$}<digit>" is deprecated
           (D) Perl versions before 5.004 misinterpreted any type marker followed by "$" and a
           digit.  For example, "$$0" was incorrectly taken to mean "${$}0" instead of "${$0}".
           This bug is (mostly) fixed in Perl 5.004.

           However, the developers of Perl 5.004 could not fix this bug completely, because at
           least two widely-used modules depend on the old meaning of "$$0" in a string.  So Perl
           5.004 still interprets "$$<digit>" in the old (broken) way inside strings; but it
           generates this message as a warning.  And in Perl 5.005, this special treatment will
           cease.

       Value of %s can be "0"; test with defined()
           (W) In a conditional expression, you used <HANDLE>, <*> (glob), "each()", or
           "readdir()" as a boolean value.  Each of these constructs can return a value of "0";
           that would make the conditional expression false, which is probably not what you
           intended.  When using these constructs in conditional expressions, test their values
           with the "defined" operator.

       Variable "%s" may be unavailable
           (W) An inner (nested) anonymous subroutine is inside a named subroutine, and outside
           that is another subroutine; and the anonymous (innermost) subroutine is referencing a
           lexical variable defined in the outermost subroutine.  For example:

              sub outermost { my $a; sub middle { sub { $a } } }

           If the anonymous subroutine is called or referenced (directly or indirectly) from the
           outermost subroutine, it will share the variable as you would expect.  But if the
           anonymous subroutine is called or referenced when the outermost subroutine is not
           active, it will see the value of the shared variable as it was before and during the
           *first* call to the outermost subroutine, which is probably not what you want.

           In these circumstances, it is usually best to make the middle subroutine anonymous,
           using the "sub {}" syntax.  Perl has specific support for shared variables in nested
           anonymous subroutines; a named subroutine in between interferes with this feature.

       Variable "%s" will not stay shared
           (W) An inner (nested) named subroutine is referencing a lexical variable defined in an
           outer subroutine.

           When the inner subroutine is called, it will probably see the value of the outer
           subroutine's variable as it was before and during the *first* call to the outer
           subroutine; in this case, after the first call to the outer subroutine is complete,
           the inner and outer subroutines will no longer share a common value for the variable.
           In other words, the variable will no longer be shared.

           Furthermore, if the outer subroutine is anonymous and references a lexical variable
           outside itself, then the outer and inner subroutines will never share the given
           variable.

           This problem can usually be solved by making the inner subroutine anonymous, using the
           "sub {}" syntax.  When inner anonymous subs that reference variables in outer
           subroutines are called or referenced, they are automatically rebound to the current
           values of such variables.

       Warning: something's wrong
           (W) You passed warn() an empty string (the equivalent of "warn """) or you called it
           with no args and $_ was empty.

       Ill-formed logical name |%s| in prime_env_iter
           (W) A warning peculiar to VMS.  A logical name was encountered when preparing to
           iterate over %ENV which violates the syntactic rules governing logical names.  Since
           it cannot be translated normally, it is skipped, and will not appear in %ENV.  This
           may be a benign occurrence, as some software packages might directly modify logical
           name tables and introduce nonstandard names, or it may indicate that a logical name
           table has been corrupted.

       Got an error from DosAllocMem
           (P) An error peculiar to OS/2.  Most probably you're using an obsolete version of
           Perl, and this should not happen anyway.

       Malformed PERLLIB_PREFIX
           (F) An error peculiar to OS/2.  PERLLIB_PREFIX should be of the form

               prefix1;prefix2

           or

               prefix1 prefix2

           with nonempty prefix1 and prefix2.  If "prefix1" is indeed a prefix of a builtin
           library search path, prefix2 is substituted.  The error may appear if components are
           not found, or are too long.  See "PERLLIB_PREFIX" in README.os2.

       PERL_SH_DIR too long
           (F) An error peculiar to OS/2. PERL_SH_DIR is the directory to find the "sh"-shell in.
           See "PERL_SH_DIR" in README.os2.

       Process terminated by SIG%s
           (W) This is a standard message issued by OS/2 applications, while *nix applications
           die in silence.  It is considered a feature of the OS/2 port.  One can easily disable
           this by appropriate sighandlers, see "Signals" in perlipc.  See also "Process
           terminated by SIGTERM/SIGINT" in README.os2.

BUGS

       If you find what you think is a bug, you might check the headers of recently posted
       articles in the comp.lang.perl.misc newsgroup.  There may also be information at
       http://www.perl.com/perl/ , the Perl Home Page.

       If you believe you have an unreported bug, please run the perlbug program included with
       your release.  Make sure you trim your bug down to a tiny but sufficient test case.  Your
       bug report, along with the output of "perl -V", will be sent off to <perlbug@perl.com> to
       be analysed by the Perl porting team.

SEE ALSO

       The Changes file for exhaustive details on what changed.

       The INSTALL file for how to build Perl.  This file has been significantly updated for
       5.004, so even veteran users should look through it.

       The README file for general stuff.

       The Copying file for copyright information.

HISTORY

       Constructed by Tom Christiansen, grabbing material with permission from innumerable
       contributors, with kibitzing by more than a few Perl porters.

       Last update: Wed May 14 11:14:09 EDT 1997