PERLEMBED(1) Perl Programmers Reference Guide PERLEMBED(1)
NAME
perlembed - how to embed perl in your C program
DESCRIPTION
PREAMBLE
Do you want to:
Use C from Perl?
Read perlxstut, perlxs, h2xs, perlguts, and perlapi.
Use a Unix program from Perl?
Read about back-quotes and about "system" and "exec" in perlfunc.
Use Perl from Perl?
Read about "do" in perlfunc and "eval" in perlfunc and "require" in perlfunc and "use" in perlfunc.
Use C from C?
Rethink your design.
Use Perl from C?
Read on...
ROADMAP
· Compiling your C program
· Adding a Perl interpreter to your C program
· Calling a Perl subroutine from your C program
· Evaluating a Perl statement from your C program
· Performing Perl pattern matches and substitutions from your C program
· Fiddling with the Perl stack from your C program
· Maintaining a persistent interpreter
· Maintaining multiple interpreter instances
· Using Perl modules, which themselves use C libraries, from your C program
· Embedding Perl under Win32
Compiling your C program
If you have trouble compiling the scripts in this documentation, you're not alone. The cardinal rule: COMPILE
THE PROGRAMS IN EXACTLY THE SAME WAY THAT YOUR PERL WAS COMPILED. (Sorry for yelling.)
Also, every C program that uses Perl must link in the perl library. What's that, you ask? Perl is itself
written in C; the perl library is the collection of compiled C programs that were used to create your perl
executable (/usr/bin/perl or equivalent). (Corollary: you can't use Perl from your C program unless Perl has
been compiled on your machine, or installed properly--that's why you shouldn't blithely copy Perl executables
from machine to machine without also copying the lib directory.)
When you use Perl from C, your C program will--usually--allocate, "run", and deallocate a PerlInterpreter
object, which is defined by the perl library.
Execute this statement for a hint about where to find CORE:
perl -MConfig -e 'print $Config{archlib}'
Here's how you'd compile the example in the next section, "Adding a Perl interpreter to your C program", on my
Linux box:
% gcc -O2 -Dbool=char -DHAS_BOOL -I/usr/local/include
-I/usr/local/lib/perl5/i586-linux/5.003/CORE
-L/usr/local/lib/perl5/i586-linux/5.003/CORE
-o interp interp.c -lperl -lm
(That's all one line.) On my DEC Alpha running old 5.003_05, the incantation is a bit different:
% cc -O2 -Olimit 2900 -DSTANDARD_C -I/usr/local/include
-I/usr/local/lib/perl5/alpha-dec_osf/5.00305/CORE
-L/usr/local/lib/perl5/alpha-dec_osf/5.00305/CORE -L/usr/local/lib
-D__LANGUAGE_C__ -D_NO_PROTO -o interp interp.c -lperl -lm
How can you figure out what to add? Assuming your Perl is post-5.001, execute a "perl -V" command and pay
special attention to the "cc" and "ccflags" information.
You'll have to choose the appropriate compiler (cc, gcc, et al.) for your machine: "perl -MConfig -e 'print
$Config{cc}'" will tell you what to use.
You'll also have to choose the appropriate library directory (/usr/local/lib/...) for your machine. If your
compiler complains that certain functions are undefined, or that it can't locate -lperl, then you need to
change the path following the "-L". If it complains that it can't find EXTERN.h and perl.h, you need to
change the path following the "-I".
You may have to add extra libraries as well. Which ones? Perhaps those printed by
perl -MConfig -e 'print $Config{libs}'
Provided your perl binary was properly configured and installed the ExtUtils::Embed module will determine all
of this information for you:
% cc -o interp interp.c `perl -MExtUtils::Embed -e ccopts -e ldopts`
If the ExtUtils::Embed module isn't part of your Perl distribution, you can retrieve it from
http://www.perl.com/perl/CPAN/modules/by-module/ExtUtils/ (If this documentation came from your Perl
distribution, then you're running 5.004 or better and you already have it.)
The ExtUtils::Embed kit on CPAN also contains all source code for the examples in this document, tests,
additional examples and other information you may find useful.
Adding a Perl interpreter to your C program
In a sense, perl (the C program) is a good example of embedding Perl (the language), so I'll demonstrate
embedding with miniperlmain.c, included in the source distribution. Here's a bastardized, non-portable
version of miniperlmain.c containing the essentials of embedding:
#include <EXTERN.h> /* from the Perl distribution */
#include <perl.h> /* from the Perl distribution */
perl_free(my_perl);
PERL_SYS_TERM();
}
Notice that we don't use the "env" pointer. Normally handed to "perl_parse" as its final argument, "env" here
is replaced by "NULL", which means that the current environment will be used.
The macros PERL_SYS_INIT3() and PERL_SYS_TERM() provide system-specific tune up of the C runtime environment
necessary to run Perl interpreters; they should only be called once regardless of how many interpreters you
create or destroy. Call PERL_SYS_INIT3() before you create your first interpreter, and PERL_SYS_TERM() after
you free your last interpreter.
Since PERL_SYS_INIT3() may change "env", it may be more appropriate to provide "env" as an argument to
perl_parse().
Also notice that no matter what arguments you pass to perl_parse(), PERL_SYS_INIT3() must be invoked on the C
main() argc, argv and env and only once.
Now compile this program (I'll call it interp.c) into an executable:
% cc -o interp interp.c `perl -MExtUtils::Embed -e ccopts -e ldopts`
After a successful compilation, you'll be able to use interp just like perl itself:
% interp
print "Pretty Good Perl \n";
print "10890 - 9801 is ", 10890 - 9801;
<CTRL-D>
Pretty Good Perl
10890 - 9801 is 1089
or
% interp -e 'printf("%x", 3735928559)'
deadbeef
You can also read and execute Perl statements from a file while in the midst of your C program, by placing the
filename in argv[1] before calling perl_run.
Calling a Perl subroutine from your C program
To call individual Perl subroutines, you can use any of the call_* functions documented in perlcall. In this
example we'll use "call_argv".
That's shown below, in a program I'll call showtime.c.
#include <EXTERN.h>
#include <perl.h>
static PerlInterpreter *my_perl;
int main(int argc, char **argv, char **env)
{
char *args[] = { NULL };
PERL_SYS_INIT3(&argc,&argv,&env);
PERL_SYS_TERM();
}
where showtime is a Perl subroutine that takes no arguments (that's the G_NOARGS) and for which I'll ignore
the return value (that's the G_DISCARD). Those flags, and others, are discussed in perlcall.
I'll define the showtime subroutine in a file called showtime.pl:
print "I shan't be printed.";
sub showtime {
print time;
}
Simple enough. Now compile and run:
% cc -o showtime showtime.c `perl -MExtUtils::Embed -e ccopts -e ldopts`
% showtime showtime.pl
818284590
yielding the number of seconds that elapsed between January 1, 1970 (the beginning of the Unix epoch), and the
moment I began writing this sentence.
In this particular case we don't have to call perl_run, as we set the PL_exit_flag PERL_EXIT_DESTRUCT_END
which executes END blocks in perl_destruct.
If you want to pass arguments to the Perl subroutine, you can add strings to the "NULL"-terminated "args" list
passed to call_argv. For other data types, or to examine return values, you'll need to manipulate the Perl
stack. That's demonstrated in "Fiddling with the Perl stack from your C program".
Evaluating a Perl statement from your C program
Perl provides two API functions to evaluate pieces of Perl code. These are "eval_sv" in perlapi and "eval_pv"
in perlapi.
Arguably, these are the only routines you'll ever need to execute snippets of Perl code from within your C
program. Your code can be as long as you wish; it can contain multiple statements; it can employ "use" in
perlfunc, "require" in perlfunc, and "do" in perlfunc to include external Perl files.
eval_pv lets us evaluate individual Perl strings, and then extract variables for coercion into C types. The
following program, string.c, executes three Perl strings, extracting an "int" from the first, a "float" from
the second, and a "char *" from the third.
#include <EXTERN.h>
#include <perl.h>
static PerlInterpreter *my_perl;
main (int argc, char **argv, char **env)
{
char *embedding[] = { "", "-e", "0" };
PERL_SYS_INIT3(&argc,&argv,&env);
my_perl = perl_alloc();
printf("a = %f\n", SvNV(get_sv("a", 0)));
/** Treat $a as a string **/
eval_pv("$a = 'rekcaH lreP rehtonA tsuJ'; $a = reverse($a);", TRUE);
printf("a = %s\n", SvPV_nolen(get_sv("a", 0)));
perl_destruct(my_perl);
perl_free(my_perl);
PERL_SYS_TERM();
}
All of those strange functions with sv in their names help convert Perl scalars to C types. They're described
in perlguts and perlapi.
If you compile and run string.c, you'll see the results of using SvIV() to create an "int", SvNV() to create a
"float", and SvPV() to create a string:
a = 9
a = 9.859600
a = Just Another Perl Hacker
In the example above, we've created a global variable to temporarily store the computed value of our eval'ed
expression. It is also possible and in most cases a better strategy to fetch the return value from eval_pv()
instead. Example:
...
SV *val = eval_pv("reverse 'rekcaH lreP rehtonA tsuJ'", TRUE);
printf("%s\n", SvPV_nolen(val));
...
This way, we avoid namespace pollution by not creating global variables and we've simplified our code as well.
Performing Perl pattern matches and substitutions from your C program
The eval_sv() function lets us evaluate strings of Perl code, so we can define some functions that use it to
"specialize" in matches and substitutions: match(), substitute(), and matches().
I32 match(SV *string, char *pattern);
Given a string and a pattern (e.g., "m/clasp/" or "/\b\w*\b/", which in your C program might appear as
"/\\b\\w*\\b/"), match() returns 1 if the string matches the pattern and 0 otherwise.
int substitute(SV **string, char *pattern);
Given a pointer to an "SV" and an "=~" operation (e.g., "s/bob/robert/g" or "tr[A-Z][a-z]"), substitute()
modifies the string within the "SV" as according to the operation, returning the number of substitutions made.
int matches(SV *string, char *pattern, AV **matches);
Given an "SV", a pattern, and a pointer to an empty "AV", matches() evaluates "$string =~ $pattern" in a list
context, and fills in matches with the array elements, returning the number of matches found.
Here's a sample program, match.c, that uses all three (long lines have been wrapped here):
#include <EXTERN.h>
PUSHMARK(SP);
eval_sv(sv, G_SCALAR);
SPAGAIN;
retval = POPs;
PUTBACK;
if (croak_on_error && SvTRUE(ERRSV))
croak(SvPVx_nolen(ERRSV));
return retval;
}
/** match(string, pattern)
**
** Used for matches in a scalar context.
**
** Returns 1 if the match was successful; 0 otherwise.
**/
I32 match(SV *string, char *pattern)
{
SV *command = newSV(0), *retval;
sv_setpvf(command, "my $string = '%s'; $string =~ %s",
SvPV_nolen(string), pattern);
retval = my_eval_sv(command, TRUE);
SvREFCNT_dec(command);
return SvIV(retval);
}
/** substitute(string, pattern)
**
** Used for =~ operations that modify their left-hand side (s/// and tr///)
**
** Returns the number of successful matches, and
** modifies the input string if there were any.
**/
I32 substitute(SV **string, char *pattern)
{
SV *command = newSV(0), *retval;
sv_setpvf(command, "$string = '%s'; ($string =~ %s)",
SvPV_nolen(*string), pattern);
retval = my_eval_sv(command, TRUE);
SvREFCNT_dec(command);
*string = get_sv("string", 0);
{
SV *command = newSV(0);
I32 num_matches;
sv_setpvf(command, "my $string = '%s'; @array = ($string =~ %s)",
SvPV_nolen(string), pattern);
my_eval_sv(command, TRUE);
SvREFCNT_dec(command);
*match_list = get_av("array", 0);
num_matches = av_len(*match_list) + 1;
return num_matches;
}
main (int argc, char **argv, char **env)
{
char *embedding[] = { "", "-e", "0" };
AV *match_list;
I32 num_matches, i;
SV *text;
PERL_SYS_INIT3(&argc,&argv,&env);
my_perl = perl_alloc();
perl_construct(my_perl);
perl_parse(my_perl, NULL, 3, embedding, NULL);
PL_exit_flags |= PERL_EXIT_DESTRUCT_END;
text = newSV(0);
sv_setpv(text, "When he is at a convenience store and the "
"bill comes to some amount like 76 cents, Maynard is "
"aware that there is something he *should* do, something "
"that will enable him to get back a quarter, but he has "
"no idea *what*. He fumbles through his red squeezey "
"changepurse and gives the boy three extra pennies with "
"his dollar, hoping that he might luck into the correct "
"amount. The boy gives him back two of his own pennies "
"and then the big shiny quarter that is his prize. "
"-RICHH");
if (match(text, "m/quarter/")) /** Does text contain 'quarter'? **/
printf("match: Text contains the word 'quarter'.\n\n");
else
printf("match: Text doesn't contain the word 'quarter'.\n\n");
if (match(text, "m/eighth/")) /** Does text contain 'eighth'? **/
printf("match: Text contains the word 'eighth'.\n\n");
else
printf("match: Text doesn't contain the word 'eighth'.\n\n");
/** Match all occurrences of /wi../ **/
num_matches = matches(text, "m/(wi..)/g", &match_list);
printf("matches: m/(wi..)/g found %d matches...\n", num_matches);
/** Attempt a substitution **/
if (!substitute(&text, "s/Perl/C/")) {
printf("substitute: s/Perl/C...No substitution made.\n\n");
}
SvREFCNT_dec(text);
PL_perl_destruct_level = 1;
perl_destruct(my_perl);
perl_free(my_perl);
PERL_SYS_TERM();
}
which produces the output (again, long lines have been wrapped here)
match: Text contains the word 'quarter'.
match: Text doesn't contain the word 'eighth'.
matches: m/(wi..)/g found 2 matches...
match: will
match: with
substitute: s/[aeiou]//gi...139 substitutions made.
Now text is: Whn h s t cnvnnc str nd th bll cms t sm mnt lk 76 cnts,
Mynrd s wr tht thr s smthng h *shld* d, smthng tht wll nbl hm t gt bck
qrtr, bt h hs n d *wht*. H fmbls thrgh hs rd sqzy chngprs nd gvs th by
thr xtr pnns wth hs dllr, hpng tht h mght lck nt th crrct mnt. Th by gvs
hm bck tw f hs wn pnns nd thn th bg shny qrtr tht s hs prz. -RCHH
substitute: s/Perl/C...No substitution made.
Fiddling with the Perl stack from your C program
When trying to explain stacks, most computer science textbooks mumble something about spring-loaded columns of
cafeteria plates: the last thing you pushed on the stack is the first thing you pop off. That'll do for our
purposes: your C program will push some arguments onto "the Perl stack", shut its eyes while some magic
happens, and then pop the results--the return value of your Perl subroutine--off the stack.
First you'll need to know how to convert between C types and Perl types, with newSViv() and sv_setnv() and
newAV() and all their friends. They're described in perlguts and perlapi.
Then you'll need to know how to manipulate the Perl stack. That's described in perlcall.
Once you've understood those, embedding Perl in C is easy.
Because C has no builtin function for integer exponentiation, let's make Perl's ** operator available to it
(this is less useful than it sounds, because Perl implements ** with C's pow() function). First I'll create a
stub exponentiation function in power.pl:
sub expo {
my ($a, $b) = @_;
return $a ** $b;
}
ENTER; /* everything created after here */
SAVETMPS; /* ...is a temporary variable. */
PUSHMARK(SP); /* remember the stack pointer */
XPUSHs(sv_2mortal(newSViv(a))); /* push the base onto the stack */
XPUSHs(sv_2mortal(newSViv(b))); /* push the exponent onto stack */
PUTBACK; /* make local stack pointer global */
call_pv("expo", G_SCALAR); /* call the function */
SPAGAIN; /* refresh stack pointer */
/* pop the return value from stack */
printf ("%d to the %dth power is %d.\n", a, b, POPi);
PUTBACK;
FREETMPS; /* free that return value */
LEAVE; /* ...and the XPUSHed "mortal" args.*/
}
int main (int argc, char **argv, char **env)
{
char *my_argv[] = { "", "power.pl" };
PERL_SYS_INIT3(&argc,&argv,&env);
my_perl = perl_alloc();
perl_construct( my_perl );
perl_parse(my_perl, NULL, 2, my_argv, (char **)NULL);
PL_exit_flags |= PERL_EXIT_DESTRUCT_END;
perl_run(my_perl);
PerlPower(3, 4); /*** Compute 3 ** 4 ***/
perl_destruct(my_perl);
perl_free(my_perl);
PERL_SYS_TERM();
}
Compile and run:
% cc -o power power.c `perl -MExtUtils::Embed -e ccopts -e ldopts`
% power
3 to the 4th power is 81.
Maintaining a persistent interpreter
When developing interactive and/or potentially long-running applications, it's a good idea to maintain a
persistent interpreter rather than allocating and constructing a new interpreter multiple times. The major
reason is speed: since Perl will only be loaded into memory once.
However, you have to be more cautious with namespace and variable scoping when using a persistent interpreter.
In previous examples we've been using global variables in the default package "main". We knew exactly what
code would be run, and assumed we could avoid variable collisions and outrageous symbol table growth.
Let's say your application is a server that will occasionally run Perl code from some arbitrary file. Your
server has no way of knowing what code it's going to run. Very dangerous.
If the file is pulled in by "perl_parse()", compiled into a newly constructed interpreter, and subsequently
ensure that memory consumption is minimized. You'll also want to scope your variables with "my" in perlfunc
whenever possible.
package Embed::Persistent;
#persistent.pl
use strict;
our %Cache;
use Symbol qw(delete_package);
sub valid_package_name {
my($string) = @_;
$string =~ s/([^A-Za-z0-9\/])/sprintf("_%2x",unpack("C",$1))/eg;
# second pass only for words starting with a digit
$string =~ s|/(\d)|sprintf("/_%2x",unpack("C",$1))|eg;
# Dress it up as a real package name
$string =~ s|/|::|g;
return "Embed" . $string;
}
sub eval_file {
my($filename, $delete) = @_;
my $package = valid_package_name($filename);
my $mtime = -M $filename;
if(defined $Cache{$package}{mtime}
&&
$Cache{$package}{mtime} <= $mtime)
{
# we have compiled this subroutine already,
# it has not been updated on disk, nothing left to do
print STDERR "already compiled $package->handler\n";
}
else {
local *FH;
open FH, $filename or die "open '$filename' $!";
local($/) = undef;
my $sub = <FH>;
close FH;
#wrap the code into a subroutine inside our unique package
my $eval = qq{package $package; sub handler { $sub; }};
{
# hide our variables within this block
my($filename,$mtime,$package,$sub);
eval $eval;
}
die $@ if $@;
#cache it unless we're cleaning out each time
$Cache{$package}{mtime} = $mtime unless $delete;
}
eval {$package->handler;};
/* persistent.c */
#include <EXTERN.h>
#include <perl.h>
/* 1 = clean out filename's symbol table after each request, 0 = don't */
#ifndef DO_CLEAN
#define DO_CLEAN 0
#endif
#define BUFFER_SIZE 1024
static PerlInterpreter *my_perl = NULL;
int
main(int argc, char **argv, char **env)
{
char *embedding[] = { "", "persistent.pl" };
char *args[] = { "", DO_CLEAN, NULL };
char filename[BUFFER_SIZE];
int exitstatus = 0;
PERL_SYS_INIT3(&argc,&argv,&env);
if((my_perl = perl_alloc()) == NULL) {
fprintf(stderr, "no memory!");
exit(1);
}
perl_construct(my_perl);
PL_origalen = 1; /* don't let $0 assignment update the proctitle or embedding[0] */
exitstatus = perl_parse(my_perl, NULL, 2, embedding, NULL);
PL_exit_flags |= PERL_EXIT_DESTRUCT_END;
if(!exitstatus) {
exitstatus = perl_run(my_perl);
while(printf("Enter file name: ") &&
fgets(filename, BUFFER_SIZE, stdin)) {
filename[strlen(filename)-1] = '\0'; /* strip \n */
/* call the subroutine, passing it the filename as an argument */
args[0] = filename;
call_argv("Embed::Persistent::eval_file",
G_DISCARD | G_EVAL, args);
/* check $@ */
if(SvTRUE(ERRSV))
fprintf(stderr, "eval error: %s\n", SvPV_nolen(ERRSV));
}
}
PL_perl_destruct_level = 0;
perl_destruct(my_perl);
perl_free(my_perl);
PERL_SYS_TERM();
exit(exitstatus);
sub foo {
print "foo says: @_\n";
}
Now run:
% persistent
Enter file name: test.pl
foo says: hello
Enter file name: test.pl
already compiled Embed::test_2epl->handler
foo says: hello
Enter file name: ^C
Execution of END blocks
Traditionally END blocks have been executed at the end of the perl_run. This causes problems for applications
that never call perl_run. Since perl 5.7.2 you can specify "PL_exit_flags |= PERL_EXIT_DESTRUCT_END" to get
the new behaviour. This also enables the running of END blocks if the perl_parse fails and "perl_destruct"
will return the exit value.
$0 assignments
When a perl script assigns a value to $0 then the perl runtime will try to make this value show up as the
program name reported by "ps" by updating the memory pointed to by the argv passed to perl_parse() and also
calling API functions like setproctitle() where available. This behaviour might not be appropriate when
embedding perl and can be disabled by assigning the value 1 to the variable "PL_origalen" before perl_parse()
is called.
The persistent.c example above is for instance likely to segfault when $0 is assigned to if the "PL_origalen =
1;" assignment is removed. This because perl will try to write to the read only memory of the "embedding[]"
strings.
Maintaining multiple interpreter instances
Some rare applications will need to create more than one interpreter during a session. Such an application
might sporadically decide to release any resources associated with the interpreter.
The program must take care to ensure that this takes place before the next interpreter is constructed. By
default, when perl is not built with any special options, the global variable "PL_perl_destruct_level" is set
to 0, since extra cleaning isn't usually needed when a program only ever creates a single interpreter in its
entire lifetime.
Setting "PL_perl_destruct_level" to 1 makes everything squeaky clean:
while(1) {
...
/* reset global variables here with PL_perl_destruct_level = 1 */
PL_perl_destruct_level = 1;
perl_construct(my_perl);
...
/* clean and reset _everything_ during perl_destruct */
PL_perl_destruct_level = 1;
perl_destruct(my_perl);
perl_free(my_perl);
...
/* let's go do it again! */
option otherwise some interpreter variables may not be initialized correctly between consecutive runs and your
application may crash.
See also "Thread-aware system interfaces" in perlxs.
Using "-Dusethreads -Duseithreads" rather than "-Dusemultiplicity" is more appropriate if you intend to run
multiple interpreters concurrently in different threads, because it enables support for linking in the thread
libraries of your system with the interpreter.
Let's give it a try:
#include <EXTERN.h>
#include <perl.h>
/* we're going to embed two interpreters */
#define SAY_HELLO "-e", "print qq(Hi, I'm $^X\n)"
int main(int argc, char **argv, char **env)
{
PerlInterpreter *one_perl, *two_perl;
char *one_args[] = { "one_perl", SAY_HELLO };
char *two_args[] = { "two_perl", SAY_HELLO };
PERL_SYS_INIT3(&argc,&argv,&env);
one_perl = perl_alloc();
two_perl = perl_alloc();
PERL_SET_CONTEXT(one_perl);
perl_construct(one_perl);
PERL_SET_CONTEXT(two_perl);
perl_construct(two_perl);
PERL_SET_CONTEXT(one_perl);
perl_parse(one_perl, NULL, 3, one_args, (char **)NULL);
PERL_SET_CONTEXT(two_perl);
perl_parse(two_perl, NULL, 3, two_args, (char **)NULL);
PERL_SET_CONTEXT(one_perl);
perl_run(one_perl);
PERL_SET_CONTEXT(two_perl);
perl_run(two_perl);
PERL_SET_CONTEXT(one_perl);
perl_destruct(one_perl);
PERL_SET_CONTEXT(two_perl);
perl_destruct(two_perl);
PERL_SET_CONTEXT(one_perl);
perl_free(one_perl);
PERL_SET_CONTEXT(two_perl);
perl_free(two_perl);
PERL_SYS_TERM();
}
Run it, Run it:
% multiplicity
Hi, I'm one_perl
Hi, I'm two_perl
Using Perl modules, which themselves use C libraries, from your C program
If you've played with the examples above and tried to embed a script that use()s a Perl module (such as
Socket) which itself uses a C or C++ library, this probably happened:
Can't load module Socket, dynamic loading not available in this perl.
(You may need to build a new perl executable which either supports
dynamic loading or has the Socket module statically linked into it.)
What's wrong?
Your interpreter doesn't know how to communicate with these extensions on its own. A little glue will help.
Up until now you've been calling perl_parse(), handing it NULL for the second argument:
perl_parse(my_perl, NULL, argc, my_argv, NULL);
That's where the glue code can be inserted to create the initial contact between Perl and linked C/C++
routines. Let's take a look some pieces of perlmain.c to see how Perl does this:
static void xs_init (pTHX);
EXTERN_C void boot_DynaLoader (pTHX_ CV* cv);
EXTERN_C void boot_Socket (pTHX_ CV* cv);
EXTERN_C void
xs_init(pTHX)
{
char *file = __FILE__;
/* DynaLoader is a special case */
newXS("DynaLoader::boot_DynaLoader", boot_DynaLoader, file);
newXS("Socket::bootstrap", boot_Socket, file);
}
Simply put: for each extension linked with your Perl executable (determined during its initial configuration
on your computer or when adding a new extension), a Perl subroutine is created to incorporate the extension's
routines. Normally, that subroutine is named Module::bootstrap() and is invoked when you say use Module. In
turn, this hooks into an XSUB, boot_Module, which creates a Perl counterpart for each of the extension's
XSUBs. Don't worry about this part; leave that to the xsubpp and extension authors. If your extension is
dynamically loaded, DynaLoader creates Module::bootstrap() for you on the fly. In fact, if you have a working
DynaLoader then there is rarely any need to link in any other extensions statically.
Once you have this code, slap it into the second argument of perl_parse():
perl_parse(my_perl, xs_init, argc, my_argv, NULL);
Then compile:
% cc -c interp.c `perl -MExtUtils::Embed -e ccopts`
% cc -o interp perlxsi.o interp.o `perl -MExtUtils::Embed -e ldopts`
Consult perlxs, perlguts, and perlapi for more details.
Hiding Perl_
If you completely hide the short forms of the Perl public API, add -DPERL_NO_SHORT_NAMES to the compilation
flags. This means that for example instead of writing
warn("%d bottles of beer on the wall", bottlecount);
you will have to write the explicit full form
Perl_warn(aTHX_ "%d bottles of beer on the wall", bottlecount);
(See "Background and PERL_IMPLICIT_CONTEXT" in perlguts for the explanation of the "aTHX_". ) Hiding the
short forms is very useful for avoiding all sorts of nasty (C preprocessor or otherwise) conflicts with other
software packages (Perl defines about 2400 APIs with these short names, take or leave few hundred, so there
certainly is room for conflict.)
MORAL
You can sometimes write faster code in C, but you can always write code faster in Perl. Because you can use
each from the other, combine them as you wish.
AUTHOR
Jon Orwant <[email protected]> and Doug MacEachern <[email protected]>, with small contributions from Tim
Bunce, Tom Christiansen, Guy Decoux, Hallvard Furuseth, Dov Grobgeld, and Ilya Zakharevich.
Doug MacEachern has an article on embedding in Volume 1, Issue 4 of The Perl Journal ( http://www.tpj.com/ ).
Doug is also the developer of the most widely-used Perl embedding: the mod_perl system (perl.apache.org),
which embeds Perl in the Apache web server. Oracle, Binary Evolution, ActiveState, and Ben Sugars's
nsapi_perl have used this model for Oracle, Netscape and Internet Information Server Perl plugins.
COPYRIGHT
Copyright (C) 1995, 1996, 1997, 1998 Doug MacEachern and Jon Orwant. All Rights Reserved.
This document may be distributed under the same terms as Perl itself.
perl v5.16.3 2013-03-04 PERLEMBED(1)
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