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PERLEPOC(1)                                Perl Programmers Reference Guide                               PERLEPOC(1)



NAME
       perlepoc - Perl for EPOC

SYNOPSIS
       Perl 5 README file for the EPOC Release 5 operating system.

INTRODUCTION
       EPOC is an OS for palmtops and mobile phones. For more information look at: <http://www.symbian.com/>

       This is a port of perl to the epocemx SDK by Eberhard Mattes, which itself uses the SDK by symbian.
       Essentially epocemx it is a POSIX look alike environment for the EPOC OS.  For more information look at:
       <http://epocemx.sourceforge.net/>

       perl and epocemx runs on Epoc Release 5 machines: Psion 5mx, 5mx Pro, Psion Revo, Psion Netbook and on the
       Ericsson M128. It may run on Epoc Release 3 Hardware (Series 5 classic), too. For more information about this
       hardware please refer to <http://www.psion.com/>

       Vendors which like to have support for their devices are free to send me a sample.

INSTALLING PERL ON EPOC
       You can download a ready-to-install version from <http://www.oflebbe.de/perl/perl5.html>

       You will need at least ~6MB free space in order to install and run perl.

       Please install the emxusr.sis package from <http://epocemx.sourceforge.net/> first.

       Install perl.sis on the EPOC machine. If you do not know how to do that, consult your PsiWin documentation.

       Perl itself and its standard library is using 4 MB disk space.  Unicode support and some other modules are
       left out. (For details, please look into epoc/createpkg.pl). If you like to use these modules, you are free to
       copy them from a current perl release.

STARTING PERL ON EPOC
       Please use the epocemx shell to start perl. perl integrates with the conventions of epocemx.

   Features of Perl on Epoc
       The built-in function EPOC::getcwd returns the current directory.

   Restrictions of Perl on Epoc
       Features are left out, because of restrictions of the POSIX support in EPOC:

       ·   socket IO is only implemented poorly. You can only use sysread and syswrite on them. The commands read,
           write, print, <> do not work for sockets. This may change iff epocemx supports sockets.

       ·   kill, alarm and signals. Do not try to use them. This may be impossible to implement on EPOC.

       ·   select is missing.

       ·   binmode does not exist. (No CR LF to LF translation for text files)

       ·   EPOC does not handle the notion of current drive and current directory very well (i.e. not at all, but it
           tries hard to emulate one). See PATH.

       ·   Heap is limited to 4MB.

       ·   Dynamic loading is not implemented.

           Start again from scratch

                 cp epoc/* .
                 ./Configure -S
                 make
                 cp miniperl.native miniperl
                 touch miniperl.exe
                 make
                 perl createpkg.pl

                 emxsis perl.pkg perl.sis

SUPPORT STATUS OF PERL ON EPOC
       I'm offering this port "as is". You can ask me questions, but I can't guarantee I'll be able to answer them.
       Since the port to epocemx is quite new, please check the web for updates first.

       Very special thanks to Eberhard Mattes for epocemx.

AUTHOR
       Olaf Flebbe <[email protected]> <http://www.oflebbe.de/perl/perl5.html>

LAST UPDATE
       2003-01-18



perl v5.16.3                                          2013-03-04                                          PERLEPOC(1)