=head1 AVAILABILITY
Perl is available for most operating systems, including virtually
-all Unix-like platforms.
-
-As of early March 2000 (the Perl release 5.6.0), the following
-platforms are able to build Perl from the standard source code
-distribution available at http://www.perl.com/CPAN/src/index.html
-
- AIX
- DOS DJGPP 1)
- FreeBSD
- HP-UX
- IRIX
- Linux
- LynxOS
- MachTen
- MPE/iX
- NetBSD
- OpenBSD
- OS/2
- Rhapsody/Darwin 2)
- Solaris
- Tru64 UNIX 3)
- UNICOS
- UNICOS/mk
- VMS
- VOS
- Windows 3.1 1)
- Windows 95 1) 4)
- Windows 98 1) 4)
- Windows NT 1) 4)
-
- 1) in DOS mode either the DOS or OS/2 ports can be used
- 2) new in 5.6.0: the BSD/NeXT-based UNIX of Mac OS X
- 3) formerly known as Digital UNIX and before that DEC OSF/1
- 4) compilers: Borland, Cygwin, Mingw32 EGCS/GCC, VC++
-
-The following platforms worked for the previous major release
-(5.005_03 being the latest maintenance release of that, as of early
-March 2000), but be did not manage to test these in time for the 5.6.0
-release of Perl. There is a very good chance that these will work
-just fine with 5.6.0.
-
- A/UX
- BeOS
- BSD/OS
- DG/UX
- DYNIX/ptx
- DomainOS
- Hurd
- NextSTEP
- OpenSTEP
- PowerMAX
- QNX
- SCO ODT/OSR
- SunOS
- SVR4
- Ultrix
-
-The following platform worked for the previous major release (5.005_03
-being the latest maintenance release of that, as of early March 2000).
-However, standardization on UTF-8 as the internal string representation
-in 5.6.0 has introduced incompatibilities in this EBCDIC platform.
-Support for this platform may be enabled in a future release:
-
- OS390 1)
-
- 1) Previously known as MVS, or OpenEdition MVS.
-
-Strongly related to the OS390 platform by also being EBCDIC-based
-mainframe platforms are the following platforms:
-
- BS2000
- VM/ESA
-
-These are also not expected to work under 5.6.0 for the same reasons
-as OS390. Contact the mailing list perl-mvs@perl.org for more details.
-
-MacOS (Classic, pre-X) is almost 5.6.0-ready; building from the source
-does work with 5.6.0, but additional MacOS specific source code is needed
-for a complete port. Contact the mailing list macperl-porters@macperl.org
-for more more information.
-
-The following platforms have been known to build Perl from source in
-the past, but we haven't been able to verify their status for the
-current release, either because the hardware/software platforms are
-rare or because we don't have an active champion on these
-platforms--or both:
-
- 3b1
- AmigaOS
- ConvexOS
- CX/UX
- DC/OSx
- DDE SMES
- DOS EMX
- Dynix
- EP/IX
- ESIX
- FPS
- GENIX
- Greenhills
- ISC
- MachTen 68k
- MiNT
- MPC
- NEWS-OS
- Opus
- Plan 9
- PowerUX
- RISC/os
- Stellar
- SVR2
- TI1500
- TitanOS
- Unisys Dynix
- Unixware
-
-Support for the following platform is planned for a future Perl release:
-
- Netware
-
-The following platforms have their own source code distributions and
-binaries available via http://www.perl.com/CPAN/ports/index.html:
-
- Perl release
-
- AS/400 5.003
- Netware 5.003_07
- Tandem Guardian 5.004
-
-The following platforms have only binaries available via
-http://www.perl.com/CPAN/ports/index.html:
-
- Perl release
-
- Acorn RISCOS 5.005_02
- AOS 5.002
- LynxOS 5.004_02
-
-Although we do suggest that you always build your own Perl from
-the source code, both for maximal configurability and for security,
-in case you are in a hurry you can check
-http://www.perl.com/CPAN/ports/index.html for binary distributions.
+all Unix-like platforms. See L<perlport/"Supported Platforms">
+for a listing.
=head1 ENVIRONMENT
You may mail your bug reports (be sure to include full configuration
information as output by the myconfig program in the perl source
tree, or by C<perl -V>) to perlbug@perl.com . If you've succeeded
-in compiling perl, the perlbug script in the utils/ subdirectory
+in compiling perl, the B<perlbug> script in the F<utils/> subdirectory
can be used to help mail in a bug report.
Perl actually stands for Pathologically Eclectic Rubbish Lister, but
=back
+=head1 Supported Platforms
+
+As of early March 2000 (the Perl release 5.6.0), the following
+platforms are able to build Perl from the standard source code
+distribution available at http://www.perl.com/CPAN/src/index.html
+
+ AIX
+ DOS DJGPP 1)
+ FreeBSD
+ HP-UX
+ IRIX
+ Linux
+ LynxOS
+ MachTen
+ MPE/iX
+ NetBSD
+ OpenBSD
+ OS/2
+ QNX
+ Rhapsody/Darwin 2)
+ Solaris
+ SVR4
+ Tru64 UNIX 3)
+ UNICOS
+ UNICOS/mk
+ Unixware
+ VMS
+ VOS
+ Windows 3.1 1)
+ Windows 95 1) 4)
+ Windows 98 1) 4)
+ Windows NT 1) 4)
+
+ 1) in DOS mode either the DOS or OS/2 ports can be used
+ 2) new in 5.6.0: the BSD/NeXT-based UNIX of Mac OS X
+ 3) formerly known as Digital UNIX and before that DEC OSF/1
+ 4) compilers: Borland, Cygwin, Mingw32 EGCS/GCC, VC++
+
+The following platforms worked for the previous major release
+(5.005_03 being the latest maintenance release of that, as of early
+March 2000), but be did not manage to test these in time for the 5.6.0
+release of Perl. There is a very good chance that these will work
+just fine with 5.6.0.
+
+ A/UX
+ BeOS
+ BSD/OS
+ DG/UX
+ DYNIX/ptx
+ DomainOS
+ Hurd
+ NextSTEP
+ OpenSTEP
+ PowerMAX
+ SCO ODT/OSR
+ SunOS
+ Ultrix
+
+The following platform worked for the previous major release (5.005_03
+being the latest maintenance release of that, as of early March 2000).
+However, standardization on UTF-8 as the internal string representation
+in 5.6.0 has introduced incompatibilities in this EBCDIC platform.
+Support for this platform may be enabled in a future release:
+
+ OS390 1)
+
+ 1) Previously known as MVS, or OpenEdition MVS.
+
+Strongly related to the OS390 platform by also being EBCDIC-based
+mainframe platforms are the following platforms:
+
+ BS2000
+ VM/ESA
+
+These are also not expected to work under 5.6.0 for the same reasons
+as OS390. Contact the mailing list perl-mvs@perl.org for more details.
+
+MacOS (Classic, pre-X) is almost 5.6.0-ready; building from the source
+does work with 5.6.0, but additional MacOS specific source code is needed
+for a complete port. Contact the mailing list macperl-porters@macperl.org
+for more information.
+
+The following platforms have been known to build Perl from source in
+the past, but we haven't been able to verify their status for the
+current release, either because the hardware/software platforms are
+rare or because we don't have an active champion on these
+platforms--or both:
+
+ 3b1
+ AmigaOS
+ ConvexOS
+ CX/UX
+ DC/OSx
+ DDE SMES
+ DOS EMX
+ Dynix
+ EP/IX
+ ESIX
+ FPS
+ GENIX
+ Greenhills
+ ISC
+ MachTen 68k
+ MiNT
+ MPC
+ NEWS-OS
+ Opus
+ Plan 9
+ PowerUX
+ RISC/os
+ Stellar
+ SVR2
+ TI1500
+ TitanOS
+ Unisys Dynix
+ Unixware
+
+Support for the following platform is planned for a future Perl release:
+
+ Netware
+
+The following platforms have their own source code distributions and
+binaries available via http://www.perl.com/CPAN/ports/index.html:
+
+ Perl release
+
+ AS/400 5.003
+ Netware 5.003_07
+ Tandem Guardian 5.004
+
+The following platforms have only binaries available via
+http://www.perl.com/CPAN/ports/index.html:
+
+ Perl release
+
+ Acorn RISCOS 5.005_02
+ AOS 5.002
+ LynxOS 5.004_02
+
+Although we do suggest that you always build your own Perl from
+the source code, both for maximal configurability and for security,
+in case you are in a hurry you can check
+http://www.perl.com/CPAN/ports/index.html for binary distributions.
+
=head1 AUTHORS / CONTRIBUTORS
Abigail <abigail@fnx.com>,