A couple of carifications:

Perl versions:

Basically, an entry cannot be reliant on any feature of 5.6 or above, but must use a Perl 5 version.

Windows / Unix compatibility:

I realize that not everyone will have a Windows box to test on, and others may not have a Unix box. However, I feel this is a pretty generic challenge. I believe that if fork() is avoided, there shouldn't be any OS specific functionality. If you select a CPAN module for your DB (and this is not REQUIRED. The requirement is only that headlines be stored. You could use a flat file.), the module generally indicates what platforms are or are not supported.

Meta tag refresh time:

The parameter for the META tag refresh interval is in minutes, with a default value of 10. (In the rules I had not clarified what units the refresh interval should be expressed in.)

It's a little more difficult to design a challenge that gives all platform users a fair chance. This should run on a Mac, although so few people use Macs (compared to Windows/Unix), that I did not specifically call them out. Since this is the first one, I'm open to suggestions for future challanges on how to handle this. But for now, it was as fair as I could think of. Any input is appreciated.

If I've still not expressed this well, please /msg me and I will update this node to clarify.

The www.tinymicros.com/contest page has been updated, and includes a list of changes.

Any Perl 5 version? I think many here would have trouble testing that. For instance how many here know (or need to) that

foreach my $foo (@bar) {
  # Do something
}
[download]

is a syntax error in 5.003?

Did I miss a memo? I don't recall seeing anything on who won this.

Cheers,
KM