Intrepid has asked for the wisdom of the Perl Monks concerning the following question:

I've got an observation/question to make that isn't about the Perl language but instead is about our Perl infrastructure. Hope it's ok to put it at SoPW anyhow.

I went to look at what's been released recently, at metacpan.org, and found Image::ExifTool v13.35, released a day ago. On my CygwinPerl installation I have cpanplus set up to install CPAN modules. In the cpanp shell I typed i Image::ExifTool and cpanplus found v13.30, not v13.35! Is this a known thing? How would metacpan have a newer release than cpan.org? Aren't packages uploaded to cpan.org first, then somehow appear on metacpan.org?

What I did about it was this. I first ran x --update_source, which did not cause the newer Image-ExifTool to show up. Then, I uninstalled v13.30 (probably an unnecessary step). Then I downloaded the ExifTool .tar.gz package from metacpan and unrolled the archive, typed i <path to archive dir> and hit enter. Pleasingly, that worked (cpanplus does have some good features).

    — Soren

Sep 07, 2025 at 22:09 UTC

A just machine to make big decisions
Programmed by fellows (and gals) with compassion and vision
We'll be clean when their work is done
We'll be eternally free yes, and eternally young
Donald Fagen —> I.G.Y.
(Slightly modified for inclusiveness)

  • Comment on Released modules sometimes newer on metacpan.org than on cpan.org?!

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Re: Released modules sometimes newer on metacpan.org than on cpan.org?!
by stevieb (Canon) on Sep 08, 2025 at 04:35 UTC

    This to me sounds like you're using a mirror server that hadn't been updated with the newer version yet.

    I use cpanm (App::cpanminus) so I'm not sure how to go about troubleshooting your specific issue, or updating the list of mirrors.

    -stevieb

[reply]
[d/l]

      stevieb, thanks for the reply. My setup, using cpanplus for installing modules to CygwinPerl, has just used the default. We no longer set up remote mirrors for cpan clients, whether they are are CPAN.pm, CPANPLUS, or cpanminus. As discussed at log.perl.org, here's what happened:

      Furthermore, www.cpan.org was pointed at a global CDN, meaning that traffic could be routed efficiently without client configuration. The CDN also meant that users wouldn’t need to worry about out of date or down mirrors.

      I have to admit that I don't know what a CDN is, but the meaning is clear enough. A remote mirror that's slow to update shouldn't be a problem. However, my local mirror could be. I'm going to check now.

      Here's my settings; one uses s mirrors in the cpanplus shell:

      CPAN Terminal> s mirrors

Readonly list of mirrors (in order of preference):

        1 http://192.168.1.7/minicpan
        2 http://www.cpan.org

      Yes, my local mirror at 192.168.1.7 was out of date. I would like to punch myself. I need to make a cron job or something similar for this mirror. Sorry, everyone.

          — Soren

      Sep 08, 2025 at 17:46 UTC
[reply]
[reply]

        Content Delivery Network. Basically, traffic is automatically directed to local caching and/or mirroring proxies. You might have heard of Cloudflare? They're a king in that industry.

[reply]

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