Help compiling perl

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

I downloaded perl-5.12.5 tarball and followed compile directions. make test failed. I tried "perl harness" and got this:

Test Summary Report
-------------------
../ext/POSIX/t/posix.t      (Wstat: 0 Tests: 66 Failed: 0)
  TODO passed:   11
../lib/locale.t                    (Wstat: 0 Tests: 117 Failed: 1)
  Failed test:  99
Files=1806, Tests=350140, 639 wallclock secs (36.87 usr 12.68 sys + 27
+9.50 cusr 53.72 csys = 382.77 CPU)
Result: FAIL
[download]

How do i interpret this info? It looks like there is one failure in locale.t . I don't think I need to worry about what I think is locale functions. How vital is this section? How do I pin down what test had trouble then track it down?

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Re: Help compiling perl by Corion (Patriarch) on Oct 29, 2016 at 06:28 UTC
Like Anonymous Monk says, a failure in `locale.t` can most likely be ignored, as you shouldn't be using locales anyway and the locale support across many OSes is inconsistent and/or buggy. May I ask why you are compiling 5.12 specifically? The most recent release is 5.24, which is officially supported. Unless you are doing this to match an existing installation, I would go for a more recent version. If you are doing this to match an existing installation, you are taking the correct approach. If the locale failure worries you, consider compiling a more recent version just to see if the error goes away there. If you are running a less common OS and want to improve Perl support for it, and the error still happens with the most recent releases of Perl, you can send the relevant information using the `perlbug` utility from your compiled-but-not-installed version of Perl to send all relevant information to the Perl 5 Porters.	[reply] [d/l] [select]
Re^2: Help compiling perl by davies (Monsignor) on Oct 29, 2016 at 12:18 UTC
Need older version for OS X gives an explanation. Regards, John Davies	[reply]
Re: Help compiling perl (make test "perl harness") by Anonymous Monk on Oct 29, 2016 at 06:19 UTC
Hi, you have only one choice, ignore the test failure :) How do i interpret this info? If you have to ask, the information is not for you :) Mostly its for the perl5-porters to interpret, you send them a report if you feel the urge (perlbug...), and get on with your life :) It looks like there is one failure in locale.t . I don't think I need to worry about what I think is locale functions. How vital is this section? Does your code base make use of locales? (have you read perllocale) If your code base makes use of locales, it should have test for testing that functionality, which should take care of making sure this feature works the way you need it (vitality and what not) How do I pin down what test had trouble then track it down? Turn on verbosity , it can be as simple as running the test file manually, something like (untested) `perl harness -v ext/POSIX/t/locale.t`	[reply] [d/l]