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

Hi,

I'm trying to use the module WWW::Search to search this site, with the backend WWW::Search::PubMed. CPAN keeps installing it in C:\Perl\site\lib when it should be in C:\Perl\site\lib\WWW\Search. When I try to run the code:

#! c:\perl\bin

use WWW::Search; 

$query = "lung cancer treatment";
$search = new WWW::Search('PubMed'); 
$search->native_query(WWW::Search::escape_query($query)); 
$search->maximum_to_retrieve(100); 
my $response = $search->response();
if ($response->is_success) {
    print "Page returned ok";
} else {
    print "error:  " . $response->as_string();
}
while (my $result = $search->next_result()) { 
$url = $result->url;
$title = $result->title;
$desc = $result->description; 
print "$result\n";
print "<a href=$url>$title<br>$desc<p>\n";

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I get:

Unknown search engine backend PubMed (Can't locate WWW/Search/PubMed.p
+m in @INC (@INC contains: C:/Perl//lib C:/Perl/site/lib .) at (eval 5
+) line 2.
BEGIN failed--compilation aborted at (eval 5) line 2.
) at C:\Perl\progs\test2.pl line 6

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So I tried moving it into C:\Perl\site\lib\WWW\Search. The above script then works but gives no response other than:

Page returned ok

I'm able to search the web via WWW::Search::AltaVista so I know that the WWW::Search module installation is ok. I'm thinking this might be some sort of installation problem. Is there any way to force installation of WWW::Search::PubMed into C:\Perl\site\lib\WWW\Search? Or maybe this is some other problem?

Replies are listed 'Best First'.
Re: problem with module installation
by ant9000 (Monk) on Jul 04, 2003 at 13:05 UTC
    Perl complains about not finding WWW/Search/PubMed.pm in its @INC, so moving the module where you put it should be enough to let it work.
    There are few debug options in WWW::Search, nonetheless: first of all, try 
    use WWW::Search;
print sort &WWW::Search::installed_engines();

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    (more or less pasted from perldoc WWW::Search) to see if PubMed is recognized correctly. Assuming it is, you could try 
    use WWW::Search;
my $oSearch=WWW::Search->new('PubMed');
$oSearch->native_query(
 "lung cancer treatment",
 { search_debug=>1, search_parser_debug=>1 }
);
#... whatever ...

    [download]
    so that the engine will spit out some (hopefully useful) debug information.
    HTH!
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