To be fair, he's using Module::Build rather than ExtUtils::MakeMaker. After a few minutes of browsing the POD, Module::Build seems much more flexible than MakeMaker.

I don't like his reply, but it might be more productive to alter CPAN.pm/CPANPLUS.pm to make it capable of using alternativite build systems. Meanwhile, Earle might be pointed to Module::Build::Compat.

Update: another poster pointed out that CPANPLUS can already do this :)

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I wanted to explore how Perl's closures can be manipulated, and ended up creating an object system by accident.
-- Schemer

Note: All code is untested, unless otherwise stated