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

Howdy brethren

I am supporting a fair number (30 or so) of windows boxes over several sites, and I am trying to plan out a release schedule. All boxes are currently 5.6.1, which has worked pretty well. We are just starting to get a wave of "please upgrade to 5.8" requests for things like: DBI (DBDs not easily available for 5.6), WWW::Mechanize (requires LWP::UA 2.03, not available by PPM), and UTF support. Nothing critical there yet, but it seems to be a good time to upgrade.

At the same time, I see 5.8.1 will be out shortly, which makes me think waiting until then would be a good idea. Only... I have no idea what ActiveState's release schedule might be, or how to find out. Are they planning an ActivePerl version for 5.8.1? How long does it usually take them to "catch up" to the most recent Perl release?

I'm torn between wanting to upgrade now to avoid end-user hassles and waiting for 5.8.1. What do my fellow monks think?

Replies are listed 'Best First'.
Re: ActiveState and 5.8.1
by PodMaster (Abbot) on Sep 23, 2003 at 06:08 UTC
    Here's what I think
    1. about the schedule, ask ActiveState
    2. about the ppm's, either teach your users how to use CPANPLUS(you can simply point them to A Guide to Installing Modules) , or start your own ppm repository
    3. don't worry about activestate's release schedule (meaning get a compiler, compile perl, add whatever you need, distribute it)

    MJD says "you can't just make shit up and expect the computer to know what you mean, retardo!"
    I run a Win32 PPM repository for perl 5.6.x and 5.8.x -- I take requests (README).
    ** The third rule of perl club is a statement of fact: pod is sexy.

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Re: ActiveState and 5.8.1
by Roger (Parson) on Sep 23, 2003 at 06:12 UTC
    Hmmmm, a question before you do any upgrade - How do you verify/test that your application under 5.6.1 will still work under 5.8.x? There are a few differences in the 5.8.x release (checkout the release note). Probably won't matter that much, but it would be great if your application, including all the modules for the application, has test cases to verify that nothing is broken by the upgrade. You can't assume that your application will work under later releases of Perl.

    Case 1 - If your projects are using Test::Simple or Test::More for testing. Congratulations! You should be pretty confident to say - I can upgrade to any future Perl version I want.

    Case 2 - If your projects do not have test suite, then start writing them now! Be sure to check out the Test::Simple and Test::More packages on CPAN.

[reply]
      Case 1 - If your projects are using Test::Simple or Test::More for testing. Congratulations! You should be pretty confident to say - I can upgrade to any future Perl version I want.

      True. But you may be surprised by the number of warnings your test-suite will show as it runs with "use warnings" by default in 5.8.1.

      Liz

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