I've read the other posts about running Perl on Windows, and have some related questions:

1) The Perl source code sites say to use a compiler when running scripts. What is it, what's it do, is it a must, and where do I get it?

2) They also say if you can't get a compiler to download a binary version of Perl instead. What's binary, how's it differ from standard Perl, can I write/test/run binary scripts and then publish them w/o conversion problems, and can I open/edit a script written in standard Perl with my binary version?

As you've probably gathered by now, I'm a newbie -- just looking for the easiest way to get started. All help's appreciated.

Great monastery you got here, BTW. :)

Edit ar0n -- moved to SoPW from Q&A

In reply to Running/Testing Perl on Windows -- binaries, compiling by garyj

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