I'm building a site for a client that INSISTS I code for perl on their Netware Enterprise server. They think they'll move to *nix hosting in the near future.

They've got Perl installed and running, luckily. I don't have to do that.

They are a non-profit and don't want to outsource hosting under ANY circumstance. (won't shell out $25 a month. . .jeez.)

What I was going to build is a mySQL-based site that allows for administration and editing of documents via web forms. I've already got a similar system running on a linux box. I guess what I'll do instead is use DBI:CSV to store and retrieve variables related to pages (category, date, author, etc.) and "include" the page data somehow.

Anyway, are there any monks that have any feedback/ideas about perl and netware? I haven't seen much (update: I've done google, deja, slashdot and perlmonk searches, among others), which usually isn't a good sign.

Update: I've ditched this project. See last post from me in thread

Replies are listed 'Best First'.
Re: Netware and Perl (a few links)
by ybiC (Prior) on Mar 09, 2001 at 07:52 UTC
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Re: Netware and Perl
by Coyote (Deacon) on Mar 09, 2001 at 09:57 UTC
    While I don't have any experience running perl on a Netware server, this article from http://developer.novell.com says that DBI::ODBC has been ported to the perl on netware. Netware comes with an ODBC driver for Oracle. I suspect you might also be able to find drivers for Sybase and BTreive as well. I know that Oracle and Sybase Adaptive Server run on Netware. I am currently running Sybase on one of my servers with better results than I expected. You also might want to check out the DBI::Proxy and DBI::ProxyServer modules. I believe the proxy driver comes with DBI.

    Hero ZZyzzx, would you mind updating this node when you come up with a solution to your netware problems? As a netware admin, I would be interested to hear your experiences using perl in this context.

    ----
    Coyote

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      By all means I'll update this node when I've put a little more elbow grease into this. If I can get CGI (which I'm learning, *flagellation*) and DBI running everything should work out for what I want to do.

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Re: Netware and Perl
by Guruzilla (Scribe) on Mar 09, 2001 at 21:48 UTC
    As a Novell sympathizer, I happen to know there's a private newsgroup for Netware Perl on devforums.novell.com. Low-traffic, but (to an ignorant apprentice) looks like it might be a good place for such an obscure topic... Guruzilla -- "so let us not talk falsely now / the hour is getting late"
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Re: Netware and Perl
by Hero Zzyzzx (Curate) on Mar 22, 2001 at 03:16 UTC

    I've decided to ditch this project. Sorry, I guess I won't be updating this node in any major way.

    Here's what I've discovered:

    • Not many people code for perl on netware. Bad sign.
    • perl on netware is known to "abend" (crash) servers. Not good either. The site I would be making on this project would rely on perl so much that I really think of this as a risk.
    • The perl version ported to netware is kind of old (5.0005 or something) and doesn't have all modules available to it
    • mySQL doesn't run on netware, causing a whole slew of other problems for me (setting up the mySQL db on another server, using flat files, Oracle, etc.)
    • I don't feel like developing for a platform that I'll never develop for again.

    I have enough paying gigs. I don't feel like dealing with all this crap. Another issue was that the client didn't want to give me an FTP account, so I'd have to email them zipped archives of the site when I wanted to do updates. Amazing. Not very good for debugging. . .

    Sorry for sketching out on this.

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