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

Dear fellow monks,

I wanted to start a new CPAN prompt installation in my new Linux PC. However I found this following problem especially in accessing ftp.perl.org.

How can I resolve this?

This is the message I got. 
$ perl -MCPAN -e shell
/home/monkfan/.cpan/CPAN/MyConfig.pm initialized.
CPAN is the world-wide archive of perl resources. It consists of about
100 sites that all replicate the same contents all around the globe.
Many countries have at least one CPAN site already. The resources
found on CPAN are easily accessible with the CPAN.pm module. If you
want to use CPAN.pm, you have to configure it properly.

If you do not want to enter a dialog now, you can answer 'no' to this
question and I'll try to autoconfigure. (Note: you can revisit this
dialog anytime later by typing 'o conf init' at the cpan prompt.)

Are you ready for manual configuration? [yes] 

# ...EVERYTHING GOES SMOOTHLY UNTIL.....

If you're accessing the net via proxies, you can specify them in the
CPAN configuration or via environment variables. The variable in
the $CPAN::Config takes precedence.

Your ftp_proxy?  
Your http_proxy?  
Your no_proxy?  
You have no /home/ewijaya/.cpan/sources/MIRRORED.BY
  I'm trying to fetch one
CPAN: LWP::UserAgent loaded ok
Fetching with LWP:
  ftp://ftp.perl.org/pub/CPAN/MIRRORED.BY

Fetching with LWP:
  ftp://ftp.perl.org/pub/CPAN/MIRRORED.BY.gz
Fetching with Net::FTP:
  ftp://ftp.perl.org/pub/CPAN/MIRRORED.BY
Fetching with Net::FTP
  ftp://ftp.perl.org/pub/CPAN/MIRRORED.BY.gz

Trying with "/usr/bin/lynx -source" to get
    ftp://ftp.perl.org/pub/CPAN/MIRRORED.BY


Looking up ftp.perl.org
Making FTP connection to ftp.perl.org
Alert!: Unable to connect to FTP host.
Looking up ftp.perl.org
Making FTP connection to ftp.perl.org
Alert!: Unable to connect to FTP host.
Can't Access `ftp://ftp.perl.org/pub/CPAN/MIRRORED.BY'
Alert!: Unable to access document.

lynx: Can't access startfile 

Trying with "/usr/bin/lynx -source" to get
  ftp://ftp.perl.org/pub/CPAN/MIRRORED.BY.gz

Looking up ftp.perl.org
Making FTP connection to ftp.perl.org
Alert!: Unable to connect to FTP host.
Looking up ftp.perl.org
Making FTP connection to ftp.perl.org
Alert!: Unable to connect to FTP host.
Can't Access `ftp://ftp.perl.org/pub/CPAN/MIRRORED.BY.gz'
Alert!: Unable to access document.

lynx: Can't access startfile 

Trying with "/usr/bin/ncftpget" to get
    ftp://ftp.perl.org/pub/CPAN/MIRRORED.BY
Could not connect to ftp.perl.org -- try again later: Connection timed
+ out.
Could not connect to ftp.perl.org -- try again later: Connection timed
+ out.
Could not connect to ftp.perl.org -- try again later: Connection timed
+ out.
ncftpget: cannot open ftp.perl.org: could not connect to remote host, 
+but can try again.

Trying with "/usr/bin/ncftpget" to get
  ftp://ftp.perl.org/pub/CPAN/MIRRORED.BY.gz
Could not connect to ftp.perl.org -- try again later: Connection timed
+ out.
Could not connect to ftp.perl.org -- try again later: Connection timed
+ out.
Could not connect to ftp.perl.org -- try again later: Connection timed
+ out.
ncftpget: cannot open ftp.perl.org: could not connect to remote host, 
+but can try again.

Trying with "/usr/bin/wget -O -" to get
    ftp://ftp.perl.org/pub/CPAN/MIRRORED.BY
--15:57:57--  ftp://ftp.perl.org/pub/CPAN/MIRRORED.BY
           => `-'
Resolving ftp.perl.org... 163.143.1.21
Connecting to ftp.perl.org|163.143.1.21|:21... failed: Connection time
+d out.
Retrying.

--16:01:07--  ftp://ftp.perl.org/pub/CPAN/MIRRORED.BY
  (try: 2) => `-'
Connecting to ftp.perl.org|163.143.1.21|:21... failed: Connection time
+d out.
Retrying.

--16:04:18--  ftp://ftp.perl.org/pub/CPAN/MIRRORED.BY
  (try: 3) => `-'
Connecting to ftp.perl.org|163.143.1.21|:21... failed: Connection time
+d out.
Retrying.

--16:07:30--  ftp://ftp.perl.org/pub/CPAN/MIRRORED.BY
  (try: 4) => `-'
Connecting to ftp.perl.org|163.143.1.21|:21... failed: Connection time
+d out.
Retrying.

--16:10:43--  ftp://ftp.perl.org/pub/CPAN/MIRRORED.BY
  (try: 5) => `-'
Connecting to ftp.perl.org|163.143.1.21|:21... 


#...THIS KEPT GOING ON AND ON ENDLESSLY....

[download]

Regards,
Edward

Replies are listed 'Best First'.
Re: Problem Starting CPAN Shell with ftp.perl.org
by Corion (Patriarch) on Aug 31, 2008 at 07:36 UTC

    You seem to have a network problem, either with ftp in general or when connecting to ftp.perl.org. Debug your network problem or configure CPAN to use another CPAN mirror manually. You can also fetch the MIRRORED.BY manually and put it in the right place.

[reply]
[d/l]
[select]
Re: Problem Starting CPAN Shell with ftp.perl.org
by bart (Canon) on Aug 31, 2008 at 14:23 UTC
    On a lot of corporate firewalls, FTP is blocked by default. Try HTTP instead.

    I don't think it's still the case with the most modern distributions, but the old CPAN was setup by default to only try FTP. Which is... aaaaargggghhhh!! just infuriating.

[reply]
      Try HTTP instead.
      Hi Bart,
      How do you do that?

      Regards,
      Edward
[reply]
        How do you do that?
        By adding HTTP URLs in the URL-list. The main tool to manage that list is "o conf" in the CPAN shell.

        You can see the current contents (under "urllist") with just "o conf", or, more limited in output, with "o conf urllist".

        You can replace the whole URL-list with, for example (this is the contents I have, which must have been put there by default): 

        o conf urllist http://ppm.activestate.com/CPAN http://cpan.perl.org

        [download]

        You can also add a URL to the existing list with shift and push, like this: 

        o conf urllist push http://cpan.perl.org
o conf urllist unshift http://cpan.perl.org

        [download]
        or drop the first or last entry resp. with 
        o conf urllist shift
o conf urllist pop

        [download]

        You must save the changes with 

        o conf commit

        [download]
        or you can rollback (after a disastrous mistake) with 
        o conf defaults

        [download]

        HTH.

[reply]
[d/l]
[select]

Back to Seekers of Perl Wisdom