I assume you must have installed a 64-bit Perl?

The reason why ppm install mingw doesn't work on 64-bit 5.12 (or any other 64-bit build) is explained here (by clicking the icons).

It comes down to: nobody at AS has either tried (or they have but failed to succeed) getting it to build.

You would need to get it from http://mingw-w64.sourceforge.net/ for it to work :/

Yeah, mingw project is kinda odd like that :)

You would need to get it from http://mingw-w64.sourceforge.net/ for it to work :/

Get what "it" for what "it" to work?

The point is, if the OP had installed a 32-bit version of Perl 5.12, then that single, simple command ppm install mingw is (apparently) all that is required to install the mingw compiler and set it up to work such that cpan will build most compiled modules.

As for getting anything from sourceforge, I'd rather have root canal work. That site is the single biggest OSS handicap there is. Trying to find what is there is next to impossible. Once you know something is there, it is neigh impossible to find out that that something is or does. If you lucky enough to find a link to something you know you want, working out what files to download is ludicrously hard. And then there is no information on what you should do with them; what dependencies you're going to need; how to put them all together and in what order.

---

Examine what is said, not who speaks -- Silence betokens consent -- Love the truth but pardon error.

"Science is about questioning the status quo. Questioning authority".

In the absence of evidence, opinion is indistinguishable from prejudice.

Thanks BrowserUK, a relief to know I wasn't doing something stupid. Had actually come across that AS code/faq chart yesterday but didn't realise what it meant! Back to 32bit for now. Regards, Tom

Back to 32bit for now

It probably should be mentioned that, once you install a mingw64 compiler, you *can* use that compiler with 64-bit ActivePerl by installing ExtUtils::FakeConfig. (It's just ActiveState's automated integration of mingw that's broken for the x64 builds.)

In addition to sourceforge, there's also a few mingw64 compilers available from the Strawberry Perl project.
Specifically, you could take the link to 64_gcctoolchain and download one of the ~30Mb zip files.
There's also some useful pre-built external libraries to be found in the 64 libs folder.

(However, reverting to a 32-bit perl on your 64-bit box is not something you should fret about, IMHO.)

Cheers,
Rob

Which distribution of Perl are you using? (Strawberry, ActiveState, etc.)

Since you mentioned PPM, I'm going to assume that you're using ActiveState's ActivePerl. In that case, there's a PPM utility that was installed when Perl was installed. Run the PPM utility to install mingw, which will install that and dmake. Once that's installed, you should be able to install packages via CPAN.

Yes, it is Active State

When I try "ppm install minGW" as you suggested, I get a msg "can't find any package that provides minGW". Must be missing some obvious step.

I hesitate to say anything that contradicts what BrowserUk posts since I usually find out that I'm wrong. However, I'll share what I have been able to do.

In both 32-bit and 64-bit Windows 7, here's what I have been able to successfully do with 32-bit ActivePerl 5.12. Launch the PPM in GUI mode and install mingw (PPM will also install dmake). That installs without complaint. Considering that aftewards on both 32-bit and 64-bit Windows 7 I was able to install modules via the cpan utility (e.g.: cpan install PAR::Packer) which seems to invoke dmake, I'm assuming that mingw and dmake were installed and were working properly.

However, based on the link in BrowserUk's post, I'm guessing that I might eventually hit a problem with doing the above on a 64-bit Windows with 32-bit ActivePerl. Anyways, just wanted to share what I have "successfully" been able to do.