There are at least three ways I can think of. You could push the appropriate directory onto @INC in a BEGIN block, so compilation won't fail:

BEGIN {
    push @INC, "/usr/lib/perl5/site_perl/Cobalt";
}
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You can use the -I switch in your hashbang line: #!/usr/bin/perl -w -I/usr/lib/perl5/site_perl/Cobalt My favorite is the use lib syntax: use lib "/usr/lib/perl5/site_perl/Cobalt"; The Perl faq says you can also modify the PERLLIB or PERL5LIB environmental variables. Check your .profile or .blahrc files there.