I'm distributing a script that depends on a couple non-core modules. I'd like to write a custom Makefile.PL that will automatically install those modules. If Makefile.PL is run as root, then it installs the modules properly using CPAN.pm and everything is good.

However, not all the users of the script will be able to obtain root access. For these users, I'd like to be able to install the modules into a directory that they can access. The problem is that whenever I try to make use of CPAN.pm from a non-root user, I get errors that CPAN.pm can't access /root/.cpan. I'm fairly sure that this is happening because I initially configured the CPAN module while running as root.

What I need now is to be able to use CPAN.pm as a non-root user. I mentioned this in the CB earlier, and a few people suggested that I could change that user's local CPAN config. I'd really prefer a generic method that would let this run anywhere without having to worry about messing with config files. I'd like to be able to just run Makefile.PL and have those modules installed into a user directory.

Is it possible to do this? Do I need CPANPLUS?

In reply to Running CPAN without Being root by batkins

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