> Would anybody tell me what's the difference > between using ppm to install a module and > downloading it and puting it in my site/lib/?
Yeah, it works properly and is easier. On Unix, modules are installed using 'make', which isn't available on Windows. If you look carefully, you can probably get ppm to test modules before installing them - which is a good idea. On Unix you would do that by: perl Makefile.PL make make test Most of the time copying into the right lib folder is enough, but sometimes more is required to make them work... e.g. download the other modules that are required to make it work. > By the way, why there is a folder call LIB > while other one is Site/Lib , but they just > put modules too...... any difference ? Only speculating: The lib folder holds the standard modules distributed with perl, whilst site/lib has those that have been added either by yourself or your perl distribution. On Unix, placing perl on a shared filesystem is typical, but then it will be read only. Therefore, you require another directory that perl looks in that you could install your own stuff. --- Unix filesystems --- To know how that works, you need to know that Unix doesn't have drive letters, rather it uses a unified filesystem starting at / Say I have two partitions /dev/hda1 and /dev/hda2. hda1 is to be my main partition, so I mount it at root: mount /dev/hda1 / giving me (say): /usr/bin /usr/lib/perl5/site /usr/lib/perl5/5.005_03 /tmp /var .... Now, if my /usr/lib/perl5/site is empty but my other partition contains files starting at this point, e.g. /Net/IRC.pm /IPC/Open3.pm .... then I could mount it at /usr/lib/perl5/site by doing: mount /dev/hda2 /usr/lib/perl5/site giving: /usr/bin /usr/lib/perl5/site/Net/IRC.pm /usr/lib/perl5/site/IPC/Open3.pm /usr/lib/perl5/5.005_03 /tmp /var .... Now, two things... 1. /dev/hda1 and /dev/hda2 are local to the machine, but on Unix that could just as easily be a filesystem on a server. Useful if you have many computers you need to keep upto date. 2. The adminstrator of the network version of perl can update it, happy in the knowledge that you won't suddenly lose your files or have your scripts broken (probably). Note that the network versions of the libs also override the site libs - a small security feature preventing someone from installing a bad/dangerous module in your lib directory. Anyway, I hope that helps understand why silly things like making two lib directories is done. Don't worry if you skipped the Unix filesystem bit, it's only background reason/interest. Take care, Jonathan Paton __________________________________________________ Do You Yahoo!? Everything you'll ever need on one web page from News and Sport to Email and Music Charts http://uk.my.yahoo.com -- To unsubscribe, e-mail: [EMAIL PROTECTED] For additional commands, e-mail: [EMAIL PROTECTED]
