Changes/perl5.18

Perl 5.18

Summary

A new perl 5.18 version brings a lot of changes done over a year of development. See 5.18.0 perldelta for more details.

Owner

• Name: Petr Písař
• Email: <ppisar@redhat.com>
• Name: Jitka Plesníková
• Email: <jplesnik@redhat.com>
• Release notes owner:

Current status

• Targeted release: Fedora 20
• Last updated: 2013-08-03
• Tracker bug: will be assigned by the Wrangler

Completed items

• Get dedicated build-root from rel-engs (f20-perl). Rel-engs gave us only 7 days. The build-root will be merged on 2013-07-19.
• Patch perl to link XS modules to libperl.so explicitly
• Rebase perl to 5.18.0
• Define perl_bootstrap in perl-srpm-macros
• Build new perl 5.18 keeping old COMPAT Provides
• Rebuild packages needed for minimal build-root
• Rebuild dual-lived packages (otherwise yum recommends --skip-broken and fails)
• Rebuild packages needed for building source packages from git repository
• Remove old perl(:MODULE_COMPAT_5.16.*) from perl
• Merge dedicated build-root to rawhide and remove the dedicated one by rel-engs [1]. The build-root has been merged no 2013-08-03.

Items in progress

• Rebuilt Perl packages: 2412 of 2758 done (87.45 %)
• Synchronize packages upgraded in f20 build root
• Rebuild other packages: Use Fedora::Rebuild dependency solver or ordered sets computed by Paul

Items to be done

• Undefine perl_bootstrap
• Rebuild packages having perl_bootstrap condition in spec file again
• Failed rebuilds (70 including intermittent failures):
  • claws-mail – cannot use libetpan during configuration
  • condor – broken libmongodb [2]
  • emacspeak – does not build due to texinfo [3]
  • geoqo – tests fail due to random hashes [4]
  • gpsdrive – non-existing compat-libgda-devel [5]
  • graphviz – ghostscript issue [6]
  • kdenetwork – C++ error [7]
  • libdigidocpp – compiler error at zlib header [8]
  • monotone – lua bug [9]
  • perl-CGI-Application-Plugin-Stream – a test fails, ranodomization bug in CGI::Application? [10]
  • perl-CGI-FormBuilder – test fail due to hash randomization [11]
  • perl-Class-Prototyped – test fail due to hash randomization [12]
  • perl-Data-Alias – "doing creepy things that go far beyond the API" [13] [14]
  • perl-DBD-AnyData – tests fail, not compatible with DBI > 1.622 [15], remove it from distribution.
  • perl-Encode-JP-Mobile – tests fail [16]
  • perl-IPTables-libiptc – not compatible with current iptables
  • perl-File-LibMagic – broken bundled code, latest release segfaults [17]
  • perl-Jemplate – a test fails [18]
  • perl-MIME-Lite-HTML – tests fail, maybe hash ordering, but definitively test samples do not match code (MIME-Version header is removed) [19]
  • perl-Net-DNS-SEC – a test fails [20]
  • perl-PDL – segfaults
  • perl-Qt – tests fail
  • perl-SOOT – root is broken on ARM [21], ExcludeArch?
  • perl-Template-Alloy – a test fails [22]
  • perl-Test-Class – not compatible with Test-Simple 0.98_05 [23]
  • perl-Test-Moose-More – new version 0.20 requires unpackaged Syntax::Keyword::Junction
  • perl-Test-Refcount – SIGBUS [24]
  • perl-Test-Unit – a test fails [25]
  • perl-XML-Hash-LX – a test fails due to hash randomization [26]
  • polymake – perl API change [27]
  • root – broken C++ on ARM [28]
  • scsi-target-utils – build fails on XSLT transformation
  • tiobench – compiler error [29]
  • xmms2 – waf build system hardcodes wrong path to xsubpp [30]

Detailed Description

New perl is released every year and updates containing mainly bug fixes follow during the year. The 5.18.0 version is stable release this year and 5.18.1 and subsequent revisions will follow during the year to fix issues introduced in 5.18.0.

Because of change in dlopen(3) from RTLD_GLOBAL to RTLD_LOCAL (bug #960048), we will try to link all native perl module DSOs to libperl.so explicitly. This item needs discussion. Current status does not allow to use perl interpreter via dlopen() from other programs (like slapd, snmpd), but proposed change can bring other unforeseen difficulties (like double-linking).

Benefit to Fedora

Up-to-date and latest perl release will be delivered to Fedora users.

Scope

Every Perl package will be rebuilt in a dedicated f20-perl build-root against perl 5.18.0 and then if no major problem emerges the packages will be merged back to f20 build-root.

• Proposal owners:

New perl and all packages requiring perl or a Perl module will be rebuilt into f20-perl build-root.

• Other developers:

Owners of packages that fail to rebuild, mainly perl-sig users, will be asked using Bugzilla to fix or remove their packages from the distribution.

• Release engineering:

Release engineers will be asked for new f20-perl build-root inheriting from f20 build-root. After successful finishing the rebuild, they will be asked to merge f20-perl packages back to f20 build-root.

• Policies and guidelines:

No policies have to be modified to complete this change.

Upgrade/compatibility impact

Vast majority of functionality will be preserved. Only the packages that failed to build against perl 5.18 will be removed from the distribution. That will require to remove those packages from existing systems otherwise package manager will encounter unsatisfied dependencies.

How To Test

Try upgrading from Fedora 19 to 20. Try some Perl application to verify they work as expected. Try embedded perl in slapd or snmpd.

User Experience

There should not be any remarkable change in user experience. Though developers can hit some changes in perl interpreter behavior like a hash key randomization.

Dependencies

There is more than 2000 packages depending on perl. Most of them are expected not to break. Finishing this change can be endangered only by critical changes in a toolchain.

Contingency Plan

If we find perl 5.18 is not suitable for Fedora 20, we will revert back to perl 5.16 and we drop the temporary build-root with already rebuilt packages.

• Contingency deadline: branching Fedora 20 from Rawhide.
• Blocks release? No.

Documentation

5.18.0 perldelta

Release Notes

To be done.