NAME

par.pl - Make and run Perl Archives

SYNOPSIS

(Please see pp for convenient ways to make self-contained executables, scripts or PAR archives from perl programs.)

To make a PAR distribution from a CPAN module distribution:

    % par.pl -p                 # make a PAR dist under the current path
    % par.pl -p Foo-0.01        # assume unpacked CPAN dist in Foo-0.01/

To manipulate a PAR distribution:

    % par.pl -i Foo-0.01-i386-freebsd-5.8.0.par # install
    % par.pl -i http://foo.com/Foo-0.01         # auto-appends archname + perlver
    % par.pl -i cpan://AUTRIJUS/PAR-0.74        # uses CPAN author directory
    % par.pl -u Foo-0.01-i386-freebsd-5.8.0.par # uninstall
    % par.pl -s Foo-0.01-i386-freebsd-5.8.0.par # sign
    % par.pl -v Foo-0.01-i386-freebsd-5.8.0.par # verify

To use Hello.pm from ./foo.par:

    % par.pl -A./foo.par -MHello
    % par.pl -A./foo -MHello    # the .par part is optional

Same thing, but search foo.par in the @INC;

    % par.pl -Ifoo.par -MHello
    % par.pl -Ifoo -MHello      # ditto

Run test.pl or script/test.pl from foo.par:

    % par.pl foo.par test.pl    # looks for 'main.pl' by default,
                                # otherwise run 'test.pl'

To make a self-containing script containing a PAR file :

    % par.pl -O./foo.pl foo.par
    % ./foo.pl test.pl          # same as above

To embed the necessary non-core modules and shared objects for PAR's execution (like "Zlib", "IO", "Cwd", etc), use the -b flag:

    % par.pl -b -O./foo.pl foo.par
    % ./foo.pl test.pl          # runs anywhere with core modules installed

If you also wish to embed core modules along, use the -B flag instead:

    % par.pl -B -O./foo.pl foo.par
    % ./foo.pl test.pl          # runs anywhere with the perl interpreter

This is particularly useful when making stand-alone binary executables; see pp for details.

DESCRIPTION

This stand-alone command offers roughly the same feature as "perl -MPAR", except that it takes the pre-loaded .par files via "-Afoo.par" instead of "-MPAR=foo.par".

Additionally, it lets you convert a CPAN distribution to a PAR distribution, as well as manipulate such distributions. For more information about PAR distributions, see PAR::Dist.

Binary PAR loader (parl)

If you have a C compiler, or a pre-built binary package of PAR is available for your platform, a binary version of par.pl will also be automatically installed as parl. You can use it to run .par files:

    # runs script/run.pl in archive, uses its lib/* as libraries
    % parl myapp.par run.pl     # runs run.pl or script/run.pl in myapp.par
    % parl otherapp.pl          # also runs normal perl scripts

However, if the .par archive contains either main.pl or script/main.pl, it is used instead:

    % parl myapp.par run.pl     # runs main.pl, with 'run.pl' as @ARGV

Finally, the "-O" option makes a stand-alone binary executable from a PAR file:

    % parl -B -Omyapp myapp.par
    % ./myapp                   # run it anywhere without perl binaries

With the "--par-options" flag, generated binaries can act as "parl" to pack new binaries:

    % ./myapp --par-options -Omyap2 myapp.par   # identical to ./myapp
    % ./myapp --par-options -Omyap3 myap3.par   # now with different PAR

Stand-alone executable format

The format for the stand-alone executable is simply concatenating the following elements:

The executable itself
Either in plain-text (par.pl) or native executable format (parl or parl.exe).
Any number of embedded files
These are typically used for bootstrapping PAR's various XS dependencies. Each section contains:

The magic string ""FILE""
Length of file name in "pack('N')" format plus 9
8 bytes of hex-encoded CRC32 of file content
A single slash (""/"")
The file name (without path)
File length in "pack('N')" format
The file's content (not compressed)

One PAR file
This is just a zip file beginning with the magic string ""PK\003\004"".
Ending section
The pre-computed cache name. A pack('Z40') string of the value of -T (--tempcache) or the hash of the file, followed by "\0CACHE". The hash of the file is calculated with Digest::SHA.

A pack('N') number of the total length of FILE and PAR sections, followed by a 8-bytes magic string: ""\012PAR.pm\012"".

AUTHORS

Audrey Tang <cpan@audreyt.org>, Steffen Mueller <smueller@cpan.org>

You can write to the mailing list at <par@perl.org>, or send an empty mail to <par-subscribe@perl.org> to participate in the discussion.

Please submit bug reports to <bug-par-packer@rt.cpan.org>.

COPYRIGHT

Neither this program nor the associated parl program impose any licensing restrictions on files generated by their execution, in accordance with the 8th article of the Artistic License:

    "Aggregation of this Package with a commercial distribution is
    always permitted provided that the use of this Package is embedded;
    that is, when no overt attempt is made to make this Package's
    interfaces visible to the end user of the commercial distribution.
    Such use shall not be construed as a distribution of this Package."

Therefore, you are absolutely free to place any license on the resulting executable, as long as the packed 3rd-party libraries are also available under the Artistic License.

This program is free software; you can redistribute it and/or modify it under the same terms as Perl itself.

See LICENSE.