NAME
perlce - Perl for WinCE
Building Perl for WinCE
\s-1DESCRIPTION\s0
This file gives the instructions for building Perl5.8 and above for WinCE. Please read and understand the terms under which this software is distributed.
General explanations on cross-compiling WinCE
o |
miniperlis built. This is a single executable (without DLL), intended to run on Win32, and it will facilitate remaining build process; all binaries built after it are foreign and should not run locally.
miniperlis built using ./win32/Makefile; this is part of normal build process invoked as dependency from wince/Makefile.ce |
o |
After miniperlis built, configpmis invoked to create right Config.pmin right place and its corresponding Cross.pm. Unlike Win32 build, miniperl will not have Config.pmof host within reach; it rather will use Config.pmfrom within cross-compilation directories. File Cross.pmis dead simple: for given cross-architecture places in @INCa path where perl modules are, and right Config.pmin that place. That said, miniperl -Ilib -MConfig -we 1should report an error, because it can not find Config.pm. If it does not give an error wrong Config.pmis substituted, and resulting binaries will be a mess.
miniperl -MCross -MConfig -we 1should run okay, and it will provide right Config.pmfor further compilations. |
o |
During extensions build phase, a script ./win32/buldext.plis invoked, which in turn steps in ./extsubdirectories and performs a build of each extension in turn. All invokes of Makefile.PLare provided with -MCrossso to enable cross- compile. |
\s-1BUILD\s0
This section describes the steps to be performed to build PerlCE. You may find additional information about building perl for WinCE at <http://perlce.sourceforge.net> and some pre-built binaries.
Tools & SDK
For compiling, you need following:
o | Microsoft Embedded Visual Tools |
o | Microsoft Visual C++ |
o | Rainer Keuchels celib-sources |
o | Rainer Keuchels console-sources |
Make
Normally you only need to edit
./win32/ce-helpers/compile.batto reflect your system and run it.
File
./win32/ce-helpers/compile.batis actually a wrapper to call
nmake -f makefile.cewith appropriate parameters and it accepts extra parameters and forwards them to
nmakecommand as additional arguments. You should pass target this way.
To prepare distribution you need to do following:
o |
go to ./win32subdirectory |
o |
edit file ./win32/ce-helpers/compile.bat |
o | run compile.bat |
o | run compile.bat dist |
Makefile.cehas
CROSS_NAMEmacro, and it is used further to refer to your cross-compilation scheme. You could assign a name to it, but this is not necessary, because by default it is assigned after your machine configuration name, such as wince-sh3-hpc-wce211, and this is enough to distinguish different builds at the same time. This option could be handy for several different builds on same platform to perform, say, threaded build. In a following example we assume that all required environment variables are set properly for C cross-compiler (a special *.bat file could fit perfectly to this purpose) and your
compile.bathas proper MACHINE parameter set, to, say,
wince-mips-pocket-wce300.
compile.bat
compile.bat dist
compile.bat CROSS_NAME=mips-wce300-thr "USE_ITHREADS=define" "USE_IMP_SYS=define" "USE_MULTI=define"
compile.bat CROSS_NAME=mips-wce300-thr "USE_ITHREADS=define" "USE_IMP_SYS=define" "USE_MULTI=define" dist
If all goes okay and no errors during a build, youll get two independent distributions:
wince-mips-pocket-wce300and
mips-wce300-thr.
Target
distprepares distribution file set. Target
zipdistperforms same as
distbut additionally compresses distribution files into zip archive.
NOTE: during a build there could be created a number (or one) of
Config.pmfor cross-compilation (foreign
Config.pm) and those are hidden inside
../xlib/$(CROSS_NAME)with other auxilary files, but, and this is important to note, there should be no
Config.pmfor host miniperl. If youll get an error that perl could not find Config.pm somewhere in building process this means something went wrong. Most probably you forgot to specify a cross-compilation when invoking miniperl.exe to Makefile.PL When building an extension for cross-compilation your command line should look like
..\miniperl.exe -I..\lib -MCross=mips-wce300-thr Makefile.PL
or just
..\miniperl.exe -I..\lib -MCross Makefile.PL
to refer a cross-compilation that was created last time.
All questions related to building for WinCE devices could be asked in perlce-user@lists.sourceforge.net mailing list.
Using Perl on WinCE
\s-1DESCRIPTION\s0
PerlCE is currently linked with a simple console window, so it also works on non-hpc devices.
The simple stdio implementation creates the files
stdin.txt,
stdout.txtand
stderr.txt, so you might examine them if your console has only a liminted number of cols.
When exitcode is non-zero, a message box appears, otherwise the console closes, so you might have to catch an exit with status 0 in your program to see any output.
stdout/stderr now go into the files
/perl-stdout.txtand
/perl-stderr.txt.
PerlIDE is handy to deal with perlce.
\s-1LIMITATIONS\s0
No fork(), pipe(), popen() etc.
\s-1ENVIRONMENT\s0
All environment vars must be stored in HKLM\Environment as strings. They are read at process startup.
PERL5LIB | Usual perl lib path (semi-list). |
PATH | Semi-list for executables. |
TMP | - Tempdir. |
UNIXROOTPATH |
- Root for accessing some special files, i.e. /dev/null, /etc/services. |
ROWS/COLS | - Rows/cols for console. |
HOME | - Home directory. |
CONSOLEFONTSIZE | - Size for console font. |
\s-1REGISTRY\s0
To start perl by clicking on a perl source file, you have to make the according entries in HKCR (see
ce-helpers/wince-reg.bat). cereg.exe (which must be executed on a desktop pc with ActiveSync) is reported not to work on some devices. You have to create the registry entries by hand using a registry editor.
\s-1XS\s0
The following Win32-Methods are built-in:
newXS("Win32::GetCwd", w32_GetCwd, file);
newXS("Win32::SetCwd", w32_SetCwd, file);
newXS("Win32::GetTickCount", w32_GetTickCount, file);
newXS("Win32::GetOSVersion", w32_GetOSVersion, file);
newXS("Win32::IsWinNT", w32_IsWinNT, file);
newXS("Win32::IsWin95", w32_IsWin95, file);
newXS("Win32::IsWinCE", w32_IsWinCE, file);
newXS("Win32::CopyFile", w32_CopyFile, file);
newXS("Win32::Sleep", w32_Sleep, file);
newXS("Win32::MessageBox", w32_MessageBox, file);
newXS("Win32::GetPowerStatus", w32_GetPowerStatus, file);
newXS("Win32::GetOemInfo", w32_GetOemInfo, file);
newXS("Win32::ShellEx", w32_ShellEx, file);
\s-1BUGS\s0
Opening files for read-write is currently not supported if they use stdio (normal perl file handles).
If you find bugs or if it does not work at all on your device, send mail to the address below. Please report the details of your device (processor, ceversion, devicetype (hpc/palm/pocket)) and the date of the downloaded files.
\s-1INSTALLATION\s0
Currently installation instructions are at <http://perlce.sourceforge.net/>.
After installation & testing processes will stabilize, information will be more precise.
ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS
The port for Win32 was used as a reference.
History of WinCE port
5.6.0 |
Initial port of perl to WinCE. It was performed in separate directory
named wince. This port was based on contents of ./win32directory. miniperlwas not built, user must have HOST perl and properly edit makefile.ceto reflect this. |
5.8.0 |
wince port was kept in the same ./wincedirectory, and wince/Makefile.cewas used to invoke native compiler to create HOST miniperl, which then facilitates cross-compiling process. Extension building support was added. |
5.9.4 |
Two directories ./win32and ./wincewere merged, so perlce build process comes in ./win32directory. |
AUTHORS
Rainer Keuchel <coyxc@rainer-keuchel.de> | provided initial port of Perl, which appears to be most essential work, as it was a breakthrough on having Perl ported at all. Many thanks and obligations to Rainer! |
Vadim Konovalov | made further support of WinCE port. |