PAR(1) User Contributed Perl Documentation PAR(1)
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:
o The executable itself
Either in plain-text (par.pl) or native executable format (parl or parl.exe).
o 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)
o One PAR file
This is just a zip file beginning with the magic string ""PK 03 04"".
o 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 "