UNIX for Dummies Questions & Answers

Hi,
I have UNIX system on which Perl is already installed. When I run the command

Code:

perl -v

. It gives the output as
This is perl, v5.8.8 built for x86_64-linux-thread-multi

Copyright 1987-2006, Larry Wall

I wanted to upgrade it to the latest version. So, I downloaded the perl onto my Windows desktop, transferred it to Unix system using Winscp and installed it as per the README file. The installation went on fine, but the version still shows as 5.8.8

I know the reason because the PATH is given as 5.8.8
Please the code below:

Code:

[ usher4500 usrcscmssvc CMSDV1 ]echo $PATH
/u01/app/oracle/product/11.1.0/db_1/bin:/usr/ccs/bin:/usr/bin/X11:/u01/app/oracle/product/11.1.0/db_1/Apache/perl/bin:/bin:/usr/bin:/usr/local/bin:/usr/lbin:/etc:/u01/app/oracle/bin:/usr/local/bin:/usr/bin:/usr/X11R6/bin:/bin:/usr/games:/opt/gnome/bin:/opt/kde3/bin:/usr/lib/jvm/jre/bin:/usr/lib/mit/bin:/usr/lib/mit/sbin:/home/usrcscmssvc/bin:.
[ usher4500 usrcscmssvc CMSDV1 ]pwd
/home/usrcscmssvc
[ usher4500 usrcscmssvc CMSDV1 ]cd perl-5.12.2/
[ usher4500 usrcscmssvc CMSDV1 ]perl -v

This is perl, v5.8.8 built for x86_64-linux-thread-multi

Copyright 1987-2006, Larry Wall

Perl may be copied only under the terms of either the Artistic License or the
GNU General Public License, which may be found in the Perl 5 source kit.

Complete documentation for Perl, including FAQ lists, should be found on
this system using "man perl" or "perldoc perl".  If you have access to the
Internet, point your browser at http://www.perl.org/, the Perl Home Page.

[ usher4500 usrcscmssvc CMSDV1 ]/home/usrcscmssvc/perl-5.12.2/perl -v

This is perl 5, version 12, subversion 2 (v5.12.2) built for x86_64-linux

My questions are:
1. How can I uninstall the current version (5.8) and install the latest version (5.12)?
This way, the default perl version should be 5.12
2. If I can have two perls on my system, then how do I install a module Excel-Writer-XLSX? This module requires atleast Perl version of 5.10 .Since the default version shows it as 5.8 how do I change it?
http://search.cpan.org/~jmcnamara/Excel-Writer-XLSX-0.02/lib/Excel/Writer/XLSX.pm
3. The only reason why I use Perl is to write into excel. But, the problem with excel is it can write only 65,532 records. So, I found the above module which writes into xlsx. The module which we are using currently is Spreadsheet:WriteExcel
Now, how do I upgrade without affecting the existing perl scripts? I do not want to change the existing Perl scripts. Moreover, if i upgrade I think I've to reinstall the Spreadsheet:WriteExcel module. Please let me how I do this?

Thanks for helping

---------- Post updated at 10:51 PM ---------- Previous update was at 02:17 PM ----------

Could someone help me in upgrading the Perl from 5.8 to 5.12 without loss to the existing perl scripts?

What distribution is this? Is there a version of Perl >5.10 available by the distribution?

My Distribution is SUSE Linux Enterprise Server 10. (SLES10). The supported version is 5.8.8 . I have now successfully installed on the machine. The problem was with the PATH variable. I had to change the PATH variable.

Thanks for your help.

Don