Challenges in CPAN Releases of 'dist/' Libraries (3 of 3)

In two recent posts to this list 
(https://www.nntp.perl.org/group/perl.perl5.porters/2022/02/msg262954.html 
and 
https://www.nntp.perl.org/group/perl.perl5.porters/2022/02/msg262976.html), 
I have discussed the problems we may face when we go to do CPAN releases 
of the libraries maintained by Perl 5 Porters underneath the 'dist/' 
directory in the core distribution.

Based on my own research, conducted on our Dromedary development server, 
I would like to make the following recommendations for action.

1. We should check each dist/ distro for CPAN viability once each 
development cycle, especially if we are changing the distro's .xs code. 
That doesn't mean we have to do a release each cycle; we simply have to 
check for releasability.

2. We should recruit additional people to help us with those inspections 
and view this as an on-ramp to expanding participation in Perl 5 Porters.

3. Distribution-specific recommendations:

a. encoding-warnings should get a CPAN release whose Makefile.PL no 
longer depends on Module-Install.

b. Time-HiRes needs investigation to determine whether the failures 
during 'make' are due to changes in its source code or limitations of 
p5-dist-backcompat.

c. Unicode-Normalize needs investigation for build-time failures earlier 
than 5.34 that appear connected with
PERL_VERSION_LT in Normalize.xs.

d. threads needs investigation for build-time failures that appear 
connected with "‘G_LIST’ undeclared (first use in this function)" in 
threads.xs.

e. threads-shared needs investigation for build-time failures that 
appear connected with 'PERL_VERSION_GE' in shared.xs.  Then needs 
exploration of "Can't locate ./t/test.pl" test failures.

f. IO test failures are at least in part due to limitations of 
p5-dist-backcompat; need to see if we can work around them.

g. PathTools needs investigation for errors in tests associated with 
"dist/PathTools/blib/arch/auto/Cwd/Cwd.so: undefined symbol: 
PerlLIO_readlink at ... Dynaloader".  Probably a combination of 
limitation of p5-dist-backcompat and real problems with Cwd.xs.

h. SelfLoader needs investigation for test failures on (very) old perls 
associated with "Bareword found where operator expected at t/03taint.t".

Whatever we do about these distributions depends on (i) the PSC 
developing some way of enabling non-PSC people to do CPAN releases as 
the "P5P" user; and (ii) recruiting people who believe that we should be 
making improvements in these distros that have been done in core 
available to users of older perls.  Anyone interested in (ii) who would 
like to discuss particular 'dist/' distros and their challenges, please 
contact me off-list.

Thank you very much.
Jim Keenan

• Challenges in CPAN Releases of 'dist/' Libraries (3 of 3) by James E Keenan
• Re: Challenges in CPAN Releases of 'dist/' Libraries (3 of 3) by Leon Timmermans
• Re: Challenges in CPAN Releases of 'dist/' Libraries (3 of 3) by Karl Williamson