NAME¶
perlaix - Perl version 5 on IBM AIX (UNIX) systems
DESCRIPTION¶
This document describes various features of IBM's UNIX operating system AIX that
will affect how Perl version 5 (hereafter just Perl) is compiled and/or runs.
Compiling Perl 5 on AIX¶
For information on compilers on older versions of AIX, see "Compiling Perl
5 on older AIX versions up to 4.3.3".
When compiling Perl, you must use an ANSI C compiler. AIX does not ship an ANSI
compliant C compiler with AIX by default, but binary builds of gcc for AIX are
widely available. A version of gcc is also included in the AIX Toolbox which
is shipped with AIX.
Supported Compilers¶
Currently all versions of IBM's "xlc", "xlc_r",
"cc", "cc_r" or "vac" ANSI/C compiler will work
for building Perl if that compiler works on your system.
If you plan to link Perl to any module that requires thread-support, like
DBD::Oracle, it is better to use the _r version of the compiler. This will not
build a threaded Perl, but a thread-enabled Perl. See also "Threaded
Perl" later on.
As of writing (2010-09) only the
IBM XL C for AIX or
IBM XL C/C++
for AIX compiler is supported by IBM on AIX 5L/6.1/7.1.
The following compiler versions are currently supported by IBM:
IBM XL C and IBM XL C/C++ V8, V9, V10, V11
The XL C for AIX is integrated in the XL C/C++ for AIX compiler and therefore
also supported.
If you choose XL C/C++ V9 you need APAR IZ35785 installed otherwise the
integrated SDBM_File do not compile correctly due to an optimization bug. You
can circumvent this problem by adding -qipa to the optimization flags
(-Doptimize='-O -qipa'). The PTF for APAR IZ35785 which solves this problem is
available from IBM (April 2009 PTF for XL C/C++ Enterprise Edition for AIX,
V9.0).
If you choose XL C/C++ V11 you need the April 2010 PTF (or newer) installed
otherwise you will not get a working Perl version.
Perl can be compiled with either IBM's ANSI C compiler or with gcc. The former
is recommended, as not only it can compile Perl with no difficulty, but also
can take advantage of features listed later that require the use of IBM
compiler-specific command-line flags.
If you decide to use gcc, make sure your installation is recent and complete,
and be sure to read the Perl INSTALL file for more gcc-specific details.
Please report any hoops you had to jump through to the development team.
If the AIX Toolbox version of lib gdbm < 1.8.3-5 is installed on your system
then Perl will not work. This library contains the header files
/opt/freeware/include/gdbm/dbm.h|ndbm.h which conflict with the AIX system
versions. The lib gdbm will be automatically removed from the wanted libraries
if the presence of one of these two header files is detected. If you want to
build Perl with GDBM support then please install at least gdbm-devel-1.8.3-5
(or higher).
Perl 5 was successfully compiled and tested on:¶
Perl | AIX Level | Compiler Level | w th | w/o th
-------+---------------------+-------------------------+------+-------
5.12.2 |5.1 TL9 32 bit | XL C/C++ V7 | OK | OK
5.12.2 |5.1 TL9 64 bit | XL C/C++ V7 | OK | OK
5.12.2 |5.2 TL10 SP8 32 bit | XL C/C++ V8 | OK | OK
5.12.2 |5.2 TL10 SP8 32 bit | gcc 3.2.2 | OK | OK
5.12.2 |5.2 TL10 SP8 64 bit | XL C/C++ V8 | OK | OK
5.12.2 |5.3 TL8 SP8 32 bit | XL C/C++ V9 + IZ35785 | OK | OK
5.12.2 |5.3 TL8 SP8 32 bit | gcc 4.2.4 | OK | OK
5.12.2 |5.3 TL8 SP8 64 bit | XL C/C++ V9 + IZ35785 | OK | OK
5.12.2 |5.3 TL10 SP3 32 bit | XL C/C++ V11 + Apr 2010 | OK | OK
5.12.2 |5.3 TL10 SP3 64 bit | XL C/C++ V11 + Apr 2010 | OK | OK
5.12.2 |6.1 TL1 SP7 32 bit | XL C/C++ V10 | OK | OK
5.12.2 |6.1 TL1 SP7 64 bit | XL C/C++ V10 | OK | OK
5.13 |7.1 TL0 SP1 32 bit | XL C/C++ V11 + Jul 2010 | OK | OK
5.13 |7.1 TL0 SP1 64 bit | XL C/C++ V11 + Jul 2010 | OK | OK
w th = with thread support
w/o th = without thread support
OK = tested
Successfully tested means that all "make test" runs finish with a
result of 100% OK. All tests were conducted with -Duseshrplib set.
All tests were conducted on the oldest supported AIX technology level with the
latest support package applied. If the tested AIX version is out of support
(AIX 4.3.3, 5.1, 5.2) then the last available support level was used.
Building Dynamic Extensions on AIX¶
Starting from Perl 5.7.2 (and consequently 5.8.x / 5.10.x / 5.12.x) and AIX 4.3
or newer Perl uses the AIX native dynamic loading interface in the so called
runtime linking mode instead of the emulated interface that was used in Perl
releases 5.6.1 and earlier or, for AIX releases 4.2 and earlier. This change
does break backward compatibility with compiled modules from earlier Perl
releases. The change was made to make Perl more compliant with other
applications like Apache/mod_perl which are using the AIX native interface.
This change also enables the use of C++ code with static constructors and
destructors in Perl extensions, which was not possible using the emulated
interface.
It is highly recommended to use the new interface.
Using Large Files with Perl¶
Should yield no problems.
Threaded Perl¶
Should yield no problems with AIX 5.1 / 5.2 / 5.3 / 6.1 / 7.1.
IBM uses the AIX system Perl (V5.6.0 on AIX 5.1 and V5.8.2 on AIX 5.2 / 5.3 and
6.1; V5.8.8 on AIX 5.3 TL11 and AIX 6.1 TL4; V5.10.1 on AIX 7.1) for some AIX
system scripts. If you switch the links in /usr/bin from the AIX system Perl
(/usr/opt/perl5) to the newly build Perl then you get the same features as
with the IBM AIX system Perl if the threaded options are used.
The threaded Perl build works also on AIX 5.1 but the IBM Perl build (Perl
v5.6.0) is not threaded on AIX 5.1.
Perl 5.12 an newer is not compatible with the IBM fileset perl.libext.
64-bit Perl¶
If your AIX system is installed with 64-bit support, you can expect 64-bit
configurations to work. If you want to use 64-bit Perl on AIX 6.1 you need an
APAR for a libc.a bug which affects (n)dbm_XXX functions. The APAR number for
this problem is IZ39077.
If you need more memory (larger data segment) for your Perl programs you can
set:
/etc/security/limits
default: (or your user)
data = -1 (default is 262144 * 512 byte)
With the default setting the size is limited to 128MB. The -1 removes this
limit. If the "make test" fails please change your
/etc/security/limits as stated above.
Recommended Options AIX 5.1/5.2/5.3/6.1 and 7.1 (threaded/32-bit)¶
With the following options you get a threaded Perl version which passes all make
tests in threaded 32-bit mode, which is the default configuration for the Perl
builds that AIX ships with.
rm config.sh
./Configure \
-d \
-Dcc=cc_r \
-Duseshrplib \
-Dusethreads \
-Dprefix=/usr/opt/perl5_32
The -Dprefix option will install Perl in a directory parallel to the IBM AIX
system Perl installation.
Recommended Options AIX 5.1/5.2/5.3/6.1 and 7.1 (32-bit)¶
With the following options you get a Perl version which passes all make tests in
32-bit mode.
rm config.sh
./Configure \
-d \
-Dcc=cc_r \
-Duseshrplib \
-Dprefix=/usr/opt/perl5_32
The -Dprefix option will install Perl in a directory parallel to the IBM AIX
system Perl installation.
Recommended Options AIX 5.1/5.2/5.3/6.1 and 7.1 (threaded/64-bit)¶
With the following options you get a threaded Perl version which passes all make
tests in 64-bit mode.
export OBJECT_MODE=64 / setenv OBJECT_MODE 64 (depending on your shell)
rm config.sh
./Configure \
-d \
-Dcc=cc_r \
-Duseshrplib \
-Dusethreads \
-Duse64bitall \
-Dprefix=/usr/opt/perl5_64
Recommended Options AIX 5.1/5.2/5.3/6.1 and 7.1 (64-bit)¶
With the following options you get a Perl version which passes all make tests in
64-bit mode.
export OBJECT_MODE=64 / setenv OBJECT_MODE 64 (depending on your shell)
rm config.sh
./Configure \
-d \
-Dcc=cc_r \
-Duseshrplib \
-Duse64bitall \
-Dprefix=/usr/opt/perl5_64
The -Dprefix option will install Perl in a directory parallel to the IBM AIX
system Perl installation.
If you choose gcc to compile 64-bit Perl then you need to add the following
option:
-Dcc='gcc -maix64'
Compiling Perl 5 on AIX 7.1.0¶
A regression in AIX 7 causes a failure in make test in Time::Piece during
daylight savings time. APAR IV16514 provides the fix for this. A quick test to
see if it's required, assuming it is currently daylight savings in Eastern
Time, would be to run " TZ=EST5 date +%Z ". This will come back with
"EST" normally, but nothing if you have the problem.
Compiling Perl 5 on older AIX versions up to 4.3.3¶
Due to the fact that AIX 4.3.3 reached end-of-service in December 31, 2003 this
information is provided as is. The Perl versions prior to Perl 5.8.9 could be
compiled on AIX up to 4.3.3 with the following settings (your mileage may
vary):
When compiling Perl, you must use an ANSI C compiler. AIX does not ship an ANSI
compliant C-compiler with AIX by default, but binary builds of gcc for AIX are
widely available.
At the moment of writing, AIX supports two different native C compilers, for
which you have to pay:
xlC and
vac. If you decide to use either
of these two (which is quite a lot easier than using gcc), be sure to upgrade
to the latest available patch level. Currently:
xlC.C 3.1.4.10 or 3.6.6.0 or 4.0.2.2 or 5.0.2.9 or 6.0.0.3
vac.C 4.4.0.3 or 5.0.2.6 or 6.0.0.1
note that xlC has the OS version in the name as of version 4.0.2.0, so you will
find xlC.C for AIX-5.0 as package
xlC.aix50.rte 5.0.2.0 or 6.0.0.3
subversions are not the same "latest" on all OS versions. For example,
the latest xlC-5 on aix41 is 5.0.2.9, while on aix43, it is 5.0.2.7.
Perl can be compiled with either IBM's ANSI C compiler or with gcc. The former
is recommended, as not only can it compile Perl with no difficulty, but also
can take advantage of features listed later that require the use of IBM
compiler-specific command-line flags.
The IBM's compiler patch levels 5.0.0.0 and 5.0.1.0 have compiler optimization
bugs that affect compiling perl.c and regcomp.c, respectively. If Perl's
configuration detects those compiler patch levels, optimization is turned off
for the said source code files. Upgrading to at least 5.0.2.0 is recommended.
If you decide to use gcc, make sure your installation is recent and complete,
and be sure to read the Perl INSTALL file for more gcc-specific details.
Please report any hoops you had to jump through to the development team.
OS level¶
Before installing the patches to the IBM C-compiler you need to know the level
of patching for the Operating System. IBM's command 'oslevel' will show the
base, but is not always complete (in this example oslevel shows 4.3.NULL,
whereas the system might run most of 4.3.THREE):
# oslevel
4.3.0.0
# lslpp -l | grep 'bos.rte '
bos.rte 4.3.3.75 COMMITTED Base Operating System Runtime
bos.rte 4.3.2.0 COMMITTED Base Operating System Runtime
#
The same might happen to AIX 5.1 or other OS levels. As a side note, Perl cannot
be built without bos.adt.syscalls and bos.adt.libm installed
# lslpp -l | egrep "syscalls|libm"
bos.adt.libm 5.1.0.25 COMMITTED Base Application Development
bos.adt.syscalls 5.1.0.36 COMMITTED System Calls Application
#
Building Dynamic Extensions on AIX < 5L¶
AIX supports dynamically loadable objects as well as shared libraries. Shared
libraries by convention end with the suffix .a, which is a bit misleading, as
an archive can contain static as well as dynamic members. For Perl dynamically
loaded objects we use the .so suffix also used on many other platforms.
Note that starting from Perl 5.7.2 (and consequently 5.8.0) and AIX 4.3 or newer
Perl uses the AIX native dynamic loading interface in the so called runtime
linking mode instead of the emulated interface that was used in Perl releases
5.6.1 and earlier or, for AIX releases 4.2 and earlier. This change does break
backward compatibility with compiled modules from earlier Perl releases. The
change was made to make Perl more compliant with other applications like
Apache/mod_perl which are using the AIX native interface. This change also
enables the use of C++ code with static constructors and destructors in Perl
extensions, which was not possible using the emulated interface.
The IBM ANSI C Compiler¶
All defaults for Configure can be used.
If you've chosen to use vac 4, be sure to run 4.4.0.3. Older versions will turn
up nasty later on. For vac 5 be sure to run at least 5.0.1.0, but vac 5.0.2.6
or up is highly recommended. Note that since IBM has removed vac 5.0.2.1
through 5.0.2.5 from the software depot, these versions should be considered
obsolete.
Here's a brief lead of how to upgrade the compiler to the latest level. Of
course this is subject to changes. You can only upgrade versions from
ftp-available updates if the first three digit groups are the same (in where
you can skip intermediate unlike the patches in the developer snapshots of
Perl), or to one version up where the "base" is available. In other
words, the AIX compiler patches are cumulative.
vac.C.4.4.0.1 => vac.C.4.4.0.3 is OK (vac.C.4.4.0.2 not needed)
xlC.C.3.1.3.3 => xlC.C.3.1.4.10 is NOT OK (xlC.C.3.1.4.0 is not available)
# ftp ftp.software.ibm.com
Connected to service.boulder.ibm.com.
: welcome message ...
Name (ftp.software.ibm.com:merijn): anonymous
331 Guest login ok, send your complete e-mail address as password.
Password:
... accepted login stuff
ftp> cd /aix/fixes/v4/
ftp> dir other other.ll
output to local-file: other.ll? y
200 PORT command successful.
150 Opening ASCII mode data connection for /bin/ls.
226 Transfer complete.
ftp> dir xlc xlc.ll
output to local-file: xlc.ll? y
200 PORT command successful.
150 Opening ASCII mode data connection for /bin/ls.
226 Transfer complete.
ftp> bye
... goodbye messages
# ls -l *.ll
-rw-rw-rw- 1 merijn system 1169432 Nov 2 17:29 other.ll
-rw-rw-rw- 1 merijn system 29170 Nov 2 17:29 xlc.ll
On AIX 4.2 using xlC, we continue:
# lslpp -l | fgrep 'xlC.C '
xlC.C 3.1.4.9 COMMITTED C for AIX Compiler
xlC.C 3.1.4.0 COMMITTED C for AIX Compiler
# grep 'xlC.C.3.1.4.*.bff' xlc.ll
-rw-r--r-- 1 45776101 1 6286336 Jul 22 1996 xlC.C.3.1.4.1.bff
-rw-rw-r-- 1 45776101 1 6173696 Aug 24 1998 xlC.C.3.1.4.10.bff
-rw-r--r-- 1 45776101 1 6319104 Aug 14 1996 xlC.C.3.1.4.2.bff
-rw-r--r-- 1 45776101 1 6316032 Oct 21 1996 xlC.C.3.1.4.3.bff
-rw-r--r-- 1 45776101 1 6315008 Dec 20 1996 xlC.C.3.1.4.4.bff
-rw-rw-r-- 1 45776101 1 6178816 Mar 28 1997 xlC.C.3.1.4.5.bff
-rw-rw-r-- 1 45776101 1 6188032 May 22 1997 xlC.C.3.1.4.6.bff
-rw-rw-r-- 1 45776101 1 6191104 Sep 5 1997 xlC.C.3.1.4.7.bff
-rw-rw-r-- 1 45776101 1 6185984 Jan 13 1998 xlC.C.3.1.4.8.bff
-rw-rw-r-- 1 45776101 1 6169600 May 27 1998 xlC.C.3.1.4.9.bff
# wget ftp://ftp.software.ibm.com/aix/fixes/v4/xlc/xlC.C.3.1.4.10.bff
#
On AIX 4.3 using vac, we continue:
# lslpp -l | grep 'vac.C '
vac.C 5.0.2.2 COMMITTED C for AIX Compiler
vac.C 5.0.2.0 COMMITTED C for AIX Compiler
# grep 'vac.C.5.0.2.*.bff' other.ll
-rw-rw-r-- 1 45776101 1 13592576 Apr 16 2001 vac.C.5.0.2.0.bff
-rw-rw-r-- 1 45776101 1 14133248 Apr 9 2002 vac.C.5.0.2.3.bff
-rw-rw-r-- 1 45776101 1 14173184 May 20 2002 vac.C.5.0.2.4.bff
-rw-rw-r-- 1 45776101 1 14192640 Nov 22 2002 vac.C.5.0.2.6.bff
# wget ftp://ftp.software.ibm.com/aix/fixes/v4/other/vac.C.5.0.2.6.bff
#
Likewise on all other OS levels. Then execute the following command, and fill in
its choices
# smit install_update
-> Install and Update from LATEST Available Software
* INPUT device / directory for software [ vac.C.5.0.2.6.bff ]
[ OK ]
[ OK ]
Follow the messages ... and you're done.
If you like a more web-like approach, a good start point can be
http://www14.software.ibm.com/webapp/download/downloadaz.jsp and click "C
for AIX", and follow the instructions.
The usenm option¶
If linking miniperl
cc -o miniperl ... miniperlmain.o opmini.o perl.o ... -lm -lc ...
causes error like this
ld: 0711-317 ERROR: Undefined symbol: .aintl
ld: 0711-317 ERROR: Undefined symbol: .copysignl
ld: 0711-317 ERROR: Undefined symbol: .syscall
ld: 0711-317 ERROR: Undefined symbol: .eaccess
ld: 0711-317 ERROR: Undefined symbol: .setresuid
ld: 0711-317 ERROR: Undefined symbol: .setresgid
ld: 0711-317 ERROR: Undefined symbol: .setproctitle
ld: 0711-345 Use the -bloadmap or -bnoquiet option to obtain more information.
you could retry with
make realclean
rm config.sh
./Configure -Dusenm ...
which makes Configure to use the "nm" tool when scanning for library
symbols, which usually is not done in AIX.
Related to this, you probably should not use the "-r" option of
Configure in AIX, because that affects of how the "nm" tool is used.
Using GNU's gcc for building Perl¶
Using gcc-3.x (tested with 3.0.4, 3.1, and 3.2) now works out of the box, as do
recent gcc-2.9 builds available directly from IBM as part of their Linux
compatibility packages, available here:
http://www.ibm.com/servers/aix/products/aixos/linux/
Using Large Files with Perl < 5L¶
Should yield no problems.
Threaded Perl < 5L¶
Threads seem to work OK, though at the moment not all tests pass when threads
are used in combination with 64-bit configurations.
You may get a warning when doing a threaded build:
"pp_sys.c", line 4640.39: 1506-280 (W) Function argument assignment
between types "unsigned char*" and "const void*" is not allowed.
The exact line number may vary, but if the warning (W) comes from a line line
this
hent = PerlSock_gethostbyaddr(addr, (Netdb_hlen_t) addrlen, addrtype);
in the "pp_ghostent" function, you may ignore it safely. The warning
is caused by the reentrant variant of
gethostbyaddr() having a slightly
different prototype than its non-reentrant variant, but the difference is not
really significant here.
64-bit Perl < 5L¶
If your AIX is installed with 64-bit support, you can expect 64-bit
configurations to work. In combination with threads some tests might still
fail.
AIX 4.2 and extensions using C++ with statics¶
In AIX 4.2 Perl extensions that use C++ functions that use statics may have
problems in that the statics are not getting initialized. In newer AIX
releases this has been solved by linking Perl with the libC_r library, but
unfortunately in AIX 4.2 the said library has an obscure bug where the various
functions related to time (such as
time() and
gettimeofday())
return broken values, and therefore in AIX 4.2 Perl is not linked against the
libC_r.
AUTHORS¶
Rainer Tammer <tammer@tammer.net>