netCDF-Perl Install
Greetings,
This file explains how to incorporate netCDFPerl, the perl extension for
netCDF dataset access, into perl 5.00? on a UNIX system. (We're afraid
you're on your own for non-UNIX systems.)
PLATFORMS
---------
We've successfully incorporated netCDFPerl into perl 5.003 on the
following systems:
Machine Operating System C Compiler
DEC Alpha Digital UNIX V4.0 /bin/cc
DEC RISC ULTRIX 4.5 /bin/cc
HP 9000/715 HP_UX A.09.05 /bin/cc
IBM rs6000 AIX 4.2 /bin/cc
Intel 586 Red Hat Linux 2.0.27 /usr/bin/cc
SGI mips IRIX 6.2 /bin/cc
Sun sparc SunOS 4.1.4 SC3.0.1/bin/acc
Sun sparc SunOS 5.5 SC4.2/bin/cc
PREREQUISITES
-------------
In order to incorporate netCDFPerl, you must already have version of
perl 5.003 (or later) installed on your system. Perl can be obtained from
URL
http://www.perl.com/pub/a/language/info/software.html
You should also have the netCDF package installed. The version should
be 2.3.2, patch level 4, or later. The netCDF package can be obtained
from URL
/software/netcdf/
In order to be usable by a dynamically-linked netCDFPerl package, the
object modules in the netCDF library should have been compiled in a
position-independent manner, i.e. they should have been compiled as if
they were going to be put into a shared library (which they will be in a
dynamically-linked netCDFPerl module). The following table gives some
of the relevant C compiler options that should have been used:
Operating System Option
HP-UX +z
SunOS 4.x -pic
SunOS 5.x -Kpic
On many other systems, generating position-independent code is
the default. Check the manual page for your compiler for further
information.
If your system has perl4 or an early version of perl5 installed as well as
version 5.003, they must be moved before installing netCDFPerl because the
netCDFPerl installation will use the old perl binaries.
INSTALLATION INSTRUCTIONS
-------------------------
When you have the prerequisite perl 5.003 (or later) and netCDF packages
installed, then do the following to incorporate netCDFPerl:
1. Go to the directory containing this file (the top-level source
directory of the NetCDFPerl package).
2. Set configuration variables, either in the environment or in the
file CUSTOMIZE. In particular, the following variables might need
values:
Variable Meaning
-------- -------
CPP_NETCDF C compiler reference for the location of the
netCDF header file (e.g.
"-I/usr/local/include").
LD_NETCDF Linker reference for the location of the
netCDF library (e.g. "-L/usr/local/lib -lnetcdf").
PERL Pathname of the perl(1) utility. If given, it
*must* refer to a perl 5 utility (and not a perl
4 one).
PERL_MANDIR Pathname of the root of the directory hierarchy
that contains the perl manual pages (e.g.
"/usr/local/man"). The netCDFPerl(1) manual
page will be install under this directory.
3. Execute the "configure" script. Redirect standard output and
standard error to the file "configure.log". If an error message
occurs in the output, then stop and send items A-E below to
SUPPORT (see below).
The configure script will look for your installed netCDF package
and for your perl package. If it can't find them, then it will
tell you how to help it find them (via the variables mentioned
above).
4. Execute the command "make perl/Makefile" to make the makefile
in
the perl/ subdirectory. Redirect standard output and standard
error to the file "makefile.log". If an error occurs, then stop
and send items A-F to SUPPORT (see below).
5. Modify the file perl/Makefile.PL if necessary:
Because the netCDF header-file, "netcdf.h", is written in
Standard C, it is necessary to use a Standard C compiler to
build the NetCDFPerl extension module. This can cause problems
on systems whose perl(1) utility was not built using a Standard
C compiler because the building of a perl(1) extension module is
controlled by perl(1) (i.e. it is *not* under our control) and
perl(1) insists on using the same compiler and options that were
used to build it -- and if the compiler is non-standard, then
the build of NetCDFPerl might fail.
It is possible, however, to modify how perl(1) builds NetCDFPerl
by modifying the file perl/Makefile.PL, which is created when
the configure script is executed. For example, on a SunOS
4.1.4 system, we needed to use a Standard C compiler to compile
NetCDFPerl, so we added the following entry to perl/Makefile.PL:
'CC' => "acc",
We also needed to reference the ANSI-C runtime-library because
the netCDF library referred to it; so we changed the following
entry
'LIBS' => "-L/upc/netcdf/lib -lnetcdf",
to
'LIBS' => "-L/upc/netcdf/lib -lnetcdf -L/usr/lang/SC3.0.1/lib -lansi",
You might have to do similar sorts of things -- depending on
your system. Look in the makefile "perl/Makefile" to see what
variables you might add to or modify in "perl/Makefile.PL".
IRIX64-6 Users: You must ensure that the same Application
Binary Interface is used for the perl, netCDF, and netCDFPerl
packages.
6. Execute "make". Redirect standard output and standard error to
the file "make.log". If an error occurs, then stop and send items
A-G to support (see below).
This will build netCDFPerl in the perl/ subdirectory. On
systems that support shared libraries, a netCDFPerl shared
library will be built. On systems that lack shared library
support, a new, statically-linked perl utility will be built
that incorporates netCDFPerl as well as all previously
incorporated extensions (e.g. TkPerl).
NOTE: On a DEC RISC/ULTRIX 4.5 system, the perl-generated
makefile "perl/Makefile" incorrectly believes that
running the ranlib(1) utility on the created library
perl/blib/auto/NetCDF/NetCDF.a is unnecessary. Thus, the "make"
will fail. The workaround is to manually run ranlib(1) on the
library man and then re-execute the "make".
7. Execute "make test". Redirect standard output and standard
error to the file "test.log". If an error occurs, then stop and
send items A-H to SUPPORT (see below).
This will test netCDFPerl. The perl script that executes the
test is in perl/test.pl. You might wish to peruse it as an
example.
8. Execute "make install". Redirect standard output and standard
error to the file "install.log". If an error occurs, then stop
and send items A-I to SUPPORT (see below).
This will incorporate netCDFPerl and its manual page into the
perl installation. To do this, you might need to be the user
who originally installed perl. NOTE: Currently, there is a bug
in the perl/Makefile created by perl. To correct the problem,
edit the file perl/Makefile: on the line with "MOD_INSTALL"
(near line 210) add "-I$(PERL_ARCHLIB)" before "-I$(PERL_LIB)".
9. Execute "make realclean". This will remove all intermediate
files, allowing you to incorporate netCDFPerl on another platform.
SUPPORT
-------
Questions should be directed to the support
request form. For help
on installation, please enclose everything possible that might help a
diagnosis. We suggest the following:
A. Output from the command "uname -a".
B. The file "VERSION".
C. Output from the command "which <cc>" or "type <cc>",
where <cc>
is the C compiler that was used in the build attempt.
D. The file "configure.log".
E. The file "config.log".
F. The file "makefile.log".
G. The file "make.log".
H. The file "test.log".
I. The file "install.log".
Regards,
Steve Emmerson <Support Request
Form>
Robb Kambic <Support Request
Form>
