The configuration mechanism that builds and installs Perl assembles a wealth of information about your system. The Config module exports by default a tied hash variable named %Config, which provides access to over 900 different configuration values. (These values are also available through Perl's -V:PATTERN command-line switch.) Config also provides three functions that give more shell-like access to these values, as shown above. For instance, that last call might print out:use Config; if ($Config{cc} =~ /gcc/) { print "This perl was built by GNU C.\n"; } use Config qw(myconfig config_sh config_vars); print myconfig(); # like perl -V without a pattern print config_sh(); # gives absolutely everything config_vars qw/osname osvers archname/;
The module's online documentation describes the configuration variables and their possible values. Be aware that if you move your perl executable to a system other than the one on which it was built, these values may not reflect the current reality; for instance, if you're running a Linux or a Solaris binary on a BSD system.osname='openbsd'; osvers='2.6'; archname='OpenBSD.sparc-openbsd';
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