Re: Should we support Perl 5.6?

From: Eric Wong <normalperson@yhbt.net>
Date: Feb 20, 2006, 19:10 UTC
Message-ID: <20060220191011.GA18085@hand.yhbt.net>
In-Reply-To: <Pine.LNX.4.63.0602201934270.28957@wbgn013.biozentrum.uni-wuerzburg.de>

Johannes Schindelin <Johannes.Schindelin@gmx.de> wrote:

Show 9 quoted lines

> Hi,
> 
> I just had a failure when pulling, because since a few days (to be exact, 
> since commit 1cb30387, git-fmt-merge-msg uses a syntax which is not 
> understood by Perl 5.6.
> 
> It is this:
> 
> 	open $fh, '-|', 'git-symbolic-ref', 'HEAD' or die "$!";

This is just 5.8 shorthand for the following (which is 5.6-compatible, and probably for earlier versions, too):

	my $pid = open my $fh, '-|';
	defined $pid or die "Unable to fork: $!\n";
	if ($pid == 0) {
		exec 'git-symbolic-ref', 'HEAD' or die "$!";
	}
	<continue with original code here>

All of the Perl code I've written uses this method.

> I know that there was already some discussion on this list, but I don't 
> remember if we decided on leaving 5.6 behind or not.
> 
> Somebody remembers?

IIRC, there was no clear decision.

I still have some Debian Woody machines/chroots with 5.6 around in some places. I don't use git on them, but I may someday, but upgrading to Sarge is more likely on those.

-- 
Eric Wong