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CPAN(1)                Perl Programmers Reference Guide                CPAN(1)

NAME
       cpan - easily interact with CPAN from the command line
SYNOPSIS
               # with arguments and no switches, installs specified modules
               cpan module_name [ module_name ... ]
               # with switches, installs modules with extra behavior
               cpan [-cfgimt] module_name [ module_name ... ]
               # with just the dot, install from the distribution in the
               # current directory
               cpan .
               # without arguments, starts CPAN.pm shell
               cpan
               # dump the configuration
               cpan -J
               # load a different configuration to install Module::Foo
               cpan -j some/other/file Module::Foo
               # without arguments, but some switches
               cpan [-ahrvACDlLO]
DESCRIPTION
       This script provides a command interface (not a shell) to CPAN. At the
       moment it uses CPAN.pm to do the work, but it is not a one-shot command
       runner for CPAN.pm.
   Options
       -a  Creates a CPAN.pm autobundle with CPAN::Shell->autobundle.
       -A module [ module ... ]
           Shows the primary maintainers for the specified modules.
       -c module
           Runs a `make clean` in the specified module's directories.
       -C module [ module ... ]
           Show the Changes files for the specified modules
       -D module [ module ... ]
           Show the module details. This prints one line for each out-of-date
           module (meaning, modules locally installed but have newer versions
           on CPAN).  Each line has three columns: module name, local version,
           and CPAN version.
       -f  Force the specified action, when it normally would have failed. Use
           this to install a module even if its tests fail. When you use this
           option, -i is not optional for installing a module when you need to
           force it:
                   % cpan -f -i Module::Foo
       -F  Turn off CPAN.pm's attempts to lock anything. You should be careful
           with this since you might end up with multiple scripts trying to
           muck in the same directory. This isn't so much of a concern if
           you're loading a special config with "-j", and that config sets up
           its own work directories.
       -g module [ module ... ]
           Downloads to the current directory the latest distribution of the
           module.
       -G module [ module ... ]
           UNIMPLEMENTED
           Download to the current directory the latest distribution of the
           modules, unpack each distribution, and create a git repository for
           each distribution.
           If you want this feature, check out Yanick Champoux's
           "Git::CPAN::Patch" distribution.
       -h  Print a help message and exit. When you specify "-h", it ignores
           all of the other options and arguments.
       -i  Install the specified modules.
       -j Config.pm
           Load the file that has the CPAN configuration data. This should
           have the same format as the standard CPAN/Config.pm file, which
           defines $CPAN::Config as an anonymous hash.
       -J  Dump the configuration in the same format that CPAN.pm uses. This
           is useful for checking the configuration as well as using the dump
           as a starting point for a new, custom configuration.
       -L author [ author ... ]
           List the modules by the specified authors.
       -m  Make the specified modules.
       -O  Show the out-of-date modules.
       -t  Run a `make test` on the specified modules.
       -r  Recompiles dynamically loaded modules with CPAN::Shell->recompile.
       -v  Print the script version and CPAN.pm version then exit.
   Examples
               # print a help message
               cpan -h
               # print the version numbers
               cpan -v
               # create an autobundle
               cpan -a
               # recompile modules
               cpan -r
               # install modules ( sole -i is optional )
               cpan -i Netscape::Booksmarks Business::ISBN
               # force install modules ( must use -i )
               cpan -fi CGI::Minimal URI
EXIT VALUES
       The script exits with zero if it thinks that everything worked, or a
       positive number if it thinks that something failed. Note, however, that
       in some cases it has to divine a failure by the output of things it
       does not control. For now, the exit codes are vague:
               1       An unknown error
               2       The was an external problem
               4       There was an internal problem with the script
               8       A module failed to install
TO DO
       * one shot configuration values from the command line
BUGS
       * none noted
SEE ALSO
       Most behaviour, including environment variables and configuration,
       comes directly from CPAN.pm.
SOURCE AVAILABILITY
       This code is in Github:
               git://github.com/briandfoy/cpan_script.git
CREDITS
       Japheth Cleaver added the bits to allow a forced install (-f).
       Jim Brandt suggest and provided the initial implementation for the up-
       to-date and Changes features.
       Adam Kennedy pointed out that exit() causes problems on Windows where
       this script ends up with a .bat extension
AUTHOR
       brian d foy, "<bdfoy AT cpan.org>"
COPYRIGHT
       Copyright (c) 2001-2009, brian d foy, All Rights Reserved.
       You may redistribute this under the same terms as Perl itself.

perl v5.16.3                      2023-10-25                           CPAN(1)