# PODNAME: Alien::Build::Manual::AlienAuthor
# ABSTRACT: Alien author documentation
# VERSION

__END__

=pod

=encoding UTF-8

=head1 NAME

Alien::Build::Manual::AlienAuthor - Alien author documentation

=head1 VERSION

version 1.67

=head1 SYNOPSIS

 perldoc Alien::Build::Manual::AlienAuthor

=head1 DESCRIPTION

This document is intended to teach L<Alien> authors how to build their 
own L<Alien> distribution using L<Alien::Build> and L<Alien::Base>.  
Such an L<Alien> distribution consists of three essential parts:

=over 4

=item An L<alienfile>

This is a recipe for how to 1) detect an already installed version of 
the library or tool you are alienizing 2) download and build the library 
or tool that you are alienizing and 3) gather the configuration settings 
necessary for the use of that library or tool.

=item An installer C<Makefile.PL> or C<Build.PL> or a C<dist.ini> if you are using L<Dist::Zilla>

This is a thin layer between your L<alienfile> recipe, and the Perl 
installer (either L<ExtUtils::MakeMaker> or L<Module::Build>.

=item A Perl class (.pm file) that inherits from L<Alien::Base>

For most L<Alien>s this does not need to be customized at all, since 
L<Alien::Base> usually does what you need.

=back

For example if you were alienizing a library called libfoo, you might 
have these files:

 Alien-Libfoo-1.00/Makefile.PL
 Alien-Libfoo-1.00/alienfile
 Alien-Libfoo-1.00/lib/Alien/Libfoo.pm

This document will focus mainly on instructing you how to construct an 
L<alienfile>, but we will also briefly cover making a simple 
C<Makefile.PL> or C<dist.ini> to go along with it.  We will also touch 
on when you might want to extend your subclass to add non-standard 
functionality.

=head2 Using commands

Most software libraries and tools will come with instructions for how to 
install them in the form of commands that you are intended to type into 
a shell manually.  The easiest way to automate those instructions is to 
just put the commands in your L<alienfile>.  For example, lets suppose 
that libfoo is built using autoconf and provides a C<pkg-config> C<.pc>
file.

(Aside, autoconf is a series of tools and macros used to configure 
(usually) a C or C++ library or tool by generating any number of 
Makefiles.  It is the C equivalent to L<ExtUtils::MakeMaker>, if you 
will.  Basically, if your library or tool instructions start with 
'./configure' it is most likely an autoconf based library or tool).

(Aside2, C<pkg-config> is a standard-ish way to provide the compiler and 
linker flags needed for compiling and linking against the library.  If 
your tool installs a C<.pc> file, usually in C<$PREFIX/lib/pkgconfig> 
then, your tool uses C<pkg-config>).

Here is the L<alienfile> that you might have:

 use alienfile;
 
 probe [ 'pkg-config --exists libfoo' ];
 
 share {
   
   start_url 'http://www.libfoo.org/src/libfoo-1.00.tar.gz';
   
   download [ 'wget %{.meta.start_url}' ];
   
   extract [ 'tar zxf %{.install.download}' ];
   
   build [
     [ './configure --prefix=%{.install.prefix} --disable-shared' ],
     [ '%{make}' ],
     [ '%{make} install' ],
   ];
   
 };
 
 gather [
   [ 'pkg-config --modversion libfoo', \'%{.runtime.version}' ],
   [ 'pkg-config --cflags     libfoo', \'%{.runtime.cflags}'  ],
   [ 'pkg-config --libs       libfoo', \'%{.runtime.libs}'    ],
 ];

There is a lot going on here, so lets decode it a little bit.  An 
L<alienfile> is just some Perl with some alien specific sugar.  The 
first line

 use alienfile;

imports the sugar into the L<alienfile>.  It also is a flag for the 
reader to see that this is an L<alienfile> and not some other kind of 
Perl script.

The second line is the probe directive:

 probe [ 'pkg-config --exists libfoo' ];

is used to see if the library is already installed on the target system.  
If C<pkg-config> is in the path, and if libfoo is installed, this should 
exit with a success (0) and tell L<Alien::Build> to use the system 
library.  If either C<pkg-config> in the PATH, or if libfoo is not 
installed, then it will exist with non-success (!= 0) and tells 
L<Alien::Build> to download and build from source.

You can provide as many probe directives as you want.  This is useful if 
there are different ways to probe for the system.  L<Alien::Build> will 
stop on the first successfully found system library found.  Say our 
library libfoo comes with a C<.pc> file for use with C<pkg-config> and 
also provides a C<foo-config> program to find the same values.  You 
could then specify this in your L<alienfile>

 probe [ 'pkg-config --exists libfoo' ];
 probe [ 'foo-config --version' ];

Other directives can be specified multiple times if there are different 
methods that can be tried for the various steps.

Sometimes it is easier to probe for a library from Perl rather than with 
a command.  For that you can use a code reference.  For example, another 
way to call C<pkg-config> would be from Perl:

 probe sub {
   my($build) = @_;  # $build is the Alien::Build instance.
   system 'pkg-config --exists libfoo';
   $? == 0 ? 'system' : 'share';
 };

The Perl code should return 'system' if the library is installed, and 
'share' if not.  (Other directives should return a true value on 
success, and a false value).  You can also throw an exception with 
C<die> to indicate a failure.

The next part of the L<alienfile> is the C<share> block, which is used 
to group the directives which are used to download and install the 
library or tool in the event that it is not already installed.

 share {
   start_url 'http://www.libfoo.org/src/libfoo-1.00.tar.gz';
   download [ 'wget %{.meta.start_url}' ];
   extract [ 'tar zxf %{.install.download}' ];
   build [
     [ './configure --prefix=%{.install.prefix} --disable-shared' ],
     [ '%{make}' ],
     [ '%{make} install' ],
   ];
 };

The start_url specifies where to find the package that you are alienizing.
It should be either a tarball (or zip file, or what have you) or an
HTML index.  The download directive as you might imagine specifies how
to download  the library or tool.  The extract directive specifies how
to extract the archive once it is downloaded.  In the extract step, you
can use the variable C<%{.install.download}> as a placeholder for the archive 
that was downloaded in the download step.  This is also accessible if 
you use a code reference from the L<Alien::Build> instance:

 share {
   ...
   requires 'Archive::Extract';
   extract sub {
     my($build) = @_;
     my $tarball = $build->install_prop->{download};
     my $ae = Archive::Extract->new( archive => $tarball );
     $ae->extract;
     1;
   }
   ...
 };

The build directive specifies how to build the library or tool once it 
has been downloaded and extracted.  Note the special variable 
C<%{.install.prefix}> is the location where the library should be 
installed.  C<%{make}> is a helper which will be replaced by the 
appropriate C<make>, which may be called something different on some 
platforms (on Windows for example, it frequently may be called C<nmake> 
or C<dmake>).

The final part of the L<alienfile> has a gather directive which 
specifies how to get the details on how to compile and link against the 
library.  For this, once again we use the C<pkg-config> command:

 gather [
   [ 'pkg-config --modversion libfoo', \'%{.runtime.version}' ],
   [ 'pkg-config --cflags     libfoo', \'%{.runtime.cflags}'  ],
   [ 'pkg-config --libs       libfoo', \'%{.runtime.libs}'    ],
 ];

The scalar reference as the final item in the command list tells 
L<Alien::Build> that the output from the command should be stored in the 
given variable.  The runtime variables are the ones that will be 
available to C<Alien::Libfoo> once it is installed.  (Install 
properties, which are the ones that we have seen up till now are thrown 
away once the L<Alien> distribution is installed.

You can also provide a C<sys> block for directives that should be used 
when a system install is detected.  Normally you only need to do this if 
the gather step is different between share and system installs.  For 
example, the above is equivalent to:

 build {
   ...
   gather [
     [ 'pkg-config --modversion libfoo', \'%{.runtime.version}' ],
     [ 'pkg-config --cflags     libfoo', \'%{.runtime.cflags}'  ],
     [ 'pkg-config --libs       libfoo', \'%{.runtime.libs}'    ],
   ];
 };
 
 sys {
   gather [
     [ 'pkg-config --modversion libfoo', \'%{.runtime.version}' ],
     [ 'pkg-config --cflags     libfoo', \'%{.runtime.cflags}'  ],
     [ 'pkg-config --libs       libfoo', \'%{.runtime.libs}'    ],
   ];
 };

(Aside3, the reason it is called C<sys> and not C<system> is so that it 
does not conflict with the built in C<system> function)!

=head2 Using plugins

The first example is a good way of showing the full manual path that you 
can choose, but there is a lot of repetition, if you are doing many 
L<Alien>s that use autoconf and C<pkg-config> (which are quite common.  
L<alienfile> allows you to use plugins.  See L<Alien::Build::Plugin> for
a list of some of the plugin categories.

For now, I will just show you how to write the L<alienfile> for libfoo 
above using L<Alien::Build::Plugin::Build::Autoconf>, 
L<Alien::Build::Plugin::PkgConfig::Negotiate>, 
L<Alien::Build::Plugin::Download::Negotiate>, and
L<Alien::Build::Plugin::Extract::Negotiate>

 use alienfile;
 
 plugin 'PkgConfig' => (
   pkg_name => 'libfoo',
 );
 
 share {
   start_url 'http://www.libfoo.org/src';
   plugin 'Download' => (
     filter => qr/^libfoo-[0-9\.]+\.tar\.gz$/,
     version => qr/^libfoo-([0-9\.]+)\.tar\.gz$/,
   );
   plugin 'Extract' => 'tar.gz';
   plugin 'Build::Autoconf';
   build [
     '%{configure} --disable-shared',
     '%{make}',
     '%{make} install',
   ];
 };

The first plugin that we use is the C<pkg-config> negotiation plugin.  A 
negotiation plugin is one which doesn't do the actual work but selects 
the best one from a set of plugins depending on your platform and 
environment.  (In the case of 
L<Alien::Build::Plugin::PkgConfig::Negotiate>, it may choose to use 
command line tools, a pure Perl implementation (L<PkgConfig>), or 
libpkgconf, depending on what is available).  When using negotiation 
plugins you may omit the C<::Negotiate> suffix.  So as you can see using 
the plugin here is an advantage because it is more reliable that just 
specifying a command which may not be installed!

Next we use the download negotiation plugin.  This is also better than 
the version above, because again, C<wget> my not be installed on the 
target system.  Also you can specify a URL which will be scanned for 
links, and use the most recent version.

We use the Extract negotiation plugin to use either command line tools, 
or Perl libraries to extract from the archive once it is downloaded.

Finally we use the Autoconf plugin 
(L<Alien::Build::Plugin::Build::Autoconf>).  This is a lot more 
sophisticated and reliable than in the previous example, for a number of 
reasons.  This version will even work on Windows assuming the library or 
tool you are alienizing supports that platform!

Strictly speaking the build directive is not necessary, because the 
autoconf plugin provides a default which is reasonable.  The only reason 
that you would want to include it is if you need to provide additional 
flags to the configure step.

 share {
   ...
   build [
     '%{configure} --enable-bar --enable-baz --disable-shared',
     '%{make}',
     '%{make} install',
   ];
 };

=head2 Verifying and debugging your alienfile

You could feed your alienfile directly into L<Alien::Build>, or 
L<Alien::Build::MM>, but it is sometimes useful to test your alienfile 
using the C<af> command (it does not come with L<Alien::Build>, you need 
to install L<App::af>).  By default C<af> will use the C<alienfile> in 
the current directory (just as C<make> uses the C<Makefile> in the 
current directory; just like C<make> you can use the C<-f> option to 
specify a different L<alienfile>).

You can test your L<alienfile> in dry run mode:

 % af install --dry-run
 Alien::Build::Plugin::Core::Legacy> adding legacy hash to config
 Alien::Build::Plugin::Core::Gather> mkdir -p /tmp/I2YXRyxb0r/_alien
 ---
 cflags: ''
 cflags_static: ''
 install_type: system
 legacy:
   finished_installing: 1
   install_type: system
   name: libfoo
   original_prefix: /tmp/7RtAusykNN
   version: 1.2.3
 libs: '-lfoo '
 libs_static: '-lfoo '
 prefix: /tmp/7RtAusykNN
 version: 1.2.3

You can use the C<--type> option to force a share install (download and 
build from source):

 % af install --type=share --dry-run
 Alien::Build::Plugin::Core::Download> decoding html
 Alien::Build::Plugin::Core::Download> candidate *https://www.libfoo.org/download/libfoo-1.2.4.tar.gz
 Alien::Build::Plugin::Core::Download> candidate  https://www.libfoo.org/download/libfoo-1.2.3.tar.gz
 Alien::Build::Plugin::Core::Download> candidate  https://www.libfoo.org/download/libfoo-1.2.2.tar.gz
 Alien::Build::Plugin::Core::Download> candidate  https://www.libfoo.org/download/libfoo-1.2.1.tar.gz
 Alien::Build::Plugin::Core::Download> candidate  https://www.libfoo.org/download/libfoo-1.2.0.tar.gz
 Alien::Build::Plugin::Core::Download> candidate  https://www.libfoo.org/download/libfoo-1.1.9.tar.gz
 Alien::Build::Plugin::Core::Download> candidate  https://www.libfoo.org/download/libfoo-1.1.8.tar.gz
 Alien::Build::Plugin::Core::Download> candidate  https://www.libfoo.org/download/libfoo-1.1.7.tar.gz
 Alien::Build::Plugin::Core::Download> candidate  ...
 Alien::Build::Plugin::Core::Download> setting version based on archive to 1.2.4
 Alien::Build::Plugin::Core::Download> downloaded libfoo-1.2.4.tar.gz
 Alien::Build::CommandSequence> + ./configure --prefix=/tmp/P22WEXj80r --with-pic --disable-shared
 ... snip ...
 Alien::Build::Plugin::Core::Gather> mkdir -p /tmp/WsoLAQ889w/_alien
 ---
 cflags: ''
 cflags_static: ''
 install_type: share
 legacy:
   finished_installing: 1
   install_type: share
   original_prefix: /tmp/P22WEXj80r
   version: 1.2.4
 libs: '-L/tmp/P22WEXj80r/lib -lfoo '
 libs_static: '-L/tmp/P22WEXj80r/lib -lfoo '
 prefix: /tmp/P22WEXj80r
 version: 1.2.4

You can also use the C<--before> and C<--after> options to take a peek 
at what the build environment looks like at different stages as well, 
which can sometimes be useful:

 % af install --dry-run --type=share --before build bash
 Alien::Build::Plugin::Core::Download> decoding html
 Alien::Build::Plugin::Core::Download> candidate *https://www.libfoo.org/download/libfoo-1.2.4.tar.gz
 Alien::Build::Plugin::Core::Download> candidate  https://www.libfoo.org/download/libfoo-1.2.3.tar.gz
 Alien::Build::Plugin::Core::Download> candidate  https://www.libfoo.org/download/libfoo-1.2.2.tar.gz
 Alien::Build::Plugin::Core::Download> candidate  https://www.libfoo.org/download/libfoo-1.2.1.tar.gz
 Alien::Build::Plugin::Core::Download> candidate  https://www.libfoo.org/download/libfoo-1.2.0.tar.gz
 Alien::Build::Plugin::Core::Download> candidate  https://www.libfoo.org/download/libfoo-1.1.9.tar.gz
 Alien::Build::Plugin::Core::Download> candidate  https://www.libfoo.org/download/libfoo-1.1.8.tar.gz
 Alien::Build::Plugin::Core::Download> candidate  https://www.libfoo.org/download/libfoo-1.1.7.tar.gz
 Alien::Build::Plugin::Core::Download> candidate  ...
 Alien::Build::Plugin::Core::Download> setting version based on archive to 1.2.4
 Alien::Build::Plugin::Core::Download> downloaded libfoo-1.2.4.tar.gz
 App::af::install>  [ before build ] + bash
 /tmp/fbVPu4LRTs/build_5AVn/libfoo-1.2.4$ ls
 CHANGES Makefile autoconf.ac lib
 /tmp/fbVPu4LRTs/build_5AVn/libfoo-1.2.4$ 

There are a lot of other useful things that you can do with the C<af> 
command.  See L<af> for details.

=head2 Integrating with MakeMaker

Once you have a working L<alienfile> you can write your C<Makefile.PL>.

 use ExtUtils::MakeMaker;
 use Alien::Build::MM;
 
 my $abmm = Alien::Build::MM->new;
 
 WriteMakefile($abmm->mm_args(
   ABSTRACT => 'Discover or download and install libfoo',
   DISTNAME => 'Alien-Libfoo',
   NAME     => 'Alien::Libfoo',
   VERSION_FROM => 'lib/Alien/Libfoo.pm',
 ));
 
 sub MY::postamble {
   $abmm->mm_postamble;
 }

The C<lib/Alien/Libfoo.pm> that goes along with it is very simple:

 package Alien::Libfoo;
 
 use strict;
 use warnings;
 use base qw( Alien::Base );
 
 1;

You are done and can install it normally:

 % perl Makefile.PL
 % make
 % make test
 % make install

=head2 Integrating with Module::Build

Please don't!  Okay if you have to there is L<Alien::Build::MB>.

=head2 Non standard configuration

L<Alien::Base> support most of the things that your L<Alien> will need, 
like compiler flags (cflags), linker flags (libs) and binary directory 
(bin_dir).  Your library or tool may have other configuration items 
which are not supported by default.  You can store the values in the 
L<alienfile> into the runtime properties:

 gather [
   # standard:
   [ 'foo-config --version libfoo', \'%{.runtime.version}' ],
   [ 'foo-config --cflags  libfoo', \'%{.runtime.cflags}'  ],
   [ 'foo-config --libs    libfoo', \'%{.runtime.libs}'    ],
   # non-standard
   [ 'foo-config --bar-baz libfoo', \'%{.runtime.bar_baz}' ],
 ];

then you can expose them in your L<Alien::Base> subclass:

 package Alien::Libfoo;
 
 use strict;
 use warnings;
 use base qw( Alien::Base );
 
 sub bar_baz {
   my($self) = @_;
   $self->runtime_prop->{bar_baz},
 };
 
 1;

=head2 Testing

(optional, but highly recommended)

You should write a test using L<Test::Alien> to make sure that your 
alien will work with any XS modules that are going to use it:

 use Test2::V0;
 use Test::Alien;
 use Alien::Libfoo;
 
 alien_ok 'Alien::Libfoo';
 
 xs_ok { local $/; <DATA> }, with_subtest {
   is Foo::something(), 1, 'Foo::something() returns 1';
 };
 
 done_testing;
 
 __DATA__
 #include "EXTERN.h"
 #include "perl.h"
 #include "XSUB.h"
 #include <foo.h>
 
 MODULE = Foo PACKAGE = Foo
 
 int something(class)

You can also use L<Test::Alien> to test tools instead of libraries:

 use Test2::V0;
 use Test::Alien;
 use Alien::Libfoo;
 
 alien_ok 'Alien::Libfoo';
 run_ok(['foo', '--version'])
   ->exit_is(0);
 
 done_testing;

More details on testing L<Alien> modules can be found in the 
L<Test::Alien> documentation.

You can also run the tests that come with the package that you are alienizing,
by using a C<test> block in your L<alienfile>.  Keep in mind that some packages
use testing tools or have other prerequisites that will not be available on your
users machines when they attempt to install your alien.  So you do not want to
blindly add a test block without checking what the prereqs are.  For Autoconf
style packages you typically test a package using the C<make check> command:

 use alienfile;
 
 plugin 'PkgConfig' => 'libfoo';
 
 share {
   ... # standard build steps.
   test [ '%{make} check' ];
 };

=head2 Dist::Zilla

(optional, mildly recommended)

You can also use the L<Alien::Build> L<Dist::Zilla> plugin
L<Dist::Zilla::Plugin::AlienBuild>:

 name    = Alien-Libfoo
 author  = E. Xavier Ample <example@cpan.org>
 license = Perl_5
 copyright_holder = E. Xavier Ample <example@cpan.org>
 copyright_year   = 2017
 version = 0.01

 [@Basic]
 [AlienBuild]

The plugin takes care of a lot of details like making sure that the 
correct minimum versions of L<Alien::Build> and L<Alien::Base> are used.  
See the plugin documentation for additional details.

=head2 Using your Alien

Once you have installed you can use your Alien.  See 
L<Alien::Build::Manual::AlienUser> for guidance on that.

=head1 AUTHOR

Author: Graham Ollis E<lt>plicease@cpan.orgE<gt>

Contributors:

Diab Jerius (DJERIUS)

Roy Storey

Ilya Pavlov

David Mertens (run4flat)

Mark Nunberg (mordy, mnunberg)

Christian Walde (Mithaldu)

Brian Wightman (MidLifeXis)

Zaki Mughal (zmughal)

mohawk (mohawk2, ETJ)

Vikas N Kumar (vikasnkumar)

Flavio Poletti (polettix)

Salvador Fandiño (salva)

Gianni Ceccarelli (dakkar)

Pavel Shaydo (zwon, trinitum)

Kang-min Liu (劉康民, gugod)

Nicholas Shipp (nshp)

Juan Julián Merelo Guervós (JJ)

Joel Berger (JBERGER)

Petr Pisar (ppisar)

Lance Wicks (LANCEW)

Ahmad Fatoum (a3f, ATHREEF)

José Joaquín Atria (JJATRIA)

Duke Leto (LETO)

Shoichi Kaji (SKAJI)

Shawn Laffan (SLAFFAN)

Paul Evans (leonerd, PEVANS)

=head1 COPYRIGHT AND LICENSE

This software is copyright (c) 2011-2019 by Graham Ollis.

This is free software; you can redistribute it and/or modify it under
the same terms as the Perl 5 programming language system itself.

=cut
