This is the README file for Software::Packager, the Perl module for creation
of software installation packages.
This is Alpha software it may or may not do anything. The API is subject to
change. 
This module comes with NO WARRANTY.

INSTALLATION
Software::Packager uses the standard perl module install process

perl Makefile.PL
make
make test [TEST_VERBOSE=1] (optional but recommended) 
make install

DESCRIPTION
If you release software for a range of platforms then this is the module for
you.  Software::Packager is the base module for suite of Perl modules providing
a common interface for the creation of platform specific software installation
packagers.
From version 0.05 you also need to install the Software::Packager module for
the platform you require.

This module does not do the packaging of the software but is merely a wrapper
around the various software packaging tools already provided with various
operating systems.

The file example/example.pl contains an example of how this module can be used.

WHY ANOTHER PACKAGE CREATION SYSTEM?
There so many different ways to create installation media these days. There are
platform specific formats for all the UNIX operating systems and then there are
different formats for different distributions of the same operating system. 
If you take Linux for example.
 RedHat has RPM (RedHat Package Manager)
 Debian has dpkg (Debian Package Manager?)
 Slackware has yet another format.
No doubt there are more.
Microsoft Windows is no better.

So as a developer how so you create software and install in on many platforms?
Like many companies do you could create you own installation system.
That sounds fine. Go ahead and write one in Java, and you can create
installation media for any platform that supports Java.
Sounds like a good idea doesn't it? Wrong. By doing this you just make a big
job for yourself and the world a harder place to work in for developers like you
and me.

What should you do as a developer?
you should create you installation media in the format that the various
operating systems use.
This until now, ment creating scripts for every packaging system that you were
going to release on to create the media.

With Software::Packager you only need to create one script and run it on the
various operating systems that you want to release your software on. It's as
easy as that.
Granted you might need to do things slightly different on each platform but
these that is only necessary if you are doing advanced tasks.
In time these may even be removed as Software::Packager evolves.

HOMEPAGE

http://bernard.gondwana.com.au

AUTHOR
R Bernard Davison <rbdavison@cpan.org>

COPYRIGHT
Copyright (c) 2001 R Bernard Davison. All rights reserved.
This program is free software; you can redistribute it and/or modify it under
the same terms as Perl itself.

