Installing mod_perl
If you already have Apache installed on your machine, you will have to rebuild it with mod_perl. You can get the source for both Apache and mod_perl from http://www.apache.org/. (You can also get mod_perl from CPAN.) If there isn’t already an Apache httpd in the Apache source tree, you must build one. Then build mod_perl as directed in the INSTALL file for the mod_perl distribution.
As we’ve mentioned, mod_perl allows you to hook in Perl
modules as handlers for various stages of a request.
By default, however, the only callback hook that is enabled
is PerlHandler
, which is the one that processes content (i.e.,
a CGI document).
If you want to use other hooks—for example, to extend Apache’s
logging facilities via the PerlLogHandler
directive; you need
to specify it at build time as directed in the INSTALL file.
For example:
% perl Makefile.PL PERL_LOG=1
The mod_perl Makefile replaces the httpd in the Apache source tree with a Perl-enabled one. When you install mod_perl, it installs not only the new httpd in your system area, but also several Perl modules, including Apache::Registry.
At the time of this writing, both Apache and mod_perl are being ported to Win32. However, mod_perl runs only with the standard Perl Win32 port (not with ActiveState’s). The INSTALL.win32 file contains the instructions for installing mod_perl under Win32.
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