Bug#2495: perl requires tcsh (as it is currently configured)
Package: perl
Version: 5.001-6
Some perl configuration file (perhaps /usr/lib/perl5/Config.pm) invokes
csh; I believe this is used particularly for filename globbing.
If csh or tcsh isn't present, at least some perl scripts fail.
This problem was discovered as a result of debugging LaTeX2HTML on another
Debian 0.93R6 system which had the same TeX, LaTeX, and perl configuration
as this Debian 0.93R6 system (on which LaTeX2HTML was known to work).
The criticial difference between the two systems turned out to be that
tcsh was not installed on the system where LaTeX2HTML didn't work; as soon
as tcsh was installed, LaTeX2HTML worked fine.
Future problems with scripts like LaTeX2HTML could be avoided if either:
-- the configuration file that calls tcsh were edited to call bash
instead, or
-- the perl control file were changed to state that perl depends
explicitly on csh.
If I've mis-interpreted the behaviour of perl, csh, LaTeX2HTML, or some
other associated program I apologize for this bug report, and would
appreciate being set straight.
Thanks,
Susan Kleinmann
sgk@sgk.tiac.net
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