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I have downloaded Strawberry-Perl-5.12.1.0 for Windows and was using it for many days. Today I have realized that there is some folder which has many executable files in it.

The folder structure is:

c
cpan
cpanplus
perl
ppm
win32

What do all these folders signify and what is the use of the executables in these folders?

What I am interested in are the executables I found in folder c. I have 38: addr2line.exe ar.exe as.exe c++.exe c++filt.exe cpp.exe dlltool.exe dllwrap.exe dmake.exe elfedit.exe g++.exe gcc.exe gcov.exe gmake.exe gprof.exe i686-w64-mingw32-c++.exe i686-w64-mingw32-g++.exe i686-w64-mingw32-gcc-4.4.3.exe i686-w64-mingw32-gcc.exe iconv.exe ld.exe nm.exe objcopy.exe objdump.exe openssl.exe patch.exe pexports.exe pg_config.exe ranlib.exe readelf.exe size.exe strings.exe strip.exe windmc.exe windres.exe xmlcatalog.exe

In my downloaded folder there is no documentation available and I was not able to find any right information with Google. Maybe I have not queried the right way.

The --help options of the executables are only saying what available options are but not the purpose.

daxim
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vrbilgi
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  • Wait, Googling for "CPAN" failed to find anything? Assumably cpan (and cpanplus) are CPAN shells, used to install packages from CPAN. I'd post an answer, but I don't have a Strawberry install to check on. – derobert Jan 17 '11 at 08:59
  • @derobert: Thanks for replying. I have an idea about cpan. What I am interested in is the EXE's I found in folder "c": I have 38 EXE. Which are "addr2line.exe ar.exe as.exe c++.exe c++filt.exe cpp.exe dlltool.exe dllwrap.exe dmake.exe elfedit.exe g++.exe gcc.exe gcov.exe gmake.exe gprof.exe i686-w64-mingw32-c++.exe i686-w64-mingw32-g++.exe i686-w64-mingw32-gcc-4.4.3.exe i686-w64-mingw32-gcc.exe iconv.exe ld.exe nm.exe objcopy.exe objdump.exe openssl.exe patch.exe pexports.exe pg_config.exe ranlib.exe readelf.exe size.exe strings.exe strip.exe windmc.exe windres.exe xmlcatalog.exe " – vrbilgi Jan 17 '11 at 09:12
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    @user430294: That is (from the names) clearly a C compiler (gcc) and associated build chain, plus a few utilities (openssl, etc.). Probably for building xs modules. – derobert Jan 17 '11 at 09:14

1 Answers1

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Strawberry C comes with a C compiler and build tools to enable you to compile new XS distributions from CPAN. The tools will be automatically properly run when needed if you install module distributions; you don't need to worry about them.

ysth
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