GMP in itself is not necessary -- it's much faster if you have it, though. Did it *force* you to install GMP? I thought I put that requirement in the "recommends" parameter (like this: http://search.cpan.org/src/DMAKI/DateTime-Util-Calc-0.01/Build.PL). Perhpas I don't quite understand how Module::Build works... Please let me know.
From the next release on, I should make sure that GMP is an optional package, and that Math::BigInt/Math::BigFloat is the bare minimum. After that I should be able to put some code in Build.PL that probes for GMP.
--d
I've had an entertaining morning building Perl 5.8.3 and getting DateTime::Calendar::Japanese etc installed. Perl 5.8.3 itself was trivial - I'm glad to say.
I ran into a bigger problem with DateTime::Calendar::Japanese etc -- they need the GMP (GNU Multi-Precision Math) library installed. I didn't have it, so I had to build it - twice, because the first time it opted to build 64-bit interfaces on a system (Solaris 8) where I still run mainly in 32-bit mode. With GMP built and installed, I could get Math::BigInt::GMP installed, and hence everything else. That was done first with 5.8.2 and then with 5.8.3.
I don't know if there's an effective way for ensuring that a non-Perl prerequisite such as the GMP libraries are available. In DBD::Informix, my Makefile.PL does a lot of poking around to ensure that the prerequisite non-Perl ESQL/C product (library and headers) is both installed and usable - basically because I had so many people running into problems when it was not because they didn't know it was necessary.
Also, when a test takes a long time, as many of yours do, you very kindly output a warning that the test will take a while, but it is really helpful to know when the test started, so you can easily determine how long the test has taken so far.
So, once I had GMP installed (outside the Perl installation, but where Perl expects to find libraries), then the new modules installed OK.
-- Jonathan Leffler ([EMAIL PROTECTED]) STSM, Informix Database Engineering, IBM Data Management 4100 Bohannon Drive, Menlo Park, CA 94025 Tel: +1 650-926-6921 Tie-Line: 630-6921 "I don't suffer from insanity; I enjoy every minute of it!"
