1
2
3
4
5
6
7
8
9
10
11
12
13
14
15
16
17
18
19
20
21
22
23
24
25
26
27
28
29
30
31
32
33
34
35
36
37
38
39
40
41
42
43
44
45
46
47
48
49
50
51
52
53
54
55
56
57
58
59
60
61
62
63
64
65
66
67
68
69
70
71
72
73
74
75
76
77
78
79
80
81
82
83
84
85
86
87
88
89
90
91
92
93
94
95
96
97
98
99
100
101
102
103
104
105
106
107
108
109
110
111
112
113
114
115
116
117
118
119
120
121
122
123
124
125
126
127
128
129
130
131
132
133
134
135
136
137
138
139
140
141
142
143
144
145
146
147
148
149
150
151
152
153
154
155
156
157
158
159
160
161
162
163
164
165
166
167
168
169
170
171
172
173
174
175
176
177
178
179
180
181
182
183
184
185
|
=for :stopwords DOAP RDF
=head1 NAME
CPAN::Meta::History::Meta_1_0 - Version 1.0 metadata specification for META.yml
=head1 PREFACE
This is a historical copy of the version 1.0 specification for F<META.yml>
files, copyright by Ken Williams.
Modifications from the original:
=over
=item *
Conversion from the original HTML to POD format
=back
=head1 DESCRIPTION
This document describes version 1.0 of the F<META.yml> specification.
The META.yml file describes important properties of contributed Perl
distributions such as the ones found on L<CPAN|http://www.cpan.org>. It is
typically created by tools like L<Module::Build> and L<ExtUtils::MakeMaker>.
The fields in the F<META.yml> file are meant to be helpful to people
maintaining module collections (like CPAN), for people writing
installation tools (like L<CPAN> or L<CPANPLUS>), or just people who want to
know some stuff about a distribution before downloading it and starting to
install it.
=head1 Format
F<META.yml> files are written in the L<YAML|http://www.yaml.org/> format. The
reasons we chose YAML instead of, say, XML or Data::Dumper are discussed in
L<this thread|http://archive.develooper.com/makemaker@perl.org/msg00405.html>
on the MakeMaker mailing list.
The first line of a F<META.yml> file should be a valid L<YAML document header|http://www.yaml.org/spec/#.Document>
like C<"--- #YAML:1.0">
=head1 Fields
The rest of the META.yml file is one big YAML
L<mapping|http://www.yaml.org/spec/#.-syntax-mapping-Mapping->,
whose keys are described here.
=over 4
=item name
Example: C<Module-Build>
The name of the distribution. Often created by taking the "main
module" in the distribution and changing "::" to "-". Sometimes it's
completely different, however, as in the case of the
L<libwww-perl|http://search.cpan.org/author/GAAS/libwww-perl/> distribution.
=item version
Example: C<0.16>
The version of the distribution to which the META.yml file refers.
=item license
Example: C<perl>
The license under which this distribution may be used and
redistributed. See L<Module::Build> for the list of valid options.
=item distribution_type
Example: C<module>
What kind of stuff is contained in this distribution. Most things on
CPAN are C<module>s (which can also mean a collection of
modules), but some things are C<script>s.
=item requires
Example:
Data::Dumper: 0
File::Find: 1.03
A YAML L<mapping|http://www.yaml.org/spec/#.-syntax-mapping-Mapping->
indicating the Perl modules this distribution requires for proper
operation. The keys are the module names, and the values are version
specifications as described in the L<Module::Build|documentation for Module::Build's "requires" parameter>.
I<Note: the exact nature of the fancy specifications like
C<< ">= 1.2, != 1.5, < 2.0" >> is subject to
change. Advance notice will be given here. The simple specifications
like C<"1.2"> will not change in format.>
=item recommends
Example:
Data::Dumper: 0
File::Find: 1.03
A YAML L<mapping|http://www.yaml.org/spec/#.-syntax-mapping-Mapping->
indicating the Perl modules this distribution recommends for enhanced
operation.
=item build_requires
Example:
Data::Dumper: 0
File::Find: 1.03
A YAML L<mapping|http://www.yaml.org/spec/#.-syntax-mapping-Mapping->
indicating the Perl modules required for building and/or testing of
this distribution. These dependencies are not required after the
module is installed.
=item conflicts
Example:
Data::Dumper: 0
File::Find: 1.03
A YAML L<mapping|http://www.yaml.org/spec/#.-syntax-mapping-Mapping->
indicating the Perl modules that cannot be installed while this
distribution is installed. This is a pretty uncommon situation.
=item dynamic_config
Example: C<0>
A boolean flag indicating whether a F<Build.PL> or
F<Makefile.PL> (or similar) must be executed, or whether this
module can be built, tested and installed solely from consulting its
metadata file. The main reason to set this to a true value if that
your module performs some dynamic configuration (asking questions,
sensing the environment, etc.) as part of its build/install process.
Currently L<Module::Build> doesn't actually do anything with
this flag - it's probably going to be up to higher-level tools like
L<CPAN|CPAN.pm> to do something useful with it. It can potentially
bring lots of security, packaging, and convenience improvements.
=item generated_by
Example: C<Module::Build version 0.16>
Indicates the tool that was used to create this F<META.yml> file. It's
good form to include both the name of the tool and its version, but
this field is essentially opaque, at least for the moment.
=back
=head1 Related Projects
=over 4
=item DOAP
An RDF vocabulary to describe software projects. L<http://usefulinc.com/doap>.
=back
=head1 History
=over 4
=item *
B<March 14, 2003> (Pi day) - created version 1.0 of this document.
=item *
B<May 8, 2003> - added the "dynamic_config" field, which was missing from the
initial version.
=back
|
