GuidesTotal Modern Mod_perl Page 3

Total Modern Mod_perl Page 3

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What about mod_perl? http://perl.apache.org/netcraft/
reports that sites running mod_perl account for 852,675 host names and 108,327
unique IP addresses. This is actually an underestimate, since when hosts are
scanned for running Web servers only well known ports are checked (80, 81, 8080
and a few others). If a server runs on unusual port it does not enter the count
unless the owner has manually added it to the Netcraft database. Here is a
graph of the growth in mod_perl usage:

mod_perl growth

For the latest numbers see http://perl.apache.org/netcraft/.

The Road Ahead

You probably are all excited about the release of Apache 2.0, the next
generation of the best Web server. The major new feature of this new generation
of the Web server is threaded processes, which should make the server faster.
Early tests show that the alpha version is faster than the latest stable
version from the previous generation.

You probably are not less excited about the recent release of Perl 5.6,
whose main new feature is stable support for threads, something that existed in
the previous Perl version but which was quite shaky.

What has all this to do with mod_perl? mod_perl 2.0 is being
developed at this very moment and will benefit enormously from the new Apache
and Perl features. The most important improvement will be a reduced process
size–a parsed Perl opcodes tree will be almost completely shared between
threads of the same process.

Do you believe in coincidences? Both Perl 5.6 and Apache 2.0 were released
in the same week. Looks very suspicious to me. If you get the obvious
conspiracy uncovered please let me know.

Of course there are lots of bumps ahead of us. It will take time before all
our applications will be able to benefit from the threading features. The main
reason lies in fact that most of the Perl modules available from CPAN aren’t
thread safe. But you shouldn’t despair. You can turn off threads for Perl code
that is not thread safe or which uses modules which aren’t thread safe.

I Want mod_perl Now, Where Do I Get It?

mod_perl’s home is http://perl.apache.org. From the site you
will be able to download the latest mod_perl software and various
documentation, find commercial products and free third-party modules, read the
success stories, and learn more about mod_perl.

It’s quite important to get yourself subscribed to the mod_perl list. If
you want know what happens with mod_perl, if you want to know what new features
are being developed, if you want to influence and contribute or if you simply
want to get help, then you don’t want to skip this mailing list. To subscribe
to the list send an empty email to
modperl-subscribe@apache.org.

Are There Any mod_perl Books and Documentation?

Lincoln Stein and Doug MacEachern wrote Writing Apache Modules with Perl and
C
. You will also find a vast list of mod_perl documentation on the
mod_perl home page: http://perl.apache.org.

I Love mod_perl, I Want To Know Who Wrote This Great Free Product!

Well, Doug MacEachern is the person to blame. He is the guy who gave
mod_perl to the mod_perl community. He is the Linus of the mod_perl project.

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