http://ali.as/download/vanilla-perl-5.10.0-build-15.exe (14.4 MB)
I'm happy to (FINALLY) release the new Vanilla Perl build 15.
Vanilla Perl is the experimental Win32 Perl distribution with the mandate to do the absolute minimum amount of changes to the Perl core to get various features working.
This latest experimental release contains most of the new tricks that will be in the upcoming April Strawberry Perl, and probably the biggest number of new features yet in a Vanilla release.
XML::Parser
This release comes with Expat and XML::Parser built in (since I still can't make XML::Parser install from CPAN itself and you can't upgrade it).
So it should be possible to build a range of other stuff on top of it now (like PPM support, which is out of the scope of Vanilla).
Win32::API
Although it probably won't stay in Vanilla beyond this release, I've bundled in Win32::API out of the box. With Win32::API also comes (be necessity) with libwin32 bundled in as well (which is by far the biggest install from cpan.strawberryperl.com).
With those two installed, most of the rest of the Win32:: family should install relatively easily.
Relocation
This release contains experimental patches for all three configuration files that contain hard-coded paths to make them capable or handling the Perl installation being shoved around.
This should also be the first release usable for people interested in creating Portable Perl type distributions for flash drives, etc. Of course, this is still an .exe installer (which Portable Perl people don't want, cause it dumps crap into the registry).
This particular feature WON'T be in Strawberry Perl, but it involved adding some extra capabilities in regards to tweaking installs.
libwwwperl aka LWP
Because I refuse to use FTP CPAN mirrors any more (HTTP being infinitely superior in every way) Vanilla now comes with LWP out of the box.
This also means that the built in CPAN mirrors can be used now, intead of it falling back on the horrible FTP defaults.
Righto then...
So, with Vanilla 15 working, time to move on to getting a Strawberry Beta.
