I think this is a missing tool for Perl developers. If I am wrong, and there is any solution out there, please let me know.
But I think there should be available a computer farm with different operating systems. For instance, I have a Linux server, a Mac laptop, and a Windows VMWare with Strawberry. But I do not have a Windows with ActiveState Perl, neither a Windows with Cygwin Perl, neither a BSD. Not to mention other strange operating systems.
I know that to give random users access to a machine is not secure. Thus, if this farm gets created, I suggest that some precedents should be requested to the CPAN author to get the account. For instance, to have at least one released module. Other options might arise when we start discussing this.
Also, for easier maintenance, it would be great if this farm would be of virtual machines. This way it would be easy to define a time (say, 0:00 GMT) to delete the running virtual machine and install a new snapshot. Of course that would annoy people logged in at that time, but it won't hurt much.
Thoughts?
Well, all this to say I need to test my Config::AutoConf module on BSD :P
http://web.archive.org/web/20070607133515/http://ali.as/pita/
http://search.cpan.org/dist/PITA
A beginning is laid, if you have tuits, help finish it.
Re:PITA
Alias on 2009-05-21T03:20:39
And it's very very close to being ready...
Just requires someone with a little willpower and time.
Probably I could submit a grant proposal.. wait.. I can't.. damn
This is what Andy Armstrong set up for Test::Harness. Even had a VMS box at one point (might still have it). It's saved our bacon more than once
Releasing a developer release comes close. You cannot log into the machines but you can write your tests such that they spit out enough diagnostics. Some testers have a modern setup that delivers the tests within minutes after the upload. So while it's not as relaxed as sitting in front of a shell prompt it's an alternative.
