=head1 NAME perlexperiment - A listing of experimental features in Perl =head1 DESCRIPTION This document lists the current and past experimental features in the perl core. Although all of these are documented with their appropriate topics, this succinct listing gives you an overview and basic facts about their status. So far I've merely tried to find and list the experimental features and infer their inception, versions, etc. There's a lot of speculation here. =head2 Current experiments =over 8 =item fork() emulation Introduced in Perl 5.6.1 See also L<perlfork> =item Weak references Introduced in Perl 5.6.0 =item Internal file glob Introduced in Perl 5.6.0 Accepted in XXX =item 64-bit support Introduced in Perl 5.005 Accepted in XXX =item die accepts a reference Introduced in Perl 5.005 Accepted in Perl XXX =item Unicode support Introduced in Perl 5.6.0 Accepted in Perl 5.8.0 XXX =item -Dusemultiplicity -Dusethreads Introduced in Perl 5.6.0 =item Long Doubles Still Don't Work In Solaris Introduced in Perl 5.7.0 =item GetOpt::Long Options can now take multiple values at once (experimental) C<Getopt::Long> upgraded to version 2.35 Removed in Perl 5.8.8 =item 5.005-style threading Introduced in Perl 5.005 Removed in Perl 5.10 XXX =item Test::Harness::Straps Removed in Perl 5.10.1 =item perlcc Introduced in Perl 5.005 Removed in Perl 5.9.0 =item C<our> can now have an experimental optional attribute C<unique> Introduced in Perl 5.8.0 Deprecated in Perl 5.10.0 =item Assertions The C<-A> command line switch Introduced in Perl 5.9.0 Removed in Perl 5.9.5 =item Linux abstract Unix domain sockets Introduced in Perl 5.9.2 See also L<Socket> =item L<Pod::HTML2Pod|Pod::HTML2Pod> =item L<Pod::PXML|Pod::PXML> =item threads =item The <:pop> IO pseudolayer See also L<perlrun> =item The <:win32> IO pseudolayer See also L<perlrun> =item MLDBM See also L<perldsc> =item internal functions with M flag See also L<perlguts> =item lex_start API Introduced in Perl 5.13.7 =item internal API for C<%H> Introduced in Perl 5.13.7 See also C<cophh_> in L<perlapi>. =item av_create_and_push =item av_create_and_unshift_one =item av_create_and_unshift_one =item PL_keyword_plugin =item hv_iternext_flags =item lex_bufutf8 =item lex_discard_to =item lex_grow_linestr =item lex_next_chunk =item lex_peek_unichar =item lex_read_space =item lex_read_to =item lex_read_unichar =item lex_stuff_pv =item lex_stuff_pvn =item lex_stuff_pvs =item lex_stuff_sv =item lex_unstuff =item parse_fullstmt =item parse_stmtseq =item PL_parser-E<gt>bufend =item PL_parser-E<gt>bufptr =item PL_parser-E<gt>linestart =item PL_parser-E<gt>linestr =item Perl_signbit =item pad_findmy =item sv_utf8_decode =item sv_utf8_downgrade =item bytes_from_utf8 =item bytes_to_utf8 =item utf8_to_bytes =item DB module Introduced in Perl 5.6.0 See also L<perldebug>, L<perldebtut> =item The pseudo-hash data type Introduced in Perl 5.6.0 =item Lvalue subroutines Introduced in Perl 5.6.0 See also L<perlsub> =item There is an C<installhtml> target in the Makefile. =item Unicode in Perl on EBCDIC =item C<(?{code})> See also L<perlre> =item C<(??{ code })> See also L<perlre> =item Backtracking control verbs C<(*ACCEPT)> Introduced in: Perl 5.10 See also: L<perlre/"Special Backtracking Control Verbs"> =item Code expressions, conditional expressions, and independent expressions in regexes =item The C<\N> regex character class The C<\N> character class, not to be confused with the named character sequence C<\N{NAME}>, denotes any non-newline character in a regular expression. Introduced in: Perl 5.12 See also: =item gv_try_downgrade See also L<perlintern> =item Experimental Support for Sun Studio Compilers for Linux OS See also L<perllinux> =item Pluggable keywords See L<perlapi/PL_keyword_plugin> for the mechanism. Introduced in: Perl 5.11.2 =back =head2 Accepted features These features were so wildly successful and played so well with others that we decided to remove their experimental status and admit them as full, stable features in the world of Perl, lavishing all the benefits and luxuries thereof. They are also awarded +5 Stability and +3 Charisma. =over 8 =item (none yet identified) =back =head2 Removed features These features are no longer considered experimental and their functionality has disappeared. It's your own fault if you wrote production programs using these features after we explicitly told you not to (see L<perlpolicy>). =over 8 =item C<legacy> The experimental C<legacy> pragma was swallowed by the C<feature> pragma. Introduced in: 5.11.2 Removed in: 5.11.3 =back =head1 AUTHORS brian d foy C<< <brian.d.foy@gmail.com> >> =head1 COPYRIGHT Copyright 2010, brian d foy C<< <brian.d.foy@gmail.com> >> =head1 LICENSE You can use and redistribute this document under the same terms as Perl itself. =cut