Perl returns MSWin32 whereas my laptop is 64-bit

Question

print "$^O\n";

returns

MSWin32

However, my laptop is 64-bit. Any idea if the Perl system call retrieves wrong data (by its or Windows' bug) or is it as designed?

Answer 1

Win32 is just the standard Windows API. This has little connection to 32-bit/64-bit processors or OS variants.

From perldoc -v $^O:

In Windows platforms, $^O is not very helpful: since it is always "MSWin32", it doesn't tell the difference between 95/98/ME/NT/2000/XP/CE/.NET. Use Win32::GetOSName() or Win32::GetOSVersion() (see Win32 and perlport) to distinguish between the variants.

On my system, it isn't very helpful either; returning just a plain linux ;-)

Answer 2

$^O is always MSWin32 on Windows.

If you want to know more about the system on which perl runs, you can use

use Win32;
print Win32::GetOSDisplayName(), "\n";
print Win32::GetOSName(), "\n";
print Win32::GetOSVersion(), "\n";

If you want to know the architecture for which perl was built, you can use

use Config qw( $Config );
print "$Config{archname}\n";

If you want to know the size of integers, you can use

use Config qw( $Config );
print $Config{ivsize}*8, " bits\n";