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What are the impacts (If any) by developing code in Perl 5.6.1 but running the code in Perl 5.8.x or 5.10.x?

I'm using these modules:

(For Linux)
HTTP::Request
HTTP::Response
LWP::UserAgent
Unicode::String
XML::DOM
DateTime::Format::DateManip

(For Windows)

Unicode-String
XML-DOM
DateTime-Format-DateManip (Haven't installed this yet on Windows, still looking for package)
Borodin
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Phill Pafford
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    I'll take this opportunity to plug strawberry perl, it doesn't use packages like activestate perl does but uses a cpan shell instead. So installing should be as simple as typing `cpan DateTime::Format::DateManip` – Nifle Jan 27 '10 at 16:14
  • I don't see Strawberry Perl for 5.6.x, so I would need to upgrade to at least 5.8.x but I do like this option – Phill Pafford Jan 27 '10 at 16:23
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    Supporting 5.6 isn't fun. A lot of popular modules on CPAN don't, like Moose, so you will be sacrificing a lot of development productivity going back that far. – Evan Carroll Jan 27 '10 at 17:22
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    There's also the fact that 5.12 is right around the corner: staying on 5.6 is effectively the same as staying with leeches for general medical malady treatment. :) – Robert P Jan 28 '10 at 01:07
  • @David: Please stop removing Perl version tags from questions – Borodin Jul 18 '15 at 23:23
  • @Borodin, I was acting on the following question and answer. Could you post another answer or comment there, so that we can all benefit from your guidance? - [Should there generally be only one tag for a language, rather than multiple (especially minor) versions?](http://meta.stackoverflow.com/questions/299598/should-there-generally-be-only-one-tag-for-a-language-rather-than-multiple-esp) In the mean-time, yes, I can refrain from further such edits. – David Jul 18 '15 at 23:29

3 Answers3

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The release notes for each version of Perl contain good summaries of all the important differences from the prior version. See, for example

perl58delta

perl581delta

perl5100delta

mob
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Try it and find out. You can install multiple perls at the same time with them interfering with each other. Test your code with the different versions and see what happens. If everything blows up, you still have the original perl around.

See the answers to How should I install more than one version of Perl?

Community
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brian d foy
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These are fairly standard modules... I wouldn't expect many problems. In general Perl is mature enough that you can assume backwards compatibility. But you can't know it for sure until you try :)

amarillion
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  • These are good points, this is production that clients use and time for testing is limited. Would you say it's better to just to the latest version or from 5.6.x to 5.8.x? – Phill Pafford Jan 27 '10 at 16:21
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    There are a few violations, 5.6 and 5.8 have pseudo hashes a different obscure data type, 5.10 introduces a new operator `//`, and `~~` which can introduces parsing ambiguities in 5.10 iirc. There are also a few differencing in sorting algo performance, and utf handling. 5.6 has a different thread model iirc from 5.8 and 5.10 – Evan Carroll Jan 27 '10 at 17:20