Item4585: configure generates apache errors

[Sat Sep 08 16:45:36 2007] [error] [client 131.151.90.98] Subroutine TWiki::Configure::Checker::tmpfile redefined at /usr/lib/perl5/5.8.5/Exporter.pm line 65.
[Sat Sep 08 16:45:36 2007] [error] [client 131.151.90.98] at /usr/lib/perl5/5.8.5/i386-linux-thread-multi/POSIX.pm line 19
[Sat Sep 08 16:45:36 2007] [error] [client 131.151.90.98] Subroutine TWiki::Configure::Checker::tmpnam redefined at /usr/lib/perl5/5.8.5/Exporter.pm line 65.
[Sat Sep 08 16:45:36 2007] [error] [client 131.151.90.98] at /usr/lib/perl5/5.8.5/i386-linux-thread-multi/POSIX.pm line 19
[Sat Sep 08 16:46:21 2007] [error] [client 131.151.90.98] Subroutine TWiki::Configure::Checker::tmpfile redefined at /usr/lib/perl5/5.8.5/Exporter.pm line 65., referer: http://xxxx.xxxx.xxxx/helptwiki/bin/configure
[Sat Sep 08 16:46:21 2007] [error] [client 131.151.90.98] at /usr/lib/perl5/5.8.5/i386-linux-thread-multi/POSIX.pm line 19, referer: http://xxxx.xxxx.xxxx/helptwiki/bin/configure
[Sat Sep 08 16:46:21 2007] [error] [client 131.151.90.98] Subroutine TWiki::Configure::Checker::tmpnam redefined at /usr/lib/perl5/5.8.5/Exporter.pm line 65., referer: http://r03venom.desktop.umr.edu/helptwiki/bin/configure
[Sat Sep 08 16:46:21 2007] [error] [client 131.151.90.98] at /usr/lib/perl5/5.8.5/i386-linux-thread-multi/POSIX.pm line 19, referer: http://xxxx.xxxx.xxxx/helptwiki/bin/configure

-- TWiki:Main/ThomasWeigert - 08 Sep 2007

Yes. We all have these.

And they are bogus errors. But they would be nice to avoid. Many report them in connection with unrelated bugs.

-- TWiki:Main.KennethLavrsen - 08 Sep 2007

Quite a few packages have use strict outside the package, which presumably makes the scope global. It's possible that this just happens to be the first of those that's encountered during compilation, so the warnings get blamed on it. We can try moving the use strict calls inside the package declaration to see if that makes a difference.

-- TWiki:Main.CrawfordCurrie - 09 Sep 2007

Well, that didn;t fix it. But I noticed that when we check for mudule availability we use a 'use' and not a require. On closer analysis, it emerges that File::Temp and POSIX both export the tmpfile symbol into the global namespace by default. A curse on anyone who exports symbols into the global namespace! Idiots!

Anyway, we can get rid of the warning simply by doing a require instead of a use. Since this is just a compile check, we are not relying on it to provide these symbols.

CC