version 0.9908
==================================

Object oriented versions for all Perl releases from 5.6.2 onward.  Replaces
the core version code for all Perl releases from 5.10.0 onwards.  

Although this code has been fully integrated into the latest Perl release
itself (e.g. bleadperl), the CPAN release is considered upstream.  The source
code itself is available from two mirrors:

    https://bitbucket.org/jpeacock/version (primary)
    https://github.com/JohnPeacock/version.git (secondary)

and a bug queue here:

   https://rt.cpan.org/Dist/Display.html?Queue=version

Patches welcomed.

IMPORTANT NOTE - 0.9906 is the last release that fully supports Perl
releases prior to 5.6.2.  It is just too much trouble to continue to
fight to maintain full backward compatibility.

YOU SHOULD INSTALL THIS RELEASE WHEN USING VERSION OBJECTS IN PERL 5.10.0.
There was a bug caused by objects serialized by YAML that will cause Perl
5.10.0 to segfault.  As long as some module calls 'use version', then the
replacement code will take effect and Perl will not crash.

Major Changes in 0.9908 - 2014-02-02
=====================================
More optimizations courtesy of Daniel Dragan (bulk88@hotmail.com).
Also resolves:
    https://rt.cpan.org/Ticket/Display.html?id=92438
    https://rt.cpan.org/Ticket/Display.html?id=92540
    https://rt.cpan.org/Ticket/Display.html?id=92642

Major Changes in 0.9907 - 2014-01-12
=====================================
Lots of optimizations of XS and C code courtesy of Daniel Dragan
(bulk88@hotmail.com).  Lots of minor tweaks as well.

Resolves:
    https://rt.cpan.org/Ticket/Display.html?id=91892
    https://rt.cpan.org/Ticket/Display.html?id=91867
    https://rt.cpan.org/Ticket/Display.html?id=91987
    https://rt.cpan.org/Ticket/Display.html?id=92051

Major Changes in 0.9906 - 2014-01-04
=====================================
Applied C89 compatibility fix from Karl Williamson to vxs.inc.  Added back
support for $version::LAX and $version::STRICT to resolve:

    https://rt.cpan.org/Ticket/Display.html?id=88458
    https://rt.cpan.org/Ticket/Display.html?id=91858
    https://rt.cpan.org/Ticket/Display.html?id=91868

Major Changes in 0.9905 - 2014-01-04
=====================================
Major rewrite of XS code to permit easier inclusion in core Perl (mostly 
written by Father Chrysostomos <sprout@cpan.org>).  XS code is no longer
supported for any Perl < v5.10, although the pure Perl code still works
going back to 5.005_04.

In addition, the version::vpp class is now completely independent and can
be use'd exactly like the base version class.  It is still better to use
the base class for compatibility purposes.

Major Changes in 0.9904 - 2013-08-20
=====================================
Final upstream changes from bleadperl.  Resolves RT tickets:

    https://rt.cpan.org/Ticket/Display.html?id=87513
    https://rt.cpan.org/Ticket/Display.html?id=87983

Major Changes in 0.9903 - 2013-08-18
=====================================
Upstream test changes from bleadperl.
Include version::vpp even when installing XS version.
Subtle locale test changes.

Major Changes in 0.9902 - 2013-03-05
=====================================
Upstream test changess from bleadperl.
Support env PERL_ONLY=1 as well as --perl-only.
version::new with no arguments reads past the end of the stack.

Major Changes in 0.9901 - 2012-04-26
=====================================
Fix problem with short floating point alpha versions (e.g. 0.52_0).

Major Changes in 0.99 - 2012-04-26
=====================================
Apply missing patch from core Perl to prevent overflow with ludicrous
versions.

Major Changes in 0.98 - 2012-04-25
=====================================
Apply patch from core Perl to prevent overflow with ludicrous versions.

Major Changes in 0.97 - 2012-02-28
=====================================
Minor tweak to locale test to skip if no locales are installed at all.

Major Changes in 0.96 - 2012-02-06
=====================================
Merge in upstream changes from bleadperl.  Improved locale tests.

Major Changes in 0.95 - 2011-11-12
=====================================
Restore compatibility in replacement UNIVERSAL::VERSION with the behavior
of Perl 5.14.x, essentially by reverting the changes in 

    https://rt.perl.org/rt3/Ticket/Display.html?id=95544

Fix segfault error with strings that begin with 'v', especially the string
'version'.  Resolves:

    https://rt.cpan.org/Ticket/Display.html?id=72365

Forbid all math operations on version objects in base class (this was
already the case for XS code but the pure Perl was lacking).  Resolves:

    https://rt.cpan.org/Public/Bug/Display.html?id=70950

Major Changes in 0.94 - 2011-08-21
=====================================
Clarify documentation on advisability of using leading 'v' (it isn't
mandatory, but it is much more likely to DTRT).  Resolves:

    https://rt.cpan.org/Public/Bug/Display.html?id=70120

Use a localized DIE handler when attempting to load the XS code, in case
the caller has its own DIE handler.  Resolves:

    https://rt.cpan.org/Public/Bug/Display.html?id=70260

Major Changes in 0.93 - 2011-07-27
=====================================
Fix problem with UNIVERSAL::VERSION noted by Father Chrysostomos.

Major Changes in 0.92 - 2011-07-26
=====================================
Forbid negative versions.  Make replacement UNIVERSAL::VERSION return the
original $VERSION scalar if called without a requested version.  Resolves

  https://rt.perl.org/rt3/Ticket/Display.html?id=95544

Rewrite code so that we just override all subs for Perl >= 5.9.0 (when
version.pm was added to the core).

Major Changes in 0.91 - 2011-06-05
=====================================
Fix compilation/linking on Strawberry Perl, resolves

  https://rt.cpan.org/Ticket/Display.html?id=68611

Major Changes in 0.90 - 2011-06-01
=====================================
Make all tests pass even with older Test::More releases.  Resolves

  https://rt.cpan.org/Ticket/Display.html?id=68588

Major Changes in 0.89 - 2011-05-31
=====================================
Change behavior of pure Perl qv/declare to match the core/XS behavior; do 
not use parent's new() class for derived classes.  This breaks
encapsulation but I can justify it because qv/declare is a very specific
thing that shouldn't be casually overridden (unless you do it directly in the
subclass).

Major Changes in 0.88 - 2010-12-19
=====================================
Fix Makefile.PL to make Strawberry Perl happy.  Resolves:

	https://rt.cpan.org/Public/Bug/Display.html?id=63991

Major Changes in 0.87 - 2010-12-09
=====================================
Remove Build.PL since there are modules in the Module::Build tool chain
that require version.pm, leading to circular dependencies.  This also allows
Module::Build itself to depend on version.pm.

Major Changes in 0.86 - 2010-11-26
=====================================
is_strict/is_lax were not exported correctly (which no one noticed).  Also
pull in strict/lax tests from core.

Major Changes in 0.85 - 2010-10-25
=====================================
Don't include MYMETA.yml file in distro

Major Changes in 0.84 - 2010-10-24
=====================================
Restore public API vcmp() broken in 0.83

Major Changes in 0.83 - 2010-10-17
=====================================
Changed vverify API (David Golden).  Improved heuristic for non-magical
v-strings (Perl 5.6.0-5.8.0).  Install in proper patch post-@INC
reordering.

Major Changes in 0.82 - 2010-04-13
=====================================
Still more changes to sync with Perl 5.12.0-as-released.  Rewritten POD
thanks to many hands, but mostly David Golden.  Vastly improved Regex
definitions from Zephram.

Major Changes in 0.81 - 2010-02-01
=====================================
Merge in changes from bleadperl that will be part of Perl 5.12.0.
Completely rewrite pure Perl code to operate exactly like the XS code,
through the creation of a character-array class called charstar.  Now
the pure Perl code and XS code can be more easily be synchronized.

Major Changes in 0.80 - 2010-01-21
=====================================
No outwardly visible changes.  This release is to fix an assertion error
with certain picky/older compilers.  NOTE: this is not the version object
code that will be part of Perl 5.12.0, which will be released shortly as
0.81.

Major Changes in 0.79 - 2010-01-03
=====================================
No outwardly visible changes.  This release is to match the code that 
will part of Perl 5.12.0, but which doesn't affect the external API of
the CPAN release.


Major Changes in 0.78 - 2009-10-12
=====================================
More changes to improve the non-magic v-string heuristics, this time 
affecting both the pure Perl and XS backends.  NOTE: these fixes only
matter if you are running Perl 5.6.x to 5.8.0 (inclusive).  Beginning
with Perl 5.8.1, v-strings are now magical and version.pm no longer has
to guess.  Resolves:

	https://rt.cpan.org/Ticket/Display.html?id=50347

Also resolve the issue where attempting to install CPAN releases on top
of core releases (e.g. 5.10.0 and 5.10.1) would not DTRT.  Resolves:

	https://rt.cpan.org/Ticket/Display.html?id=49667

Major Changes in 0.7702 - 2009-09-07
=====================================
Add additional contraints to the code which tries to guess whether something
is a v-string or not for Perl 5.6.0 through 5.8.0 (inclusive).  Resolves:

	https://rt.cpan.org/Ticket/Display.html?id=49348

Major Changes in 0.7701 - 2009-07-28
=====================================
Special RHEL4.x/Fedora4.x Are Too Stupid to Live Release.  Those distros
have never updated beyond Perl 5.8.5/5.8.6 respectively.  Consequently,
they contain a complete broken Test::More::use_ok which doesn't load the
package into the correct namespace:

	https://rt.cpan.org/Ticket/Display.html?id=48268

thus causing mysterious test failures.  No version.pm code was changed at
all. :(

Major Changes in 0.77 - 2009-07-26
===================================

Complete POD rewrite to document common usage in version.pod and put all
of the implementation details into version::Internals.

Resolve a number of RT tickets:
RT#48135 - Compilation failure using MS VC++ 7.0.
RT#47980 - Remove need for runtime class loading in pure Perl code
RT#46921 - locale and eval action at a distance.
RT#45241 - mistaken regex to convert large exponential numbers
to non-exponential form before scanning.


Please read the POD documentation for usage/details.  See the CHANGES file
for full details of all changes to the module behavior.

INSTALLATION

To install this module type the following:

   $ perl Makefile.PL
   $ make
   $ make test
   # make install

This release includes an optional pure Perl implementation (in case
you don't have a C-compiler or if some reason you want your code to be
much slower).  You can test it by replacing the first line above with:

   $ perl Makefile.PL --perl_only

and it will install the Perl only version.

DEPENDENCIES

The same C compiler used to build Perl (or not).  Module::Build 0.2611
or better.

Module::Build installs fine under 5.005_03 or better, though the optional
dependency Archive::Tar doesn't.  If you install Module::Build without any
of the optional dependencies, you can safely install version.pm.


COPYRIGHT AND LICENCE

This module can be distributed under the same terms as Perl.

Copyright (C) 2004-2010 John Peacock