Perl 5.12.0 released

  'Please would you tell me,' said Alice, a little timidly, for she was
  not quite sure whether it was good manners for her to speak first,
  'why your cat grins like that?'

  'It's a Cheshire cat,' said the Duchess, 'and that's why. Pig!'

  She said the last word with such sudden violence that Alice quite
  jumped; but she saw in another moment that it was addressed to the baby,
  and not to her, so she took courage, and went on again:--

  'I didn't know that Cheshire cats always grinned; in fact, I didn't
  know that cats COULD grin.'

  'They all can,' said the Duchess; 'and most of 'em do.'

        
            -- Lewis Carroll, /Alice's Adventures in Wonderland/


On behalf of Perl's development team, It gives me great pleasure to
announce the release of Perl 5.12.0.

Perl 5.12.0 represents approximately two years of development since
version 5.10.0 and contains over 750,000 lines of changes across over
3,000 files from over 200 authors and committers. 

SHA-1 signatures for this release:

     f533687077e2da113b48a6c5e578f4a206fbf173  perl-5.12.0.tar.bz2
     5341e60d099fdda71bc33b2a36e417fc0926518f  perl-5.12.0.tar.gz

You can download this release from your nearest CPAN mirror or from:
    
    http://search.cpan.org/dist/perl-5.12.0/

This release cycle marks a change to a time-based release process.
Beginning with version 5.11.0, we make a new development release
of Perl available on the 20th of each month.  Each spring, we will
release a new stable version of Perl.  One month later, we will make a
minor update to deal with any issues discovered after the initial ".0"
release. Future releases in the stable series will follow quarterly.
In contrast to releases of Perl, maintenance releases will contain fixes
for issues discovered after the .0 release, but will not include new
features or behavior.

Notable changes in Perl 5.12 include:

* Perl now conforms much more closely to the Unicode standard.
  Additionally, this release includes an upgrade to version
  5.2 of the standard.

* New experimental APIs allow developers to extend Perl with 
  "pluggable" keywords and syntax.

* Perl now has a better sense of time and will be able to keep
  accurate time well past the "Y2038" barrier.

* New syntax allows developers to specify package version numbers
  directly in "package" statements

* Perl now warns the user about the use of deprecated features
  by default.

Perl 5.12.0 features numerous new features, optimizations and bugfixes.
You can find a complete list of these changes on the web at:

  http://search.cpan.org/~jesse/perl-5.12.0/pod/perl5120del...

As specified in the licenses for Perl (see the files named Artistic
or Copying in the Perl distribution), THIS PACKAGE IS PROVIDED WITH
ABSOLUTELY NO WARRANTY.

Based on extensive testing over the past 3 months, we believe that Perl
5.12.0 is ready for production deployments. However, you should never
blindly trust any software vendor. It is imperative that you test new
software before deploying it in production.

While we have worked tirelessly to ensure that Perl 5.12.0 will be a
solid platform for your software, it's possible that issues will be
found after release day. You can find a current list of known issues
with Perl 5.12.0 at http://dev.perl.org/perl5/errata.html

Perl continues to flourish into its third decade thanks to a vibrant
community of users and developers.  The following people are known to
have contributed the improvements that became Perl 5.12.0:

Aaron Crane, Abe Timmerman, Abhijit Menon-Sen, Abigail, Adam Russell,
Adriano Ferreira, AEvar Arnfjörð Bjarmason, Alan Grover, Alexandr
Ciornii, Alex Davies, Alex Vandiver, Andreas Koenig, Andrei Yelistratov,
Andrew Rodland, Andy Armstrong, Andy Dougherty, Jose Auguste-Etienne,
Benjamin Smith, Ben Morrow, bharanee rathna, Bo Borgerson, Bo Lindbergh,
Brad Gilbert, Bram, Brendan O'Dea, brian d foy, Charles Bailey, Chip
Salzenberg, Chris 'BinGOs' Williams, Christoph Lamprecht, Chris Williams,
chromatic, Claes Jakobsson, Craig A. Berry, Dan Dascalescu, Daniel
Frederick Crisman, Daniel M. Quinlan, Dan Jacobson, Dan Kogai, Dave
Rolsky, David Cantrell, David Dick, David Golden, David Mitchell, David
M. Syzdek, David Nicol, David Wheeler, Dennis Kaarsemaker, Dintelmann,
Peter, Dominic Dunlop, Dr.Ruud, Duke Leto, Enrico Sorcinelli, Eric
Brine, Father Chrysostomos, Florian Ragwitz, Frank Wiegand, Gabor Szabo,
Gene Sullivan, Geoffrey T. Dairiki, George Greer, Gerard Goossen, Gisle
Aas, Goro Fuji, Graham Barr, Green, Paul, Hans Dieter Pearcey, Harmen,
H. Merijn Brand, Hugo van der Sanden, Ian Goodacre, Igor Sutton, Ingo
Weinhold, James Bence, James Mastros, Jan Dubois, Jari Aalto, Jarkko
Hietaniemi, Jay Hannah, Jerry Hedden, Jesse Vincent, Jim Cromie, Jody
Belka, John Malmberg, John Peacock, John P. Linderman, John Wright, Josh
ben Jore, Jos I. Boumans, Karl Williamson, Kenichi Ishigaki, Ken Williams,
Kevin Brintnall, Kevin Ryde, Kurt Starsinic, Leon Brocard, Lubomir Rintel,
Luke Ross, Marcel Grünauer, Marcus Holland-Moritz, Mark Jason Dominus,
Marko Asplund, Martin Hasch, Mashrab Kuvatov, Matt Kraai, Matt S Trout,
Max Maischein, Michael Breen, Michael Cartmell, Michael G Schwern,
Michael Witten, Mike Giroux, Milosz Tanski, Moritz Lenz, Nicholas Clark,
Nick Cleaton, Niko Tyni, Offer Kaye, Osvaldo Villalon, Paul Fenwick, Paul
Gaborit, Paul Green, Paul Johnson, Paul Marquess, Philip Hazel, Philippe
Bruhat, Rafael Garcia-Suarez, Rainer Tammer, Rajesh Mandalemula, Reini
Urban, Renée Bäcker, Ricardo Signes, Richard Foley, Rich Rauenzahn,
Rick Delaney, Risto Kankkunen, Robert May, Roberto C. Sanchez, Robin
Barker, Tomoyuki Sadahiro, Salvador Ortiz Garcia, Sam Vilain, Scott
Lanning, Sébastien Aperghis-Tramoni, Sérgio Durigan Júnior, Shlomi
Fish, Simon Schubert, Sisyphus, Slaven Rezic, Smylers, Steffen Müller,
Steffen Ullrich, Stepan Kasal, Steve Hay, Steven Schubiger, Steve Peters,
Tels, The Doctor, Tim Bunce, Tim Jenness, Todd Rinaldo, Tom Christiansen,
Tom Hukins, Tom Wyant, Tony Cook, Torsten Schoenfeld, Tye McQueen, Vadim
Konovalov, Vincent Pit, Hio Yamashina, Yasuhiro Matsumoto, Yitzchak
Scott-Thoennes, Yuval Kogman, Yves Orton, Zefram and Zsban Ambrus.

This list is woefully incomplete as it's automatically generated from
version control history.  In particular, it doesn't include the names of
the (very much appreciated) contributors who reported issues in previous
versions of Perl that helped make Perl 5.12.0 better. For a more complete
list of all of Perl's historical contributors, please see the AUTHORS
file in the Perl 5.12.0 distribution.

  Best,

  Jesse Vincent