LinuxQuestions.org - perl -MCPAN -e shell # PROBLEM FINDING CPAN site

Dear All,

I am trying to install GNOME on LFS. To that end, I am installing one of its packages, gtk-doc. When I ./configure, I get:

checking for DocBook XML DTD V4.1.2 in XML catalog... not found
configure: error: could not find DocBook XML DTD V4.1.2 in XML catalog

I read some linuxquestions.org postings, downloaded and installed expat, dowmloaded Parser.pm, typed...

perl -MCPAN -e shell

...answered many questions with defaults, and came to the following error (the error and preceding questions are between the hash marks; I added the <ENTER>s):

#####
If you're accessing the net via proxies, you can specify them in the
CPAN configuration or via environment variables. The variable in
the $CPAN::Config takes precedence.

Your ftp_proxy? <ENTER>
Your http_proxy? <ENTER>
Your no_proxy? <ENTER>

You have no /root/.cpan/sources/MIRRORED.BY
I'm trying to fetch one
LWP not available
CPAN: Net::FTP loaded ok
Fetching with Net::FTP:
ftp://ftp.perl.org/pub/CPAN/MIRRORED.BY
Fetching with Net::FTP
ftp://ftp.perl.org/pub/CPAN/MIRRORED.BY.gz
Issuing "/usr/bin/ftp -n"
ftp: ftp.perl.org: Host name lookup failure
Not connected.
Local directory now /root/.cpan/sources

Not connected.
Not connected.
Not connected.
Not connected.
Not connected.
Bad luck... Still failed!

Can't access URL ftp://ftp.perl.org/pub/CPAN/MIRRORED.BY.

Please check, if the URLs I found in your configuration file () are valid.
The urllist can be edited. E.g. with 'o conf urllist push ftp://myurl/'

Could not fetch MIRRORED.BY
CPAN.pm needs at least one URL where it can fetch CPAN files from.

Please enter your CPAN site: []
#####

What is my CPAN site? What is a proxy? What am I doing?

Sorry - I'm bulldozing through lots of learning experiences all at once and probably need to take a break.

I don't know what to enter for "your CPAN site". Just hitting enter doesn't do it; It just asks for this information again and again.

If anyone has any ideas, I'm game.

- Thanks, Ben