How do I conditionally use a Perl module only if I'm on Windows?

Question

The following Perl code ..

if ($^O eq \"MSWin32\") {
  use Win32;                                                                                                         


        

Answer 1

This code will work in all situations, and also performs the load at compile-time, as other modules you are building might depend on it:

BEGIN {
    if ($^O eq "MSWin32")
    {
        require Module;
        Module->import();  # assuming you would not be passing arguments to "use Module"
    }
}

This is because use Module (qw(foo bar)) is equivalent to BEGIN { require Module; Module->import( qw(foo bar) ); } as described in perldoc -f use.

(EDIT, a few years later...)

This is even better though:

use if $^O eq "MSWin32", Module;

Read more about the if pragma here.