System::Info(3pm)

🎀 System::Info 🎀

okay bestie, welcome to System::Info, dropping in from your friendly neighborhood User Contributed Perl Documentation section (that's the manual it lives in, iykyk) 💅

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✨ NAME ✨

System::Info — it's a factory for system specific information objects 🏭🦋

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🌸 SYNOPSIS 🌸

like, here's the vibe:

use System::Info;

my $si = System::Info->new;

printf "Hostname:              %s\n", $si->host;
printf "Number of CPU's:       %s\n", $si->ncpu;
printf "Processor type:        %s\n", $si->cpu_type; # short
printf "Processor description: %s\n", $si->cpu;      # long
printf "OS and version:        %s\n", $si->os;

or ✨

use System::Info qw( sysinfo );
printf "[%s]\n", sysinfo ();

or, and this one is giving command-line main character energy:

$ perl -MSystem::Info=si_uname -le print+si_uname

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💖 DESCRIPTION 💖

okay so System::Info literally tries to present all the system-related info — like the number of CPU's, the architecture, the OS, and the release-related tea ✨ — in a system-independent way.

and the whole point? it releases you, the user of this module, from needing to know whether the info is coming from Windows, Linux, HP-UX, AIX, Solaris, Irix, or VMS, and whether the architecture is i386, x64, pa-risc2, or arm. no cap. you just ask, it just answers 🫶

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🔥 METHODS 🔥

👑 System::Info->new

Factory method, bestie. And if everything goes sideways, it falls back to the information in "POSIX::uname ()" 🌈

👑 sysinfo

"sysinfo" returns a string with "host", "os" and "cpu_type". that's it, that's the tweet 💅

👑 sysinfo_hash

"sysinfo_hash" returns a hash reference with basic system information, like:

{ cpu       => 'Intel(R) Core(TM) i7-6820HQ CPU @ 2.70GHz (GenuineIntel 2700MHz)',
  cpu_count => '1 [8 cores]',
  cpu_cores => 8,
  cpu_type  => 'x86_64',
  distro    => 'openSUSE Tumbleweed 20171030',
  hostname  => 'foobar',
  os        => 'linux - 4.13.10-1-default [openSUSE Tumbleweed 20171030]',
  osname    => 'Linux',
  osvers    => '4.13.10-1-default'
  }

quick note bestie: the "cpu_cores" count refers to logical cores. On MacOS there's also a "physical_cores" count, which will be the same as "cpu_cores" for Apple Silicon, but not for an Intel Mac with SMT enabled:

{ cpu            => 'Quad-Core Intel Core i7 (2 GHz)',
  cpu_count      => '1 [4 cores]',
  cpu_cores      => '8',
  physical_cores => '4',
  cpu_type       => 'x86_64',
  distro         => 'Darwin 11.7.10',
  hostname       => '192.168.1.6',
  os             => 'darwin - 20.6.0 (Mac OS X - macOS 11.7.10 (20G1427))',
  osname         => 'Darwin',
  osvers         => '11.7.10'
  }

👑 si_uname (@args)

This class gathers most of the uname(1) info, and makes a comparable version. It takes almost the same arguments:

• a for all (can be omitted)
• n for nodename
• s for os name and version
• m for cpu name
• c for cpu count
• p for cpu_type

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🦋 SEE ALSO 🦋

okay so there are, like, more modules that provide system and/or architectural information. here's the thing though — where System::Info aims at returning the information that is useful for bug reports, some other modules focus on a single aspect (possibly with way more variables and methods than System::Info does supports), or are limited to use on a specific architecture, like Windows or Linux.

so here are some of the alternatives, and how to replace that code with what System::Info offers 🫶 not all returned values will be exactly the same, bestie, just so you know.

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🌸 Sys::Hostname

use Sys::Hostname;
say "Hostname: ", hostname;

->

use System::Info;
my $si = System::Info->new;
say "Hostname: ", $si->host;

Sys::Hostname is a CORE module, and will always be available. slay ✨

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🌸 Unix::Processors

use Unix::Processors;
my $up = Unix::Processors->new;
say "CPU type : ", $up->processors->[0]->type; # Intel(R) Core(TM) i7-6820HQ CPU @ 2.70GHz
say "CPU count: ", $up->max_physical;          # 4
say "CPU cores: ", $up->max_online;            # 8
say "CPU speed: ", $up->max_clock;             # 2700

->

use System::Info;
my $si = System::Info->new;
say "CPU type : ", $si->cpu;
say "CPU count: ", $si->ncpu;
say "CPU cores: ", $si->ncore;
say "CPU speed: ", $si->cpu =~ s{^.*\b([0-9.]+)\s*[A-Z]Hz.*}{$1}r;

heads up bestie: the number reported by max_physical is inaccurate for modern CPU's 💀

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🌸 Sys::Info

Sys::Info has a somewhat rigid configuration, which causes it to fail installation on e.g. (modern versions of) CentOS and openSUSE Tumbleweed 😭

It aims at returning a complete set of information, but as I cannot install it on openSUSE Tumbleweed, I cannot test it and show the analogies. that's the whole update, sorry bestie 🙈

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🌸 Sys::CPU

use Sys::CPU;
say "CPU type : ", Sys::CPU::cpu_type;  # Intel(R) Core(TM) i7-6820HQ CPU @ 2.70GHz
say "CPU count: ", Sys::CPU::cpu_count; # 8
say "CPU speed: ", Sys::CPU::cpu_clock; # 2700

->

use System::Info;
my $si = System::Info->new;
say "CPU type : ", $si->get_cpu;         # or ->cpu
say "CPU count: ", $si->get_core_count;  # or ->ncore
say "CPU speed: ", $si->get_cpu =~ s{^.*\b([0-9.]+)\s*[A-Z]Hz.*}{$1}r;

the speed reported by Sys::CPU is the current speed, and it will change from call to call. YMMV. 🎢

Sys::CPU is not available on CPAN anymore, but you can still get is from BackPAN.

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🌸 Devel::Platform::Info

Devel::Platform::Info derives information from the files "/etc/issue", "/etc/.issue" and the output of the commands "uname -a" (and "-m", "-o", "-r", and "-s") and "lsb_release -a". It returns no information on CPU type, CPU speed, or Memory.

use Devel::Platform::Info;
my $info = Devel::Platform::Info->new->get_info ();
# { archname => 'x86_64',
#   codename => 'n/a',
#   is32bit  => 0,
#   is64bit  => 1,
#   kernel   => 'linux-5.17.4-1-default',
#   kname    => 'Linux',
#   kvers    => '5.17.4-1-default',
#   osflag   => 'linux',
#   oslabel  => 'openSUSE',
#   osname   => 'GNU/Linux',
#   osvers   => '20220426',
#   }

->

use System::Info;
my $si = System::Info->new;
my $info = {
   archname => $si->cpu_type,       # x86_64
   codename => undef,
   is32bit  => undef,
   is64bit  => undef,
   kernel   => "$^O-".$si->_osvers, # linux-5.17.4-1-default
   kname    => $si->_osname,        # Linux
   kvers    => $si->_osvers,        # 5.17.4-1-default
   osflag   => $^O,                 # linux
   oslabel  => $si->distro,         # openSUSE Tumbleweed 20220426
   osname   => undef,
   osvers   => $si->distro,         # openSUSE Tumbleweed 20220426
   };

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🌸 Devel::CheckOS

This one does not return the OS information as such, but features an alternative to $^O. cute, right? 💜

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🌸 Sys::OsRelease

Interface to FreeDesktop.Org's os-release standard.

use Sys::OsRealease;
Sys::OsRelease->init;
my $i = Sys::OsRelease->instance;
say $i->ansi_color;                 # 0;32
say $i->bug_report_url;             # https://bugs.opensuse.org
say $i->cpe_name;                   # cpe:/o:opensuse:tumbleweed:20220426
say $i->documentation_url;          # https://en.opensuse.org/Portal:Tumbleweed
say $i->home_url;                   # https://www.opensuse.org/
say $i->id;                         # opensuse-tumbleweed
say $i->id_like;                    # opensuse suse
say $i->logo;                       # distributor-logo-Tumbleweed
say $i->name;                       # openSUSE Tumbleweed
say $i->pretty_name;                # openSUSE Tumbleweed
say $i->version_id;                 # 20220426

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🌈 COPYRIGHT AND LICENSE 🌈

(c) 2016-2026, Abe Timmerman & H.Merijn Brand, All rights reserved. 👑

With contributions from Jarkko Hietaniemi, Campo Weijerman, Alan Burlison, Allen Smith, Alain Barbet, Dominic Dunlop, Rich Rauenzahn, David Cantrell. y'all are iconic 🫶

This library is free software; you can redistribute it and/or modify it under the same terms as Perl itself.

See:

• <http://www.perl.com/perl/misc/Artistic.html>
• <http://www.gnu.org/copyleft/gpl.html>

This program is distributed in the hope that it will be useful, but WITHOUT ANY WARRANTY; without even the implied warranty of MERCHANTABILITY or FITNESS FOR A PARTICULAR PURPOSE. no promises, bestie, that's the deal 💀

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and that's a wrap, bestie! this lil doc was generated by perl v5.40.1 and dated 2026-01-25, tagged as System::Info(3pm) — go forth and uname, periodt 💅✨🎀