PEAR and Hosting Companies
If your hosting company doesn??™t allow users to install new software on its servers,
don??™t fret because it likely already offers at least rudimentary support for the most prominent
packages. If PEAR support is not readily obvious, contact customer support and
inquire as to whether they would consider making a particular package available for
use on the server. If they deny your request to make the package available to all users,
it??™s still possible to use the desired package, although you??™ll have to install it by a
somewhat more manual mechanism. This process is outlined in the later section
???Installing a PEAR Package.???
Updating PEAR
Although it??™s been around for years, the PEAR Package Manager is constantly the
focus of ongoing enhancements. That said, you??™ll want to occasionally check for
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updates to the system. Doing so is a trivial process on both the Unix and Windows
platforms; just execute the installation process anew. This will restart the installation
process, overwriting the previously installed Package Manager version.
Using the PEAR Package Manager
The PEAR Package Manager allows you to browse and search the contributions, view
recent releases, and download packages. It executes via the command line, using the
following syntax:
%>pear [options] command [command-options]
To get better acquainted with the Package Manager, open up a command prompt
and execute the following:
%>pear
You??™ll be greeted with a list of commands and some usage information.
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