Simplest way to get a comprehensive listing of package names available in CPAN?

Question

Suppose that, as a private project, I have implemented a Perl package, and tested it, both formally and through extensive everyday use. I find the package useful and solid enough to warrant submitting it to CPAN.

Up to this point, since the package has been a private project, I have not worried too much about the package's name, but now that I want to submitted to CPAN, however, I would like the package's name to fit well within the ecology of package names already in CPAN.

In order to find a suitable "CPAN name" for my package, I would have to inspect a comprehensive listing of all these package names¹.

What is the simplest way to get this comprehensive listing of names of packages in CPAN?

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ObPedantry

(IOW, if the question above is already clear enough for you, you may safely ignore what follows.)

I don't think that I can give a technically correct formal definition of what I mean here by "package name", so let me at least give an "operational definition".

If, for example, the one-liner

$ perl -MFoo::Bar::Baz -c -e 1

fails with an error beginning with

Can't locate Foo/Bar/Baz.pm in @INC ...

..., but after installing some distributions from CPAN, the same oneliner succeeds with

-e syntax OK

...then I'll say that "Foo::Bar::Baz is a package name in CPAN".

(We could split hairs over the package/module distinction, and consider scenarios in which the distinction matters, but please let's not.)

Furthermore, if after inspecting the list this question asks about I discover that, on the one hand, there are in fact many eminent package names in CPAN that begin with the prefix Foo::Bar::, and on the other, there are none (or negligibly few) that begin with the prefix Fubar::, then this would be a good enough reason for me to change the name of my Fubar::Frobozz package to Foo::Bar::Frobozz before submitting it to CPAN.

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^{1 Of course, after inspecting such a list, I may discover that my package does not add sufficiently new functionality relative to what's already available in CPAN to warrant submitting my package to CPAN after all.}

Answer 1

If you have run cpan before, you have downloaded a comprehensive package and distribution list under <cpan-home>/sources/modules/02packages.details.txt.gz.

A fresh copy is available on any CPAN mirror, e.g. http://www.cpan.org/modules/02packages.details.txt.gz .