N.B. After looking at WAIT integration, I've decided that I had better clear up the difference between a module distribution file and a module. Module::MetaInfo deals with the meta information for CPAN module distribution file. A module is only one exact package namespace provided in that module. The module distribution files normally contain a set of modules which it is logical to install together. This means that when they are packaged into a binary distribution they should be packaged together. - so that it's easier to manage since there are less objects - less individual installation jobs - less choice - less confusion - so that less mistakes are made by failing to install needed software (N.B. package dependency systems) Module::MetaInfo is an experimental interface to the meta information of a perl package. The first release is primarily intended to get some debate about whether this is the correct way to do such things. At the present moment, most of the meta information produced is guessed from the contents of the module. Module::MetaInfo currently (partially) implements one particular model for how developers can deliberately provide information by putting it in files in a directory (PkgData in the package top level directory). See Module::MetaInfo::DirTree for details. This has the advantages of - low clutter in the distribution - extreme simplicity - can represent any data And the disadvantages of - space inefficient on old fasioned operating systems * - slight time inefficiency ** - it is not in any way standard. I'm interested in alternative suggestions B. Especially there have been several suggestions including the use of XML. A patch for Module::MetaInfo support has been contributed to RedHat's cpanflute. A copy is included in the file cpanflute.patch. This should allow the building of RPMs using the metainformation that the program meta-from-perl-mods can extract. Please see the copyright notice in each file. * This is caused by the extra space taken up by small files on certain operating systems. If you are using a Windows family operating such as an XP system, you are advised to upgrade a more modern one such as GNU/Linux or FreeBSD. ** this is caused by extra system calls to open each file and is a very minor problem