[vox-tech] Need help with bad Perl

[ALLO (Alfredo Lopez)]

Dear Vox-Tech:

I have been trying to install a Perl module that is required to run a
Database.  This module is called "GD" I have been able to install all the
required libraries and modules that this module requires and at the end I
got this error message.

[rioja GD-1.38]$ make test
PERL_DL_NONLAZY=1 /usr/bin/perl -Iblib/arch -Iblib/lib
-I/usr/lib/perl5/5.6.0/i386-linux -I/usr/lib/perl5/5.6.0 -e 'use
Test::Harness qw(&runtests $verbose); $verbose=0; runtests @ARGV;' t/*.t
t/GD................Can't load './blib/arch/auto/GD/GD.so' for module GD:
./blib/arch/auto/GD/GD.so: undefined symbol: gdImageStringFT at
/usr/lib/perl5/5.6.0/i386-linux/DynaLoader.pm line 200.  at t/GD.t line 12
Compilation failed in require at t/GD.t line 12. BEGIN failed--compilation
aborted at t/GD.t line 12. t/GD................dubious
        Test returned status 255 (wstat 65280, 0xff00)
DIED. FAILED tests 1-10
        Failed 10/10 tests, 0.00% okay
Failed Test  Status Wstat Total Fail  Failed  List of failed
----------------------------------------------------------------------------
---
t/GD.t          255 65280    10   10 100.00%  1-10
Failed 1/1 test scripts, 0.00% okay. 10/10 subtests failed, 0.00% okay.
make: *** [test_dynamic] Error 2
[rioja GD-1.38]$

I found out that according to one of the Bioinformatics wizards at Cold
Spring Harbor the problem is Perl:

"This problem has been reported under some versions of SuSE and RedHat Linux
(it appears to be related to a particular RPM distribution of Perl).  Perl
was built incorrectly, causing some but not all loadable modules to fail.
The only solution I know of is to rebuild Perl correctly from scratch and
reinstall all previously-installed modules."

Has anybody experienced this?  Is there a way to get around this other that
building Perl.  I don't know but for an inexperienced user like me,
rebuilding Perl is not a trivial exercise.  BTY I am using the latest
version of Caldera (Workstation 3.1) and I am getting next Friday a copy of
RedHat 7.2. But I am almost sure 7.2 will have the same problem.

TIA
Alfredo