Alien::Base is now distributed as part of Alien-Build.  Please see
https://github.com/Perl5-Alien/Alien-Build for details.

Alien::Base is a base class and framework for creating Alien 
distributions.  The goal of the project is to make things as simple and 
easy as possible for both developers and users of Alien modules.

Alien is a Perl namespace for defining dependencies in CPAN for 
libraries and tools which are not "native" to CPAN.  Alien modules will 
typically use the system libraries if they are available, or download 
the latest version from the internet and build them from source code. 
These libraries can then be used by other Perl modules, usually modules 
that are implemented with XS or FFI.

To install Alien::Base, use cpanminus:

 cpanm Alien::Base
 
If you have downloaded this from GitHub or locally, do

 cpanm --installdeps .
 cpanm .

Once installed you can read the project documentation using the perldoc 
command, or via the metacpan.org website.  If you are an Alien 
developer, see the authoring documentation:

 perldoc Alien::Base::ModuleBuild::Authoring
 perldoc Alien::Build::Manual::AlienAuthor

(this one installed in a separate module)

 http://metacpan.org/pod/Alien::Base::ModuleBuild::Authoring
 http://metacpan.org/pod/Alien::Build::Manual::AlienAuthor
 

The FAQ also contains hints on dealing with specific challenges, like 
dealing with specific tools:

 perldoc Alien::Base::FAQ
 http://metacpan.org/pod/Alien::Base::FAQ

If you are a user of an Alien module, you will likely be more interested 
in the Alien::Base interface itself:

 perldoc Alien::Base
 http://metacpan.org/pod/Alien::Base

For questions that aren't answered in the documentation, please feel 
free to contact the Alien::Base team:

 * IRC: #native on irc.perl.org
 * mailing list at https://groups.google.com/forum/#!forum/perl5-alien
 * GitHub issue tracker at https://github.com/Perl5-Alien/Alien-Base/issues