## 13 Bootstrapping

Suppose you have a stow directory all set up and ready to go: `/usr/local/stow/perl` contains the Perl installation, `/usr/local/stow/stow` contains Stow itself, and perhaps you have other packages waiting to be stowed. You’d like to be able to do this:

    cd /usr/local/stow
    stow -vv *

but `stow` is not yet in your `PATH`. Nor can you do this:

    cd /usr/local/stow
    stow/bin/stow -vv *

because the ‘`#!`’ line at the beginning of `stow` tries to locate Perl (usually in `/usr/local/bin/perl`), and that won’t be found. The solution you must use is:

    cd /usr/local/stow
    perl/bin/perl stow/bin/stow -vv *