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perlmod (1)

Name

perlmod - Perl modules (packages and symbol tables)

Synopsis

Please see following description for synopsis

Description




Perl Programmers Reference Guide                       PERLMOD(1)



NAME
     perlmod - Perl modules (packages and symbol tables)

DESCRIPTION
  Packages
     Perl provides a mechanism for alternative namespaces to
     protect packages from stomping on each other's variables.
     In fact, there's really no such thing as a global variable
     in Perl.  The package statement declares the compilation
     unit as being in the given namespace.  The scope of the
     package declaration is from the declaration itself through
     the end of the enclosing block, "eval", or file, whichever
     comes first (the same scope as the my() and local()
     operators).  Unqualified dynamic identifiers will be in this
     namespace, except for those few identifiers that if
     unqualified, default to the main package instead of the
     current one as described below.  A package statement affects
     only dynamic variables--including those you've used local()
     on--but not lexical variables created with my().  Typically
     it would be the first declaration in a file included by the
     "do", "require", or "use" operators.  You can switch into a
     package in more than one place; it merely influences which
     symbol table is used by the compiler for the rest of that
     block.  You can refer to variables and filehandles in other
     packages by prefixing the identifier with the package name
     and a double colon: $Package::Variable.  If the package name
     is null, the "main" package is assumed.  That is, $::sail is
     equivalent to $main::sail.

     The old package delimiter was a single quote, but double
     colon is now the preferred delimiter, in part because it's
     more readable to humans, and in part because it's more
     readable to emacs macros.  It also makes C++ programmers
     feel like they know what's going on--as opposed to using the
     single quote as separator, which was there to make Ada
     programmers feel like they knew what was going on.  Because
     the old-fashioned syntax is still supported for backwards
     compatibility, if you try to use a string like "This is
     $owner's house", you'll be accessing $owner::s; that is, the
     $s variable in package "owner", which is probably not what
     you meant.  Use braces to disambiguate, as in "This is
     ${owner}'s house".

     Packages may themselves contain package separators, as in
     $OUTER::INNER::var.  This implies nothing about the order of
     name lookups, however.  There are no relative packages: all
     symbols are either local to the current package, or must be
     fully qualified from the outer package name down.  For
     instance, there is nowhere within package "OUTER" that
     $INNER::var refers to $OUTER::INNER::var.  "INNER" refers to
     a totally separate global package.




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     Only identifiers starting with letters (or underscore) are
     stored in a package's symbol table.  All other symbols are
     kept in package "main", including all punctuation variables,
     like $_.  In addition, when unqualified, the identifiers
     STDIN, STDOUT, STDERR, ARGV, ARGVOUT, ENV, INC, and SIG are
     forced to be in package "main", even when used for other
     purposes than their built-in ones.  If you have a package
     called "m", "s", or "y", then you can't use the qualified
     form of an identifier because it would be instead
     interpreted as a pattern match, a substitution, or a
     transliteration.

     Variables beginning with underscore used to be forced into
     package main, but we decided it was more useful for package
     writers to be able to use leading underscore to indicate
     private variables and method names.  However, variables and
     functions named with a single "_", such as $_ and "sub _",
     are still forced into the package "main".  See also
     "Technical Note on the Syntax of Variable Names" in perlvar.

     "eval"ed strings are compiled in the package in which the
     eval() was compiled.  (Assignments to $SIG{}, however,
     assume the signal handler specified is in the "main"
     package.  Qualify the signal handler name if you wish to
     have a signal handler in a package.)  For an example,
     examine perldb.pl in the Perl library.  It initially
     switches to the "DB" package so that the debugger doesn't
     interfere with variables in the program you are trying to
     debug.  At various points, however, it temporarily switches
     back to the "main" package to evaluate various expressions
     in the context of the "main" package (or wherever you came
     from).  See perldebug.

     The special symbol "__PACKAGE__" contains the current
     package, but cannot (easily) be used to construct variable
     names.

     See perlsub for other scoping issues related to my() and
     local(), and perlref regarding closures.

  Symbol Tables
     The symbol table for a package happens to be stored in the
     hash of that name with two colons appended.  The main symbol
     table's name is thus %main::, or %:: for short.  Likewise
     the symbol table for the nested package mentioned earlier is
     named %OUTER::INNER::.

     The value in each entry of the hash is what you are
     referring to when you use the *name typeglob notation.

         local *main::foo    = *main::bar;




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     You can use this to print out all the variables in a
     package, for instance.  The standard but antiquated
     dumpvar.pl library and the CPAN module Devel::Symdump make
     use of this.

     Assignment to a typeglob performs an aliasing operation,
     i.e.,

         *dick = *richard;

     causes variables, subroutines, formats, and file and
     directory handles accessible via the identifier "richard"
     also to be accessible via the identifier "dick".  If you
     want to alias only a particular variable or subroutine,
     assign a reference instead:

         *dick = \$richard;

     Which makes $richard and $dick the same variable, but leaves
     @richard and @dick as separate arrays.  Tricky, eh?

     There is one subtle difference between the following
     statements:

         *foo = *bar;
         *foo = \$bar;

     "*foo = *bar" makes the typeglobs themselves synonymous
     while "*foo = \$bar" makes the SCALAR portions of two
     distinct typeglobs refer to the same scalar value. This
     means that the following code:

         $bar = 1;
         *foo = \$bar;       # Make $foo an alias for $bar

         {
             local $bar = 2; # Restrict changes to block
             print $foo;     # Prints '1'!
         }

     Would print '1', because $foo holds a reference to the
     original $bar. The one that was stuffed away by "local()"
     and which will be restored when the block ends. Because
     variables are accessed through the typeglob, you can use
     "*foo = *bar" to create an alias which can be localized.
     (But be aware that this means you can't have a separate @foo
     and @bar, etc.)

     What makes all of this important is that the Exporter module
     uses glob aliasing as the import/export mechanism. Whether
     or not you can properly localize a variable that has been
     exported from a module depends on how it was exported:



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         @EXPORT = qw($FOO); # Usual form, can't be localized
         @EXPORT = qw(*FOO); # Can be localized

     You can work around the first case by using the fully
     qualified name ($Package::FOO) where you need a local value,
     or by overriding it by saying "*FOO = *Package::FOO" in your
     script.

     The "*x = \$y" mechanism may be used to pass and return
     cheap references into or from subroutines if you don't want
     to copy the whole thing.  It only works when assigning to
     dynamic variables, not lexicals.

         %some_hash = ();                    # can't be my()
         *some_hash = fn( \%another_hash );
         sub fn {
             local *hashsym = shift;
             # now use %hashsym normally, and you
             # will affect the caller's %another_hash
             my %nhash = (); # do what you want
             return \%nhash;
         }

     On return, the reference will overwrite the hash slot in the
     symbol table specified by the *some_hash typeglob.  This is
     a somewhat tricky way of passing around references cheaply
     when you don't want to have to remember to dereference
     variables explicitly.

     Another use of symbol tables is for making "constant"
     scalars.

         *PI = \3.14159265358979;

     Now you cannot alter $PI, which is probably a good thing all
     in all.  This isn't the same as a constant subroutine, which
     is subject to optimization at compile-time.  A constant
     subroutine is one prototyped to take no arguments and to
     return a constant expression.  See perlsub for details on
     these.  The "use constant" pragma is a convenient shorthand
     for these.

     You can say *foo{PACKAGE} and *foo{NAME} to find out what
     name and package the *foo symbol table entry comes from.
     This may be useful in a subroutine that gets passed
     typeglobs as arguments:









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         sub identify_typeglob {
             my $glob = shift;
             print 'You gave me ', *{$glob}{PACKAGE}, '::', *{$glob}{NAME}, "\n";
         }
         identify_typeglob *foo;
         identify_typeglob *bar::baz;

     This prints

         You gave me main::foo
         You gave me bar::baz

     The *foo{THING} notation can also be used to obtain
     references to the individual elements of *foo.  See perlref.

     Subroutine definitions (and declarations, for that matter)
     need not necessarily be situated in the package whose symbol
     table they occupy.  You can define a subroutine outside its
     package by explicitly qualifying the name of the subroutine:

         package main;
         sub Some_package::foo { ... }   # &foo defined in Some_package

     This is just a shorthand for a typeglob assignment at
     compile time:

         BEGIN { *Some_package::foo = sub { ... } }

     and is not the same as writing:

         {
             package Some_package;
             sub foo { ... }
         }

     In the first two versions, the body of the subroutine is
     lexically in the main package, not in Some_package. So
     something like this:

         package main;

         $Some_package::name = "fred";
         $main::name = "barney";

         sub Some_package::foo {
             print "in ", __PACKAGE__, ": \$name is '$name'\n";
         }

         Some_package::foo();

     prints:




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         in main: $name is 'barney'

     rather than:

         in Some_package: $name is 'fred'

     This also has implications for the use of the SUPER::
     qualifier (see perlobj).

  BEGIN, UNITCHECK, CHECK, INIT and END
     Five specially named code blocks are executed at the
     beginning and at the end of a running Perl program.  These
     are the "BEGIN", "UNITCHECK", "CHECK", "INIT", and "END"
     blocks.

     These code blocks can be prefixed with "sub" to give the
     appearance of a subroutine (although this is not considered
     good style).  One should note that these code blocks don't
     really exist as named subroutines (despite their
     appearance). The thing that gives this away is the fact that
     you can have more than one of these code blocks in a
     program, and they will get all executed at the appropriate
     moment.  So you can't execute any of these code blocks by
     name.

     A "BEGIN" code block is executed as soon as possible, that
     is, the moment it is completely defined, even before the
     rest of the containing file (or string) is parsed.  You may
     have multiple "BEGIN" blocks within a file (or eval'ed
     string); they will execute in order of definition.  Because
     a "BEGIN" code block executes immediately, it can pull in
     definitions of subroutines and such from other files in time
     to be visible to the rest of the compile and run time.  Once
     a "BEGIN" has run, it is immediately undefined and any code
     it used is returned to Perl's memory pool.

     An "END" code block is executed as late as possible, that
     is, after perl has finished running the program and just
     before the interpreter is being exited, even if it is
     exiting as a result of a die() function.  (But not if it's
     morphing into another program via "exec", or being blown out
     of the water by a signal--you have to trap that yourself (if
     you can).)  You may have multiple "END" blocks within a
     file--they will execute in reverse order of definition; that
     is: last in, first out (LIFO).  "END" blocks are not
     executed when you run perl with the "-c" switch, or if
     compilation fails.

     Note that "END" code blocks are not executed at the end of a
     string "eval()": if any "END" code blocks are created in a
     string "eval()", they will be executed just as any other
     "END" code block of that package in LIFO order just before



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     the interpreter is being exited.

     Inside an "END" code block, $? contains the value that the
     program is going to pass to "exit()".  You can modify $? to
     change the exit value of the program.  Beware of changing $?
     by accident (e.g. by running something via "system").

     "UNITCHECK", "CHECK" and "INIT" code blocks are useful to
     catch the transition between the compilation phase and the
     execution phase of the main program.

     "UNITCHECK" blocks are run just after the unit which defined
     them has been compiled.  The main program file and each
     module it loads are compilation units, as are string
     "eval"s, code compiled using the "(?{ })" construct in a
     regex, calls to "do FILE", "require FILE", and code after
     the "-e" switch on the command line.

     "CHECK" code blocks are run just after the initial Perl
     compile phase ends and before the run time begins, in LIFO
     order.  "CHECK" code blocks are used in the Perl compiler
     suite to save the compiled state of the program.

     "INIT" blocks are run just before the Perl runtime begins
     execution, in "first in, first out" (FIFO) order.

     The "CHECK" and "INIT" code blocks will not be executed
     inside a string eval(), if that eval() happens after the end
     of the main compilation phase; that can be a problem in
     mod_perl and other persistent environments which use "eval
     STRING" to load code at runtime.

     When you use the -n and -p switches to Perl, "BEGIN" and
     "END" work just as they do in awk, as a degenerate case.
     Both "BEGIN" and "CHECK" blocks are run when you use the -c
     switch for a compile-only syntax check, although your main
     code is not.

     The begincheck program makes it all clear, eventually:

       #!/usr/bin/perl

       # begincheck

       print         "10. Ordinary code runs at runtime.\n";

       END { print   "16.   So this is the end of the tale.\n" }
       INIT { print  " 7. INIT blocks run FIFO just before runtime.\n" }
       UNITCHECK {
         print       " 4.   And therefore before any CHECK blocks.\n"
       }
       CHECK { print " 6.   So this is the sixth line.\n" }



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       print         "11.   It runs in order, of course.\n";

       BEGIN { print " 1. BEGIN blocks run FIFO during compilation.\n" }
       END { print   "15.   Read perlmod for the rest of the story.\n" }
       CHECK { print " 5. CHECK blocks run LIFO after all compilation.\n" }
       INIT { print  " 8.   Run this again, using Perl's -c switch.\n" }

       print         "12.   This is anti-obfuscated code.\n";

       END { print   "14. END blocks run LIFO at quitting time.\n" }
       BEGIN { print " 2.   So this line comes out second.\n" }
       UNITCHECK {
        print " 3. UNITCHECK blocks run LIFO after each file is compiled.\n"
       }
       INIT { print  " 9.   You'll see the difference right away.\n" }

       print         "13.   It merely _looks_ like it should be confusing.\n";

       __END__

  Perl Classes
     There is no special class syntax in Perl, but a package may
     act as a class if it provides subroutines to act as methods.
     Such a package may also derive some of its methods from
     another class (package) by listing the other package name(s)
     in its global @ISA array (which must be a package global,
     not a lexical).

     For more on this, see perltoot and perlobj.

  Perl Modules
     A module is just a set of related functions in a library
     file, i.e., a Perl package with the same name as the file.
     It is specifically designed to be reusable by other modules
     or programs.  It may do this by providing a mechanism for
     exporting some of its symbols into the symbol table of any
     package using it, or it may function as a class definition
     and make its semantics available implicitly through method
     calls on the class and its objects, without explicitly
     exporting anything.  Or it can do a little of both.

     For example, to start a traditional, non-OO module called
     Some::Module, create a file called Some/Module.pm and start
     with this template:

         package Some::Module;  # assumes Some/Module.pm

         use strict;
         use warnings;

         BEGIN {



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             use Exporter   ();
             our ($VERSION, @ISA, @EXPORT, @EXPORT_OK, %EXPORT_TAGS);

             # set the version for version checking
             $VERSION     = 1.00;
             # if using RCS/CVS, this may be preferred
             $VERSION = sprintf "%d.%03d", q$Revision: 1.1 $ =~ /(\d+)/g;

             @ISA         = qw(Exporter);
             @EXPORT      = qw(&func1 &func2 &func4);
             %EXPORT_TAGS = ( );     # eg: TAG => [ qw!name1 name2! ],

             # your exported package globals go here,
             # as well as any optionally exported functions
             @EXPORT_OK   = qw($Var1 %Hashit &func3);
         }
         our @EXPORT_OK;

         # exported package globals go here
         our $Var1;
         our %Hashit;

         # non-exported package globals go here
         our @more;
         our $stuff;

         # initialize package globals, first exported ones
         $Var1   = '';
         %Hashit = ();

         # then the others (which are still accessible as $Some::Module::stuff)
         $stuff  = '';
         @more   = ();

         # all file-scoped lexicals must be created before
         # the functions below that use them.

         # file-private lexicals go here
         my $priv_var    = '';
         my %secret_hash = ();

         # here's a file-private function as a closure,
         # callable as &$priv_func;  it cannot be prototyped.
         my $priv_func = sub {
             # stuff goes here.
         };

         # make all your functions, whether exported or not;
         # remember to put something interesting in the {} stubs
         sub func1      {}    # no prototype
         sub func2()    {}    # proto'd void
         sub func3($$)  {}    # proto'd to 2 scalars



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         # this one isn't exported, but could be called!
         sub func4(\%)  {}    # proto'd to 1 hash ref

         END { }       # module clean-up code here (global destructor)

         ## YOUR CODE GOES HERE

         1;  # don't forget to return a true value from the file

     Then go on to declare and use your variables in functions
     without any qualifications.  See Exporter and the perlmodlib
     for details on mechanics and style issues in module
     creation.

     Perl modules are included into your program by saying

         use Module;

     or

         use Module LIST;

     This is exactly equivalent to

         BEGIN { require Module; import Module; }

     or

         BEGIN { require Module; import Module LIST; }

     As a special case

         use Module ();

     is exactly equivalent to

         BEGIN { require Module; }

     All Perl module files have the extension .pm.  The "use"
     operator assumes this so you don't have to spell out
     "Module.pm" in quotes.  This also helps to differentiate new
     modules from old .pl and .ph files.  Module names are also
     capitalized unless they're functioning as pragmas; pragmas
     are in effect compiler directives, and are sometimes called
     "pragmatic modules" (or even "pragmata" if you're a
     classicist).

     The two statements:

         require SomeModule;
         require "SomeModule.pm";



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     differ from each other in two ways.  In the first case, any
     double colons in the module name, such as "Some::Module",
     are translated into your system's directory separator,
     usually "/".   The second case does not, and would have to
     be specified literally.  The other difference is that seeing
     the first "require" clues in the compiler that uses of
     indirect object notation involving "SomeModule", as in "$ob
     = purge SomeModule", are method calls, not function calls.
     (Yes, this really can make a difference.)

     Because the "use" statement implies a "BEGIN" block, the
     importing of semantics happens as soon as the "use"
     statement is compiled, before the rest of the file is
     compiled.  This is how it is able to function as a pragma
     mechanism, and also how modules are able to declare
     subroutines that are then visible as list or unary operators
     for the rest of the current file.  This will not work if you
     use "require" instead of "use".  With "require" you can get
     into this problem:

         require Cwd;                # make Cwd:: accessible
         $here = Cwd::getcwd();

         use Cwd;                    # import names from Cwd::
         $here = getcwd();

         require Cwd;                # make Cwd:: accessible
         $here = getcwd();           # oops! no main::getcwd()

     In general, "use Module ()" is recommended over "require
     Module", because it determines module availability at
     compile time, not in the middle of your program's execution.
     An exception would be if two modules each tried to "use"
     each other, and each also called a function from that other
     module.  In that case, it's easy to use "require" instead.

     Perl packages may be nested inside other package names, so
     we can have package names containing "::".  But if we used
     that package name directly as a filename it would make for
     unwieldy or impossible filenames on some systems.
     Therefore, if a module's name is, say, "Text::Soundex", then
     its definition is actually found in the library file
     Text/Soundex.pm.

     Perl modules always have a .pm file, but there may also be
     dynamically linked executables (often ending in .so) or
     autoloaded subroutine definitions (often ending in .al)
     associated with the module.  If so, these will be entirely
     transparent to the user of the module.  It is the
     responsibility of the .pm file to load (or arrange to
     autoload) any additional functionality.  For example,
     although the POSIX module happens to do both dynamic loading



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     and autoloading, the user can say just "use POSIX" to get it
     all.

  Making your module threadsafe
     Since 5.6.0, Perl has had support for a new type of threads
     called interpreter threads (ithreads). These threads can be
     used explicitly and implicitly.

     Ithreads work by cloning the data tree so that no data is
     shared between different threads. These threads can be used
     by using the "threads" module or by doing fork() on win32
     (fake fork() support). When a thread is cloned all Perl data
     is cloned, however non-Perl data cannot be cloned
     automatically.  Perl after 5.7.2 has support for the "CLONE"
     special subroutine.  In "CLONE" you can do whatever you need
     to do, like for example handle the cloning of non-Perl data,
     if necessary.  "CLONE" will be called once as a class method
     for every package that has it defined (or inherits it).  It
     will be called in the context of the new thread, so all
     modifications are made in the new area.  Currently CLONE is
     called with no parameters other than the invocant package
     name, but code should not assume that this will remain
     unchanged, as it is likely that in future extra parameters
     will be passed in to give more information about the state
     of cloning.

     If you want to CLONE all objects you will need to keep track
     of them per package. This is simply done using a hash and
     Scalar::Util::weaken().

     Perl after 5.8.7 has support for the "CLONE_SKIP" special
     subroutine.  Like "CLONE", "CLONE_SKIP" is called once per
     package; however, it is called just before cloning starts,
     and in the context of the parent thread. If it returns a
     true value, then no objects of that class will be cloned; or
     rather, they will be copied as unblessed, undef values.  For
     example: if in the parent there are two references to a
     single blessed hash, then in the child there will be two
     references to a single undefined scalar value instead.  This
     provides a simple mechanism for making a module threadsafe;
     just add "sub CLONE_SKIP { 1 }" at the top of the class, and
     "DESTROY()" will be now only be called once per object. Of
     course, if the child thread needs to make use of the
     objects, then a more sophisticated approach is needed.

     Like "CLONE", "CLONE_SKIP" is currently called with no
     parameters other than the invocant package name, although
     that may change. Similarly, to allow for future expansion,
     the return value should be a single 0 or 1 value.






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ATTRIBUTES
     See attributes(5) for descriptions of the following
     attributes:

     +---------------+------------------+
     |ATTRIBUTE TYPE | ATTRIBUTE VALUE  |
     +---------------+------------------+
     |Availability   | runtime/perl-512 |
     +---------------+------------------+
     |Stability      | Uncommitted      |
     +---------------+------------------+
SEE ALSO
     See perlmodlib for general style issues related to building
     Perl modules and classes, as well as descriptions of the
     standard library and CPAN, Exporter for how Perl's standard
     import/export mechanism works, perltoot and perltooc for an
     in-depth tutorial on creating classes, perlobj for a hard-
     core reference document on objects, perlsub for an
     explanation of functions and scoping, and perlxstut and
     perlguts for more information on writing extension modules.



NOTES
     This software was built from source available at
     https://java.net/projects/solaris-userland.  The original
     community source was downloaded from
     http://www.cpan.org/src/5.0/perl-5.12.5.tar.bz2

     Further information about this software can be found on the
     open source community website at http://www.perl.org/.
























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