package Tie::Hash; our $VERSION = '1.00'; =head1 NAME Tie::Hash, Tie::StdHash, Tie::ExtraHash - base class definitions for tied hashes =head1 SYNOPSIS package NewHash; require Tie::Hash; @ISA = (Tie::Hash); sub DELETE { ... } # Provides needed method sub CLEAR { ... } # Overrides inherited method package NewStdHash; require Tie::Hash; @ISA = (Tie::StdHash); # All methods provided by default, define only those needing overrides # Accessors access the storage in %{$_[0]}; # TIEHANDLE should return a reference to the actual storage sub DELETE { ... } package NewExtraHash; require Tie::Hash; @ISA = (Tie::ExtraHash); # All methods provided by default, define only those needing overrides # Accessors access the storage in %{$_[0][0]}; # TIEHANDLE should return an array reference with the first element being # the reference to the actual storage sub DELETE { $_[0][1]->('del', $_[0][0], $_[1]); # Call the report writer delete $_[0][0]->{$_[1]}; # $_[0]->SUPER::DELETE($_[1]) } package main; tie %new_hash, 'NewHash'; tie %new_std_hash, 'NewStdHash'; tie %new_extra_hash, 'NewExtraHash', sub {warn "Doing \U$_[1]\E of $_[2].\n"}; =head1 DESCRIPTION This module provides some skeletal methods for hash-tying classes. See L for a list of the functions required in order to tie a hash to a package. The basic B package provides a C method, as well as methods C, C and C. The B and B packages provide most methods for hashes described in L (the exceptions are C and C). They cause tied hashes to behave exactly like standard hashes, and allow for selective overwriting of methods. B grandfathers the C method: it is used if C is not defined in the case a class forgets to include a C method. For developers wishing to write their own tied hashes, the required methods are briefly defined below. See the L section for more detailed descriptive, as well as example code: =over 4 =item TIEHASH classname, LIST The method invoked by the command C. Associates a new hash instance with the specified class. C would represent additional arguments (along the lines of L and compatriots) needed to complete the association. =item STORE this, key, value Store datum I into I for the tied hash I. =item FETCH this, key Retrieve the datum in I for the tied hash I. =item FIRSTKEY this Return the first key in the hash. =item NEXTKEY this, lastkey Return the next key in the hash. =item EXISTS this, key Verify that I exists with the tied hash I. The B implementation is a stub that simply croaks. =item DELETE this, key Delete the key I from the tied hash I. =item CLEAR this Clear all values from the tied hash I. =back =head1 Inheriting from B The accessor methods assume that the actual storage for the data in the tied hash is in the hash referenced by C. Thus overwritten C method should return a hash reference, and the remaining methods should operate on the hash referenced by the first argument: package ReportHash; our @ISA = 'Tie::StdHash'; sub TIEHASH { my $storage = bless {}, shift; warn "New ReportHash created, stored in $storage.\n"; $storage } sub STORE { warn "Storing data with key $_[1] at $_[0].\n"; $_[0]{$_[1]} = $_[2] } =head1 Inheriting from B The accessor methods assume that the actual storage for the data in the tied hash is in the hash referenced by C<(tied(%tiedhash))[0]>. Thus overwritten C method should return an array reference with the first element being a hash reference, and the remaining methods should operate on the hash C<< %{ $_[0]->[0] } >>: package ReportHash; our @ISA = 'Tie::StdHash'; sub TIEHASH { my $storage = bless {}, shift; warn "New ReportHash created, stored in $storage.\n"; [$storage, @_] } sub STORE { warn "Storing data with key $_[1] at $_[0].\n"; $_[0][0]{$_[1]} = $_[2] } The default C method stores "extra" arguments to tie() starting from offset 1 in the array referenced by C; this is the same storage algorithm as in TIEHASH subroutine above. Hence, a typical package inheriting from B does not need to overwrite this method. =head1 C and C The methods C and C are not defined in B, B, or B. Tied hashes do not require presense of these methods, but if defined, the methods will be called in proper time, see L. If needed, these methods should be defined by the package inheriting from B, B, or B. =head1 MORE INFORMATION The packages relating to various DBM-related implementations (F, F, etc.) show examples of general tied hashes, as does the L module. While these do not utilize B, they serve as good working examples. =cut use Carp; use warnings::register; sub new { my $pkg = shift; $pkg->TIEHASH(@_); } # Grandfather "new" sub TIEHASH { my $pkg = shift; if (defined &{"${pkg}::new"}) { warnings::warnif("WARNING: calling ${pkg}->new since ${pkg}->TIEHASH is missing"); $pkg->new(@_); } else { croak "$pkg doesn't define a TIEHASH method"; } } sub EXISTS { my $pkg = ref $_[0]; croak "$pkg doesn't define an EXISTS method"; } sub CLEAR { my $self = shift; my $key = $self->FIRSTKEY(@_); my @keys; while (defined $key) { push @keys, $key; $key = $self->NEXTKEY(@_, $key); } foreach $key (@keys) { $self->DELETE(@_, $key); } } # The Tie::StdHash package implements standard perl hash behaviour. # It exists to act as a base class for classes which only wish to # alter some parts of their behaviour. package Tie::StdHash; # @ISA = qw(Tie::Hash); # would inherit new() only sub TIEHASH { bless {}, $_[0] } sub STORE { $_[0]->{$_[1]} = $_[2] } sub FETCH { $_[0]->{$_[1]} } sub FIRSTKEY { my $a = scalar keys %{$_[0]}; each %{$_[0]} } sub NEXTKEY { each %{$_[0]} } sub EXISTS { exists $_[0]->{$_[1]} } sub DELETE { delete $_[0]->{$_[1]} } sub CLEAR { %{$_[0]} = () } package Tie::ExtraHash; sub TIEHASH { my $p = shift; bless [{}, @_], $p } sub STORE { $_[0][0]{$_[1]} = $_[2] } sub FETCH { $_[0][0]{$_[1]} } sub FIRSTKEY { my $a = scalar keys %{$_[0][0]}; each %{$_[0][0]} } sub NEXTKEY { each %{$_[0][0]} } sub EXISTS { exists $_[0][0]->{$_[1]} } sub DELETE { delete $_[0][0]->{$_[1]} } sub CLEAR { %{$_[0][0]} = () } 1;