forks::Devel::Symdump(3pm)

NAME

forks::Devel::Symdump - dump symbol names or the symbol table

SYNOPSIS

# Constructor
require forks::Devel::Symdump;
@packs = qw(some_package another_package);
$obj = forks::Devel::Symdump->new(@packs);        # no recursion
$obj = forks::Devel::Symdump->rnew(@packs);       # with recursion

# Methods
@array = $obj->packages;
@array = $obj->scalars;
@array = $obj->arrays;
@array = $obj->hashes;
@array = $obj->functions;
@array = $obj->filehandles;  # deprecated, use ios instead
@array = $obj->dirhandles;   # deprecated, use ios instead
@array = $obj->ios;
@array = $obj->unknowns;     # only perl version < 5.003 had some

$string = $obj->as_string;
$string = $obj->as_HTML;
$string = $obj1->diff($obj2);

$string = forks::Devel::Symdump->isa_tree;    # or $obj->isa_tree
$string = forks::Devel::Symdump->inh_tree;    # or $obj->inh_tree

# Methods with autogenerated objects
# all of those call new(@packs) internally
@array = forks::Devel::Symdump->packages(@packs);
@array = forks::Devel::Symdump->scalars(@packs);
@array = forks::Devel::Symdump->arrays(@packs);
@array = forks::Devel::Symdump->hashes(@packs);
@array = forks::Devel::Symdump->functions(@packs);
@array = forks::Devel::Symdump->ios(@packs);
@array = forks::Devel::Symdump->unknowns(@packs);

DESCRIPTION

This little package serves to access the symbol table of perl.

"forks::Devel::Symdump->rnew(@packages)": returns a symbol table object for all subtrees below @packages.
Nested Modules are analyzed recursively. If no package is given as argument, it defaults to "main". That means to get the whole symbol table, just do a "rnew" without arguments.; The global variable $forks::Devel::Symdump::MAX_RECURSION limits
the recursion to prevent contention. The default value is set to
97, just low enough to survive the test suite without a warning
about deep recursion.
"forks::Devel::Symdump->new(@packages)": does not go into recursion and only analyzes the packages that are given as arguments.
packages, scalars, arrays, hashes, functions, ios: The methods packages(), scalars(), arrays(), hashes(), functions(), ios(), and (for older perls) unknowns() each return an array of fully qualified symbols of the specified type in all packages that are held within a forks::Devel::Symdump object, but without the
leading "$", "@" or "%". In a scalar context, they will return the number of such symbols. Unknown symbols are usually either formats or variables that haven't yet got a defined value.
as_string as_HTML: As_string() and as_HTML() return a simple string/HTML representations of the object.
diff: Diff() prints the difference between two forks::Devel::Symdump objects in human readable form. The format is similar to the one
used by the as_string method.
isa_tree inh_tree: Isa_tree() and inh_tree() both return a simple string representation of the current inheritance tree. The difference
between the two methods is the direction from which the tree is
viewed: top-down or bottom-up. As I'm sure, many users will have
different expectation about what is top and what is bottom, I'll
provide an example what happens when the Socket module is loaded:
% print forks::Devel::Symdump->inh_tree: AutoLoader
DynaLoader
Socket

DynaLoader

Socket

Exporter

Carp
Config
Socket
The inh_tree method shows on the left hand side a package name and indented to the right the packages that use the former.
% print forks::Devel::Symdump->isa_tree: Carp
Exporter; Config
Exporter; DynaLoader
AutoLoader; Socket
Exporter
DynaLoader
AutoLoader
The isa_tree method displays from left to right ISA relationships, so Socket IS A DynaLoader and DynaLoader IS A AutoLoader. (Actually, they were at the time this manpage was written)
You may call both methods, isa_tree() and inh_tree(), with an object. If you do that, the object will store the output and retrieve it when you call the same method again later. The typical usage would be to use them as class methods directly though.

SUBCLASSING

The design of this package is intentionally primitive and allows it to be subclassed easily. An example of a (maybe) useful subclass is
forks::Devel::Symdump::Export, a package which exports all methods of
the forks::Devel::Symdump package and turns them into functions.

AUTHORS

Andreas Koenig <andk@cpan.org> and Tom Christiansen <tchrist@perl.com>. Based on the old dumpvar.pl by Larry Wall.

COPYRIGHT, LICENSE

This is a modified version of Devel::Symdump 2.08. It includes custom patches for Perl 5.10 compatibility.

Original module is

This library is free software; you may use, redistribute and/or modify it under the same terms as Perl itself.

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