PPI::Find(3) User Contributed Perl Documentation PPI::Find(3)NAME
PPI::Find - Object version of the Element->find method
SYNOPSIS
# Create the Find object
my $Find = PPI::Find->new( \&wanted );
# Return all matching Elements as a list
my @found = $Find->in( $Document );
# Can we find any matching Elements
if ( $Find->any_matches($Document) ) {
print "Found at least one matching Element";
}
# Use the object as an iterator
$Find->start($Document) or die "Failed to execute search";
while ( my $token = $Find->match ) {
...
}
DESCRIPTION
PPI::Find is the primary PDOM searching class in the core PPI package.
History
It became quite obvious during the development of PPI that many of the
modules that would be built on top of it were going to need large
numbers of saved, storable or easily creatable search objects that
could be reused a number of times.
Although the internal ->find method provides a basic ability to search,
it is by no means thorough. PPI::Find attempts to resolve this problem.
Structure and Style
PPI::Find provides a similar API to the popular File::Find::Rule module
for file searching, but without the ability to assemble queries.
The implementation of a separate PPI::Find::Rule sub-class that does
provide this ability is left as an exercise for the reader.
The &wanted function
At the core of each PPI::Find object is a "wanted" function that is
passed a number of arguments and returns a value which controls the
flow of the search.
As the search executes, each Element will be passed to the wanted
function in depth-first order.
It will be provided with two arguments. The current Element to test as
$_[0], and the top-level Element of the search as $_[1].
The &wanted function is expected to return 1 (positive) if the Element
matches the condition, 0 (false) if it does not, and undef (undefined)
if the condition does not match, and the Find search should not descend
to any of the current Element's children.
Errors should be reported from the &wanted function via die, which will
be caught by the Find object and returned as an error.
METHODS
new &wanted
The "new" constructor takes a single argument of the &wanted function,
as described above and creates a new search.
Returns a new PPI::Find object, or "undef" if not passed a CODE
reference.
clone
The "clone" method creates another instance of the same Find object.
The cloning is done safely, so if your existing Find object is in the
middle of an iteration, the cloned Find object will not also be in the
iteration and can be safely used independently.
Returns a duplicate PPI::Find object.
in $Document [, array_ref => 1 ]
The "in" method starts and completes a full run of the search.
It takes as argument a single PPI::Element object which will serve as
the top of the search process.
Returns a list of PPI::Element objects that match the condition
described by the &wanted function, or the null list on error.
You should check the ->errstr method for any errors if you are returned
the null list, which may also mean simply that no Elements were found
that matched the condition.
Because of this need to explicitly check for errors, an alternative
return value mechanism is provide. If you pass the "array_ref =" 1>
parameter to the method, it will return the list of matched Elements as
a reference to an ARRAY. The method will return false if no elements
were matched, or "undef" on error.
The ->errstr method can still be used to get the error message as
normal.
start $Element
The "start" method lets the Find object act as an iterator. The method
is passed the parent PPI::Element object as for the "in" method, but
does not accept any parameters.
To simplify error handling, the entire search is done at once, with the
results cached and provided as-requested.
Returns true if the search completes, and false on error.
match
The "match" method returns the next matching Element in the iteration.
Returns a PPI::Element object, or "undef" if there are no remaining
Elements to be returned.
finish
The "finish" method provides a mechanism to end iteration if you wish
to stop the iteration prematurely. It resets the Find object and allows
it to be safely reused.
A Find object will be automatically finished when "match" returns
false. This means you should only need to call "finnish" when you stop
iterating early.
You may safely call this method even when not iterating and it will
return without failure.
Always returns true
errstr
The "errstr" method returns the error messages when a given PPI::Find
object fails any action.
Returns a string, or "undef" if there is no error.
TO DO
- Implement the PPI::Find::Rule class
SUPPORT
See the support section in the main module.
AUTHOR
Adam Kennedy <adamk@cpan.org>
COPYRIGHT
Copyright 2001 - 2011 Adam Kennedy.
This program is free software; you can redistribute it and/or modify it
under the same terms as Perl itself.
The full text of the license can be found in the LICENSE file included
with this module.
perl v5.12.5 2011-02-25 PPI::Find(3)
