NAME

Attribute::Constant - Make read-only variables via attribute

VERSION

$Id: Constant.pm,v 1.1 2013/04/03 14:37:57 dankogai Exp $

SYNOPSIS

 use Attribute::Constant;
 my $sv : Constant( $initial_value );
 my @av : Constant( @values );
 my %hv : Constant( key => value, key => value, ...);

DESCRIPTION

This module uses Data::Lock to make the variable read-only. Check the document and source of Data::Lock for its mechanism.

ATTRIBUTES

This module adds only one attribute, "Constant". You give its initial value as shown. Unlike Readonly, parantheses cannot be ommited but it is semantically more elegant and thanks to Data::Lock, it imposes almost no performance penalty.

CAVEAT

Multi-line attributes

Multi-line attributes are not allowed in Perl 5.8.x.

  my $o : Constant(Foo->new(one=>1,two=>2,three=>3));    # ok
  my $p : Constant(Bar->new(
                            one   =>1,
                            two   =>2,
                            three =>3
                           )
                 ); # needs Perl 5.10

In which case you can use Data::Lock instead:

  dlock(my $p = Bar->new(
        one   => 1,
        two   => 2,
        three => 3
    )
  );

After all, this module is a wrapper to Data::Lock;

Constants from Variables

You may be surprised the following code DOES NOT work as you expected:

  #!/usr/bin/perl
  use strict;
  use warnings;
  use Attribute::Constant;
  use Data::Dumper;
  {
    package MyClass;
    sub new {
        my ( $class, %params ) = @_;
        return bless \%params, $class;
    }
  }
  my $o = MyClass->new( a => 1, b => 2 );
  my $x : Constant($o);
  print Dumper( $o, $x );

Which outputs:

  $VAR1 = bless( {
                 'a' => 1,
                 'b' => 2
               }, 'MyClass' );
  $VAR2 = undef;

Why? Because " $x : Constant($o) " happens before "$o = Myclass->new()".

On the other hand, the following works.

  my $y : Constant(MyClass->new(a => 1,b => 2));
  print Dumper( $o, $y );

Rule of the thumb is do not feed variables to constant because varialbes change after the attribute invocation.

Or simply use "Data::Lock::dlock".

  use Data::Lock qw/dlock/;
  dlock my $z = $o;
  print Dumper( $o, $y );

AUTHOR

Dan Kogai, "<dankogai+cpan at gmail.com>"

BUGS & SUPPORT

See Data::Lock.

ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS

Readonly

COPYRIGHT & LICENSE

This program is free software; you can redistribute it and/or modify it under the same terms as Perl itself.