NAME¶
Text::Bidi::Array - Base class for dual life arrays
VERSION¶
version 2.09
SYNOPSIS¶
use Text::Bidi::Array::Byte;
my $a = new Text::Bidi::Array::Byte "abc";
say $a->[1]; # says 98
say $$a; # says abc
say "$a"; # also says abc
DESCRIPTION¶
This is an abstract base class for objects that function as ``dual-life''
arrays: When viewed as an array reference, it functions as a usual array of
numbers. When used as a scalar reference, it returns the same array as a
packed string. The packing specification depends on the sub-class. These
classes are used in Text::Bidi to conveniently pass arrays to the underlying
fribidi library, but could be of independent interest.
OVERLOADED OPERATORS¶
An object of this type can be dereferenced either as a scalar or as an array. In
the first case, it returns the packed (string) representation of the array. In
the second, it returns the unpacked array of numbers.
The packed representation is also returned when the object is used as a string.
CONSTRUCTION¶
$a = new Text::Bidi::Array::<Type> $data
Create a new array of the given
Type, and initialise it with
$data .
$data can be either a
string, which the new object then view as an array of the given type, or an
array reference (more precisely, anything that can be dereferenced as an
array), which is then packed according to the rules of
Type. If no
$data is given, it defaults to 0.
SEE ALSO¶
Text::Bidi::Array::Byte, Text::Bidi::Array::Long
FOR IMPLEMENTORS¶
The rest of this documentation is for writing specific derived classes. The
object is represented internally as a hashref. To implement a particular
instance, the following methods should be implemented. Each of these should
manipulate the field "data", which is the string that stores the
actual value. Unimplemented methods will lead to croaking. See
Text::Bidi::Array::Byte and Text::Bidi::Array::Long for examples.
- $self->pack(@data)
- Convert (pack) an array of numbers into a string according to the format
of the current class (this will probably be a class method). Returns the
string.
The following methods should behave as described in Tie::Array.
- $self->STORE($index, $value)
- Store the $value in the part of
"$self->{'data'}" corresponding to
$index.
- $self->FETCH($index)
- Fetch the value at $index from the correct part of
"$self->{'data'}".
- $self->STORESIZE($count)
- Modify "$self->{'data'}" to represent an array of size
$count.
- $self->FETCHSIZE()
- Return the size of the array represented by
"$self->{'data'}".
AUTHOR¶
Moshe Kamensky <kamensky@cpan.org>
COPYRIGHT AND LICENSE¶
This software is copyright (c) 2013 by Moshe Kamensky.
This is free software; you can redistribute it and/or modify it under the same
terms as the Perl 5 programming language system itself.