Name
struct
Synopsis
struct (paramlist
)
Description
Creates a class, with object methods for each element of the class. The parameter list paramlist can take one of three forms:
struct( CLASS_NAME => [ ELEMENT_LIST ]); # object is array-based struct( CLASS_NAME => { ELEMENT_LIST }); # object is hash-based struct( ELEMENT_LIST ); # class name is current package name # and object is array-based
The array-based element lists are faster and smaller, but the hash-based list is more flexible. The class that is created can be a subclass of the UNIVERSAL class, but not of any other class.
Element list
The items in the ELEMENT_LIST are of the form:
NAME => TYPE, ...
where each NAME=>TYPE
pair declares one element of the struct
. Each element
name is defined as an accessor method, unless a method
is explicitly defined with that name. (In that case, a warning is issued if the
-w flag is set.)
Element types and accessor methods
There are four possible element types, each represented by a string.
Each string may start with an asterisk (*
), indicating that a reference
to the element is to be returned. The type of an
element determines the accessor method provided. The following list shows
the element types, the strings that represent them, and the accessor:
-
array (
@
or*@
) The element is an array, initialized to
()
. With no argument, the accessor returns a reference to the element’s whole array. With one or two arguments, the first argument is an index specifying one element of the array; the second ...
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