Prevent instantiation of a Moose abstract class - perl

I am using Perl with Moose, and have to prevent instantiation of an abstract class.
The project is in a quite advanced stage - too late for Moose::Role or MooseX::*.
I am thinking about checking a package name against a class name in BUILDARGS,
and calling die if there's a match.
Is there any problems with this approach?
package Foo::Abstract {
use Moose;
has 'test' => ( isa => 'Int', is => 'rw', default => '0' );
around BUILDARGS => sub {
die if $_[1] eq __PACKAGE__;
$orig = shift;
$class = shift;
$class->$orig( #_ );
};
no Moose;
}
package Foo::Concrete {
use Moose;
extends 'Foo::Abstract';
no Moose;
}
use Test::More;
use Test::Exception;
dies_ok { Foo::Abstract->new() } "cannot instantiate. OK";
my $c;
lives_ok { $c = Foo::Concrete->new() } "instantiated Foo::Concrete. OK";
ok( 0 == $c->test );
done_testing();

As several people have pointed out in comments you probably should be using a Role and making the change in every "subclass" to do composition. However you make a compelling argument for laziness (one change in one place during a refactor).
My suggestion would be "do both". Refactor the existing class you want to be abstract out into a role:
mv lib/Foo/Abstract.pm lib/Foo/Role/Interface.pm;
perl -pie's/\bFoo::Abstract\b/Foo::Role::Interface/g' !$
Then in a new Foo::Abstract simply do:
package Foo::Abstract;
use Moose;
with qw(Foo::Role::Interface);
around BUILDARGS => sub {
$_[1] ne __PACKAGE__ ? shift->(#_) : die __PACKAGE__ . 'is ABSTRACT';
}
1;
This way you can slowly replace the extends qw(Foo::Abstract) over time with the more appropriate with qw(Foo::Role::Interface) but don't have to bite that cost all up front. You can even document that this is the plan in Foo::Abstract so that other developers who come along help with the conversion.

How is it too late to use Roles? Just replace:
use Moose;
with
use Moose::Role;
And in Foo::Concrete, replace
extends 'Foo::Abstract';
with
with 'Foo::Abstract';

Related

Perl - With overriden method avoid super() is called

I'm trying to create the abstract method pattern using Perl and Moose. What I don't understand is that if I override a method from the AbstractClass it will eventually be called anyway. Why is this and is there a way to avoid the superclass from being called?
Main
package main;
use AbstractSort;
use OrderedSort;
# Sub class test
my $ordered = OrderedSort->new(array => [1, -1, 23, 34123, -24324]);
$ordered->sortData();
AbstractClass
package AbstractSort;
use namespace::autoclean; # Trims EXPORTER
use Moose;
has 'array' => (traits => ['Array'],
is => 'ro',
isa => 'ArrayRef[Int]',
default => sub { [] },
handles => {
get_array => 'get',
count_array => 'count',
});
sub sortData{
my $self = shift;
print "Sorting data..\n";
_sortAlgorithm($self->array);
# ...
}
# Protected method here is the actual algorithm
sub _sortAlgorithm {
die 'You must override _sortAlgorithm() in a subclass';
# but Moose will always call the superclass which then makes it die
}
SubClass
package OrderedSort;
use namespace::autoclean; # Trims EXPORTER
use Moose;
extends 'AbstractSort';
# Override and mmpl _sortAlgorithm
override _sortAlgorithm => sub {
my $self = shift;
# ....
};
before '_sortAlgorithm' => sub {
my $self = shift;
# ...
return;
};
You are calling _sortAlgorithm as a function in the same package in AbstractSort`, and not as a method.
sub sortData {
my $self = shift;
# there is something missing here!
_sortAlgorithm( $self->array );
}
That way, it will always be called in the same package, because it's not an OOP method call.
You need to do $self->_sortAlgorithm instead.
sub sortData {
my $self = shift;
print "Sorting data..\n";
$self->_sortAlgorithm( $self->array );
# ...
}
It will now not die any more, because it looks up the _sortAlgorithm method on $self, which is an instance of your subclass.
The fact that you actually have my $self = shift on your overridden method could have given that away, as you were also not passing $self into it.
You should also not be passing around $self->array. The algorithm method also has access to $self->array, so if you want to sort the data that is attached to your object, just use it directly in there.
Also note that typical naming conventions in Perl suggest snake_case method and variable names, and CamelCase package names.

How can I implement "thunks" (delayed computation) in a general way using Moo and Type::Tiny?

I want to be able to have a Moo* class with these characteristics:
an object's attribute can store a reference to the object itself
that attribute will be type-constrained using a Type::Tiny type so the reference must be of the right type
the class must function when it is immutable, and the attribute is "required", i.e. an undefined value is unacceptable and it cannot be updated later
E.g.
package GraphQLType;
use Moo;
use Types::Standard -all;
has [qw(children)] => (
is => 'rwp',
isa => ArrayRef[InstanceOf['GraphQLType']],
required => 1,
);
package main;
my $type;
$type = GraphQLType->new(children => [$type]);
The above presents a chicken-and-egg problem: $type will be undefined and therefore fail the type constraint.
A pattern used in graphql-js is "thunking". In Perl terms:
package GraphQLType;
use Moo;
use Types::Standard -all;
has [qw(children)] => (
is => 'rwp',
isa => CodeRef | ArrayRef[InstanceOf['GraphQLType']],
required => 1,
);
package main;
my $type;
$type = GraphQLType->new(children => sub { [$type] });
While that works for the specific type there, how can I have a parameterised type that implements something like this? Also, it will help even more if this can hook into the "lazy" functionality to minimise the code involved in storing the computed value.
package Thunking;
use Moo;
use Types::Thunking -all;
use Types::Standard -all;
has [qw(children)] => (
is => 'lazy',
isa => Thunk[ArrayRef[InstanceOf['GraphQLType']]],
required => 1,
);
Two issues need to be dealt with here: a parameterised Type::Tiny type constraint for a delayed-computation immutable attribute (DCIA), and an actually-functioning DCIA.
Parameterised type
Since this is Perl, there is more than one way to do this. The heart of making a parameterised type in Type::Tiny is to provide a constraint_generator parameter. The most idiomatic way to do this, using only Type::Tiny components, is:
package Types::Thunking;
use Types::TypeTiny -all;
use Type::Library -base;
use Type::Utils -all;
declare "Thunk", constraint_generator => sub { union [ CodeLike, #_ ] };
That's it! If no parameters are given, it works just like a CodeLike. The libraries can take care of any "inline" code generating.
The reason it can be so short is that the constraint_generator must return either a code-ref, which would probably be a closure that captures the parameters passed to it (see below), or simply a Type::Tiny - in which case the other parameterisability parameters are not needed. Since union (which looks like it's normally intended for producing arguments to a declare) returns a suitably-constructed Type::Tiny::Union, it just drops in perfectly.
A more spelled-out version, not using a union type (and for brevity, using CodeRef not CodeLike:
package Types::Thunking;
use Types::Standard -all;
use Type::Library -base;
use Type::Utils -all;
declare "Thunk",
constraint_generator => sub {
my ($param) = #_;
die "parameter must be a type" if grep !UNIVERSAL::isa($_, 'Type::Tiny'), #_;
return sub { is_CodeRef($_) or $param->check($_) };
},
inline_generator => sub {
my ($param) = #_;
die "parameter must be a type" if grep !UNIVERSAL::isa($_, 'Type::Tiny'), #_;
return sub {
my ($constraint, $varname) = #_;
return sprintf(
'Types::Standard::is_CodeRef(%s) or %s',
$varname,
$param->inline_check($varname),
);
};
};
This is the "harness" I used for testing these:
#!/usr/bin/perl
use Thunking;
sub do_test {
use Data::Dumper; local $Data::Dumper::Terse = 1; local $Data::Dumper::Indent = 0;
my ($args, $should_work) = #_;
my $l = eval { Thunking->new(#$args) };
if (!$l) {
say "correctly did not work" and return if !$should_work;
say "INcorrectly did not work" and return if $should_work;
}
my $val = eval { $l->attr };
if (!$val) {
say "correctly did not work" and return if !$should_work;
say "INcorrectly did not work" and return if $should_work;
}
say(($should_work ? "" : "INcorrectly worked: "), Dumper $val);
}
do_test [attr => { k => "wrong type" }], 0;
do_test [attr => ["real value at init"]], 1;
do_test [attr => sub { [ "delayed" ] }], 1;
do_test [attr => sub { { k => "delayed wrong type" } }], 0;
Delayed-computation immutable attribute
In order to make this immutable, we want setting the attribute to fail unless it's us doing it. When reading the attribute, we want to see whether there is computation to be done; if yes, do it; then return the value.
Naive approach
package Thunking;
use Moo;
use Types::Standard -all;
use Types::Thunking -all;
has attr => (
is => 'rwp',
isa => Thunk[ArrayRef],
required => 1,
);
before 'attr' => sub {
my $self = shift;
return if #_; # attempt at setting, hand to auto
my $value = $self->{attr};
return if ref($value) ne 'CODE'; # attempt at reading and already resolved
$self->_set_attr($value->());
}
The before should be fairly self-explanatory but you will see it manually looks in the object's hash-ref, which is usually a clue that your programming is not finished yet. Also, it's rwp and requires the before in the class, which is far from pretty.
Using MooX modules
An approach that tries to generalise this with a separate module, MooX::Thunking. First, another module to encapsulate overriding of Moo functions:
package MooX::Utils;
use strict;
use warnings;
use Moo ();
use Moo::Role ();
use Carp qw(croak);
use base qw(Exporter);
our #EXPORT = qw(override_function);
sub override_function {
my ($target, $name, $func) = #_;
my $orig = $target->can($name) or croak "Override '$target\::$name': not found";
my $install_tracked = Moo::Role->is_role($target) ? \&Moo::Role::_install_tracked : \&Moo::_install_tracked;
$install_tracked->($target, $name, sub { $func->($orig, #_) });
}
Now the thunking MooX module itself, which uses the above to override has:
package MooX::Thunking;
use MooX::Utils;
use Types::TypeTiny -all;
use Class::Method::Modifiers qw(install_modifier);
sub import {
my $target = scalar caller;
override_function($target, 'has', sub {
my ($orig, $name, %opts) = #_;
$orig->($name, %opts), return if $opts{is} ne 'thunked';
$opts{is} = 'ro';
$orig->($name, %opts); # so we have method to modify
install_modifier $target, 'before', $name => sub {
my $self = shift;
return if #_; # attempt at setting, hand to auto
my $value = $self->{$name};
return if !eval { CodeLike->($value); 1 }; # attempt at reading and already resolved
$self->{$name} = $value->();
$opts{isa}->($self->{$name}) if $opts{isa}; # validate
}
});
}
This applies "thunking" to an attribute. It will only function if the attribute is ro, and will quietly resolve any CodeLike values on reading. It can be used like this:
package Thunking;
use Moo;
use MooX::Thunking;
use Types::Standard -all;
use Types::Thunking -all;
has attr => (
is => 'thunked',
isa => Thunk[ArrayRef],
);
Using BUILDARGS and lazy
An alternative approach, suggested by the mighty #haarg:
package MooX::Thunking;
use MooX::Utils;
use Types::TypeTiny -all;
use Class::Method::Modifiers qw(install_modifier);
sub import {
my $target = scalar caller;
override_function($target, 'has', sub {
my ($orig, $name, %opts) = #_;
$orig->($name, %opts), return if $opts{is} ne 'thunked';
$opts{is} = 'lazy';
my $gen_attr = "_gen_$name";
$orig->($gen_attr => (is => 'ro'));
$opts{builder} = sub { $_[0]->$gen_attr->(); };
install_modifier $target, 'around', 'BUILDARGS' => sub {
my ($orig, $self) = (shift, shift);
my $args = $self->$orig(#_);
$args->{$gen_attr} = delete $args->{$name} if eval { CodeLike->($args->{$name}); 1 };
return $args;
};
$orig->($name, %opts);
});
}
It uses the built-in lazy mechanism, creating a builder that will call the supplied CodeLike if that is what is given. One important downside is that this technique does not work for Moo::Roles.

How to add a new syntax feature for perl?

I want to add a new feature for Perl language, in order to type less $self->.
For example, Translate:
use Moo;
has a_attr => (is=>'rw');
sub XXX {
print $self->a_attr;
}
To:
use Moo;
use MyFeatureModule;
has a_attr => (is=>'rw');
sub XXX {
print _a_attr;
}
How-to?
This doesn't require any changes to Perl's syntax, only to its semantics. Luckily, that's not too hard.
What you want can be achieved by providing an AUTOLOAD sub for your package, which will kick in automatically whenever you call a sub that hasn't been defined yet (i.e. _a_attr in your example). This AUTOLOAD method can then use Devel::Caller to grab $_[0] (i.e. $self) from its caller, inject it onto #_ and then goto the original method.
use v5.14;
use strictures;
package Foo {
use Moo;
has xyzzy => (is => 'ro', default => 42);
sub sayit {
say _xyzzy();
}
sub AUTOLOAD {
require Devel::Caller;
my ($invocant) = Devel::Caller::caller_args(1);
unshift #_, $invocant;
my ($method) = (our $AUTOLOAD =~ /::_(\w+)\z/)
or die "Method not found!";
my $coderef = $invocant->can($method)
or die "Method not found!";
goto $coderef;
};
}
my $obj = Foo->new;
$obj->sayit;
Is this a good idea? Well, I certainly wouldn't do it. As well as introducing an unnecessary level of slow-down to your code, and breaking inheritance, it is likely to confuse anybody who has to maintain your code after you. (And that might be your future self if you take a break from the project, and come back to it in 6 months.)

Using a Moose alias with MooseX::Constructor::AllErrors

I'm trying to use an alias with MooseX::Aliases and MooseX::Constructor::AllErrors
However, the two don't seem to play nicely together. Consider the following example:
package Alias
{
use Moose;
use MooseX::Aliases;
use MooseX::Constructor::AllErrors;
has foo => (
is => 'rw', isa => 'Str', required => 1, alias => 'bar'
);
}
use strict;
use warnings;
use Alias;
my $obj;
eval {
$obj = Alias->new( bar => 'alias_value' );
};
if ($#)
{
foreach my $error ( $#->errors )
{
print $error ."\n";
print $error->message ."\n";
}
exit 1;
}
print $obj->bar ."\n";
$obj->foo( 'new_alias_value' );
print $obj->foo."\n";
1;
This should allow me to create an Alias object using the 'bar' alias... shouldn't it? Does anyone know if MooseX::Constructor::AllErrors is supposed to support aliased attributes?
It's a bug, in that it violates expectations, but it's not easily resolvable -- the problem is that MooseX::Aliases modifies what arguments are allowed/accepted in the constructor, but MooseX::Constructor::AllErrors is not aware of this, so when it looks at the passed values at construction time, it errors out when there is no 'agency' field.
This gets around the situation by manually moving the aliased field before MooseX::Constructor::AllErrors sees it:
around BUILDARGS => sub {
my $orig = shift;
my $self = shift;
my %args = #_;
$args{agency} //= delete $args{company};
$self->$orig(%args);
};
The good news is that this has hope of working better in the future, because
there are plans for MooseX::Aliases to be cored, which would force all other
extensions (e.g. MXCAE) to support the alias feature properly.

How can I provide an alternate init arg for an attribute in Moose?

I of course know that I can rename the init arg for an attribute by setting init_arg (e.g)
package Test {
use Moose;
has attr => (
is => 'ro',
isa => 'Str',
init_arg => 'attribute'
);
}
which would allow me to
Test->new({ attribute => 'foo' });
but not
Test->new({ attr => 'foo' });
at the same time
MooseX::Aliases actually has this behavior, but creating an alias also creates accessors. I'm currently trying to understand the code in that module to see if I can't determine how it does it, so that I can replicate said functionality (in a way I understand). If someone could explain how to do it here with an example that'd be great.
update it appears that MX::Aliases is doing this by way of replacing what's actually passed to the constructor in an around initialize_instance_slot but I'm still not sure how that's actually getting called, because in my test code my around isn't actually getting executed.
update munging in BUILDARGS isn't really an option because what I'm trying to do allow setting of the accessor via the name of the label I'm adding to the attribute via Meta Recipe3. You might say I'm doing
has attr => (
is => 'ro',
isa => 'Str',
alt_init_arg => 'attribute'
);
update
here's what I've managed to work out with what I'm trying to do so far.
use 5.014;
use warnings;
package MooseX::Meta::Attribute::Trait::OtherName {
use Moose::Role;
use Carp;
has other_name => (
isa => 'Str',
predicate => 'has_other_name',
required => 1,
is => 'ro',
);
around initialize_instance_slot => sub {
my $orig = shift;
my $self = shift;
my ( $meta_instance, $instance, $params ) = #_;
confess 'actually calling this code';
return $self->$orig(#_)
unless $self->has_other_name && $self->has_init_arg;
if ( $self->has_other_name ) {
$params->{ $self->init_arg }
= delete $params->{ $self->other_name };
}
};
}
package Moose::Meta::Attribute::Custom::Trait::OtherName {
sub register_implementation { 'MooseX::Meta::Attribute::Trait::OtherName' }
}
package Message {
use Moose;
# use MooseX::StrictConstructor;
has attr => (
traits => [ 'OtherName' ],
is => 'ro',
isa => 'Str',
other_name => 'Attr',
);
__PACKAGE__->meta->make_immutable;
}
package Client {
use Moose;
sub serialize {
my ( $self, $message ) = #_;
confess 'no message' unless defined $message;
my %h;
foreach my $attr ( $message->meta->get_all_attributes ) {
if (
$attr->does('MooseX::Meta::Attribute::Trait::OtherName')
&& $attr->has_other_name
) {
$h{$attr->other_name} = $attr->get_value( $message );
}
}
return \%h;
}
__PACKAGE__->meta->make_immutable;
}
my $message = Message->new( Attr => 'foo' );
my $ua = Client->new;
my %h = %{ $ua->serialize( $message )};
use Data::Dumper::Concise;
say Dumper \%h
problem is that my around block is never being run and I'm not sure why, maybe I'm wrapping it in the wrong place or something.
MooseX::Aliases has several moving parts to make this functionality happen, that's because the behavior needs to be applied to several different places in the MOP. Your code here looks very close to the code in MooseX::Aliases's Trait attribute.
I suspect the reason your code isn't being called is due to something going wrong when you try to register your trait. MooseX::Aliases uses Moose::Util::meta_attribute_alias rather than the old fashioned way you're using here. Try replacing your Moose::Meta::Attribute::Custom::Trait::OtherName section with a call to Moose::Util::meta_attribute_alias 'OtherName'; inside your Role.
Second the code you have here won't work for immutable classes. You'll need to add a second trait to handle those because the immutability code is handled by the class's metaclass and not the attribute's metaclass. You'll need to add some more traits to handle attributes in Roles as well I think. Then you'll need to wire up an Moose::Exporter to make sure that all the traits are applied properly when everything is compiled.
I've gotten a simple version of this working up through immutable. This code is also on github.
First the Attribute trait:
package MooseX::AltInitArg::Meta::Trait::Attribute;
use Moose::Role;
use namespace::autoclean;
Moose::Util::meta_attribute_alias 'AltInitArg';
has alt_init_arg => (
is => 'ro',
isa => 'Str',
predicate => 'has_alt_init_arg',
);
around initialize_instance_slot => sub {
my $orig = shift;
my $self = shift;
my ($meta_instance, $instance, $params) = #_;
return $self->$orig(#_)
# don't run if we haven't set any alt_init_args
# don't run if init_arg is explicitly undef
unless $self->has_alt_init_arg && $self->has_init_arg;
if (my #alternates = grep { exists $params->{$_} } ($self->alt_init_arg)) {
if (exists $params->{ $self->init_arg }) {
push #alternates, $self->init_arg;
}
$self->associated_class->throw_error(
'Conflicting init_args: (' . join(', ', #alternates) . ')'
) if #alternates > 1;
$params->{ $self->init_arg } = delete $params->{ $alternates[0] };
}
$self->$orig(#_);
};
1;
__END__
Next the Class trait.
package MooseX::AltInitArg::Meta::Trait::Class;
use Moose::Role;
use namespace::autoclean;
around _inline_slot_initializer => sub {
my $orig = shift;
my $self = shift;
my ($attr, $index) = #_;
my #orig_source = $self->$orig(#_);
return #orig_source
# only run on aliased attributes
unless $attr->meta->can('does_role')
&& $attr->meta->does_role('MooseX::AltInitArg::Meta::Trait::Attribute');
return #orig_source
# don't run if we haven't set any aliases
# don't run if init_arg is explicitly undef
unless $attr->has_alt_init_arg && $attr->has_init_arg;
my $init_arg = $attr->init_arg;
return (
'if (my #aliases = grep { exists $params->{$_} } (qw('
. $attr->alt_init_arg . '))) {',
'if (exists $params->{' . $init_arg . '}) {',
'push #aliases, \'' . $init_arg . '\';',
'}',
'if (#aliases > 1) {',
$self->_inline_throw_error(
'"Conflicting init_args: (" . join(", ", #aliases) . ")"',
) . ';',
'}',
'$params->{' . $init_arg . '} = delete $params->{$aliases[0]};',
'}',
#orig_source,
);
};
1;
__END__
Finally the Moose::Exporter glue.
package MooseX::AltInitArg;
use Moose();
use Moose::Exporter;
use MooseX::AltInitArg::Meta::Trait::Attribute;
Moose::Exporter->setup_import_methods(
class_metaroles => { class => ['MooseX::AltInitArg::Meta::Trait::Class'] }
);
1;
__END__
An example of how this is used then:
package MyApp;
use 5.10.1;
use Moose;
use MooseX::AltInitArg;
has foo => (
is => 'ro',
traits => ['AltInitArg'],
alt_init_arg => 'bar',
);
my $obj = MyApp->new( bar => 'bar' );
say $obj->foo; # prints bar
Meta-Programming in Moose is incredibly powerful, but because there are a lot of moving parts (many of which have solely to do with maximizing performance) you bite off a lot of work when you dive in.
Good luck.
I could be wrong but I think you might be able to accomplish what I think you are trying to do using the BUILDARGS method. This lets you munge the contructor arguments before they are used to create the object.
#!/usr/bin/env perl
use strict;
use warnings;
{
package MyClass;
use Moose;
has attr => (
is => 'ro',
isa => 'Str',
required => 1,
);
around BUILDARGS => sub {
my $orig = shift;
my $self = shift;
my %args = ref $_[0] ? %{shift()} : #_;
if (exists $args{attribute}) {
$args{attr} = delete $args{attribute};
}
$self->$orig(%args);
};
}
my $one = MyClass->new(attribute => "Hi");
my $two = MyClass->new(attr => "Bye");
print $one->attr, "\n";
print $two->attr, "\n";
So what I'm hearing is that:
At construction time, an attribute should be able to be set by its init_arg and any alternate init_args defined on the attribute.
An attribute should not be able to be manipulated by its alternate init_args except at instance construction; that is, aside from the above, the attribute should behave "normally".
Based on that, this seems like a good match for the MooseX::MultiInitArg attribute trait. Yes? :)