Warning: 'Use of uninitialized value in numeric eq' in Perl - perl

I am getting a warning as:
Use of uninitialized value in numeric eq (==) at script.pl line 53; line 53 isif statement`
My code snippet:
foreach(#array)
{
push #gene2refseq, $_;
}
foreach(#::ids)
{
if($_ == $gene2refseq[1])
{
push #::prot_gi, $gene2refseq[6];
}
}
Now if I declare $gene2refseq[1] before foreach(#::ids) the same error persists; but if I initialize it before foreach(#::ids) viz. $gene2refseq[1] = 0 it didn't give the error but also no results; as the value is initialized to 0.
I think I am initializing it at a wrong place, but then where have I to initialize it? As I can't initialize it before or in foreach(#array)
Disclaimer: I am not very good with use warnings and use strict
Edit: Solved
Thanks for the help; I just declared the #gene2refseq and initialized $gene2refseq[1] = 0 before the foreach(#array), and it worked fine.
Also thanks for correcting me on foreach usage.
A question:
What if I have to access multiple indexes of an array? Do I have to initialize them all? As here I need to access only a single index, so I initialized it.

If #gene2refeq is empty and #array is empty before the start of that code snippet, then #gene2refeq will be empty by line 53.
To find out, print the contents of #array and #gene2refeq. It's also possible #::ids contains uninitialized values, check that too. Add a separator so you can see what's in them.
print "\#array is ".join(", ", #array)."\n";
print "\#gene2refeq is ".join(", ", #gene2refeq)."\n";
print "\#::ids is ".join(", ", #::ids)."\n";
As to your question about when to initialize things, there's a difference between declaring a variable and initializing it. my and our declare a variable to exist lexically and globally respectively. Then you can populate (initialize) it.
The basic pattern of your program might look something like this.
my #ids;
...code to populate #ids...
my #gene2refeq;
...code to populate #gene2refeq...
my #array;
...code to populate #array...
push #gene2refeq, #array;
die "\#gene2refeq is not long enough, ".join(", ", #gene2refeq)
unless #gene2refeq >= 7;
my #prot_gi;
foreach my $id (#ids) {
if($id == $gene2refseq[1])
{
push #prot_gi, $gene2refseq[6];
}
}
A few other points. That first foreach loop is better written as simply...
push #gene2refseq, #array;
Using #::ids and #::prot_gi is odd. That's shorthand for getting the global variable #ids in the main package. It shouldn't be necessary and smells like cargo culting.

Related

Preserve a variable's value across multiple subroutine calls in perl

Just wanted to know what was the best way to reserve the value of a variable across multiple calls to the same subroutine . i.e
$someList = &someRoutine(100, 200);
$someList2 = &someRoutine(100, 200);
sub someRoutine {
$someAddition = 0;
foreach $someSum (#_){
$someAddition += $someSum;
}
return $someAddition
}
print $someList;
print $someList2;
Basically, someList should print 300 and someList2 should print 600. How do i make it so that someList2 prints 600? i want $someAddition to be preserved across multiple subroutine calls.
There are several ways to do it. I'll demonstrate two of them:
First, in modern versions of Perl you can use state:
use feature qw/state/;
print someRoutine(100,200), "\n";
print someRoutine(100,200), "\n";
sub someRoutine {
state $someAddition = 0;
foreach my $someSum ( #_ ) {
$someAddition += $someSum;
}
return $someAddition;
}
In this version, the $someAddition variable will be initialized to zero once, and only once. From that point on, the value will be retained between calls.
Another version is using a lexical closure. Here's an example:
my $summer = makeSummer();
print $summer->(100,200), "\n";
print $summer->(100,200), "\n";
sub makeSummer {
my $someAddition = 0;
return sub {
$someAddition += $_ foreach #_;
return $someAddition;
}
}
The second version is a little more complex, but has two advantages. First, you can start a fresh summation simply by calling the makeSummer routine to manufacture a new closure. Second, it will work on any version of Perl 5, not just versions recent enough to have the newer state keyword.
If you are not concerned with initializing the stateful variable before the sub is declared, you can also do this:
my $someAddition;
sub someRoutine {
$someAddition = 0 unless defined $someAddition;
foreach my $someSum( #_ ) {
$someAddition += $someSum;
}
return $someAddition;
}
A fourth method makes use of package globals. I save this one for last because it's the most prone to abuse and mistakes. But here you go;
our $someAddition = 0;
someRoutine(100,200);
print "$someAddition\n";
someRoutine(100,200);
print "$someAddition\n";
sub someRoutine {
$someAddition += $_ foreach #_;
}
In this last version, $someAddition is a package global, and its global scope makes it available both inside and outside of any subroutines living within the same namespace.
I assume you're at least using a variant of Perl 5? It has been bad practice to use ampersands & on subroutine calls since the first version of Perl 5 twenty-two years ago.
It is also vital that you use strict and use warnings at the top of every Perl program, and declare your variables ay their first point of use with my. It is a measure that will uncover many simple coding errors that you can otherwise easily overlook.
Perl variable names should use only lower-case letters, digits, and underscores. Capital letters are reserved for global identifiers such as package names.
By far the simplest and most common way of creating a static variable is just to declare it outside the subroutine. Like this
use strict;
use warnings;
my $some_list = some_routine(100, 200);
my $some_list2 = some_routine(100, 200);
my $some_addition;
sub some_routine {
$some_addition += $_ for #_;
return $some_addition
}
print $some_list, "\n";
print $some_list2, "\n";
output
300
600
If you want to protect the variable from being accessed by any following code other than the subroutine, then just enclose them in braces, like this
{
my $some_addition;
sub some_routine {
$some_addition += $_ for #_;
return $some_addition
}
}
Take a look at Persistent Private Variables in "man perlsub".

Irssi Loop Through Users in Channel

I am trying to piece together other scripts i have seen to be able to loop through a list of users on the channel.
Here is what i have come up with
my $channel = #_;
foreach my $nick ($channel->nicks()) {
$server->command("msg $chatchannel $nick->{nick}");
}
But all i get from that is
Can't call method "nicks" without a package or object reference at
/root/.irssi/scripts/test.pl line 64.
which is referring to
$channel->nicks()
Am i going about this the wrong way? or should this be working? I have seen many other scripts using $channel->nicks() so i know it must work?
Edit
I should also mention that this is already define further up in the code
my ($server, $msg, $target, $channel, $chatnet) = #_;
But when i try it with that $channel variable i get
Can't locate object method "nicks" via package
"mattigins#mattigins.tmi.twitch.tv" (perhaps you forgot to load
"mattigins#mattigins.tmi.twitch.tv"?) at /root/.irssi/scripts/test.pl
line 64.
Since the left hand side (LHS) of my $channel = #_; is a scalar it imposes scalar context on the #_ array. This means that the length of the array gets assigned to $channel. You want to assign with my ($channel) = #_; so that the LHS is in list context and that the first element in the #_ array gets assigned to your scalar.
Ref:
What is the difference between the scalar and list contexts in Perl?
Scalar and List context in Perl
I figured out how to do it.
$chan = $server->channel_find('#channel');
foreach my $nick ($chan->nicks()) {
$nickname = $nick->{nick};
}

How do I create a perl sub by specifying its parse tree?

Given a CODE ref, is it possible to:
Access the parse tree of that CODE ref
Create a new CODE ref by specifying the parse tree of the CODE ref which can contain elements of the parse tree returned in 1
Normally we create subroutines in perl by specifying source code which is then parsed and converted into a parse tree.
I would like to write a perl function which can create a subroutine by specifying its parse tree, and that parse tree could be derived from another parse tree of some other subroutine.
Possible?
I don't know the full answer to your question, but I know that Data::Dumper can deparse a code reference. Looking at its documentation, I see that it uses B::Deparse to do the heavy lifting (the B:: modules are the ones that interact with the compiler). Unfortunately it seems that this only results in a textual representation of the coderef.
Instead I searched for Op on metacpan and got many more interesting possibilities. Since I am now far out of my depth in the deepest Perl magic, I will leave it to you to look over those results. Perhaps something will be useful.
This has nothing to do with opcodes, but it does enclose the same two variables in three different closures. The variables are enclosed within subroutines reminiscent of class get/set routines, and those closed vars are then shared by other closures via their access routine.
This is a response to the comment: I'm sure it will be necessary to access the underlying nodes in the parse tree so that I can create new closures which are closed over the same variables.
use strict;
use warnings;
use v5.14;
# create closed vars
my $v1 = access_closure(6);
my $v2 = access_closure(42);
# play with them
say "v1 ", &$v1;
say "v2 ", &$v2;
say "v1 ", &$v1(5);
say "v2 ", &$v2(43);
say "v1 ", &$v1;
say "v2 ", &$v2;
# create silly closures that use them
my $test1 = test_closure(2);
my $test2 = test_closure(17);
my $test3 = test_closure(50);
# play with those
&$test1;
&$test2;
&$test3;
# create the get/set routine for a closed var
sub access_closure {
my $val = shift;
return sub {
$val = shift if #_;
return $val;
}
}
# create a silly closure that encloses a control var and uses the two other vars
sub test_closure {
my $val = shift;
return sub {
say "\nval is $val";
printf "v1 is %2d, v2 is %2d\n",
&$v1, &$v2;
if (&$v1 < $val) {
say "Increment v1";
&$v1(&$v1+1);
}
if (&$v2 > $val) {
say "Decrement v2";
&$v2(&$v2-1);
}
printf "v1 is %2d, v2 is %2d\n",
&$v1, &$v2;
}
}

(m/regexp/) or {multiple ; commands; after; or; }

I like very much this syntax:
try_something() or warn "Cant do it";
How can I add more commands after or?
For example it would be useful in this code:
foreach (#array)
{
m/regex/ or {warn "Does not match"; next;} # this syntax is wrong
...
}
One way I found is
try_something() or eval {warn "Can't do it"; next;};
but I think it is bad idea.
BEST ANSWERS:
do is better than eval.
The comma operator is even better: do_smth() or warn("Does not match"), next; Nota bene: parentheses are mandatory for warn so that next does not parse as one of its arguments.
I think that will end up being pretty unreadable pretty fast, but you can do:
foo() or do { bar(); baz(); };
sub foo {
return $_[0] == 2;
}
for (1..3) {
print $_;
foo($_) or do { print " !foo\n"; next; };
print " foo!\n";
}
For the case in your question, I would use unless.
for (#array) {
unless (/regex/) {
warn "Does not match";
next;
}
...
}
You can sometimes get away with using the comma operator. It evaluates its left-hand argument, throws away the result, evaluates the right-hand argument and returns that result. Applied to your situation it looks like
for (#array) {
/regex/ or warn("Does not match"), next;
...
}
Note the extra parentheses. You have to be a bit more careful about parentheses and grouping this way. Be judicious in your use of this technique: it can get ugly quickly.
In a comment below, Zaid suggests
warn('Does not match'), next unless /regex/;
The choice is a matter of style. Perl was created by a linguist. Natural languages allow us to express the same thought in different ways depending on which part we want to emphasize. In your case, do you want to emphasize the warning or the pattern match? Place the more important code out front.
I figured out (and tested) that you can also use 'and':
try_something() or warn "Cant do it" and print "Hmm." and next;
If try_something() is success then it doesn't do anything after or.
If try_something() fails then it warns and prints and next.

perl - universal operator overload

I have an idea for perl, and I'm trying to figure out the best way to implement it.
The idea is to have new versions of every operator which consider the undefined value as the identity of that operation. For example:
$a = undef + 5; # undef treated as 0, so $a = 5
$a = undef . "foo"; # undef treated as '', so $a = foo
$a = undef && 1; # undef treated as false, $a = true
and so forth.
ideally, this would be in the language as a pragma, or something.
use operators::awesome;
However, I would be satisfied if I could implement this special logic myself, and then invoke it where needed:
use My::Operators;
The problem is that if I say "use overload" inside My::Operators only affects objects blessed into My::Operators.
So the question is: is there a way (with "use overoad" or otherwise) to do a "universal operator overload" - which would be called for all operations, not just operations on blessed scalars.
If not - who thinks this would be a great idea !? It would save me a TON of this kind of code
if($object && $object{value} && $object{value} == 15)
replace with
if($object{value} == 15) ## the special "is-equal-to" operator
It is possible. It would take a lot of work, but you could write an "op checker" that replaces the ops for && with custom op that's your reimplementation of &&.
But it would be a very bad idea. For starters,
if ($a && $b) {
...
}
would stop being equivalent to
if ($a) {
if ($b) {
...
}
}
To take your own example,
if ($object && $object{value} && $object{value} == 15) {
...
}
With your requested model, it would have to be written
if ($object{value}) { if ($object{value} == 15) {
...
}}
You actually want the exact opposite of what you asked for. You actually want the current behaviour. Without your module, you can write:
if ($object{value} && $object{value} == 15) {
...
}
or
no warnings 'uninitialized';
if ($object{value} == 15) {
...
}
or
if (($object{value} // 0) == 15) {
...
}
As mob said, your pragma already exists. It's spelled no warnings 'uninitialized';. Perl already treats undef as either 0 or the empty string (depending on context). This just suppresses the warning you usually get (assuming you have warnings turned on, which you should).
If you want to create a package that does this automatically, you can:
package operators::awesome;
use strict;
use warnings;
sub import {
warnings->unimport('uninitialized');
}
Now use operators::awesome; will turn off warnings about uninitialized values.
Here's a fancier version of import that turns on strict and warnings, but turns off warnings about uninitialized values:
sub import {
strict->import;
warnings->import;
warnings->unimport('uninitialized');
}
All of those operations already work the way you expect them to:
In the context of numbers, undef is 0.
In the context of strings, undef is the empty string ''.
In the context of booleans, undef is 0.
If you use warnings, then perl will let you know that the value is uninitialized, but it will still work just fine.