what does '$::n' mean for perl? - perl

Do you know what "$::n;" means ? The section of codes is like below.
use JSON::XS;
# ...
open (YI, "| $cmd");
my $msg = { test => test };
my $emsg = encode_json($msg);
print YI "$msg_inject\n" unless $::n;
close YI;`
I remmeber that I also met $::v before. What is $::v ? Does it have additional usage ?
I only know $: is reserved word for a perl statment with more lines being filling in a field.
Best regards,
TWLMD.

$::n is same as $main::n or just $n where $n is residing in main:: package.
Such notation ignores eventual lexical (defined with my) definition of $n, ie.
perl -Mstrict -we 'our $n=3; my $n=1; print $::n'
output is 3

Related

(Perl) Is it possible to have interpolated variables when a string is read from a file?

I am working on a script that has some variables which are passed on to a string and then they a printed out. The initial string was only 6 lines I didn't need an external file for it but I now have a new string which can fill over 1000 lines. The new string also has some fields that are to be replaced by variables declared in the script.
The text file has something like:
Hello $name
The code is supposed to have several parts to it.
Declaration of variable
my $name = 'Foo';
Open file and read it into a string.
my $content;
open(my $fh, '<', $filename) or die "cannot open file $filename";
{
local $/;
$content = <$fh>;
}
close($fh);
Print string
print $content
Expected outcome:
Hello Foo
I am wondering if it's possible to read "Hello $name" from a file but print it as "Hello Foo" since the variable name is declared as Foo.
So you want your file to be a template. Why not use a proper template language like this one?
use Template qw( );
my %vars = (
name => "Foo",
);
my $tt = Template->new();
$tt->process($qfn, \%vars)
or die($tt->error());
Template:
Hello [% name %]
The output can be captured instead of printed by using ->process's third arg.
Simplest way:
my $foo = 'Fred';
my $bar = 'Barney';
my $string = 'Say hello to $foo and $bar';
say eval qq{"$string"}
The correct answer to the question (as you've already seen) is to use a proper templating system instead.
But it's worth noting that this is answered in the Perl FAQ.
How can I expand variables in text strings?
If you can avoid it, don't, or if you can use a templating system, such as Text::Template or Template Toolkit, do that instead. You might even be able to get the job done with sprintf or printf:
my $string = sprintf 'Say hello to %s and %s', $foo, $bar;
However, for the one-off simple case where I don't want to pull out a full templating system, I'll use a string that has two Perl scalar variables in it. In this example, I want to expand $foo and $bar to their variable's values:
my $foo = 'Fred';
my $bar = 'Barney';
$string = 'Say hello to $foo and $bar';
One way I can do this involves the substitution operator and a double /e flag. The first /e evaluates $1 on the replacement side and turns it into $foo. The second /e starts with $foo and replaces it with its value. $foo, then, turns into 'Fred', and that's finally what's left in the string:
$string =~ s/(\$\w+)/$1/eeg; # 'Say hello to Fred and Barney'
The /e will also silently ignore violations of strict, replacing undefined variable names with the empty string. Since I'm using the /e flag (twice even!), I have all of the same security problems I have with eval in its string form. If there's something odd in $foo, perhaps something like #{[ system "rm -rf /" ]}, then I could get myself in trouble.
To get around the security problem, I could also pull the values from a hash instead of evaluating variable names. Using a single /e, I can check the hash to ensure the value exists, and if it doesn't, I can replace the missing value with a marker, in this case ??? to signal that I missed something:
my $string = 'This has $foo and $bar';
my %Replacements = (
foo => 'Fred',
);
# $string =~ s/\$(\w+)/$Replacements{$1}/g;
$string =~ s/\$(\w+)/
exists $Replacements{$1} ? $Replacements{$1} : '???'
/eg;
print $string;
If you're going to be using Perl, then it's really worth your while to spend an afternoon getting to know the FAQ.

Escaping semi-colon syntax in Perl

How can I escape a semi-colon (that's syntax ) in perl by only adding characters after it?
Say I have a line of code:
print "foo";
I want to add the following code after it so it can repeat 5 times:
print "foo"; x 5;
Is there anyway I can escape/ignore the semicolon (without altering the original piece of code) so it can be interpreted as:
print "foo" x 5;
Edit: This seems like too much of a hassle, better off to just nest the line in a for loop.
Seems like you just want to print "foo" 5 times ?
If yes, then :
use strict;
use warnings;
print "foo" for (1..5);
Yields :
foofoofoofoofoo
Here is an example using a source filter.
In fact it alters the code before executing it so you don't have to do it yourself.
echo package FiveTimes; use Filter::Simple sub{s/;/x5;/g};1; > FiveTimes.pm
perl -MFiveTimes -e"print qq/foo/;"
foofoofoofoofoo
print "foo"; BEGIN{tie *STDOUT,'FiveTimer';sub FiveTimer::TIEHANDLE{bless{},'FiveTimer'}sub FiveTimer::PRINT{CORE::print STDERR $_[1] x 5}}
or more readably
print "foo"; BEGIN{ tie *STDOUT,'FiveTimer' }
sub FiveTimer::TIEHANDLE{bless{},'FiveTimer'}
sub FiveTimer::PRINT{CORE::print STDERR $_[1] x 5}}

perl error: Use of uninitialized value $_ in concatenation (.) or string

I get the following error:
Use of uninitialized value $_ in concatenation (.) or string at checkfornewfiles.pl line 34.
when attempting to run the following code :
#!/usr/bin/perl -w
#Author: mimo
#Date 3/2015
#Purpose: monitor directory for new files...
AscertainStatus();
######### start of subroutine ########
sub AscertainStatus {
my $DIR= "test2";
####### open handler #############
opendir (HAN1, "$DIR") || die "Problem: $!";
########## assign theoutput of HAN1 to array1 ##########
my #array1= readdir(HAN1);
######## adding some logic #########
if ("$#array1" > 1) { #### if files exists (more than 1) in the directory #######
for (my $i=0; $i<2; $i++) {shift #array1;} ####### for i in position 0 (which is the . position) loop twice and add one (the position ..) get rid of them #######
MailNewFiles(#array1);
} else { print "No New Files\n";}
}
sub MailNewFiles {
$mail= "sendmail";
open ($mail, "| /usr/lib/sendmail -oi -t" ) ||die "errors with sendmail $!"; # open handler and pipe it to sendmail
print $mail <<"EOF"; #print till the end of fiEOF
From: "user";
To: "root";
Subject: "New Files Found";
foreach (#_) {print $mail "new file found:\n $_\n";}
EOF
close($mail);
}
#End
I am new to perl and I don't know what's going wrong. Can anyone help me ?
A few suggestions:
Perl isn't C. Your main program loop shouldn't be a declared subroutine which you then execute. Eliminate the AscertainStatus subroutine.
Always, always use strict; and use warnings;.
Indent correctly. It makes it much easier for people to read your code and help analyze what you did wrong.
Use a more modern Perl coding style. Perl is an old language, and over the years new coding style and techniques have been developed to help you eliminate basic errors and help others read your code.
Don't use system commands when there are Perl modules that can do this for you in a more standard way, and probably do better error checking. Perl comes with the Net::SMTP that handles mail communication for you. Use that.
The error Use of uninitialized value $_ in concatenation (.) or string is exactly what it says. You are attempting to use a value of a variable that hasn't been set. In this case, the variable is the #_ variable in your foreach statement. Your foreach isn't a true foreach, but part of your print statement since your EOF is after your for statement. This looks like an error.
Also, what is the value of #_? This variable contains a list of values that have been passed to your subroutine. If none are passed, it will be undefined. Even if #_ is undefined, foreach (undef) will simply skip the loop. However, since foreach (#_) { is a string to print, your Perl program will crash without #_ being defined.
If you remove the -w from #!/usr/bin/perl, your program will actually "work" (Note the quotes), and you'll see that your foreach will literally print.
I do not recommend you not to use warnings which is what -w does. In fact, I recommend you use warnings; rather than -w. However, in this case, it might help you see your error.
You have EOF after the line with foreach. It contains $_ which is interpolated here but $_ is not initialized yet because it is not in foreach loop. It is not code but just text. Move EOF before foreach.
But probably you would like
sub MailNewFiles {
$mail= "sendmail";
open ($mail, "| /usr/lib/sendmail -oi -t" ) ||die "errors with sendmail $!"; # open handler and pipe it to sendmail
local $"="\n"; # " make syntax highlight happy
print $mail <<"EOF"; #print till the end of fiEOF
From: "user";
To: "root";
Subject: "New Files Found";
New files found:
#_
EOF
close($mail);
}
See perlvar for more informations about $".
The message
Use of uninitialized value $xxx in ...
is very straightforward. When you encounter it, it means that you are using a variable ($xxx) in any way, but that the variable has not ever been initialized.
Sometimes, adding an initialization command at the start of you code is enough :
my $str = '';
my $num = 0;
Sometimes, your algorithm is wrong, or you just mistyped your variable, like in :
my $foo = 'foo';
my $bar = $ffo . 'bar'; # << There is a warning on this line
# << because you made a mistake on $foo ($ffo)

How can Perl's print add a newline by default?

In Perl most of my print statements take the form
print "hello." . "\n";
Is there a nice way to avoid keeping all the pesky "\n"s lying around?
I know I could make a new function such as myprint that automatically appends \n, but it would be nice if I could override the existing print.
Raku (Perl 6) has the say function that automatically appends \n.
You can also use say in Perl 5.10 or 5.12 if you add
use feature qw(say);
to the beginning of your program. Or you can use Modern::Perl to get this and other features.
See perldoc feature for more details.
You can use the -l option in the she-bang header:
#!/usr/bin/perl -l
$text = "hello";
print $text;
print $text;
Output:
hello
hello
See "-l[octnum]" in perlrun(1) for details.
If Perl 5.10+ is not an option, here is a quick and dirty approximation. It's not exactly the same, since say has some magic when its first arg is a handle, but for printing to STDOUT:
sub say {print #_, "\n"}
say 'hello';
The way you're writing your print statement is unnecessarily verbose. There's no need to separate the newline into its own string. This is sufficient.
print "hello.\n";
This realization will probably make your coding easier in general.
In addition to using use feature "say" or use 5.10.0 or use Modern::Perl to get the built in say feature, I'm going to pimp perl5i which turns on a lot of sensible missing Perl 5 features by default.
Perhaps you want to change your output record separator to linefeed with:
local $\ = "\n";
$ perl -e 'print q{hello};print q{goodbye}' | od -c
0000000 h e l l o g o o d b y e
0000014
$ perl -e '$\ = qq{\n}; print q{hello};print q{goodbye}' | od -c
0000000 h e l l o \n g o o d b y e \n
0000016
Update: my answer speaks to capability rather than advisability. I don't regard adding "\n" at the end of lines to be a "pesky" chore, but if someone really wants to avoid them, this is one way. If I had to maintain a bit of code that uses this technique, I'd probably refactor it out pronto.
Here's what I found at https://perldoc.perl.org/perlvar.html:
$\
The output record separator for the print operator. If defined, this value is
printed after the last of print's arguments. Default is undef.
You cannot call output_record_separator() on a handle, only as a static method.
See IO::Handle.
Mnemonic: you set $\ instead of adding "\n" at the end of the print. Also, it's
just like $/ , but it's what you get "back" from Perl.
example:
$\ = "\n";
print "a newline will be appended to the end of this line automatically";
In Raku (Perl 6) there is, the say function.
If you're stuck with pre-5.10, then the solutions provided above will not fully replicate the say function. For example
sub say { print #_, "\n"; }
Will not work with invocations such as
say for #arr;
or
for (#arr) {
say;
}
... because the above function does not act on the implicit global $_ like print and the real say function.
To more closely replicate the perl 5.10+ say you want this function
sub say {
if (#_) { print #_, "\n"; }
else { print $_, "\n"; }
}
Which now acts like this
my #arr = qw( alpha beta gamma );
say #arr;
# OUTPUT
# alphabetagamma
#
say for #arr;
# OUTPUT
# alpha
# beta
# gamma
#
The say builtin in perl6 behaves a little differently. Invoking it with say #arr or #arr.say will not just concatenate the array items, but instead prints them separated with the list separator. To replicate this in perl5 you would do this
sub say {
if (#_) { print join($", #_) . "\n"; }
else { print $_ . "\n"; }
}
$" is the global list separator variable, or if you're using English.pm then is is $LIST_SEPARATOR
It will now act more like perl6, like so
say #arr;
# OUTPUT
# alpha beta gamma
#
As requested:
sub myprint { print #_, "\n"; }
myprint "foo", 3 . 'bar'
And what was the actual problem?
Maybe try understanding the language you have before trying to change it.
Man perlvar(1) says: "Within a subroutine the array #_ contains the parameters passed to that subroutine."

What's an easy way to print a multi-line string without variable substitution in Perl?

I have a Perl program that reads in a bunch of data, munges it, and then outputs several different file formats. I'd like to make Perl be one of those formats (in the form of a .pm package) and allow people to use the munged data within their own Perl scripts.
Printing out the data is easy using Data::Dump::pp.
I'd also like to print some helper functions to the resulting package.
What's an easy way to print a multi-line string without variable substitution?
I'd like to be able to do:
print <<EOL;
sub xyz {
my $var = shift;
}
EOL
But then I'd have to escape all of the $'s.
Is there a simple way to do this? Perhaps I can create an actual sub and have some magic pretty-printer print the contents? The printed code doesn't have to match the input or even be legible.
Enclose the name of the delimiter in single quotes and interpolation will not occur.
print <<'EOL';
sub xyz {
my $var = shift;
}
EOL
You could use a templating package like Template::Toolkit or Text::Template.
Or, you could roll your own primitive templating system that looks something like this:
my %vars = qw( foo 1 bar 2 );
Write_Code(\$vars);
sub Write_Code {
my $vars = shift;
my $code = <<'END';
sub baz {
my $foo = <%foo%>;
my $bar = <%bar%>;
return $foo + $bar;
}
END
while ( my ($key, $value) = each %$vars ) {
$code =~ s/<%$key%>/$value/g;
}
return $code;
}
This looks nice and simple, but there are various traps and tricks waiting for you if you DIY. Did you notice that I failed to use quotemeta on my key names in the substituion?
I recommend that you use a time-tested templating library, like the ones I mentioned above.
You can actually continue a string literal on the next line, like this:
my $mail = "Hello!
Blah blah.";
Personally, I find that more readable than heredocs (the <<<EOL thing mentioned elsewhere).
Double quote " interpolates variables, but you can use '. Note you'll need to escape any ' in your string for this to work.
Perl is actually quite rich in convenient things to make things more readable, e.g. other quote-operations. qq and q correspond to " and ' and you can use whatever delimiter makes sense:
my $greeting = qq/Hello there $name!
Nice to meet you/; # Interpolation
my $url = q|http://perlmonks.org/|; # No need to escape /
(note how the syntax coloring here didn't quite keep up)
Read perldoc perlop (find in page: "Quote and Quote-like Operators") for more information.
Use a data section to store the Perl code:
#!/usr/bin/perl
use strict;
use warnings;
print <DATA>;
#print munged data
__DATA__
package MungedData;
use strict;
use warnings;
sub foo {
print "foo\n";
}
Try writing your code as an actual perl subroutine, then using B::Deparse to get the source code at runtime.