#!/usr/bin/perl -w package Getopt::GetArgs; use strict; use vars qw(@ISA @EXPORT $VERSION); use Exporter; @ISA = qw(Exporter); @EXPORT = qw(GetArgs); $VERSION = "1.03"; =head1 NAME GetArgs - Perl module to allow enhanced argument passing, including passing of case-insensitive named arguments as well as positioned arguments. =head1 SYNOPSIS sub WHATEVER { my @DEFAULT_ARGS = ( Content => "Default content", Verbose => 0 ); my %ARGS=GetArgs(@_,@DEFAULT_ARGS); # do some stuff with $ARGS{Content} # show all kinds of detail if $ARGS{Verbose} } # a simple call to WHATEVER WHATEVER( "Just deal with my content" ); # a flexible call to WHATEVER WHATEVER({ verbose => 1, content => "This is my content", }); =head1 DESCRIPTION GetArgs needs to know * what your subroutine was passed, * and what it expected to be passed. * If you like, you can also supply default values to use when an argument is not passed. Using this information, GetArgs will create a hash of arguments for you to use throughout your subroutine. Using GetArgs has several advantages: 1) Calls to your subroutine can pass named arguments, making the code more readable. 2) If it's easier to pass a list of arguments as you normally would, that's fine. 3) With GetArgs your use of arguments in your subroutine code is more readable. 4) Your subroutines are no longer limited in the number of arguments they expect. 5) Arguments can be passed in any order (if passed inside the hash ref), thus only the arguments relevant to that call need to be passed--unnecessary arguments can be ignored. 6) Case is not important, as GetArgs matches argument names case insensitively. =head1 AUTHOR Special thanks to Sam Mefford who helped design and wrote most of the code for the original version. Much polishing in preparation for release to CPAN was performed by Earl Cahill. (earl@cpan.org) Maintained by Rob Brown (rob@roobik.com) =head1 COPYRIGHT Copyright (c) 2001, Rob Brown. All rights reserved. Getopt::GetArgs is free software; you can redistribute it and/or modify it under the same terms as Perl itself. $Id: GetArgs.pm,v 1.4 2001/06/08 06:26:44 rob Exp $ =cut sub GetArgs (\@\@) { ### set up variables to take the referenced arguments my ($PASSED_ARGS_ref,$DEFAULT_ARGS_ref) = @_; my (@arg_names,%default_values,$arg_name,$expect_name); %default_values=@$DEFAULT_ARGS_ref; @arg_names=(); foreach ( 0..$#$DEFAULT_ARGS_ref ) { push(@arg_names,$DEFAULT_ARGS_ref->[$_]) if ($_ % 2) == 0; } ### hash that will be returned my %returnARGS; #################### ### Check if the last argument passed to our calling function is ### a hash ref. If so use the hash values for arguments unless ### the function was expecting a hash ref as the last argument. ### Match passed keys to expected keys case-insensitively. #################### # is the last argument passed a hash ref? if (ref($PASSED_ARGS_ref->[$#$PASSED_ARGS_ref]) eq "HASH") { # is the corresponding expected parameter defaulting to a hash ref? if ( ref($DEFAULT_ARGS_ref->[($#$PASSED_ARGS_ref * 2) + 1]) ne "HASH" ) { my %arg_hash = %{pop @$PASSED_ARGS_ref}; foreach $arg_name (keys %arg_hash) { foreach $expect_name (keys %default_values) { if ($arg_name =~ /^$expect_name$/i) { $returnARGS{$expect_name} = $arg_hash{$arg_name}; } } } } } ### for the remaining arguments of the calling function fill in ### with a default value if they are not set, or overwrite with ### the ordered list arguments of the calling function foreach (@arg_names) { if ( @$PASSED_ARGS_ref ) { $returnARGS{$_} = shift(@$PASSED_ARGS_ref); } elsif ( !defined($returnARGS{$_}) ) { $returnARGS{$_} = $default_values{$_}; } } ### all done return %returnARGS; } 1;