=head1 NAME

Inline::SLang::Array - Support for arrays

=head1 SYNOPSIS

  use Inline 'SLang';

  # you can send arrays to S-Lang
  print_in_slang( [ 1, 2, 4 ] );

  # and get them back from S-Lang
  $aref = get_from_slang();
  print "The array contains: " . join(',', @$aref) . "\n";

  __END__
  __SLang__

  define print_in_slang (arr) {
    variable adims, ndim, atype;
    ( adims, ndim, atype ) = array_info(arr);
    vmessage( "Array has type=%S with %d dims", atype, ndim );
    foreach ( arr ) {
      variable val = ();
      vmessage( "  Value = %s", string(val) );
    }
  }
  define get_from_slang() { return ["a string","another one","3"]; }

The output of this code - which can be found in the source-code
distribution as F<examples/arrays.pl> - is:

  Array has type=Integer_Type with 1 dims
    Value = 1
    Value = 2
    Value = 4
  The array contains: a string,another one,3

=head1 DESCRIPTION

The philosophy behind arrays in Perl and S-Lang is somewhat
different, which makes converting arrays between the two
languages a bit more awkward than with many of the
other data types.

We admit three different array representations in Perl:
Perl's array references; as an C<Array_Type> object
(this class is a part of the C<Inline::SLang> package);
and as a piddle - the fundamental object of
the L<Perl Data Language|PDL::Intro> - which is the 
suggested method to analyze large numeric arrays in Perl.
Before discussing this I want to talk about
going the "other way".

=head2 Things to remember when converting arrays to S-Lang

Consider the following Perl array reference:

  [ [ 2, 1 ], [ 4, 5 ], [ 8, 9 ] ]

This could be represented in S-Lang as one of the
following arrays:

  Integer_Type [3,2]
  Double_Type  [3,2]
  String_Type  [3,2]
  Array_Type   [3]
  Any_Type     [3]

Note that this does B<not> match the way that
PDL represents array (which considers this
to be a C<2x3> array). As warned in earlier versions
this is a problem now that piddles are supported.
Please see the L<"Issues with the PDL support">
section below.

Admittedly most of these are unlikely, but the point is
that they are all I<valid> representations, which makes
automatically converting such an item to S-Lang awkward.

As discussed below it is possible to provide extra 
information (the type and/or dimensionality of the array) to help
the conversion - using an C<Array_Type> object or the
C<Inline::SLang::SL_array()> function - but hopefully the
guesses the code makes will be sufficient.

=head3 How do we guess the array?

If the array is stored as a I<piddle> or an C<Array_Type>
object then the computer can find out the information
without guessing, so the following is only relevant
when an I<array reference> is used.

When given an array reference, the code looks at the
first element to decide what type of array it is: if
it is an array reference then we have a multi-dimensional
array and the process is repeated until we reach a
value. So, in the example above the "2" would be used
to determine the type of the array - so it should come out
as C<Integer_Type> - and the array dimensions are taken to
be C<[3,2]>.

=head4 How to confuse the array conversion (by data type)

Since the code only looks at the first element in the
array to guess the type it is not too hard to come across
arrays that will cause the code to croak with some bizarre
message from S-Lang.
For instance:

  [ 1, 2, "a string" ]

will cause a problem since it is assumed to be an
C<Integer_Type [3]> array, which is fine for the first two
elements but not for the last one.

The code could be updated so that it checks all elements
in the array and finds the most suitable type and
dimensionality; however,
this could be a large performance hit for large
arrays and the current advice is to use one of the 
techniques we describe below.

=head4 How to confuse the array conversion (by array size)

The code assumes that the array dimensions it calculates
hold for all elements. If they don't then you will see 
error messages (quite possibly strange ones at that).
As an example,

  [ [ 2, 1 ], [1] ]

is guaranteed not to be liked by the code; on my machine
it dislikes it so much that it causes a B<segmentation fault>.

=head3 How can I help?

If you know the array size and/or type then you can use
the C<Inline::SLang::sl_array()> function to help the
code out. As an example (see also F<examples/array_help.pl>):

  use Inline 'SLang' => Config => EXPORT =>
       [ 'sl_array', 'Integer_Type' ];
  use Inline 'SLang';

  my $aref = [ 1, 3, 2 ];
  foo( $aref );
  foo( sl_array( $aref, "Int_Type" ) );
  foo( sl_array( $aref, [3] ) );
  foo( sl_array( $aref, [3], Integer_Type() ) );

  __END__
  __SLang__

  define foo(x) { vmessage("Array has type: %S", _typeof(x) ); }

which produces four lines saying

  Array has type: Integer_Type

Note that I snuck in an example of using an
automatically-generated wrapper around the C<DataType_Type>
constructor - the C<Integer_Type()> function in the last call
to C<foo()>.

Unfortunately you can I<not> use C<sl_array()> to
typecast the array: at least not at the moment.
If you replace C<Int_Type> with C<String_Type> 
in the above then you will come across the following error
message

  S-Lang Error: Type Mismatch: Unable to typecast Integer_Type to String_Type

even though Perl can happily treat 1 as an integer or
a string. Suggestions on how to handle this case are welcome.

The C<sl_array()> function is actually a wrapper around the
constructor call for the C<Array_Type> class which tries to guess
the array type and size if they have not been supplied.

=head2 Things to remember when converting arrays to Perl

There are three different ways that a S-Lang array
can be represented in Perl:

=over 4

=item 1

As a reference to a Perl array.

=item 2

As a piddle (see the L<Perl Data Language|PDL::Intro>
documentation) for numeric types. 

Please see the L<"Issues with the PDL support">
section below.

=item 3

As an C<Array_Type> object.

=back

In most cases the first two representations are likely
to be the ones you use; the use of an C<Array_Type>
object is only needed when it is I<hard> for the code to
guess the type/dimensionality of an array.

The C<Inline::SLang::sl_array2perl()> function
is used to define how S-Lang arrays are converted to
Perl, and to find out what the current conversion
system is. This function is described in
L<Inline::SLang>.

=head3 Example

  use Inline 'SLang' => Config => EXPORT => [ 'sl_array2perl' ];
  use Inline 'SLang';

  # use array references for all S-Lang arrays
  sl_array2perl(0);
  my $a0 = get_array();
  print "Array returned as an " . ref($a0) . "\n";
  print "  dim size = " . (1+$#$a0) . "\n";

  # use Array_Type for all S-Lang arrays
  sl_array2perl(1);
  my $a1 = get_array();
  print "Array returned as an " . ref($a1) . "\n";
  my ( $dims, $ndim, $atype ) = $a1->array_info();
  print "  dim size = $$dims[0]\n";
  print "  type     = $atype\n";

  # use a piddle (assumes Inline::SLang::sl_have_pdl() == 1)
  sl_array2perl(2);
  my $a2 = get_array();
  print "Array returned as an " . ref($a1) . "\n";
  print "  dim size = " . $a2->getdims(0) . "\n";
  print "  type     = " . $a2->type . "\n";

  __END__
  __SLang__

  define get_array() { return [ 14.0, 3 ]; }

This example is available as F<examples/array_conversion.pl>
in the source distribution.
When run this outputs:

  Array returned as an ARRAY
    dim size = 2
  Array returned as an Array_Type
    dim size = 2
    type     = Double_Type

B<TO DO>: add the output from the array-as-piddle part of the
code.

=head1 Issues with the PDL support

Version B<0.20> of C<Inline::SLang> adds support for
the L<Perl Data Language|PDL>. Unfortunately this support
is still a work in progress.

=over 2

=item *

1D piddles and S-Lang arrays should work properly.

=item *

Conversion of > 1D arrays/piddles is I<complicated>
because what to S-Lang is a 2x3 array is, to PDL,
a 3x2 array!

Currently the arrays are converted like this (ie the
order of the arrays is swapped). I do B<not>
think this a good long-term solution. Have I<you> any
ideas?

=item *

0-dimension piddles are not converted to S-Lang, since
S-Lang does not allow such an array. We could convert the
piddle to a scalar or a single-element array.

=item *

It has only been tested on 32-bit machines.

=back

=head1 THE ARRAY_TYPE CLASS

The Perl C<Array_Type> class stores the datatype and
dimensionality of an array along with the data.
In most cases this information is not needed
so you should stick with using array references (or
I<piddles>) since it's much easier, but there are times when it can
come in handy.

The C<Array_Type> class inherit the default methods
of all the Inline::SLang objects, namely:

=over 2

=item *

C<typeof()>

This returns C<Array_Type> as a C<DataType_Type>
object. See the C<_typeof()> method below to
find the datatype used to store the data. 

=item *

C<stringify()>

This returns the string "Array_Type".

=item *

C<is_struct_type()>

This returns 0.

=back

As with the other object classes these methods can
only be called using the C<< $object->method( args ) >>
syntax.
There are also a number of additional methods
for this class:

=over 2

=item * C<new( datatype, dims [, data ] )>

The constructor takes the datatype of the array -
as either a string or a C<DataType_Type> object - and
an array reference containing the size of the array and
returns an C<Array_Type> object. If a third argument
is supplied then it is taken to be an array reference
containing the data to be stored in the array.
Note that in this case we just copy the array reference
and B<not> the actual data stored in this array. This
means that you can change the data stored in the
object: useful but can cause bizarre behaviour for the
unwary.

  my $arr1 = Array_Type->new( "Int_Type", [3,2] );
  my $arr2 = Array_Type->new(
               "String_Type", [3],
               [ "a string", "another string", "boo" ]
             );


There is B<no> sanity checking of the input values;
if they do not agree then something strange will happen at
some point during the execution of the progam.

An alternative way to create an C<Array_Type> object
is to use the C<Inline::SLang::sl_array()> function,
which is described in the L<Inline::SLang|Inline::SLang>
document. This has the advantage that it will try and
guess the type and/or dimensionality of the array
if you do not specify it.

=item * C<_typeof()>

Returns - as a C<DataType_Type> object - the class
of the data stored in the array.

  my $arr1 = Array_Type->new( "Int_Type", [3,2] );
  my $type = $arr1->_typeof();

=item * C<array_info()>

Mimics the S-Lang C<array_info()> function (slightly
more efficient than usng the S-Lang version). The
array dimensions are returned as a Perl array reference
and the datatype as a C<DataType_Type> object.

  my $arr1 = Array_Type->new( "Int_Type", [3,2] );
  my ( $dims, $ndims, $type ) = $arr1->array_info();
  print "Num of dims = $ndims and type = $type\n";
  print "Dims = [ " . join( ", ", @$dims ) . " ]\n";

=item * C<get( coord1, ..., coordN )>

Returns the data value stored at the given location.

  my $arr1 = Array_Type->new( "Int_Type", [3,2] );
  my $val  = $arr1->get(1,0);

=item * C<set( coord1, ..., coordN, newval )>

Sets the data value stored at the given location
to the specified value. It returns this value.

  my $arr1 = Array_Type->new( "Int_Type", [3,2] );
  $arr1->set(1,0,-43);

Note that there is no check made that the datatype
of the new value matches that of the array. You
will find out about this when you try to convert the
array to S-Lang. Probably with a rather unfriendly
message.

=item * C<toPerl()>

Since the accessor functions described above
are very limited, the C<toPerl()> can be used
to get an array reference to the actual data. This
can then be used as you would any other Perl array
reference. If you change the array size then
you are going to make the object unhappy, so take care.

  my $arr1 = Array_Type->new( "Int_Type", [3,2] );
  my $dref = $arr1->toPerl();
  $$dref[1][0] = -4;

=back

Further methods could be added to improve the array access -
such as the C<resize> S-Lang function and means of accessing array
slices - but this is unlikely to happen since PDL has a
I<much> richer set of operations (although they only work for
numeric types), or you can do the array processing in S-Lang.

=head1 SEE ALSO

L<Inline::SLang::Assoc>, L<Inline::SLang::Types>, L<Inline::SLang>, L<PDL>