use strict; package Class::Delay; require Class::Delay::Message; our $VERSION = '0.02'; sub import { my $package = caller; my $class = shift; my %args = @_; my @delayed; my @methods = @{ $args{methods} }; my $return = $args{return} || 1; for my $method (@methods) { no strict 'refs'; *{"$package\::$method"} = sub { push @delayed, Class::Delay::Message->new({ package => $package, method => $method, args => [ @_ ], is_trigger => 0, }); return $return; }; } my $reorder = $args{reorder}; my @triggers = @{ $args{release} }; for my $method (@triggers) { my $sub = sub { my $self = shift; # delete our placeholders for my $method (@methods, @triggers) { no strict 'refs'; local *newglob; *{"$package\::$method"} = *newglob; } push @delayed, Class::Delay::Message->new({ package => $package, method => $method, args => [ $self, @_ ], is_trigger => 1, }); @delayed = $reorder->( @delayed ) if $reorder; # redispatch them in their new order $_->resume for @delayed; return $return; }; no strict 'refs'; *{"$package\::$method"} = $sub; } } 1; __END__ =head1 NAME Class::Delay - delay method dispatch until a trigerring event =head1 SYNOPSIS package PrintOut; sub write { my $self = shift; print "printing: ", @_, "\n"; } sub flush { print "flushed\n"; } package DelayedPrint; use base 'PrintOut'; use Class::Delay methods => [ 'write' ], release => [ 'flush' ]; package main; DelayedPrint->write( "we'll write this later" ); # won't get through # to PrintOuts 'write' yet DelayedPrint->write( "this too" ); DelayedPrint->flush; # all of the queued call are dispatched DelayedPrint->write( "this won't be delayed" ); =head1 DESCRIPTION Class::Delay provides a mechanism for the delay of method dispatch until a triggering method is called. You simply define a proxy class, and then call on the module to set up a set of methods that will defer. =head2 Options The use statement takes the following options when generate the proxying behaviour. =over =item methods An array reference naming the methods to delay until a trigger event. =item return What a delayed method will return, defaults to 1. =item release An array reference naming the methods to ise as triggering events. =item reorder A subroutine that will be passed the all the delayed messages as L objects. The routine should return these in the order that the messagages are to be deilvered. For example, if we want to ensure our trigger event arrives before the rest of the events we may do something like this: use Class::Delay methods => [qw( foo bar baz )], release => [qw( quux squirkle )], reorder => sub { sort { $b->is_trigger <=> $a->is_trigger } @_ }; =back An extended example of this module is in L which uses the module to delay database setup until the final of the database is known. =head1 AUTHOR Richard Clamp =head1 COPYRIGHT Copyright (C) 2003 Richard Clamp. All Rights Reserved. This module is free software; you can redistribute it and/or modify it under the same terms as Perl itself. =cut