Re: unknown number of dimensions of a multidimensional hash

[GrandFather]

in reply to unknown number of dimensions of a multidimensional hash

The following code is taken from a game engine and manipulates "keys" of the form (\w+\.)+\w+. Each word represents a hash level.

our %GameState; # The entire game context

# looks up a key (passed as the first param) and adds the value
# (if provided as second param). Returns a reference to the value
# list.
sub Entity {
  my ($key, $value) = @_;
  return undef if ! defined $key;
  my $hash = \%GameGlobals::GameState;
  my @keys = split /\./, $key;

  map {$_ = lc $_} @keys;
  while (@keys && defined $hash) {
    my $key = shift @keys;
    if (@keys) {
      $hash->{$key} = {} if ! exists $hash->{$key};
      $hash = $hash->{$key};
    } else {
      $hash->{$key} = [] if ! exists $hash->{$key};
      push @{$hash->{$key}}, $_[1] if defined $value;
      return \$hash->{$key};
    }
  }
}