PPI replacing/updating a stub

[clueless newbie]

How to replace a (sub's) stub using PPI?

I'm playing with PPI and the problem of fleshing out a stub has me baffled. The following snippet illustrates my problem.

#!/usr/bin/env perl

use if (-d 'C:/Users/clueless_newbie'),lib=>'C:/Users/clueless_newbie/
+GOOGLE~1/code/lib';
use if (-d 'C:/Users/clueless_newbie'),lib=>'C:/Users/clueless_newbie/
+code/Perl-5/devlib';

# $ENV{DBG} -> compile time; $ENV{DEBUG} -> run time.
use if ($ENV{DBG} || $ENV{DEBUG}),"Devel::UnComment","#[=]#","Keep";

use Data::Dumper;
use PPI;
use PPI::Dumper;
use strict;
use warnings;
use 5.10.0;

{ # INTERNALS

    }; # INTERNALS

my $raw=<<'__RAW__';
   package FeeFi;
   sub Fee {
       print "Fee\n";
       }
   sub Fi {
       print "Fi\n";
       }
   -1;
__RAW__

my %sub_h;
{ # Save the subs; replacing them with placeholders
    # Create the PPI document
    my $document=PPI::Document->new(\$raw)
        or die "oops!";
    $document->save('before');

    for my $sub (@{$document->find('PPI::Statement::Sub') || []}) {
        unless ($sub->forward) {
            #say $sub->name;
            # save the sub and its content
            $sub_h{$sub->name}{content}=$sub->content;
            # Replace the sub's block as a stub by removing its childr
+en
            my @elements=$sub->block->children;
            for (my $i=0; $i < @elements; $i++) {
                $elements[$i]->remove;
                };
            };
        };
    # Save the stubbed out "main/package" under the key '';
    $sub_h{''}{content}=$document->content;
    };
#=# DEBUG [ sub_h=>\%sub_h ];

# Completing the round trip
{
    # Create the stubbed out main
    my $document=PPI::Document->new(\$sub_h{''}{content})
        or die "oops creating ''!";
    #=# DEBUG '',PPI::Dumper->new($document,whitespace=>0)->string;

    # Find and flesh out the stubs
    for my $stub (@{$document->find('PPI::Statement::Sub') || []}) {
          unless ($stub->forward) {
            my $name=$stub->name;
            #=# TRACE $name;
            # Flesh out this stub
            my $sub=PPI::Document->new(\$sub_h{$name}{content})->find_
+first('PPI::Statement::Sub');
            #=# TRACE '',PPI::Dumper->new($sub,whitespace=>0)->string;

            # So ow do I flesh out the stub from $sub????
            $stub->insert_after($sub)    # <=== Doesn't do it!
                or warn "Can't insert_after!";
            #=# DEBUG '',PPI::Dumper->new($document,whitespace=>0)->st
+ring;


              };
        };
    #=# DEBUG '',PPI::Dumper->new($document,whitespace=>0)->string;
    $document->save('after');            # <=== "after" should be prog
+rammatically equal to "before"
    };

exit;

[haukex]

What's going on behind the scenes is actually pretty interesting. So when you say PPI::Document->new(\$sub_h{$name}{content})->find_first('PPI::Statement::Sub'), you're creating a new document, however, you're not keeping a reference to that document, so it is immediately DESTROYed - which clobbers every element of that document - including the sub returned from find_first!

So to fix that, split that statement into two, saving the document in a variable so that it is not immediately destroyed. But the code still doesn't work, because that document is still getting destroyed at the end of the loop body, removing the elements before you get to save. So to fix that, you need to disassociate the sub element from its document via remove.

There's one more minor issue, which is that you need to remove the stub, since you're replacing it with the stored one. So putting all that together gets you this, which works (file after should be identical to before):

Read more... (2 kB)

[clueless newbie]

Thank you very much!

[holli]

I just want to mention, when it's about textually transforming Perl source code, there is also PPR. That module provides one giant regex that matches all of Perl (or pieces of it). Sounds crazy, I know. But hey, Damian wrote it so go figure.

[Anonymous Monk]

$raw is the sample input yes? whats the expected output?

[clueless newbie]

Were I able to get it working the output would be programmatically identical to $raw.