Re: Perl semi-object without a constructor

[Anonymous Monk]

As far as I can see 'connect' *is* the constructor.

Whenever you see a construct that looks like Module->subroutine you should think "Class Method". The subroutine will be called with the Class name as the 1st parameter, and as expected it's used in a bless command.

Now that $conn is an object, all subroutines in it's class' (Msg) namespace and in the namespaces listed in Msg::ISA, can now be used as methods. Any such method will receive the blessed reference $conn implicitly as it's 1st parameter.

[Wiggins]

I went back and looked at all the subroutines.
2 have $pkg as arg0 (event_loop() & new_server())
7 have $conn as arg0
3 don't take args
1 starts with the line:

  shift unless ref($_[0]); # shift if first arg is package name

So maybe the entire package is actually a class.

With 1 dodgy routine:

sub _new_client {
    my $sock = $main_socket->accept();
    my $conn = bless {
        'sock' =>  $sock,
        'state' => 'connected'
    }, $g_pkg;             #< different CLASSNAME
    my $rcvd_notification_proc =
        &$g_login_proc ($conn, $sock->peerhost(), $sock->peerport());
    if ($rcvd_notification_proc) {
        $conn->{rcvd_notification_proc} = $rcvd_notification_proc;
        my $callback = sub {_rcv($conn,0)};
        set_event_handler ($sock, "read" => $callback);
    } else {  # Login failed
        $conn->disconnect();
    }
}

[dsheroh]

Common Perl convention is that sub/method names beginning with an underscore are to be treated as private. The reason that sub _new_client is structured differently than the other subs in the package is because it's meant for internal use only and is not a part of the public interface.