Re: How Do I Bundle Perl Modules and Their Tests Into the Same File?

[jdhedden]

The ifdef module would be useful for this. Write your module like this:

package MyClass; {
    # Put class code here inside the braces to
    # constrain the lexical scope of its variables
    ...
}

1;

=begin TEST

package main;
# Test code
my $obj = MyClass->new();
...

=cut

Then run it like this:

perl -Mifdef=TEST MyClass.pm

I'm sure others will offer more ideas, too.

Update: Added missing 1; as pointed out below.

[perlknight]

hmm, a module need to have "1;" as the last entry. Where does this goes in this case? The last line or in the module it is declaring, e.g for this particalur example in the MyClass package?

[ikegami]

Before of after the =begin..=cut, it doesn't matter. When used as a module, =begin..=cut is just a comment, so it's ignored. When used as a script (to test the module), the 1; isn't needed since it's not a module.