Perl/Tk IRC client

[Anonymous Monk]

So I decided to write an IRC client because all those others either don't support SOCKS or are too big. I was under the impression it would be a 10-minute project because the lovely POE::Component::IRC did all the work for me, but I've run across a problem. It fails to actually connect to anything, it just sits there. What's the problem? Code follows.

#!/usr/bin/perl
use strict;
use warnings;
use POE::Component::IRC;
use Tk;
use YAML qw( LoadFile );

my $mw = MainWindow->new();

my $chan = $mw->Entry( -width => 10 )->pack();
my $join = $mw->Button( -text => 'Join', -command => sub { join($chan)
+ } )->pack();
my $in = $mw->Entry( -width => 80 )->pack();
$mw->Button( -text => 'Send', -command => sub { enter($in,$chan) } )->
+pack();
my $out = $mw->Text()->pack();

my @arg = %{ LoadFile("config_ircclient.yml") };
my $irc = POE::Component::IRC->spawn( @arg ) || die( "Huh?!\n" );

POE::Session->create(
    package_states => [
        'main' => [ qw( _default _start irc_001 irc_public irc_msg ) ]
    ],
    heap => {
        irc => $irc
    }
);

if ( fork() ) {
    MainLoop;
}
else {
    POE::Kernel->run();
}

sub _start {
    my $session = $irc->session_id();

    POE::Kernel->post( $session => register => 'all' );
    POE::Kernel->post( $session => connect => {} );
    sendmsg( "POE is starting.\n" );
    undef;
}

sub irc_001 {
    sendmsg( "Connected.\n" );
    undef;
}

sub irc_public {
    my ($kernel,$sender,$who,$where,$what) = @_;
    my $nick = ( split /!/, $who )[0];
    my $channel = $where->[0];

    sendmsg( "$channel: $nick: $what\n" );
    undef;
}

sub _default {
    my ( $event, $args ) = @_;
    my @output = ( "$event: " );
    foreach my $arg ( @$args ) {
        if ( ref($arg) eq 'ARRAY' ) {
            push( @output, "[" . join(" ,", @$arg ) . "]" );
        }
        else {
            push ( @output, "'$arg'" );
        }
    }
    sendmsg( join( " ", @output ) . "\n" );
    undef;
}

sub irc_msg {
    my ( $sender, $msg ) = ( (split(/!/,$_[0]))[0], $_[2] );
    sendmsg( "PRIVMSG: $sender: $msg\n" );
    undef;
}

sub enter {
    $irc->yield( privmsg => $_[1]->get() => $_[0]->get() );
    $_[0]->selectionClear();
}

sub sendmsg {
    $out->insert(  'end', $_[0] );
    print "$_[0]";
}

sub join {
    $irc->yield( join => $_[0] );
}

[zentara]

It fails to actually connect to anything, it just sits there. What's the problem?

I'm not familiar with IRC nor POE, but since no one else answered, I would hazard a guess that the POE and Tk Mainloops are not working together properly. POE has an eventloop, as does Tk; one needs to be in control (probably POE), and the slave loop (Tk) needs to be updated frequently, for it to be responsive.

See POE Tk interfaces

Your code

if ( fork() ) {
    MainLoop;
}
else {
    POE::Kernel->run();
}

seems awfully suspicious, in that it separates the Tk and POE eventloops. How do the parent and child communicate after forking?