Re: The Future - Managing Modules

[Abigail]

Been there, done that. The following code is available on CPAN, as the package The::Net. It "overloads" require such that you can give it an http or ftp URL, and it will fetch the module for you using LWP.

-- Abigail

package The::Net;

#
#   $Id: Net.pm,v 1.1 2001/04/29 04:22:11 abigail Exp abigail $
#
#   $Log: Net.pm,v $
#   Revision 1.1  2001/04/29 04:22:11  abigail
#   Initial revision
#
#

use warnings 'all';
use strict;

use vars qw /$VERSION/;

($VERSION) =~ q $Revision: 1.1 $ =~ /([\d.]+)/;

push @INC => sub {
    require LWP::Simple;
    require IO::File;
    require Fcntl;

    my $url      = pop;

    return unless $url =~ m{^\w+://};

    my $document = LWP::Simple::get ($url) or die "Failed to fetch $ur
+l: $!\n";

    my $fh = IO::File -> new_tmpfile or die "Failed to create temp fil
+e: $!\n";
    $fh -> print ($document) or die "Failed to print: $!\n";
    $fh -> seek (0, Fcntl::SEEK_SET()) or die "Failed to seek: $!\n";

    $fh;
};


1;

__END__

=head1 NAME

The::Net  --  Use the Net to fetch your required modules.

=head1 SYNOPSIS

    use The::Net;

    require 'http://www.example.com/Module.pm';

=head1 DESCRIPTION

By using The::Net, you enable C<require> to fetch Modules using HTTP
or FTP, when given a URL as argument.

=head1 REVISION HISTORY

    $Log: Net.pm,v $
    Revision 1.1  2001/04/29 04:22:11  abigail
    Initial revision


=head1 AUTHOR

This package was written by Abigail, [e-mail].

=head1 COPYRIGHT and LICENSE
    
This package is copyright 2001 by Abigail.

Permission is hereby granted, free of charge, to any person obtaining 
+a
copy of this software and associated documentation files (the "Softwar
+e"),
to deal in the Software without restriction, including without limitat
+ion 
the rights to use, copy, modify, merge, publish, distribute, sublicens
+e,
and/or sell copies of the Software, and to permit persons to whom the
Software is furnished to do so, subject to the following conditions:
        
The above copyright notice and this permission notice shall be include
+d
in all copies or substantial portions of the Software.

THE SOFTWARE IS PROVIDED "AS IS", WITHOUT WARRANTY OF ANY KIND, EXPRES
+S OR
IMPLIED, INCLUDING BUT NOT LIMITED TO THE WARRANTIES OF MERCHANTABILIT
+Y,
FITNESS FOR A PARTICULAR PURPOSE AND NONINFRINGEMENT. IN NO EVENT SHAL
+L
THE AUTHOR BE LIABLE FOR ANY CLAIM, DAMAGES OR OTHER LIABILITY,
WHETHER IN AN ACTION OF CONTRACT, TORT OR OTHERWISE, ARISING FROM, OUT
OF OR IN CONNECTION WITH THE SOFTWARE OR THE USE OR OTHER DEALINGS IN
THE SOFTWARE.
    
=cut

[John M. Dlugosz]

Putting a sub on the @INC list—I had no idea! It's not mentioned in perlvar, and the equivilent code shown in require in perlfunc doesn't behave that way at all!

How long has it been able to do that, and what else might it do that isn't well known or published?