NAME

Object::Examine - additional object introspection methods

SYNOPSIS

use Object::Examine;
$some_random_object does Introspector;
say $some_random_object.menu;

DESCRIPTION

This module makes an Introspector role available which adds some additional object introspection methods, notably a wrapper around the "^methods" method named "menu".

Methods

• menu -- a long menu of available methods, one per line

The menu method uses the .^methods(:local) list as a source, but filters and sorts it, and adds a second column showing the Class it comes from.

Internal Routines

• methods_for

• clean_methods

MOTIVATION

There's a useful meta-method named "^methods" which gives you a list of available methods on an object or class, but unfortunately it uses a format which is perhaps LTA for human consumption:

my $set = Set.new(<alphan betazoid gammera>);
say $set.^methods;

# (iterator clone STORE keyof grab SET-SELF Real elems roll Numeric new-from-pairs total pickpairs RAW-HASH of Int Num default grabpairs fmt Capture pick WHICH Method+{is-nodal}.new Method+{is-nodal}.new Method+{is-nodal}.new Method+{is-nodal}.new Method+{is-nodal}.new Method+{is-nodal}.new Method+{is-nodal}.new new Method+{is-nodal}.new Method+{is-nodal}.new minpairs maxpairs Bool Method+{is-nodal}.new Method+{is-nodal}.new ACCEPTS Str gist perl Method+{is-nodal}.new Method+{is-nodal}.new Method+{is-nodal}.new Method+{is-nodal}.new Method+{is-nodal}.new Method+{is-nodal}.new Method+{is-nodal}.new BUILDALL)

This list is not sorted, it contains redundant entries, and it includes the rather mysterious "Method+{is-nodal}.new" which the average user probably does not want to hear about. By default, it's not very complete, and you might want to use ".^methods(:all)" to look all the way up the inheritance chain, presuming you knew about that option.

The "menu" method tries to fix these issues, though at the expense of being rather verbose:

$set does Introspector;
$set.menu

# ACCEPTS                   Set                      
# BIND-POS                  Any                      
# BUILDALL                  Set                      
# BUILD_LEAST_DERIVED       Mu                       
# Bool                      Set                      
# CREATE                    Mu                       
# Capture                   Set                      
# DUMP                      Mu                       
#  ...
# item                      Mu                       
# iterator                  Set                      
# keyof                     Set                      
# lazy-if                   Any                      
# match                     Any                      
# maxpairs                  Set                      
# minpairs                  Set                      
# new                       Set                      
# new-from-pairs            Set                      
# nl-out                    Any                      
#  ...

Note that the second column tells you the Class that defines the method, which may help find appropriate documentation.

AUTHOR

Joseph Brenner, doomvox@gmail.com

COPYRIGHT AND LICENSE

Copyright (C) 2018 by Joseph Brenner

Released under "The Artistic License 2.0".