in reply to Re^2: Eliminating "used only once" warnings from List::Util::reduce
in thread Eliminating "used only once" warnings from List::Util::reduce

I think a better solution would simply be for Perl to completely ignore $a and $b with respect to "used only once" warnings.

The biggest problem is: which $s & $b?

That is, it is fairly easy to preempt the warnings for $main::a & $main::b -- by soemthing as simple as BEGIN{ $main::a || $main::b } somewhere in List::Util.pm; -- but if reduce() is called from some other package they won't be the right ones. Ie. If reduce() is called from package fred,then it'll be $fred::a & $fred::b.

And there is no way to determine which package you were called from at BEGIN time. With this added to List::Util.pm:

BEGIN{
    printf "'%s'\n", scalar caller();
    $main::a || $main::b
}

[download]

The current package at BEGIN time is main for both of these:

C:\test\primes>perl -Mstrict -MList::Util=reduce -wE" say reduce{ $a +
+$b } 1,2,3"
'main'
6

C:\test\primes>perl -Mstrict -wE"package fred; use List::Util qw[ redu
+ce ]; say reduce{ $a +$b } 1,2,3"
'main'
Name "fred::a" used only once: possible typo at -e line 1.
Name "fred::b" used only once: possible typo at -e line 1.
6

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Re^4: Eliminating "used only once" warnings from List::Util::reduce
by davido (Cardinal) on Jul 30, 2013 at 19:28 UTC

    Yes, that's the problem with simple fixes. I actually thought of something similar to the BEGIN{ $main::a... trick and submitted it months ago for List::MoreUtils::pairwise, where it was eventually pointed out (as I should have realized myself) that it would only work for the first invocant of use Modulename.

    On the other hand, import does have caller context. So a fix could be applied within import. But as I mentioned in another post in this thread, that wouldn't solve times where the user skips import with "use List::Util ();, and then fully-qualifies List::Util::reduce in his code.

    So, this can be mostly fixed by overriding import. But probably instead should be fixed within the Perl interpreter so as to special-case $a and $b further. They already have special case treatment for strict vars. One step further isn't going to suddenly allow a bunch of "only once" bugs to slip through people's code.


    Dave

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      But probably instead should be fixed within the Perl interpreter so as to special-case $a and $b further.

      I always thought that it would be (would have been) better to use $A & $B for this instead.

      That might at least prevent all these pointless "Don't use $a & $b" pseudo-commandments.

      With the rise and rise of 'Social' network sites: 'Computers are making people easier to use everyday'
      Examine what is said, not who speaks -- Silence betokens consent -- Love the truth but pardon error.
      "Science is about questioning the status quo. Questioning authority".
      In the absence of evidence, opinion is indistinguishable from prejudice.
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[d/l]

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