Apache::StatINC reload explaination required

rdfield has asked for the wisdom of the Perl Monks concerning the following question:

This little problem has been bugging me for a bit and I wondered if anyone could explain the behaviour of Apache::StatINC to me?

The situation is as follows: I have a page which calls a function in a module (say module1). So far so good. This module then calls a function in another module(say module2). Great: everything displays as it should. If I make a change to module2 and reload the client page (did I say this was running under Apache/mod_perl?) the original output is displayed. If I then make a change (or just touch) module1, the changes to module2 appear.

An extract of the error.log:

test v1! at /my/module2.pm line 790
Apache::StatINC: process 1440 reloading module2.pm
test v1! at /my/module2.pm line 790
Apache::StatINC: process 1440 reloading module1.pm
test v2! at /my/module2.pm line 790
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rdfield

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Re: Apache::StatINC reload explaination required by samurai (Monk) on Sep 04, 2002 at 13:31 UTC
I can't exactly explain what happens with StatINC, for I have always used Apache::Reload. I believe it gives you more control. I would suggest using Apache::Reload as a replacement for Apache::StatINC, it may solve your problem. Just a suggestion. -- perl: code of the samurai	[reply]
Re: Re: Apache::StatINC reload explaination required by stevenc (Novice) on Sep 04, 2002 at 15:25 UTC
Is Module2 in your %INC path, or have you modified %INC in Module1 in order that you can load Module2? Apache::StatINC checks the last modified time of each module in your %INC hash at the initialisation phase. If the module isn't there or hasn't changed it wont be reloaded. If you're loading Module2 from outside your %INC in Module1 you should modify your startup.pl so that directory is included. Let us know how you get on. Steve.	[reply]
Re: Re: Re: Apache::StatINC reload explaination required by rdfield (Priest) on Sep 05, 2002 at 09:37 UTC
Module2 is in the same directory as Module1. As you can see from the error.log StatINC correctly identifies the module as requiring a reload, but the reload does not take effect until the calling module has been 'touched' and therefore reloaded. I looked at the code for Apache::Reload and as far as I could tell the only relevent difference was that the reload was done directly rather than through an eval. I changed my local StatINC to remove the eval and tried again to no avail. rdfield	[reply]