Surely the obvious "solution" is to just call the function as a function?

package Bar;
@Bar::ISA = 'Foo';

sub foobared {
   my $self = shift;
   $self->{foo} = Foo::_test( 3 );
}
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No code duplication. Works as expected. Functions are called as functions. Methods as methods.

I sometimes use functions in this way - exactly because they are not inherited. It means you can encapsulate some of your class implemention details in subs and not have to worry about some sub-class overriding them and breaking the public interface.

Not having looked at the code, I'm not sure if this applies to Data::FormValidator, but from your example it looks like you're trying to override an implementation detail (that leading "_" is a bit of a give away) in which case you're asking for trouble :-)

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Corrections:

• 2:31pm 30 Oct 2002 GMT: added missing "your" to correct my poor grammar.