Use of reserved word """"%s"""" is deprecated
(D) The indicated bareword is a reserved word. Future
versions of perl may use it as a keyword, so you're
better off either explicitly quoting the word in a
manner appropriate for its context of use, or using a
different name altogether. The warning can be
suppressed for subroutine names by either adding a &
prefix, or using a package qualifier, e.g. &our(), or
Foo::our().
In general if you get any message from Perl that
you do not understand, you should try "perldoc perldiag"
and search for that message.
Compare with the related message:
Use of %s is deprecated
(D) The construct indicated is no longer recommended
for use, generally because there's a better way to do
it, and also because the old way has bad side effects.
Which is, of course, what you get when the keyword is deprecated.
So your believing that our was deprecated because
someone got that message simply means that you (and they)
did not understand the message, and didn't know how to
RTFM. Now you do. :-) | [reply]
[d/l]
[select] |
not to pick nits, but i've never seen either message. i was simply asking about something i had read in the Camel book and wondering how it applied to my code. i've been doing due diligence in RTFM, but it's hard to read something you've never seen.
i've included here the definition of deprecate as defined by Merriam Webster online. i can see using definitions 2 or 3 when discussing features that will not be included in future releases, but it's quite a stretch for me to see this word used in context with something that will be _included_ in a future release. (2 comes close, but i still think a better message could be given.)
Main Entry: dep·re·cate
Pronunciation: 'de-pri-"kAt
Function: transitive verb
Inflected Form(s): -cat·ed; -cat·ing
Etymology: Latin deprecatus, past participle of deprecari to avert by prayer, from de- + precari to pray
Date: 1628
- a archaic : to pray against (as an evil) b : to seek to avert [deprecate the wrath ... of the Roman people -- Tobias Smollett]
- : to express disapproval of
- a : PLAY DOWN : make little of [speaks five languages ... but deprecates this facility -- Time] b : BELITTLE, DISPARAGE [the most reluctantly admired and least easily deprecated of ... novelists -- New Yorker]
- dep·re·cat·ing·ly /-"kA-ti[ng]-lE/ adverb
- dep·re·ca·tion /"de-pri-'kA-sh&n/ noun
i apologize for the attitude of this post, but it's been one of those days, and the implication that i don't know how to find out things on my own really irks me.
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tye is clearly correct about what is deprecated, but I
personally see the language as being both precise and
correct. The word "our" was reserved by Perl (though at
that point not yet used) and using that reserved word as
a bareword is deprecated. Which is exactly what it
said.
I am sorry that the implication you didn't know how to
find information irked you though. Perl has excellent
and comprehensive documentation which a tremendous amount
of work has been put into. Regrettably most people who
are introduced to the language are not shown the
documentation and have no idea how to use it. If you were
in the (good) habit of looking to that documentation then
the first thing you would have done is typed, "perldoc
perl". Scan down that index and you would have found the
following section:
perldebug Perl debugging
perldiag Perl diagnostic messages
perlsec Perl security
perltrap Perl traps for the unwary
perlport Perl portability guide
perlstyle Perl style guide
All of these are good reads, except perldiag which is
meant to be a reference. Now you type "perldoc
perldiag", and search for your message. (Type in "/",
a chunk of text, then return. Hit "n" as often as needed
until you reach the right section.) Try that, time how
long it takes. I bet it is under 5 minutes.
Now it is likely that you cracked open the Camel book for
this, possibly loooked in chapter 9. And you did not find
the documentation. Well the reason for that is that the
documentation that you are reading is for Perl 5.003, and
the message you are reading is from Perl 5.005. After two
minor revisions of the language there are different
diagnostic messages. While the Camel book is both valuable
and good, the current online documentation (ignored by
most Perl programmers) is always going to be more
accurate.
So whether or not you are irked, it is true. You made a
perfectly understandable mistake out of very understandable
ignorance of how to use the documentation system that Perl
comes with. If I got irked every time I made such a
mistake I would have little time for anything else! Just
today I found that I was leaving zombies because I was not
calling wait properly. Darn. Didn't know I had to do
that. Ask KM if you don't believe me, I used him as the
classic "blank wall" while I realized my error. (My
background really is math, not Unix programming.) Clearly
that is "Mea culpa!" My bad! OK, fix my code, file that
away, and move on. I won't do that again.
So again. You didn't know how to RTFM. Now you do. There
is no fault in not knowing, or even in having used Perl for
years and not knowing. The fact is that most Perl
programmers do not know. (The only person
in that thread who gave the right answer is someone whose name I immediately
recognized as a Perl guru. That says a lot. Much of it
not very good.) That is a different problem.
A serious one IMO, but not yours. A lot of work has gone
into producing documentation that very few people read,
and something needs to be done about that. (Do you have
any suggestions?)
The only way that I could possibly think less of you for
your not knowing what you were never told would be if you
did not take this
as a sign that you should develop the skill and habit
of reaching for perldoc every time you are not positive of
some detail. Develop that skill and your next unknown
Perl diagnostic will take under 3 minutes to answer, in
detail, with an answer that I guarantee is accurate.
Regards,
Ben Tilly
PS As for, "It's been one of those days" - well I think we
have all been there. Many, many times. At least I have...
PPS BTW another gem, Perl has a naming convention. It will
never reserve for its use any bare-word that is not
"seriously weird" (like $@), all upper case, or all lower
case. And yes, there is a convention on what types of
variables fit which description as well. Therefore if
you either never use barewords, or else you always have
mixed case, you will never, ever, conflict with any keyword
in the language. | [reply]
[d/l] |
That's exactly how I've been using it, and it works much cleaner than other solutions I've tried.
The new edition of the Camel book says for each, "Deprecated, do not use in anything new." It sounds more to me like calling the use of 'our' deprecated was a mistake. It should have been given a better message about being reserved for future use. Deprecated has always meant to me that something had been superceded by something better (safer, faster, etc) so you should transition before the feature is removed.
Just my .02 | [reply] |
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