Hi, this is making me crazy.

I have a subroutine/method in an object, looks kinda like this:

sub generate {
  my ($self, $OBJS) = @_;

# NOTE:
# $OBJS is an array of objects, and array elements can also be arrays 
+of objects

  while(SOMETHING) {
    if ($OBJS) { # we got anything?
      if (scalar(@{$OBJS})) { # 0-length array is useless
        my $OBJ = shift(@{$OBJS});
        DO MEAN STUFF TO THE OBJ
      }
    }
  }
  return LA-LA;
}

[download]
The first time into the while(SOMETHING) loop everything goes as planned, as would be expected, BUT.......!!!

The second time through the loop, $OBJ has the remnants of the MEAN STUFF that was done to it.

So, after looking around and seeing about deep copying, and FreezeThaw and Clone, and trying them out, I still can't get rid of the evidence of the MEAN STUFF I did to $OBJ.

Here's an example of what I've tried, I tried to loop through the array building copies, like this:

  my $OBJScopy;
  foreach my $obj (@$OBJS) {
    push(@{$OBJScopy}, clone($obj));
  }

[download]
and the subroutine from above references $OBJScopy instead of $OBJS

but later when I try to do MEAN STUFF to $OBJ it still bears the scars of earlier mistreatment.

Why is this so difficult? What am I overlooking?

THANKS!!!!!

Tosh

In reply to how do I copy an array of objects? by Anonymous Monk

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