Here is an outline of how to make Win32::API much easier to use. It results in code like: 

use Win32::API qw( CreateIoCompletionPort N kernel32 N N N N );
use Win32::API qw( ... );

# ...
my $hIOCP= CreateIoCompletionPort( $hSocket, 0, 0, 0 );
# ...

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which is much nicer than how I've used Win32::API. Of course, support for more DWIM argument types is also in order, but I think I've seen such work underway elsewhere. (In fact, I'd probably allow for a code ref as an argument specification...)

Here is how simple this improvement is to implement: 

sub Win32::API::import {
    my( $class, $sub, $ret, $lib, @args )= @_;
    my( $pkg )= (caller 1)[3];
    my $obj = $class->new( $lib, $sub, [@args], $ret )
        or  croak( "Can't find $sub in $lib" );
    no strict 'refs';
    *{"$pkg::$sub"} = sub {
        $obj->Call( @_ );
    };
}

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Does this type of simplification come from thinking like "the users", or am I just strange? Does this seem like a huge improvement to others? Anyone else felt "from the beginning" that Win32::API should be creating code refs, like that was the "natural" interface to provide?

I often suspect that many code authors don't put much stress on the point of view of the users of their code. But I find that my view of the world (in so many respects) looks quite skewed to most people...

I'm sorry that this is such a skimpy node. I'm tied up with my day job but wanted to throw this idea out anyway...

- tye        

In reply to How to make Win32::API easy to use by tye

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