bless() attaches a package name to a reference. If you treat that reference as an object (i.e. call methods on it), that package name tells perl in which package to start looking for that method.

You can still treat a blessed reference as a regular ol' reference, but you can't treat a regular ol' reference as an object. A blessed reference is just a reference with an associated package name.

The blessed reference doesn't provide the interface: it just tells perl which package has it. You have to provide the interface yourself, either directly in that package or in something it inherits.

--
brian d foy <bdfoy@cpan.org>

In reply to Re: reference versus bless by brian_d_foy
in thread reference versus bless by arcnon

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