Dear monks,

Would any of you know where I can find an example/tutorial showing the use CGI::Prototype? The best I've found is the CGI::Prototype::Hidden that comes with the distribution, but it would help me a lot to look at a fuller example.

I have read merlyn's article discussing this module, but the source code that goes with this article consists only of a few isolated fragments for illustration. Also, I have read various perlmonks.org posts on CGI::Prototype, but I'm still not clear how one uses this module.

My biggest obstacle is Class::Prototyped (the superclass of CGI::Prototype). I understand the basic idea behind Self-like objects, but I don't understand why one would want to use them in place of regular Perl objects. It's clear from the article that Class::Prototyped's functionality is central to the "CGI::Prototype vision", but with the exception of the line 

our $_mirror = __PACKAGE__->reflect;

[download]
at the top of the file, I don't see how CGI::Prototype::Hidden uses the fact that it is a subclass (or rather a subsubclass) of Class::Prototyped.

One problem I already see with the implementation of CGI::Prototype is that potential users not only must become familiar with it and with the Template Toolkit (which seems to me a reasonable thing to expect of a hard-working, underpaid CGI programmer), but must also become familiar with the workings of Class::Prototyped, even though this class has intrinsically nothing to do with writing CGI applications. I think users of CGI::Prototype should not have to know anything about Class::Prototyped to use CGI::Prototype effectively.

the lowliest monk

PS: I've also looked at CGI::Application, but I like C::P's MVC approach more than C::A's run mode approach. Granted, there's more stuff out there on how to use C::A, so I may ultimately go that route, but I'd like to give C::P a try first.

In reply to Seeking enlightenment on CGI::Prototype by tlm

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