I don't want to get too much into theory or start any holy wars, so I'm going to stay on the "safe side" with this.

Just what should a perl module do?

In generaly, any set of functionality that is likely to be used by more than one other script or module can and should be put into a module package. You can further use namespaces to logicially organize functionality. What comprises a 'set' of functionality is a matter of diverse opinion, but the important thing is to decide on a definition and stick with it for a given project.

An example of how I do things may be helpful. I have a particular project where several diverse CGI components are querying the same SQL database, with the same credentials, &c. I placed the connection info into a module called Connection.pm. All I need to do to connect from any of my scripts (or modules) is: 

require Connection;
die Connection::error() unless (Connection::is_up());
my $dbh = Connection::handle();

[download]

am i being retarded or bad manared separating my code into modules this way? should I only sepparate code into modules if they can be used alone ?

Modules needn't be entirely stand-alone -- many, many CPAN modules have complex dependencies, and that doesn't make them bad. If these are modules specificially useful to your project and unlikely to have broader appeal, that's ok: just release your project as one distribution rather than having a separate distribution for each module.

Modules that offer more generalized functionality are more desirable -- the point of modules is code re-use, after all. Try to think about that when you decide what you're putting into a module, but don't become over-concerned with it.

<-radiant.matrix->
A collection of thoughts and links from the minds of geeks
The Code that can be seen is not the true Code
I haven't found a problem yet that can't be solved by a well-placed trebuchet

In reply to Re: how far should i split my code into modules by radiantmatrix
in thread how far should i split my code into modules by leocharre

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