O wise and busy monks, I find myself pulling out valuable hair once again, and come seeking respite and enlightenment.

I'm writing something that will bake and eat cookies in an Apache2/mod_perl2 environment (environment2?) using HTML::Mason. After a bit of wrestling I got Apache2::Cookie and the rest of the libapreq2 things installed.

But now I can't figure out how to test this stuff. The documentation features a mysterious $r, who is supposed to be an Apache2::RequestRec. But then: 

$ perl -MApache2::RequestRec -e 'Apache2::RequestRec->new()'
Can't locate object method "new" via package "Apache2::RequestRec" at 
+-e line 1.

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Well, maybe there's just another constructor. But I can't find it, and the docs for Apache::RequestUtil actually say that's supposed to work: 

new

Create a new Apache2::RequestRec object.

  $r = Apache2::RequestRec->new($c);
  $r = Apache2::RequestRec->new($c, $pool);

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I understand that the $r is, in a running server, automagically provided by mod_perl2. But it seems like a Very Bad Idea ™ to have a running apache2/mod_perl2 system be a prerequisite for unit-testing your cookie recipes, so perhaps I'm just unclear on the concept.

The test I want to run, by the way, would look something like this in its most minimal form: 

use strict;
use warnings;

use Test::More tests => 1;

use Apache2::Cookie 2.08;
use Apache2::RequestRec 2.0;
use Apache2::RequestUtil 2.0;

# This, of course, doesn't work:
my $r = Apache2::RequestRec->new();

# This is straight out of the synopsis,
# but where do I get that blasted $r?
my $cookie = Apache2::Cookie->new(
    $r,
    -name  => "mycookie",
    -value => "whatever"
);
isa_ok( $cookie, 'Apache2::Cookie' );

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As much as I'd like to sit around and complain about the mystery meat in that documentation, I have to actually get this thing done, and I believe my options are:

  1. Fall back to CGI::Cookie and hope nothing breaks.
  2. Live without tests and hope nothing breaks. **shudder**
  3. Bite the bullet, dig around in the Apache2::* code, and figure out how to make a Test::MockObject that is sufficiently $r.
  4. Have my dumb mistake(s) pointed out to me by a wise monk who has already solved this problem.

What, dear Monks, would you recommend, and have any of you faced similar troubles in the past?

In reply to Where can I buy an $r with which to test Apache2::Cookie? by frostman

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