So if I had an array:

@colors = qw ( red blue green )

and I wanted to put it in the config file so anybody could change it, but also could be read by the Config::IniHash module, what is the best way to write it in the config file?

I am following your example and have changed other variables in the config file to look something like:

[path]
root = C:\test
code = %root%\code1
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Just choose a delimiter and split the values after you read them. What delimiter to use depends on the characters allowed in the values, but most of the time comma is good enough. So assuming the INI contains:

[path]
files=foo.txt,bar.txt,baz.csv
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you'd just need to do something like:

@files = split /\s*,\s*/, $config->{path}{files};
 # the \s* removes the optional whitespace around delimiters
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You might do the splitting inside the forValue=> callback, but I think that would just complicate the code. You'd have to specify what values to split, because you'd definitely not want to split everything that contains the delimiter. So I think it's better to split after everything is read.

If you did want to modify the $config structure to contain certain values as arrays you might do something like this:

foreach my $Section (values %$config) {
 # $Section is a hash ref containing the values of the section, not th
+e section name!
  foreach my $value (qw(files colors and other options that should be 
+arrays)) {
    $Section->{$value} = [split /\s*,\s*/, $Section->{$value}];
  }
}
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After this the $config->{anySection}{files} is no longer a string but a reference to an anonymous array containing the individual items.

Jenda


We'd like to help you learn to help yourself Look around you, all you see are sympathetic eyes Stroll around the grounds until you feel at home    -- P. Simon in Mrs. Robinson

Hi Jenda

Thank you for the reply. I understood:

@files = split /\s*,\s*/, $config->{path}{files};
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If the arrays can occur at any place in the config file along with scalar values, I did not understand how the following code takes care of that

foreach my $Section (values %$config) {
 # $Section is a hash ref containing the values of the section, not th
+e section name!
  foreach my $value (qw(files colors and other options that should be 
+arrays)) {
    $Section->{$value} = [split /\s*,\s*/, $Section->{$value}];
  }
}
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Actually, I did not understand the following line:

 foreach my $value (qw(files colors and other options that should be 
+arrays)) {
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Thanks.