our $AUTHORITY

friedo has asked for the wisdom of the Perl Monks concerning the following question:

Greetings.

I've been learning a lot about Moose lately and reading chunks of the code (always a dangerous idea.) I noticed that a lot of stvn's modules contain the line

our $AUTHORITY = 'cpan:STEVAN';
[download]

after the usual $VERSION line.

Is this $AUTHORITY variable actually used for anything on CPAN or by CPAN.pm? What does it do? Or is stvn just a crazy madman? (I'm inclined to believe these options are not mutually exclusive. :) )

Comment on our $AUTHORITY Select or Download Code

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Re: our $AUTHORITY by dragonchild (Archbishop) on Jun 27, 2008 at 15:37 UTC
Yes, stvn is a madman. Oh, and yes, AUTHORITY will be used in future versions of CPAN and definitely in C6PAN. My criteria for good software: Does it work? Can someone else come in, make a change, and be reasonably certain no bugs were introduced?	[reply]
Re^2: our $AUTHORITY by Anonymous Monk on Jun 28, 2008 at 08:11 UTC
I don't think we've settled on C6PAN , as opposed to CP6AN?	[reply]
Re^3: our $AUTHORITY by dragonchild (Archbishop) on Jun 28, 2008 at 18:53 UTC
I thought we had settled that I can't type. My criteria for good software: Does it work? Can someone else come in, make a change, and be reasonably certain no bugs were introduced?	[reply]
Re^4: our $AUTHORITY by Your Mother (Archbishop) on Jun 28, 2008 at 19:32 UTC
Re^3: our $AUTHORITY by ambrus (Abbot) on Jun 30, 2008 at 08:47 UTC
Yeah, I like the name CP6AN.	[reply]
Re^4: our $AUTHORITY by parv (Parson) on Jun 30, 2008 at 08:54 UTC
Re: our $AUTHORITY by moritz (Cardinal) on Jun 27, 2008 at 15:30 UTC
I don' think it's used in CPAN.pm (though I might be wrong), but I know that Perl 6 uses the "authority" trait (?) on modules, because it permits multiple modules of the name. Actually Perl 6 has a long or full module name, which includes the short name, the version and the authority. There's no reason why only one developer in this whole wild world should be allowed to chose the wonderful name `Foo` for a module, and there's no reason why you shouldn't be able to use two different `Foo` modules at the same time in your program, just because they happen to have the same short name. See S11: Versioning for details	[reply] [d/l] [select]
Re: our $AUTHORITY by stvn (Monsignor) on Jun 29, 2008 at 19:08 UTC
Or is stvn just a crazy madman? Yes. Although if I were truely crazy I wouldn't know I am crazy. So, I guess I should say "No". Wait, I am confused now. Is this $AUTHORITY variable actually used for anything on CPAN or by CPAN.pm? Class::MOP::Module adds introspection support for it, but mostly it was a throwback to my work on Pugs and the Perl6::MetaModel. If someone decides to use it in CPAN.pm,or someone decides to write a module to differentiate between Moose-cpan:STEVAN and Moose-cpan:FRIEDO that would be awesome. But from what I have seen that is difficult to do with Perl, possibly verging on impossible, so I am not holding my breath. However, when someone crazier then I figures it out, I know my CPAN modules will be ready... will yours?!?!? :P -stvn	[reply]