NAME File::PathList - Find a file within a set of paths (like @INC or Java classpaths) SYNOPSIS # Create a basic pathset my $inc = File::PathList->new( \@INC ); # Again, but with more explicit params my $inc2 = File::PathList->new( paths => \@INC, cache => 1, ); # Get the full (localised) path for a unix-style relative path my $file = "foo/bar/baz.txt"; my $path = $inc->find_file( $file ); if ( $path ) { print "Found '$file' at '$path'\n"; } else { print "Failed to find '$file'\n"; } DESCRIPTION Many systems that map generic relative paths to absolute paths do so with a set of base paths. For example, perl itself when loading classes first turn a "Class::Name" into a path like "Class/", and thens looks through each element of @INC to find the actual file. To aid in portability, all relative paths are provided as unix-style relative paths, and converted to the localised version in the process of looking up the path. EXTENDING The recommended method for extending "File::PathList" is to add additional topic-specific find methods. For example, a subclass that was attempting to duplicate the functionality of perl's @INC and module location may wish to add a "find_module" method. METHODS new \@path | param => $value, ... The "new" constructor creates a new "File::PathList". It takes the following options as key/value pairs. paths The compulsory "paths" param should be a reference to an "ARRAY" of local filesystem paths. cache If the optional "cache" param is set to true, the object will internally cache the results of the file lookups. (false by default) If the "new" contructor is provided only a single param, this will be take to mean "paths =" $param>. Returns a new "File::PathList" object, or "undef" if a valid path set was not provided. paths The "paths" accessor returns the list of paths use to create the "File::PathList" object. Returns a list of localised path strings. cache The "cache" accessor indicates whether or not the "File::PathList" object is caching the results of the file lookups. find_file $unix_path The "find_file" method takes a unix-style relative file path, and iterates through the list of paths, checking for the file in it. Returns the full path to the file, the false null string '' if the file could not be found, or "undef" if passed a bad file name. SUPPORT Bugs should always be submitted via the CPAN bug tracker For other issues, contact the maintainer AUTHOR Adam Kennedy ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS Thank you to Phase N () for permitting the open sourcing and release of this distribution. COPYRIGHT Copyright 2005 - 2008 Adam Kennedy. This program is free software; you can redistribute it and/or modify it under the same terms as Perl itself. The full text of the license can be found in the LICENSE file included with this module.