ExtUtils::Packlist(3pm) 				 Perl Programmers Reference Guide				   ExtUtils::Packlist(3pm)

NAME

       ExtUtils::Packlist - manage .packlist files

SYNOPSIS

	  use ExtUtils::Packlist;
	  my ($pl) = ExtUtils::Packlist->new('.packlist');
	  $pl->read('/an/old/.packlist');
	  my @missing_files = $pl->validate();
	  $pl->write('/a/new/.packlist');

	  $pl->{'/some/file/name'}++;
	     or
	  $pl->{'/some/other/file/name'} = { type => 'file',
					     from => '/some/file' };

DESCRIPTION

       ExtUtils::Packlist provides a standard way to manage .packlist files.  Functions are provided to read and write .packlist files.  The
       original .packlist format is a simple list of absolute pathnames, one per line.	In addition, this package supports an extended format,
       where as well as a filename each line may contain a list of attributes in the form of a space separated list of key=value pairs.  This is
       used by the installperl script to differentiate between files and links, for example.

USAGE

       The hash reference returned by the new() function can be used to examine and modify the contents of the .packlist.  Items may be
       added/deleted from the .packlist by modifying the hash.	If the value associated with a hash key is a scalar, the entry written to the
       .packlist by any subsequent write() will be a simple filename.  If the value is a hash, the entry written will be the filename followed by
       the key=value pairs from the hash.  Reading back the .packlist will recreate the original entries.

FUNCTIONS

       new()
	   This takes an optional parameter, the name of a .packlist.  If the file exists, it will be opened and the contents of the file will be
	   read.  The new() method returns a reference to a hash.  This hash holds an entry for each line in the .packlist.  In the case of old-
	   style .packlists, the value associated with each key is undef.  In the case of new-style .packlists, the value associated with each key
	   is a hash containing the key=value pairs following the filename in the .packlist.

       read()
	   This takes an optional parameter, the name of the .packlist to be read.  If no file is specified, the .packlist specified to new() will
	   be read.  If the .packlist does not exist, Carp::croak will be called.

       write()
	   This takes an optional parameter, the name of the .packlist to be written.  If no file is specified, the .packlist specified to new()
	   will be overwritten.

       validate()
	   This checks that every file listed in the .packlist actually exists.  If an argument which evaluates to true is given, any missing
	   files will be removed from the internal hash.  The return value is a list of the missing files, which will be empty if they all exist.

       packlist_file()
	   This returns the name of the associated .packlist file

EXAMPLE

       Here's "modrm", a little utility to cleanly remove an installed module.

	   #!/usr/local/bin/perl -w

	   use strict;
	   use IO::Dir;
	   use ExtUtils::Packlist;
	   use ExtUtils::Installed;

	   sub emptydir($) {
	       my ($dir) = @_;
	       my $dh = IO::Dir->new($dir) || return(0);
	       my @count = $dh->read();
	       $dh->close();
	       return(@count == 2 ? 1 : 0);
	   }

	   # Find all the installed packages
	   print("Finding all installed modules...
");
	   my $installed = ExtUtils::Installed->new();

	   foreach my $module (grep(!/^Perl$/, $installed->modules())) {
	      my $version = $installed->version($module) || "???";
	      print("Found module $module Version $version
");
	      print("Do you want to delete $module? [n] ");
	      my $r = <STDIN>; chomp($r);
	      if ($r && $r =~ /^y/i) {
		 # Remove all the files
		 foreach my $file (sort($installed->files($module))) {
		    print("rm $file
");
		    unlink($file);
		 }
		 my $pf = $installed->packlist($module)->packlist_file();
		 print("rm $pf
");
		 unlink($pf);
		 foreach my $dir (sort($installed->directory_tree($module))) {
		    if (emptydir($dir)) {
		       print("rmdir $dir
");
		       rmdir($dir);
		    }
		 }
	      }
	   }

AUTHOR

       Alan Burlison <Alan.Burlison@uk.sun.com>

POD ERRORS

       Hey! The above document had some coding errors, which are explained below:

       Around line 39:
	   =back without =over

perl v5.12.1							    2010-07-01						   ExtUtils::Packlist(3pm)