Check the [functional-perl website](http://functional-perl.org/) for properly formatted versions of these documents. --- # Functional programming in Perl This project aims to make it easier to reduce the number of places in Perl programs where side effects are being used, by providing facilities like data structures to enable it and tutorials and introductions to show good ways to go about it. Side effects (mutation and input/output), unless they are contained locally (transparent to the user of a subroutine/method/API) are not part of the method/subroutine calling interface but are implicit (hopefully at least documented), and such a call has lingering effects, possibly at a distance. This makes tracking down bugs more difficult, and can hinder the reuse of program parts in newly combined ways. Also, code using side effects means re-running it may not be idempotent (hence produce failures) or be calculating different values, which prevents its use in an interactive way, like from a read-eval print loop or debugger, and makes writing tests more difficult. ## Examples Work more comfortably with sequences: use Test::More; use FunctionalPerl ":all"; # includes autoboxing (methods on arrays work) is [2, 3, 4]->reduce(\&add), 9; # the `sum` method does the same is [2, 3, 4]->map(\&square)->sum, 29; Make some XML document: # Generate functions which construct PXML objects (objects that # can be serialized to XML) with the names given her as the XML # tag names: use PXML::Tags qw(myexample protocol-version records record a b c d); # The functions are generated in all-uppercase so as to minimize # the chances for naming conflicts and to let them stand apart. is RECORD(A("hi"), B(""))->string, 'hi<there>'; Now create a bigger document, with its inner parts built from external inputs: MYEXAMPLE (PROTOCOL_VERSION("0.123"), RECORDS (csv_file_to_rows($inpath, {eol=> "\n", sep_char=> ";"}) # skip the header row ->rest # map rows to XML elements ->map(sub { my ($a,$b,$c,$d)= @{$_[0]}; RECORD(A($a), B($b), C($c), D($d)) }))) # print XML document to disk ->xmlfile($outpath); The `MYEXAMPLE` document above is built lazily: `csv_file_to_rows` returns a *lazy* list of rows, `->rest` causes the first CSV row to be read and dropped and returns the remainder of the lazy list, `->map` returns a new lazy list which is passed as argument to `RECORDS`, which returns a `PXML` object representing a 'records' XML element, that is then passed to `MYEXAMPLE` which returns a `PXML` object representing a 'myexample' XML element. `PXML` objects come with an `xmlfile` method which serializes the document to a file, and only while it runs, when it encounters the embedded lazy lists, it walks those evaluating the list items one at a time and dropping each item immediately after printing. This means that only one row of the CSV file needs to be held in memory at any given point. (Note that the example still assumes that steps have been taken so that the CSV file doesn't change until the serialization step has completed, otherwise functional purity is broken; the responsibility to ensure this assumption is left to the programmer (see [[howto#Pure_functions_versus_I/O_and_other_side-effects]] for more details about this).) The core idea of functional programming is the avoidance of mutation. In the absense of mutation, a value, once calculated, stays the same, it is immutable. For example numbers: once a number is calculated you can't modify it in place; if you have multiple variables holding the same number, you can't (on purpose or accidentally) change them both at the same time: my $x= 100; my $y= $x; $x++; is $y, 100; # still true, the number itself didn't change, only the variable The same isn't true for most other values in Perl; they let you modify their internal contents without giving you a new reference. [Here's an example](examples/functional-classes) with a simple object to show the difference. Code that doesn't mutate (pure functions or methods) can be combined easily into new functions, which are still pure and thus can be further combined. `compose` takes any number of function references (coderefs) and returns a new function (coderef) that applies those functions to its argument in turn: # The function that adds all of its arguments together then # squares the result: *square_of_the_sum = compose \&square, \&add; is square_of_the_sum(10,20,2), 1024; # The same but takes the input items from a list instead of # multiple function arguments: *square_of_the_sequence_sum= compose(\&square, the_method "sum"); is square_of_the_sequence_sum(list(2, 3)), 25; Functional programming matters more in the large--with small programs it's easy to keep all places where mutation happens in the head, wheras with large ones the interactions can become unwieldy. See the [examples](examples/README.md) page for more examples. If you'd like to see a practical step-by-step introduction, read the [[intro]]. ## Status: alpha This project is in alpha status because: * Handling of streams (lazy lists) is currently unergonomic since the user has to specify explicitly whether a stream is to be retained (using of `Keep` function) or to be let go (default). Ideally the perl interpreter is extended with a pragma that, when enabled, makes it automatically keep or let go of a value, depending on whether a variable is still used further down (lexical analysis). * The project is currently using some modules which the author developed a long time ago and could be replaced with other existing ones from CPAN (e.g. `Chj::xperlfunc`, `Chj::IO::`). * `FP::Struct` was implemented as a class generator for classes that come with functional setters (setters which don't mutate the objects, but return modified versions). The author also liked to see where a very simple approach may lead to (e.g. use of predicate functions for type checking). The aim was to provide a very easy and concise way to write classes. This is experimental, and may be deprecated in favour of extending existing class generators where needed and using them instead. * The namespaces are not fixed yet (in particular, everything in `Chj::` should probably be renamed); also, the interfaces should be treated as alpha. More abstract types (similar to `FP::Abstract::Sequence`) should be defined. * Get it working correctly first, then fast: some operations aren't efficient yet. There is no functional sequence data structure yet that allows efficient random access, and none for functional hashmaps with efficient updates, but the author has plans to address those. Also the author has plans for implementing mechanisms to make chains of sequence operations (like `$foo->map($bar)->filter($baz)->drop(10)->reverse->drop(5)`) as performant as the imperative equivalent. There is a lot that still needs to be done, and it depends on the author or other people be able and willing to invest the time. (An approach to use this project while avoiding breakage due to future changes could be to add the [functional-perl Github repository](https://github.com/pflanze/functional-perl) as a Git submodule to the project using it and have it access it via `use lib`. Tell if you'd like to see stable branches of older versions with fixes.) ## Parts * `FP::Struct`: a class generator that creates functional setters and accepts predicate functions for type checking (for the reasoning see the [[howto#Object_oriented_functional_programming]]) * [lib/FP/](lib/FP/): a library of pure functions and functional data structures, including various sequences (pure arrays, linked lists and lazy streams). * the "PXML" [functional XML](functional_XML/README.md) "templating system" for XML based markup languages by way of Perl functions. * some developer utilities: `FP::Repl`, `Chj::ruse`, `Chj::Backtrace`, `FP::Repl::Trap`. * [lib/Chj/IO/](lib/Chj/IO/), and its users/wrappers `Chj::xopen`, `Chj::xopendir`, `Chj::xoutpipe`, `Chj::xpipe`, `Chj::xtmpfile`: operations on filehandles that throw exceptions on errors by default, plus many utilities. I wrote these around 15 years ago, as a means to offer IO with exceptions and more features, but in the mean time alternatives have been grown that are probably just as good or better. Do you know which replacements this project should be using? * a few more modules that are used by the above (some originally part of [chj-perllib](https://github.com/pflanze/chj-perllib)) * [Htmlgen](htmlgen/README.md), the tool used to generate this website, built using the above. ## Documentation It probably makes sense to look through the docs roughly in the given order, but if you can't follow the presentation, skip to the intro, likewise if you're bored skip ahead to the examples and the howto/design documents. * [__Introduction to using the functional-perl modules__](//intro.md) This is the latest documentation addition (thus has the best chance of being up to date), and is aiming to give a pretty comprehensive overview which doesn't require you to read the other docs first. Some of the info here is duplicated (in more detail) in the other documents. If this is too long, take a look at the presentation below or the example scripts. * [__Presentation__](http://functional-perl.org/london.pm-talk/) These are the slides of an introductory presentation, but there's no recording and the slides may not be saying enough for understanding. It's also somewhat outdated. * [__Intro directory__](intro/) The `intro` directory contains scripts introducing the concepts, including the basics of functional programming (work in progress). The scripts are meant to be viewed in this order: 1. [basics](intro/basics) 1. [tailcalls](intro/tailcalls) 1. [more_tailcalls](intro/more_tailcalls) This doesn't go very far yet (todo: add more). Also, please note that `Sub::Call::Tail` is currently broken with newer Perl versions (todo: look into fixing it or whether it is possible to imlement it in a simpler manner). * [__Examples__](examples/README.md) The `examples` directory contains scripts showing off the possibilities. You will probably not understand everything just from looking at these, but they will give an impression. * __Our howto and design documents__ * *[How to write functional programs in Perl 5](docs/howto.md)* is describing the necessary techniques to use the functional style in Perl. (Todo: this may be too difficult for someone who doesn't know anything about functional programming; what to do about it?) * *[The design principles used in the functional-perl library](docs/design.md)* is descibing the organization and ideas behind the code that the functional-perl project offers. * __Book__ If you need a more gentle introduction into the ideas behind functional programming, you may find it in *[Higher-Order Perl](http://hop.perl.plover.com/)* by Mark Jason Dominus. This book was written long before the functional-perl project was started, and does various details differently. Please ask [me](http://leafpair.com/contact) if you'd like to meet up in London, Berlin or Switzerland to get an introduction in person. ## Dependencies * to use `bin/repl` or the repl in the intro and examples scripts interactively, `Term::ReadLine::Gnu` and `PadWalker` (and optionally `Eval::WithLexicals` if you want to use the :m/:M modes, and `Capture::Tiny` to see code definition location information and `Sub::Util` to see function names when displaying code refs.) * to run the test suite: `Test::Requires` * to run all the tests (otherwise some are skipped): in addition to the above, `Test::Pod::Snippets`, `BSD::Resource`, `Method::Signatures`, `Function::Parameters`, `Sub::Call::Tail`, `Text::CSV`, `DBD::CSV`, `Text::CSV`, `URI`, `Text::Markdown`, `Clone`. Some of these are also necessary to run `htmlgen/gen` (or `website/gen` to build the website), see [Htmlgen](htmlgen/README.md) for details. (Todo: should all of the above be listed in PREREQ_PM in Makefile.PL?) ## Installation ### From CPAN Use your preferred CPAN installer, for example: `cpan FunctionalPerl` ### From the Git repository git clone https://github.com/pflanze/functional-perl.git cd functional-perl # to get the latest release, which is $FP_COMMITS_DIFFERENCE behind master: git checkout -b $FP_VERSION_UNDERSCORES $FP_VERSION # to verify the same against MitM attacks: gpg --recv-key 04EDB072 git tag -v $FP_VERSION # You'll find various pages in search engines with my fingerprint, # or you may find a trust path through one of the signatures on my # older key 1FE692DA, that this one is signed with. The bundled scripts modify the library load path to find the files locally, thus no installation is necessary. All modules are in the `lib/` directory, `export PERL5LIB=path/to/functional-perl/lib` is all that's needed. To install, run the usual `perl Makefile.PL; make test && make install`. (The repository might be split into producing several separate CPAN packages (or even repositories?) in the future, thus don't rely too much on the installation process continuing to work the way it is right now.) ## Reporting bugs, finding help, contributing * Report bugs via either: * the [Github project](https://github.com/pflanze/functional-perl) * the "Issues" link on the the distribution's [CPAN page](https://metacpan.org/pod/FunctionalPerl). * Find IRC and contact details on the [[mailing_list]] and [[contact]] pages. Check the [[design]] page to get an idea about the design principles if you'd like to write code to contribute.