Sam Vilain wrote:
To me it is a trivial case that you want to provide a fake attribute
which for all intents and purposes behaves exactly like there was a real
attribute there, backing against another attribute.
A Date object is a classic example of this; you want to provide 0-based
and 1-based attributes, which you want to present as equivalent to each
other.
FWIW, I think this question also applies to fetching members from a hash
collection.
For example, if you have a function;
sub foo($foo) { $foo || "bar" }
And you call it, passing it a hash slot;
foo(%hash<key>);
Then it will be auto-vivified, as in Perl 5; because a reference to the
slot had to be taken. Actually there is no reference taken; it's a
read-only binding of the hash slot. But either way, it is a read-only
point in the signature that is affecting the input argument, which is
arguably (right^wrong).
By returning a Proxy object 'tied' to the slot, then this autovivification
could be circumvented and the straightforward implementation - passing
bound variables as transparent references, continues to be acceptable.
Albeit requiring that the Hash::postcircumfix:<{ }> method is a Proxy
method, too.
Sam.
