"Use" the Perl file that h2ph generated from a C header? - c

Question

The h2ph utility generates a .ph "Perl header" file from a C header file, but what is the best way to use this file? Like, should it be require or use?:
require 'myconstants.ph';
# OR
use myconstants; # after mv myconstants.ph myconstants.pm
# OR, something else?
Right now, I am doing the use version shown above, because with that one I never need to type parentheses after the constant. I want to type MY_CONSTANT and not MY_CONSTANT(), and I have use strict and use warnings in effect in the Perl files where I need the constants.
It's a bit strange though to do a use with this file since it doesn't have a module name declared, and it doesn't seem to be particularly intended to be a module.
I have just one file I am running through h2ph, not a hundred or anything.
I've looked at perldoc h2ph, but it didn't mention the subject of the intended mechanism of import at all.
Example input and output: For further background, here's an example input file and what h2ph generates from it:
// File myconstants.h
#define MY_CONSTANT 42
...
# File myconstants.ph - generated via h2ph -d . myconstants.h
require '_h2ph_pre.ph';
no warnings qw(redefine misc);
eval 'sub MY_CONSTANT () {42;}' unless defined(&MY_CONSTANT);
1;
Problem example: Here's an example of "the problem," where I need to use parentheses to get the code to compile with use strict:
use strict;
use warnings;
require 'myconstants.ph';
sub main {
print "Hello world " . MY_CONSTANT; # error until parentheses are added
}
main;
which produces the following error:
Bareword "MY_CONSTANT" not allowed while "strict subs" in use at main.pl line 7.
Execution of main.pl aborted due to compilation errors.
Conclusion: So is there a better or more typical way that this is used, as far as following best practices for importing a file like myconstants.ph? How would Larry Wall do it?

Answer 1

You should require your file. As you have discovered, use accepts only a bareword module name, and it is wrong to rename myconstants.ph to have a .pm suffix just so that use works.
The choice of use or require makes no difference to whether parentheses are needed when you use a constant in your code. The resulting .ph file defines constants in the same way as the constant module, and all you need in the huge majority of cases is the bare identifier. One exception to this is when you are using the constant as a hash key, when
my %hash = { CONSTANT => 99 }
my $val = $hash{CONSTANT}
doesn't work, as you are using the string CONSTANT as a key. Instead, you must write
my %hash = { CONSTANT() => 99 }
my $val = $hash{CONSTANT()}
You may also want to wrap your require inside a BEGIN block, like this
BEGIN {
require 'myconstants.ph';
}
to make sure that the values are available to all other parts of your code, including anything in subsequent BEGIN blocks.

Answer 2

The problem does somewhat lie in the require.
Since require is a statement that will be evaluated at run-time, it cannot have any effect on the parsing of the latter part of the script. So when perl reads through the MY_CONSTANT in the print statement, it does not even know the existence of the subroutine, and will parse it as a bareword.
It is the same for eval.
One solution, as mentioned by others, is to put it into a BEGIN block. Alternatively, you may forward-delcare it by yourself:
require 'some-file';
sub MY_CONSTANT;
print 'some text' . MY_CONSTANT;
Finally, from my perspective, I have not ever used any ph files in my Perl programming.