README

NAME
    Class::Accessor::Inherited::XS - Fast XS inherited, object and class
    accessors

SYNOPSIS
      # install accessors at compile time
      use Class::Accessor::Inherited::XS 
          package      => 'Pkg', # optionally install into another package
          constructor  => 'new', # object constructor name
          inherited    => 'foo', # inherited accessor for class/object
          object       => 'foo', # non-inherited simple object accessor
          varclass     => 'foo', # non-inherited accessor for __PACKAGE__,  aliased with '$__PACKAGE__::foo' variable
          class        => 'foo', # non-inherited anonymous accessor for __PACKAGE__
      ;
  
      use Class::Accessor::Inherited::XS {  # optional braces
          inherited => {foo => 'foo_key'},  # change package variable/hash key
          object    => {foo => 'foo_key'},  # change hash key
          class_ro  => {foo => $default},   # class_ro, varclass_ro, class, varclass set default values instead
          class     => {foo => $subref},    # lazy accessor initializer
          varclass  => ['foo', 'bar'],      # provide a list of accessor names
          accessors => ['foo'],             # alias for 'object'
          getters   => ['foo'],             # alias for 'object_ro'
      };

      # Or if you prefer a Class::Accessor::Grouped-like interface, you can do it
      # at run time. Note that this is not recommended and provides limited feature set.
      use parent 'Class::Accessor::Inherited::XS::Compat';

      __PACKAGE__->mk_inherited_accessors('foo', [bar => 'bar_key']);
      __PACKAGE__->mk_class_accessors('foo');
      __PACKAGE__->mk_varclass_accessors('foo');
      __PACKAGE__->mk_object_accessors('foo');

DESCRIPTION
    This module provides a very fast implementation for a wide range of
    accessor types.

    inherited accessors have been introduced by Class::Accessor::Grouped.
    They allow you to override values set in a parent class with values set
    in childs or object instances. This module tries to be compatible with
    Class::Accessor::Grouped as much as possible.

    Since this module focuses primary on speed, it provides no means to have
    your own per-class getters/setters logic (like overriding
    "get_inherited" in Class::Accessor::Grouped / "set_inherited" in
    Class::Accessor::Grouped), but it allows you to create new inherited
    accesor types with an attached callback.

    class and varclass accessors are non-inherited package accessors - they
    return values from the class they were defined in, even when called on
    objects or child classes. The difference between them is that the
    varclass internal storage is a package variable with the same name,
    while class stores it's value in an anonymous variable.

    object accessors provides plain simple hash key access.

    class_ro, varclass_ro, inherited_ro, object_ro are readonly counterparts
    for correspoding accessors without _ro suffix. They behave exactly the
    same except that they will croak upon a call with arguments. To set
    values for such accessors, you can write to either corresponding package
    variable or a hash key. ro_class accessor has no externally accessible
    storage, but you can provide a default value for it using hash
    initializer syntax.

    lazy accessors do not have their own keyword but, instead, if you pass a
    subref as a default argument to any one of the package accessors'
    family, it's not stored as-is, but is called instead upon the first
    accessor read and it's return value is stored. After that, lazy accessor
    becomes a normal one of the same type. Calling an accessor as a setter
    before first getter will loose it's defaultness (unless, of course, it's
    a readonly one).

    constructor can create objects either from a list or from a single
    hashref. Note that if you pass a hash reference, it becomes blessed too.
    If that's not what you want, pass a dereferenced copy. As a special
    case, passing a single undef returns you an empty object.

        __PACKAGE__->new(foo => 1, bar => 2); # values are copied
        __PACKAGE__->new(\%args);             # values are not copied, much faster
        $obj->new(foo => 1, bar => 2);        # values are copied, but nothing is taken from $obj
        $obj->new(\%args);                    # values are not copied, and nothing is taken from $obj

UTF-8 AND BINARY SAFETY
    Starting with the perl 5.16.0, this module provides full support for
    UTF-8 method names and hash keys. But on older perls you can't
    distinguish UTF-8 strings from bytes string in method names, so
    accessors with UTF-8 names can end up getting a wrong value. You have
    been warned.

    Also, starting from 5.16.0 accessor installation is binary safe, except
    for the Windows platform. This module croaks on attempts to install
    binary accessors on unsupported platforms.

THREADS
    Though highly discouraged, perl threads are supported by
    Class::Accessor::Inherited::XS. You can have accessors with same names
    pointing to different keys in different threads, etc. There are no known
    conceptual leaks.

PERFORMANCE
    Class::Accessor::Inherited::XS is at least 10x times faster than
    Class::Accessor::Grouped, depending on your usage pattern. Inherited
    accessors have constant speed even in large inheritance chains. Object
    accessors are even faster than Class::XSAccessor ones.

    Accessors with just an empty sub callback are ~3x times slower then
    normal ones, so use them only when absolutely necessary.

    You can see some benchmarks by running bench/bench.pl

EXTENDING
        package MyAccessor;
        # 'register_type' isn't exported
        use Class::Accessor::Inherited::XS::Constants;
        Class::Accessor::Inherited::XS::register_type(
            inherited_cb => {on_read => sub {}, on_write => sub{}, opts => $bitset},
        );

        package MyClass;
        use MyAccessor;
        use Class::Accessor::Inherited::XS {
            inherited    => ['foo'],
            inherited_cb => ['bar'],
        };

    You can register new inherited accessor types with associated read/write
    callbacks. Unlike Class::Accessor::Grouped, only a single callback can
    be set for a type, without per-class get_$type/set_$type lookups. You
    can omit either on_read or on_write if you don't need it to avoid
    performance losses from associated call.

    on_read callback receives a single argument - return value from the
    underlying inherited accessor. It's result is the new accessor's return
    value (and it isn't stored anywhere).

    on_write callback receives original accessor's arguments, and it's
    return value is stored as usual. Exceptions thrown from this callback
    will cancel store and will leave old value unchanged.

    You can specify additional flags with the 'opts' key. Currently only
    IsNamed is supported - with it the accessor callback is invoked with
    it's name passed as an additional argument. This can be useful when
    creating a proxy.

PROFILING WITH Devel::NYTProf
    To perform it's task, Devel::NYTProf hooks into the perl interpreter by
    replacing default behaviour for subroutine calls at the opcode level. To
    squeeze last bits of performance, Class::Accessor::Inherited::XS does
    the same, but separately on each call site of its accessors. It turns
    out into CAIX favor - Devel::NYTProf sees only the first call to CAIX
    accessor, but all subsequent ones become invisible to the subs profiler.

    Note that the statement profiler still correctly accounts for the time
    spent on each line, you just don't see time spent in accessors' calls
    separately. That's sometimes OK, sometimes not - you get profile with
    all possible optimizations on, but it's not easy to comprehend.

    Since it's hard to detect Devel::NYTProf (and any other module doing
    such magic) in a portable way (all hail Win32), there's an %ENV switch
    available - you can set CAIXS_DISABLE_ENTERSUB to a true value to
    disable opcode optimizations and get a full subs profile.

CAVEATS
    When using varclass accessors, do not clear or alias
    *__PACKAGE__::accessor glob - that will break aliasing between accessor
    storage and $__PACKAGE__::accessor variable. While the stored value is
    still accessible through accessor, it effectively becomes a class one.

SEE ALSO
    *   Class::Accessor::Grouped

    *   Class::XSAccessor

COPYRIGHT AND LICENSE
    Copyright (C) 2009 by Vladimir Timofeev

    Copyright (C) 2014-2018 by Sergey Aleynikov

    This library is free software; you can redistribute it and/or modify it
    under the same terms as Perl itself, either Perl version 5.10.1 or, at
    your option, any later version of Perl 5 you may have available.