Perl completion

Perl completion

[Dominic Mitchell]

I've just noticed in _perl that it only completes *.p[ml].  Is there a
way that I can change this using zstyle somehow?  I would like to also
complete '*.t' files too (perl tests).

I've had a look at the docs, but I'm still not entirely clear on how
things hang together, I'm afraid...

Thanks,
-Dom

Re: Perl completion

[Dominic Mitchell]

On Fri, May 09, 2003 at 03:02:06PM +0100, Dominic Mitchell wrote:
> I've just noticed in _perl that it only completes *.p[ml].  Is there a
> way that I can change this using zstyle somehow?  I would like to also
> complete '*.t' files too (perl tests).
> 
> I've had a look at the docs, but I'm still not entirely clear on how
> things hang together, I'm afraid...

Doh.  It's always after you send the mail you find the answer...

zstyle ':completion:*:complete:perl:*' file-patterns \
    '*.(p[ml]|t):perl-files' '%p:all-files'

My apologies,
-Dom

Re: Perl completion

[Paul Johnson]

dom@happygiraffe.net said:

> On Fri, May 09, 2003 at 03:02:06PM +0100, Dominic Mitchell wrote:
>> I've just noticed in _perl that it only completes *.p[ml].

Which is actually wrong, I think.

.pm files are Perl modules and shouldn't be directly executed, although
that would be valid after -c to check the syntax.

.pl files are officially Perl libraries, and again they shouldn't be
directly executed.  Many people do use .pl as an extension for Perl
programs, though if an extension is required, .plx is recommended.

Many people don't use an extension at all.  Some standard Perl programs
have other extensions such as .t (tests) or .PL (often used in build
processes).

It seems to me that it would be better not to pay any heed to the extension.

-- 
Paul Johnson - paul@pjcj.net
http://www.pjcj.net

Re: Perl completion

[Bart Schaefer]

On May 9,  5:36pm, Paul Johnson wrote:
} 
} >> I've just noticed in _perl that it only completes *.p[ml].
} 
} Which is actually wrong, I think.

It's not precisely wrong, it's just that _perl isn't as clever as it
could be.  It doesn't use the state-machine mechanism for _arguments,
so it doesn't complete differently when -c is [not] among the flags.
It's easier to skip the .pm files when they appear in the completion
listing when they aren't useful, than to know they're available if they
don't appear when you want them.

} It seems to me that it would be better not to pay any heed to the
} extension.

I can't agree with that.  `perl foo<TAB>' should not complete `foo.c' or
`foo.sh' etc.  On the other hand it probably should recognize names with
no extension, such as `foobar'.