3 Catalyst::Delta - Overview of changes between versions of Catalyst
7 This is an overview of the user-visible changes to Catalyst between major
10 =head2 VERSION 5.90094
12 =head3 Multipart form POST with character set headers
14 When we did the UTF8 work, we punted on Form POSTs when the POST envelope was
15 multipart and each part had complex headers such as content-types, character
16 sets and so forth. In those cases instead of returning a possibly incorrect
17 value, we returned an object describing the part so that you could figure it
18 out manually. This turned out to be a bad workaround as people did not expect
19 to find that object. So we changed this to try much harder to get a correct
20 value. We still return an object if we fail but we try much harder now. If
21 you used to check for the object you might find that code is no longer needed
22 (although checking for it should not hurt or break anything either).
24 =head2 VERSION 5.90091
26 =head3 'case_sensitive' configuration
28 At one point in time we allowed you to set a 'case_sensitive' configuraion value so
29 that you could find actions by their private names using mixed case. We highly
30 discourage that. If you are using this 'feature' you should be on notice that we
31 plan to remove the code around it in the near future.
33 =head2 VERSION 5.90090+
35 =head3 Type constraints on Args and CaptureArgs.
37 You may now use a type constraint (using L<Moose>, L<MooseX::Types> or preferably
38 L<Type::Tiny> in your Args or CaptureArgs action attributes. This can be used
39 to restrict the value of the Arg. For example:
41 sub myaction :Local Args(Int) { ... }
43 Would match '.../myaction/5' but not '.../myaction/string'.
45 When an action (or action chain) has Args (or CaptureArgs) that declare type constraints
46 your arguments to $c->uri_for(...) must match those constraints.
48 See L<Catalyst::RouteMatching> for more.
50 =head3 Move CatalystX::InjectComponent into core
52 L<Catalyst::Utils> has a new method 'inject_component' which works the same as the method of
53 the same name in L<CatalystX::InjectComponent>.
55 =head3 inject_components
57 New configuration key allows you to inject components directly into your application without
58 any subclasses. For example:
61 inject_components => {
62 'Controller::Err' => { from_component => 'Local::Controller::Errors' },
63 'Model::Zoo' => { from_component => 'Local::Model::Foo' },
64 'Model::Foo' => { from_component => 'Local::Model::Foo', roles => ['TestRole'] },
66 'Controller::Err' => { a => 100, b=>200, namespace=>'error' },
67 'Model::Zoo' => { a => 2 },
68 'Model::Foo' => { a => 100 },
71 Injected components are useful to reduce the ammount of nearly empty boilerplate classes
72 you might have, particularly when first starting an application.
74 =head3 Component setup changes.
76 Previously you could not depend on an application scoped component doing setup_components
77 since components were setup 'in order'. Now all components are first registered and then
78 setup, so you can now reliably use any component doing setup_components.
80 =head2 VERSION 5.90080+
82 The biggest change in this release is that UTF8 encoding is now enabled by
83 default. So you no longer need any plugins (such as L<Catalyst::Plugin::Unicode::Encoding>)
84 which you can just no go ahead and remove. You also don't need to set
85 the encoding configuration (__PACKAGE__->config(encoding=>'UTF-8')) anymore
86 as well (although its presence hurts nothing).
88 If this change causes you trouble, you can disable it:
90 __PACKAGE__->config(encoding=>undef);
92 For further information, please see L<Catalyst::UTF8>
94 But please report bugs. You will find that a number of common Views have been
95 updated for this release (such as L<Catalyst::View::TT>). In all cases that the
96 author is aware of these updates were to fix test cases only. You shouldn't
97 need to update unless you are installing fresh and want tests to pass.
99 L<Catalyst::Plugin::Compress> was updated to be compatible with this release.
100 You will need to upgrade if you are using this plugin. L<Catalyst::Upgrading>
103 A small change is that the configuration setting C<using_frontend_proxy>
104 was not doing the right thing if you started your application with C<psgi_app>
105 and did not apply the default middleware. This setting is now honored in
106 all the ways an application may be started. This could cause trouble if you
107 are using the configuration value and also adding the proxy middleware
108 manually with a custom application startup. The solution is that you only
109 need the configuration value set, or the middleware manually added (not both).
111 =head2 VERSION 5.90060+
113 =head3 Catalyst::Log object autoflush on by default
115 Starting in 5.90065, the Catalyst::Log object has 'autoflush' which is on
116 by default. This causes all messages to be written to the log immediately
117 instead of at the end of startup and then at the end of each request. In
118 order to access the old behavior, you must now call:
120 $c->log->autoflush(0);
122 =head3 Deprecate Catalyst::Utils::ensure_class_loaded
124 Going forward we recommend you use L<Module::Runtime>. In fact we will
125 be converting all uses of L<Class::Load> to L<Module::Runtime>. We will
126 also convert L<Catalyst::Utils\ensure_class_loaded> to be based on
127 L<Module::Runtime> to allow some time for you to update code, however at
128 some future point this method will be removed so you should stop
131 =head3 Support passing Body filehandles directly to your Plack server.
133 We changed the way we return body content (from response) to whatever
134 Plack handler you are using (Starman, FastCGI, etc.) We no longer
135 always use the streaming interface for the cases when the body is a
136 simple scalar, object or filehandle like. In those cases we now just
137 pass the simple response on to the plack handler. This might lead to
138 some minor differences in how streaming is handled. For example, you
139 might notice that streaming starts properly supporting chunked encoding when
140 on a server that supports that, or that previously missing headers
141 (possible content-length) might appear suddenly correct. Also, if you
142 are using middleware like L<Plack::Middleware::XSendfile> and are using
143 a filehandle that sets a readable path, your server might now correctly
144 handle the file (rather than as before where Catalyst would stream it
145 very likely very slowly).
147 In other words, some things might be meaninglessly different and some
148 things that were broken codewise but worked because of Catalyst being
149 incorrect might suddenly be really broken. The behavior is now more
150 correct in that Catalyst plays better with features that Plack offers
151 but if you are making heavy use of the streaming interface there could
152 be some differences so you should test carefully (this is probably not
153 the vast majority of people). In particular if you are developing
154 using one server but deploying using a different one, differences in
155 what those server do with streaming should be noted.
157 Please see note below about changes to filehandle support and existing
158 Plack middleware to aid in backwards compatibility.
160 =head3 Distinguish between body null versus undef.
162 We also now more carefully distingush the different between a body set
163 to '' and a body that is undef. This might lead to situations where
164 again you'll get a content-length were you didn't get one before or
165 where a supporting server will start chunking output. If this is an
166 issue you can apply the middleware L<Plack::Middleware::BufferedStreaming>
167 or report specific problems to the dev team.
169 =head3 More Catalyst Middleware
171 We have started migrating code in Catalyst to equivilent Plack
172 Middleware when such exists and is correct to do so. For example we now use
173 L<Plack::Middleware::ContentLength> to determine content length of a response
174 when none is provided. This replaces similar code inlined with L<Catalyst>
175 The main advantages to doing this is 1) more similar Catalyst core that is
176 focused on the Catalyst special sauce, 2) Middleware is more broadly shared
177 so we benefit from better collaboration with developers outside Catalyst, 3)
178 In the future you'll be able to change or trim the middleware stack to get
179 additional performance when you don't need all the checks and constraints.
181 =head3 Deprecate Filehandle like objects that do read but not getline
183 We also deprecated setting the response body to an object that does 'read'
184 but not 'getline'. If you are using a custom IO-Handle like object for
185 response you should verify that 'getline' is supported in your interface.
186 Unless we here this case is a major issue for people, we will be removing support
187 in a near future release of Catalyst. When the code encounters this it
188 will issue a warning. You also may run into this issue with L<MogileFS::Client>
189 which does read but not getline. For now we will just warn when encountering
190 such an object and fallback to the previous behavior (where L<Catalyst::Engine>
191 itself unrolls the filehandle and performs blocking streams). However
192 this backwards compatibility will be removed in an upcoming release so you should either
193 rewrite your custom filehandle objects to support getline or start using the
194 middleware that adapts read for getline L<Plack::Middleware::AdaptFilehandleRead>.
196 =head3 Response->headers become read-only after finalizing
198 Once the response headers are finalized, trying to change them is not allowed
199 (in the past you could change them and this would lead to unexpected results).
201 =head3 Officially deprecate L<Catalyst::Engine::PSGI>
203 L<Catalyst::Engine::PSGI> is also officially no longer supported. We will
204 no long run test cases against this and can remove backwards compatibility code for it
205 as deemed necessary for the evolution of the platform. You should simply
206 discontinue use of this engine, as L<Catalyst> has been PSGI at the core for
209 =head3 Officially deprecate finding the PSGI $env anyplace other than Request
211 A few early releases of Cataplack had the PSGI $env in L<Catalyst::Engine>.
212 Code has been maintained here for backwards compatibility reasons. This is no
213 longer supported and will be removed in upcoming release, so you should update
214 your code and / or upgrade to a newer version of L<Catalyst>
216 =head3 Deprecate setting Response->body after using write/write_fh
218 Setting $c->res->body to a filehandle after using $c->res->write or
219 $c->res->write_fh is no longer considered allowed, since we can't send
220 the filehandle to the underlying Plack handler. For now we will continue
221 to support setting body to a simple value since this is possible, but at
222 some future release a choice to use streaming indicates that you will do
223 so for the rest of the request.
226 =head2 VERSION 5.90053
228 We are now clarifying the behavior of log, plugins and configuration during
229 the setup phase. Since Plugins might require a log during setup, setup_log
230 must run BEFORE setup_plugins. This has the unfortunate side effect that
231 anyone using the popular ConfigLoader plugin will not be able to supply
232 configuration to custom logs since the configuration is not yet finalized
233 when setup_log is run (when using ConfigLoader, which is a plugin and is
234 not loaded until later.)
236 As a workaround, you can supply custom log configuration directly into
243 my_custom_log_info => { %custom_args },
248 If you wish to configure the custom logger differently based on ENV, you can
257 Catalyst::Utils::merge_hashes(
258 +{ my_custom_log_info => { %base_custom_args } },
259 +{ do __PACKAGE__->path_to( $ENV{WHICH_CONF}."_conf.pl") },
265 Or create a standalone Configuration class that does the right thing.
267 Basically if you want to configure a logger via Catalyst global configuration
268 you can't use ConfigLoader because it will always be loaded too late to be of
269 any use. Patches and workaround options welcomed!
271 =head2 VERSION 5.9XXXX 'cataplack'
273 The Catalyst::Engine sub-classes have all been removed and deprecated,
274 to be replaced with Plack handlers.
276 Plack is an implementation of the L<PSGI> specification, which is
277 a standard interface between web servers and application frameworks.
279 This should be no different for developers, and you should not have to
280 migrate your applications unless you are using a custom engine already.
282 This change benefits Catalyst significantly by reducing the amount of
283 code inside the framework, and means that the framework gets upstream
284 bug fixes in L<Plack>, and automatically gains support for any web server
285 which a L<PSGI> compliant handler is written for.
287 It also allows you more flexibility with your application, and allows
288 the use of cross web framework 'middleware'.
290 Developers are recommended to read L<Catalyst::Upgrading> for notes about
291 upgrading, especially if you are using an unusual deployment method.
293 Documentation for how to take advantage of L<PSGI> can be found in
294 L<Catalyst::PSGI>, and information about deploying your application
295 has been moved to L<Catalyst::Manual::Deployment>.
297 =head3 Updated modules:
299 A number of modules have been updated to pass their tests or not
300 produce deprecation warnings with the latest version of Catalyst.
301 It is recommended that you upgrade any of these that you are using
302 after installing this version of Catalyst.
304 These extensions are:
308 =item L<Catalyst::Engine::HTTP::Prefork>
310 This is now deprecated, see L<Catalyst::Upgrading>.
312 =item L<Test::WWW::Mechanize::Catalyst>
314 Has been updated to not produce deprecation warnings, upgrade recommended.
316 =item Catalyst::ActionRole::ACL
318 Has been updated to fix failing tests (although older versions still
319 function perfectly with this version of Catalyst).
321 =item Catalyst::Plugin::Session::Store::DBIC
323 Has been updated to fix failing tests (although older versions still
324 function perfectly with this version of Catalyst).
326 =item Catalyst::Plugin::Authentication
328 Has been updated to fix failing tests (although older versions still
329 function perfectly with this version of Catalyst).
333 =head1 PREVIOUS VERSIONS
335 =head2 VERSION 5.8XXXX 'catamoose'
339 Please see L<Catalyst::Upgrading> for a full description of how changes in the
340 framework may affect your application.
342 Below is a brief list of features which have been deprecated in this release:
346 =item ::[MVC]:: style naming scheme has been deprecated and will warn
348 =item NEXT is deprecated for all applications and components, use MRO::Compat
350 =item Dispatcher methods which are an implementation detail made private, public versions now warn.
352 =item MyApp->plugin method is deprecated, use L<Catalyst::Model::Adaptor> instead.
354 =item __PACKAGE__->mk_accessors() is supported for backwards compatibility only, use Moose attributes instead in new code.
356 =item Use of Catalyst::Base now warns
366 =item Fix forwarding to Catalyst::Action objects.
368 =item Add the dispatch_type method
374 The development server restarter has been improved to be compatible with
375 immutable Moose classes, and also to optionally use
376 L<B::Hooks::OP::Check::StashChange> to handle more complex application layouts
379 =head3 $c->uri_for_action method.
381 Give a private path to the Catalyst action you want to create a URI for.
385 Log levels have been made additive.
387 =head3 L<Catalyst::Test>
391 =item Change to use L<Sub::Exporter>.
393 =item Support mocking multiple virtual hosts
395 =item New methods like action_ok and action_redirect to write more compact tests
399 =head3 Catalyst::Response
405 New print method which prints @data to the output stream, separated by $,.
406 This lets you pass the response object to functions that want to write to an
411 Added code method as an alias for C<< $res->status >>
415 =head3 Consequences of the Moose back end
421 Components are fully compatible with Moose, and all Moose features, such as
422 method modifiers, attributes, roles, BUILD and BUILDARGS methods are fully
423 supported and may be used in components and applications.
427 Many reusable extensions which would previously have been plugins or base
428 classes are better implemented as Moose roles.
432 L<MooseX::MethodAttributes::Role::AttrContainer::Inheritable> is used to contain action
433 attributes. This means that attributes are represented in the MOP, and
434 decouples action creation from attributes.
438 There is a reasonable API in Catalyst::Controller for working with
439 and registering actions, allowing a controller sub-class to replace
440 subroutine attributes for action declarations with an alternate
445 Refactored capturing of $app from L<Catalyst::Controller> into
446 L<Catalyst::Component::ApplicationAttribute> for easier reuse in other
451 Your application class is forced to become immutable at the end of compilation.
461 Don't ignore SIGCHLD while handling requests with the development server, so that
462 system() and other ways of creating child processes work as expected.
466 Fixes for FastCGI when used with IIS 6.0
470 Fix a bug in uri_for which could cause it to generate paths with multiple
475 Fix a bug in Catalyst::Stats, stopping garbage being inserted into
476 the stats if a user calls begin => but no end