=head1 DESCRIPTION
This document describes differences between the 5.10.0 and the 5.11.0
-developement releases.
+development releases.
=head1 Incompatible Changes
+=head2 Switch statement changes
+
+The handling of complex expressions by the C<given>/C<when> switch
+statement has been enhanced. There are two new cases where C<when> now
+interprets its argument as a boolean, instead of an expression to be used
+in a smart match:
+
+=over 4
+
+=item flip-flop operators
+
+The C<..> and C<...> flip-flop operators are now evaluated in boolean
+context, following their usual semantics; see L<perlop/"Range Operators">.
+
+Note that, as in perl 5.10.0, C<when (1..10)> will not work to test
+whether a given value is an integer between 1 and 10; you should use
+C<when ([1..10])> instead (note the array reference).
+
+However, contrary to 5.10.0, evaluating the flip-flop operators in boolean
+context ensures it can now be useful in a C<when()>, notably for
+implementing bistable conditions, like in:
+
+ when (/^=begin/ .. /^=end/) { ... }
+
+=item defined-or operator
+
+A compound expression involving the defined-or operator, as in
+C<when (expr1 // expr2)>, will be treated as boolean if the first
+expression is boolean. (This just extends the existing rule that applies
+to the regular or operator, as in C<when (expr1 || expr2)>.)
+
+=back
+
+The next section details more changes brought to the semantics to
+the smart match operator, that naturally also modify the behaviour
+of the switch statements where smart matching is implicitly used.
+
+=head2 Smart match changes
+
+=head3 Changes to type-based dispatch
+
+The smart match operator C<~~> is no longer commutative. The behaviour of
+a smart match now depends primarily on the type of its right hand
+argument. Moreover, its semantics has been adjusted for greater
+consistency or usefulness in several cases. While the general backwards
+compatibility is maintained, several changes must be noted:
+
+=over 4
+
+=item *
+
+Code references with an empty prototype are no longer treated specially.
+They are passed an argument like the other code references (even if they
+choose to ignore it).
+
+=item *
+
+C<%hash ~~ sub {}> and C<@array ~~ sub {}> now test that the subroutine
+returns a true value for each key of the hash (or element of the
+array), instead of passing the whole hash or array as a reference to
+the subroutine.
+
+=item *
+
+Due to the commutativity breakage, code references are no longer
+treated specially when appearing on the left of the C<~~> operator,
+but like any vulgar scalar.
+
+=item *
+
+C<undef ~~ %hash> is always false (since C<undef> can't be a key in a
+hash). No implicit conversion to C<""> is done (as was the case in perl
+5.10.0).
+
+=item *
+
+C<$scalar ~~ @array> now always distributes the smart match across the
+elements of the array. It's true if one element in @array verifies
+C<$scalar ~~ $element>. This is a generalization of the old behaviour
+that tested whether the array contained the scalar.
+
+=back
+
+The full dispatch table for the smart match operator is given in
+L<perlsyn/"Smart matching in detail">.
+
+=head3 Smart match and overloading
+
+According to the rule of dispatch based on the rightmost argument type,
+when an object overloading C<~~> appears on the right side of the
+operator, the overload routine will always be called (with a 3rd argument
+set to a true value, see L<overload>.) However, when the object will
+appear on the left, the overload routine will be called only when the
+rightmost argument is a simple scalar. This way distributivity of smart match
+across arrays is not broken, as well as the other behaviours with complex
+types (coderefs, hashes, regexes). Thus, writers of overloading routines
+for smart match mostly need to worry only with comparing against a scalar,
+and possibly with stringification overloading; the other common cases
+will be automatically handled consistently.
+
+C<~~> will now refuse to work on objects that do not overload it (in order
+to avoid relying on the object's underlying structure). (However, if the
+object overloads the stringification or the numification operators, and
+if overload fallback is active, it will be used instead, as usual.)
+
=head1 Core Enhancements
+=head2 The C<overloading> pragma
+
+This pragma allows you to lexically disable or enable overloading
+for some or all operations. (Yuval Kogman)
+
+=head2 C<\N> regex escape
+
+A new regex escape has been added, C<\N>. It will match any character that
+is not a newline, independently from the presence or absence of the single
+line match modifier C</s>. (If C<\N> is followed by an opening brace and
+by a letter, perl will still assume that a Unicode character name is
+coming, so compatibility is preserved.) (Rafael Garcia-Suarez)
+
+=head2 Implicit strictures
+
+Using the C<use VERSION> syntax with a version number greater or equal
+to 5.11.0 will also lexically enable strictures just like C<use strict>
+would do (in addition to enabling features.) So, the following:
+
+ use 5.11.0;
+
+will now imply:
+
+ use strict;
+ use feature ':5.11';
+
+=head2 Parallel tests
+
+The core distribution can now run its regression tests in parallel on
+Unix-like platforms. Instead of running C<make test>, set C<TEST_JOBS> in
+your environment to the number of tests to run in parallel, and run
+C<make test_harness>. On a Bourne-like shell, this can be done as
+
+ TEST_JOBS=3 make test_harness # Run 3 tests in parallel
+
+An environment variable is used, rather than parallel make itself, because
+L<TAP::Harness> needs to be able to schedule individual non-conflicting test
+scripts itself, and there is no standard interface to C<make> utilities to
+interact with their job schedulers.
+
=head1 Modules and Pragmata
+=head2 Pragmata Changes
+
+=over 4
+
+=item C<overloading>
+
+See L</"The C<overloading> pragma"> above.
+
+=back
+
+=head2 Selected Changes to Core Modules
+
+=over 4
+
+L<Carp> now includes all the necessary code to function. Previously, it
+used to be a lightweight placeholder that loaded the actual code from
+C<Carp::Heavy> on demand. C<Carp::Heavy> is now a simple, empty module
+kept for backwards compatibility for programs that used to pre-load it.
+
+=back
+
=head1 Utility Changes
=head1 Documentation
=head1 Selected Bug Fixes
+=over 4
+
+=item C<-I> on shebang line now adds directories in front of @INC
+
+as documented, and as does C<-I> when specified on the command-line.
+(Renée Bäcker)
+
+=item C<kill> is now fatal when called on non-numeric process identifiers
+
+Previously, an 'undef' process identifier would be interpreted as a request to
+kill process "0", which would terminate the current process group on POSIX
+systems. Since process identifiers are always integers, killing a non-numeric
+process is now fatal.
+
+=back
+
=head1 New or Changed Diagnostics
=head1 Changed Internals
output of C<perl -V>, will be sent off to perlbug@perl.org to be
analysed by the Perl porting team.
+If the bug you are reporting has security implications, which make it
+inappropriate to send to a publicly archived mailing list, then please send
+it to perl5-security-report@perl.org. This points to a closed subscription
+unarchived mailing list, which includes all the core committers, who be able
+to help assess the impact of issues, figure out a resolution, and help
+co-ordinate the release of patches to mitigate or fix the problem across all
+platforms on which Perl is supported. Please only use this address for security
+issues in the Perl core, not for modules independently distributed on CPAN.
+
=head1 SEE ALSO
The F<Changes> file for exhaustive details on what changed.
projects / p5sagit/p5-mst-13.2.git / blobdiff