NAME

Mite - Moose-like OO, fast to load, with zero dependencies.

SYNOPSIS

    $ mite init Foo

    $ cat lib/Foo.pm
    package Foo;

    # Load the Mite shim
    use Foo::Mite;

    # Subclass of Bar
    extends "Bar";

    # A read/write string attribute
    has attribute =>
        is      => 'rw';

    # A read-only attribute with a default
    has another_attribute =>
        is      => 'ro',
        default => 1;

    $ mite compile

DESCRIPTION

Mite provides a subset of Moose features with very fast startup time and zero dependencies.

This release is a proof-of-concept. It is to gather information about the basic premise of a pre-compiled Moose variant and gauge interest. It is missing a lot of features, they'll be added later if Mite proves to be a good idea. What it does have is well tested.

Moose and Mouse are great... unless you can't have any dependencies or compile-time is critical.

Mite provides Moose-like functionality, but it does all the work during development. New source code is written which contains the OO code. Your project does not have to depend on Mite. Nor does your project have to spend time during startup to build OO features.

Mite is for a very narrow set of use cases. Unless you specifically need ultra-fast startup time or zero dependencies, use Moose or Mouse.

How To Use It

1. Install Mite

Only developers must have Mite installed. Install it normally from CPAN.

Do not declare Mite as a dependency. It is not needed to install your release.

2. mite init <Your::Project>

Initialize your project. Tell it your project name.

This will create a .mite directory and a shim file in lib.

3. Write your code using your mite shim.

Instead of use Mite, you should use Your::Project::Mite. The name of this file will depend on the name of your project.

Mite is a subset of Moose.

4. mite compile after each change

Mite is "compiled" in that the code must be processed after editing before you run it. This is done by running mite compile. It will create .mite.pm files for each .pm file in lib.

To make development smoother, we provide utility modules to link Mite with the normal build process. See Mite::MakeMaker and Mite::ModuleBuild for MakeMaker/Makefile.PL and Module::Build/Build.PL development respectively.

5. Make sure the .mite directory is not in your MANIFEST.

The .mite directory should not be shipped with your distribution. Add ^\.mite$ to your MANIFEST.SKIP file.

6. Make sure the mite files are in your MANIFEST.

The compiled .mite.pm files must ship with your code, so make sure they get picked up in your MANIFEST file. This should happen when you build the MANIFEST normally.

7. Ship normally

Build and ship your distribution normally. It contains everything it needs.

FEATURES

Mite is a subset of Moose. These docs will only describe what Moose features are implemented or where they differ. For everything else, please read Moose and Moose::Manual.

has

Supports is, reader, writer, accessor, clearer, predicate, init_arg, required, and default.

(No support yet for lazy, isa, coerce, builder, trigger, or handles.)

extends

Works as in Moose. Options are not implemented.

strict

Mite will turn strict on for you.

warnings

Mite will turn warnings on for you.

OPTIMIZATIONS

Mite writes pure Perl code and your module will run with no dependencies. It will also write code to use other, faster modules to do the same job, if available.

These optimizations can be turned off by setting the MITE_PURE_PERL environment variable true.

You may wish to add these as recommended dependencies.

Class::XSAccessor

Mite will use Class::XSAccessor for accessors if available. They are significantly faster than those written in Perl.

WHY IS THIS

This module exists for a very special set of use cases. Authors of toolchain modules (Test::More, ExtUtils::MakeMaker, File::Spec, etc...) who cannot easily depend on other CPAN modules. It would cause a circular dependency and add instability to CPAN. These authors are frustrated at not being able to use most of the advances in Perl present on CPAN, such as Moose.

To add to their burden, by being used by almost everyone, toolchain modules limit how fast modules can load. So they have to compile very fast. They do not have the luxury of creating attributes and including roles at compile time. It must be baked in.

Use Mite if your project cannot have non-core dependencies or needs to load very quickly.

SEE ALSO

Mouse is a very fast and rather complete subset of Moose with no dependencies.

Moose is the complete Perl 5 OO module which this is all based on.

cpanm Mite

perl -MCPAN -e shell
install Mite