Pugs 6.2.13 released!

audreyt on 2006-10-17T13:32:34

After nearly four months of development and 3400+ commits, I'm very glad to announce that Pugs 6.2.13 is now available:

http://pugs.blogs.com/dist/Perl6-Pugs-6.2.13.tar.gz
SIZE: 6839270
SHA1: b06b8434c64e9bb5e3ab482282fbae0a6ba69218

Motivated by increasing use of Pugs in production, this is an extra release in the 6.2.x series, offering another 200%+ improvement in performance, comprehensive support for interoperability with Perl 5 modules, a built-in grammar engine via native perl5 embedding, and much better support for roles, classes and objects.

The web-based presence of Pugs and Perl 6 has improved as well:

http://run.pugscode.org/ puts the Pugs shell in your browser.
http://spec.pugscode.org/ annotates the Synopses with "smart-linked" tests.
http://smoke.pugscode.org/ annotates that further with fail/pass/todo records.
http://rakudo.org/perl6/ is a Wiki dedicated to collect Perl 6 related information.
http://www.programmersheaven.com/2/Perl6-FAQ offers a comprehensive FAQ on Perl 6.

Thanks again to all lambdacamels on #perl6 for building this new ship together; it is truly an exhilarating voyage. :-)

Have -Ofun!
Audrey

Changes for 6.2.13 (r14402) - October 17, 2006

Build System

Perl 5 embedding is now enabled by default
- For Windows users, Perl 5.8.x is required
- Set the PUGS_EMBED environment variable to noperl5 to disable this

Prompting for Parrot embedding is now disabled by default
- Set the PUGS_EMBED environment variable to parrot to enable this

Support for compiling using GHC 6.6
- GHC 6.4.1+ is still supported, but 6.6 will be required in the next release

Feature Changes

Interactive Shell and Command-Line Flags

New pugs -d flag to display a trace for debugging
The :r command now resets the environment once, not twice
The return value of blocks, such as gather {...}, is displayed correctly
$_ is no longer clobbered with the result of each expression's evaluation

Perl 5 Interoperability

Arrays and Hashes now round-trip from Pugs to Perl 5 land and back
Importing functions from Perl 5: use perl5:CGI <header param>
Passing unboxed values across runtimes no longer leaks memory
When embedding Perl 5.8+, Unicode flag is now on for Pugs-to-Perl5 strings
eval($str, :lang<perl5>) now accepts non-ASCII characters in $str

Lexical Syntax

Capture literals: \($bar: 1, 2, 3, named => 4)
Here-docs now work as specced; also warns against inconsistent indentation
Interpolation of chained calls: "$foo.meth.meth.meth.meth()"
List comprehension: for 0 < list(@x) < 10 {...}
Named character escapes: "\c[LATIN CAPITAL LETTER Y]"
New grammatical category term:, separated from the prefix: category
New magical variables: $?COMPILER and $?VERSION
Parse for LABEL: STMT, although it's currently treated the same as STMT
Pod directives: =begin/=end and =for now terminate without =cut
Pod variables: $=FOO and @=FOO give you access to the Pod section FOO
Quote adverbs no longer take non-parens brackets: rx:P5{...} is valid again
Shell-like quoting rules implemented for << $x "qq" 'q' >>
Signature literals: :($foo is copy = 42, $, @)
Support for UTF-8, UTF-16 and UTF-32 encoded source files
Support for backquotes and qx/.../ for capturing external command output
User-defined infix associativity: sub infix:<foo> is assoc('right') {...}
"\123" and "\03" are now errors; write "\d123" and "\o03" instead
$::x now means exactly the same a $x, instead of $*x
%h<> now means %h{} -- the entire hash, not the empty string as key
($::('x')) with two adjacent closing parens now parses correctly
0_123_456 now parses as 0d123456, not an error
1<2> is now a fatal error: Odd number of elements in Hash
q() and qw() with parentheses are parsed as functions, not quotes

Declarators and Operators

Argument interpolation via prefix | and |<<
Binding to qualified uninitialised symbols: &fully::qualify := sub {...}
Contextual variables are now declared with my $x is context, not env $x
Hyperised reduce operators: [>>+<<] and [\>>+<<]
Implicit invocation assignment: .= uc is parsed as $_ = $_.uc
Mid-block redeclaration no longer allowed: my $x; { $x = 1; my $x = 2 }
Negated comparison operators: !eqv, !=:= etc; !~~ replaces !~
New infix comparison operators: === and eqv
New infix non-short-circuiting boolean AND operator: ?&
Nullary reduction of builtin operators gives identity values: [*]() === 1
Postfix operators can be called with a dot: .++, $x.++, $x.\ ++
Prefix = now iterates on arrays as well: =@array
Short-circuiting chained comparison: 1 > 2 > die('foo') no longer fails
Smart matching against code objects: $obj ~~ { 1 > $_ > 5 }
Smart matching against implicit invocation: $obj ~~ .meth, $obj ~~ .[0]
Typed constraints on autovivification: my Hash $x; $x[0] = 1 now fails
Typed declarations: my Dog $fido, my T ($x, $y)
* is now always a term, never a prefix operator

Blocks and Statements

Implicit invocation in when: when .true {...} , when .<key> {...}
Listops in conditions no longer consume the block: for say {...}
Loop topics are not forced into rw: for 1..3 { $_++ } now fails correctly
New &break and &continue primitives for use within when blocks
New &leave primitive for exiting from the innermost block
New postfix given statement modifier: .say given foo()
Support for FIRST, NEXT, LAST loop control blocks
Support for START, PRE, POST, KEEP, UNDO, ENTER, LEAVE blocks
Support for repeat blocks: repeat {...} while 1, repeat while 1 {...}
Support for the &each list interleaver: for each(@a; @b) -> $x, $y {...}
The for loop no longer double-flattens lists: for %h.pairs -> $p {...}
Topicalisers for if, else, while, given blocks: if EXPR -> $x {...}
Topicalisers for postfix for loop: -> $x {...} for 1,2,3
&last and &redo now work in repeat {...} and loop {...} blocks
&take no longer flattens array literals: take [1,2,3];
&take now works in functions called from within a gather {...} block
BEGIN(...), END(...), etc., are now parsed as calls, not syntax errors
END {...} in .pm files are no longer ignored when executed directly
INIT {...} now works correctly inside eval "..."
do {...} is now a loop block that takes standard loop controls
do {...} with statement modifiers is explicitly disallowed

Regexes and Grammars

Anonymous tokens and rules anchor on both ends: 123 ~~ token{2} is false
New s[...] = EXPR and s[...] = .meth syntax; s[...][...] is deprecated
New tr/// syntax for transliteration; y/// will not be supported
Pugs::Compiler::Rule (PCR) replaces Parrot/PGE as the default engine
Support for :c/:continue, <prior>, and much more: see PCR's ChangeLog
$(), @() and %() parse correctly as $$/, @$/ and %$/
/.../ matches $_ under Int, Num and void context in addition to Bool
m:g/(1)|(2)/ now returns only successfully matched subcaptures

Modules and Routines

Allow space-separated adverbial named arguments: f( :x<foo> :$y :!z )
Multi-dispatching now handles named, slurpy and optional arguments
Multi-dispatching now handles parenthesized expressions as arguments
Named arguments with no matching parameters is now an error
New &c.call($capture) method to call without a caller frame (similar to Perl 5's goto &sub, but it returns)
New &c.signature method to get a Signature object from a Code object
Parse for the proto routine modifier: proto method foo ($x) {...}
Precompiled .pm.yml files with mismatching AST version will no longer load
Support for user-defined unary and optional-unary prefix macros
The main package is now ::Main, not ::main
&?CALLER_CONTINUATION is now fully reentrant
&yield in coroutines works correctly within loop blocks
sub ($x = 0 is copy) no longer allowed; say sub ($x is copy = 0) instead
sub f ($x is lazy) {...} no longer evaluates $x more than once
sub f (@x?) {...}; f() now sets @x to [], not [undef]

Classes and Objects

Attribute-like method call syntax: @.method(1), $.method: 2, 3, 4
Class attributes: class C { my $.x is rw }
Class name literals are now term macros, not prefix functions
Compile-time self-mixin no longer allowed: role A does A
Default initialiser expression for attributes: class C { has $.x = 123 }
Dot attributes are now method calls: @.x is the same as @(self.x)
Dynamic method calls: $obj.$meth
Hyperised method calls: $obj.>>meth
Quantified method calls: $obj.*meth, $obj.+meth and $obj.?meth
Reopening classes: class C is also {...}
Role mixins: role R {...} class C does R {...}
$?SELF is gone; write self instead
BUILDALL/DESTROYALL trigger once per class even with diamond inheritance
does R and is C statements in class body now evaluate in compile time

Built-in Primitives

New &HOW, &WHAT and &WHICH functions replace &meta, &ref and &id
New &VAR macro to force lvalue evaluation of an expression
New &comb function, a dual to &split but matches the wanted parts
New &crypt function to create one-way digest strings
New &fork function to create a new process
New &printf function for formatted printing
New &quotemeta function for escaping strings
Support for %b in formatted printing
The &system function no longer dies when the command does not exist
The .as method is renamed to .fmt for formatted printing
The .perl method now returns Unicode strings

Bundled Modules

New modules

ext/Automata-Cellular/ - Build and render cellular automata in a terminal
ext/Math-Basic/ - Basic mathematical functions and constants
ext/Math-Random-Kiss/ - Pseudo-random number generator
ext/re/ - Pragma to choose among grammar engine backends

ext/CGI/

A new as_yaml method to dump CGI parameters as YAML
Allow initializing the CGI object with a hash of parameters
New Dump function adapted from Perl 5's CGI.pm
New basic tests for escapeHTML and unescapeHTML, which were broken
New tests for PATH_INFO
Only send the Content-Type: header if we actually have a content-type
Only send the Status: header if it's a redirect, or if it's explicitly added
Refactored into an OO-only module. N.B.: this breaks backwards compatibility!
Some work on charset handling, though a charset method is still missing
The content_type method is renamed to type for compatibility
The cookies attribute is renamed to cookie for compatibility

ext/HTTP-Server-Simple/

The old non-standard ./method syntax has been replaced with self.method

ext/Rosetta/

Significant updates to the lib/Rosetta/SeeAlso.pod documentation

ext/Set-Relation/

Renamed from ext/Relation/
Beginning of separate Set::Tuple and Set::Relation classes

ext/Test/

Converted Test.pm documentation from Kwid to Pod syntax
The eval_ok and eval_is functions are gone; use is eval instead, which runs its string in the current lexical scope rather than in Test's (which is usually what you want)

Test Suite

util/prove6

Can now run only a portion of the test suite, or even a single file
Original shell script rewritten in Perl 5 for improved portability
Support for multiple Pugs backends and multiple Perl 6 implementations

util/smartlinks.pl

A new visualiser of smartlinks used in the test suite
Generates much nicer cross-referenced HTML pages
See annotated specs in action on http://spec.pugscode.org/
Smartlinks replace the old util/catalog_tests.pl

util/smokeserv/

See the SYN links on http://smoke.pugscode.org/ for this in action
Smoke client now uploads raw .yml results as well as .html
The smokeserver now annotates the spec with test results using smartlinks

All tests now begin with use v6-alpha; instead of use v6;
Many, many more smartlinks have been added into the spec
Programs and modules in examples/ are tested for syntactic correctness
Tests in t_disabled/ are merged back into the main test suite
t/02-test-pm/ created to ensure that Test.pm works as advertised
t/blocks/ renamed from t/subroutines/
t/closure_traits/ created to test closure traits (FIRST, LAST, etc.)
#!/usr/bin/pugs is gone from all test files
eval_ok and eval_is are now ok eval and is eval, so that eval'd strings will be run in the current lexical scope