NAME¶

Clone - recursively copy Perl datatypes

SYNOPSIS¶

  package Foo;
  use parent 'Clone';
  package main;
  my $original = Foo->new;
  $copy = $original->clone;
  
  # or
  use Clone qw(clone);
  
  $a = { 'foo' => 'bar', 'move' => 'zig' };
  $b = [ 'alpha', 'beta', 'gamma', 'vlissides' ];
  $c = Foo->new;
  $d = clone($a);
  $e = clone($b);
  $f = clone($c);

DESCRIPTION¶

This module provides a clone() method which makes recursive copies of nested hash, array, scalar and reference types, including tied variables and objects.

clone() takes a scalar argument and duplicates it. To duplicate lists, arrays or hashes, pass them in by reference. e.g.

    my $copy = clone (\@array);
    # or
    my %copy = %{ clone (\%hash) };

SEE ALSO¶

Storable's dclone() is a flexible solution for cloning variables, albeit slower for average-sized data structures. Simple and naive benchmarks show that Clone is faster for data structures with 3 or less levels, while dclone() can be faster for structures 4 or more levels deep.

COPYRIGHT¶

Copyright 2001-2012 Ray Finch. All Rights Reserved.

This module is free software; you can redistribute it and/or modify it under the same terms as Perl itself.

AUTHOR¶

Ray Finch "<rdf@cpan.org>"

Breno G. de Oliveira "<garu@cpan.org>" and Florian Ragwitz "<rafl@debian.org>" perform routine maintenance releases since 2012.