The following pair of functions are ones that I use often. As far as I’m concerned, they should be included in perl. This post serves as both a personal place holder and an opportunity to share with the Internets. Chances are you found them at the sweet end of a Google search.
Method: trim
Params: $string
Return: $str
Usage: $str = trim($str);
# This function trims white space from the
# front and back of parameter $string.
sub trim() {
my $thing = shift;
$thing =~ s/#.*$//; # trim trailing comments
$thing =~ s/^s+//; # trim leading whitespace
$thing =~ s/s+$//; # trim trailing whitespace
return $thing;
}
# Or use this function for perl 5.10 and higher
sub trim {
(my $s = $_[0]) =~ s/^\s+|\s+$//g;
return $s;
}
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Php offers a useful utility function called ’empty’ which determines whether or not a variable is, well, empty. Here’s the equivalent function is perl:
Method: empty
Params: $string
Returns: boolean
Usage: if (!empty($string)) { print “Whoo hoo!”; }
sub empty { ! defined $_[0] || ! length $_[0] }
I often use timestamps as unique identifiers or in transaction logging. The Internets are full of perl modules that provide timestamp functionality but I generally prefer to roll my own. Why? Mainly for portability. If a script relies on the basic perl library, then it runs on any server with perl installed.
Method: timestamp
Params: none
Returns: $string
Usage: print timestamp() . “n”;
# returns a string in the following format:
# YYYYMMDDHHMMSS
sub timestamp() {
my $now = time;
my @date = localtime $now;
$date[5] += 1900;
$date[4] += 1;
my $stamp = sprintf(
"%04d%02d%02d%02d%02d",
$date[5],$date[4],$date[3], $date[2], $date[1], $date[0]
);
return $stamp;
}
NOTE: The above function was corrected to include seconds.