File::BaseDir - Use the Freedesktop.org base directory specification
use File::BaseDir qw/xdg_data_files/;
for ( xdg_data_files('mime/globs') ) {
# do something
}
This module can be used to find directories and files as specified by the Freedesktop.org Base Directory Specification. This specifications gives a mechanism to locate directories for configuration, application data and cache data. It is suggested that desktop applications for e.g. the Gnome, KDE or Xfce platforms follow this layout. However, the same layout can just as well be used for non-GUI applications.
This module forked from File::MimeInfo.
This module follows version 0.6 of BaseDir specification.
None by default, but all methods can be exported on demand. Also the groups ":lookup" and ":vars" are defined. The ":vars" group contains all routines with a "xdg_" prefix; the ":lookup" group contains the routines to locate files and directories.
new()
The following methods are used to lookup files and folders in one of the search paths.
data_home(@PATH)
Takes a list of file path elements and returns a new path by appending them to the data home directory. The new path does not need to exist. Use this when writing user specific application data.
Example:
# data_home is: /home/USER/.local/share
$path = $bd->data_home('Foo', 'Bar', 'Baz');
# returns: /home/USER/.local/share/Foo/Bar/Baz
data_dirs(@PATH)
@PATH in the data home and
other data directories. Returns (possibly empty) list of readable
directories. In scalar context only the first directory found is
returned. Use this to lookup application data.
data_files(@PATH)
@PATH in the data home and other data
directories. Only returns files that are readable. In scalar context only
the first file found is returned. Use this to lookup application data.
config_home(@PATH)
config_dirs(@PATH)
@PATH in the config home and
other config directories. Returns (possibly empty) list of readable
directories. In scalar context only the first directory found is
returned. Use this to lookup configuration.
config_files(@PATH)
@PATH in the config home and other
config directories. Returns a (possibly empty) list of files that
are readable. In scalar context only the first file found is returned.
Use this to lookup configuration.
cache_home(@PATH)
The following methods only returns the value of one of the XDG variables.
xdg_data_home
$ENV{XDG_DATA_HOME} or it's default value.
Default is $HOME/.local/share.
xdg_data_dirs
$ENV{XDG_DATA_DIRS} or it's default value as list.
Default is /usr/local/share, /usr/share.
xdg_config_home
$ENV{XDG_CONFIG_HOME} or it's default value.
Default is $HOME/.config.
xdg_config_dirs
$ENV{XDG_CONFIG_DIRS} or it's default value as list.
Default is /etc/xdg.
xdg_cache_home
$ENV{XDG_CACHE_HOME} or it's default value.
Default is $HOME/.cache.
The use of File::Spec ensures that all paths are returned in the apropriate
form for the current platform. On Windows this module will try to set $HOME
to a sensible value if it is not defined yet. On other platforms one can use
e.g. File::HomeDir to set $HOME before loading File::BaseDir.
Please note that the specification is targeting Unix platforms only and will only have limited relevance on other platforms. Any platform dependend behavior in this module should be considerd an extension of the spec.
The methods xdg_data_files() and xdg_config_files() are exported for
backwards compatibilty with version 0.02. They are identical to data_files()
and config_files() respectively but without the wantarray behavior.
Please mail the author if you encounter any bugs.
Jaap Karssenberg || Pardus [Larus] <pardus@cpan.org>
Copyright (c) 2003, 2007 Jaap G Karssenberg. All rights reserved. This program is free software; you can redistribute it and/or modify it under the same terms as Perl itself.