man File::Find::Wanted (3): More obvious wrapper around File::Find

VERSION

Version 1.00

SYNOPSIS

File::Find is a great module, except that it doesn't actually find anything. Its "find()" function walks a directory tree and calls a callback function. Unfortunately, the callback function is deceptively called "wanted", which implies that it should return a boolean saying whether you want the file. That's not how it works.

Most of the time you call "find()", you just want to build a list of files. There are other modules that do this for you, most notably Richard Clamp's great File::Find::Rule, but in many cases, it's overkill, and you need to learn a new syntax.

With the "find_wanted" function, you supply a callback sub and a list of starting directories, but the sub actually should return a boolean saying whether you want the file in your list or not.

To get a list of all files ending in .jpg:

my @files = find_wanted( sub { -f && /\.jpg$/ }, $dir );

For a list of all directories that are not CVS or .svn:

    my @files = find_wanted( sub { -d && !/^(CVS|\.svn)$/ }, $dir ) );

It's easy, direct, and simple.

WHY DO THIS?

The cynical may say ``that's just the same as doing this'':

    my @files;
    find( sub { push @files, $File::Find::name if -f && /\.jpg$/ }, $dir );

Sure it is, but File::Find::Wanted makes it more obvious, and saves a line of code. That's worth it to me. I'd like it if find_wanted() made its way into the File::Find distro, but for now, this will do.

FUNCTIONS

find_wanted( &wanted, @directories )

Descends through @directories, calling the wanted function as it finds each file. The function returns a list of all the files and directories for which the wanted function returned a true value.

This is just a wrapper around "File::Find::find()". See File::Find for details on how to modify its behavior.

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