class Match

class Match is Capture is Cool { ... }

Match objects are the result of a successful regex match. They store a reference to the original string (.orig), positional and named captures, the positions of the start and end of the match in the original string, and a payload referred to as AST (abstract syntax tree), which can be used to build data structures from complex regexes and gramamrs.

Submatches are also Match objects (or lists of Match objects, if the corresponding regex was quantified), so each match object can be seen as the root of a tree of match objects.

Methods

orig

Returns the original string that the regex was matched against.

from

Returns the index of the starting position of the match.

to

Returns the index of the end position of the match.

ast

Returns the AST (ie payload).

Str

Returns the matched text.

caps

Returns a list of pairs, with the index or submatch name as key and the submatches as values. The list is ordered by starting position of the submatches.

chunks

Returns a list of pairs, with the index or submatch name as key and the submatches as values. The list is ordered by starting position of the submatches.

Those parts of the string that were not matched by submatches are interleaved with the other pairs, with the string ~ as key.

list

Returns a list of positional submatches.

hash

Returns a hash of named submatches.

prematch

Returns the part of the original string leading up to the match.

postmatch

Returns the part of the original string following the match.

make

method make(Match:D: Mu $ast)

Sets the AST to $ast, and returns it.

Full-size type graph image as SVG

Methods supplied by class Capture

Match inherits from class Capture, which provides the following methods:

list

method list(Capture:D:) returns Positional

Returns the positional part of the Capture.

hash

method hash(Capture:D:) returns Associative

Returns the named/hash part of the Capture.

elems

method elems(Capture:D:) returns Int:D

Returns the number of positional elements in the Capture.

Methods supplied by class Any

Match inherits from class Any, which provides the following methods:

ACCEPTS

multi method ACCEPTS(Any:D: Mu $other)

Returns True if $other === self (ie it checks object identity).

any

Interprets the invocant as a list and creates an any-Junction from it.

all

Interprets the invocant as a list and creates an all-Junction from it.

one

Interprets the invocant as a list and creates an one-Junction from it.

none

Interprets the invocant as a list and creates an none-Junction from it.

Methods supplied by class Mu

Match inherits from class Mu, which provides the following methods:

defined

multi sub    defined(Mu) returns Bool:D
multi method defined()   returns Bool:D

Returns False on the type object, and True otherwise.

Bool

multi sub    Bool(Mu) returns Bool:D
multi method Bool()   returns Bool:D

Returns False on the type object, and True otherwise.

Str

multi method Str()   returns Str

Returns a string representation of the invocant, intended to be machine readable.

gist

multi sub    gist(Mu) returns Str
multi method gist()   returns Str

Returns a string representation of the invocant, optimized for fast recognition by humans.

The default gist method in Mu re-dispatches to the perl method, but many built-in classes override it to something more specific.

perl

multi sub    perl(Mu) returns Str
multi method perl()   returns Str

Returns a Perlish representation of the object (i.e., can usually be reparsed to regenerate the object).

clone

method clone(*%twiddles)

Creates a shallow clone of the invocant. If named arguments are passed to it, their values are used in every place where an attribute name matches the name of a named argument.

new

multi method new(*%attrinit)

Default method for constructing (create + initialize) new objects of a class. This method expects only named arguments which are then used to initialize attributes with accessors of the same name.

Classes may provide their own new method to override this default.

bless

method bless(Mu $candidate, *%attrinit) returns Mu:D

Lower-level object construction method than new.

If you pass a Whatever as a candidate, it creates a new object of the same type as the invocant, and then uses the named arguments to initialize attributes.

If you pass something other than a Whatever object as a candidate, it simply does the attribute initialization on the $candidate.

In both cases, the object with the attributes initialized is returned.

You can use this method when writing custom constructors:

class Point {
    has $.x;
    has $.y;
    multi method new($x, $y) {
        self.bless(:$x, :$y);
    }
}
my $p = Point.new(-1, 1);

(Though each time you write a custom constructor, remember that it makes subclassing harder).

CREATE

method CREATE() returns Mu:D

Allocates a new object of the same type as the invocant, without initializating any attributes.

print

multi method print() returns Bool:D

Prints value to $*OUT after stringification using .Str method without newline at end.

say

multi method say() returns Bool:D

Prints value to $*OUT after stringification using .gist method with newline at end.

ACCEPTS

multi method ACCEPTS(Mu:U: $other)

Performs a type check. Returns True if $other conforms to the invocant (which is always a type object or failure).

This is the method that is triggered on smart-matching against type objects, for example in if $var ~~ Int { ... }.

WHICH

multi method WHICH() returns ObjAt:D

Returns an object of type ObjAt which uniquely identifies the object. Value types override this method which makes sure that two equivalent objects return the same return value from WHICH.