NAME
    File::Flat - Implements a flat filesystem

SYNOPSIS
DESCRIPTION
    File::Flat implements a flat filesystem. A flat filesystem is a
    filesystem in which directories do not exist. It provides an abstraction
    over any normal filesystem which makes it appear as if directories do
    not exist. In effect, it will automatically create directories as
    needed. This is create for things like install scripts and such, as you
    never need to worry about the existance of directories, just write to a
    file, no matter where it is.

  Comprehensive Implementation
    The implementation of File::Flat is extremely comprehensive in scope. It
    has methods for all stardard file interaction taks, the -X series of
    tests, and some other things, such as slurp.

    All methods are statically called, for example, to write some stuff to a
    file.

      use File::Flat;
      File::Flat->write( 'filename', 'file contents' );

  Use of other modules
    File::Flat tries to use more task orientated modules wherever possible.
    This includes the use of File::Copy, File::Copy::Recursive, File::Remove
    and others. These are mostly loaded on-demand.

  Pruning and $AUTO_PRUNE
    "Pruning" is a technique where empty directories are assumed to be
    useless, and thus empty removed whenever one is created. Thus, when some
    other task has the potential to leave an empty directory, it is checked
    and deleted if it is empty.

    By default File::Flat does not prune, and pruning must be done
    explicitly, via either the "prune" in File::Flat method, or by setting
    the second argument to the "remove" in File::Flat method to be true.

    However by setting the global $AUTO_PRUNE variable to true, File::Flat
    will automatically prune directories at all times. You should generally
    use this locally, such as in the following example.

      #!/usr/bin/perl
  
      use strict;
      use File::Flat;
  
      delete_files(@ARGV);
      exit();
  
      # Recursively delete and prune all files provided on the command line
      sub delete_files {
            local $File::Flat::AUTO_PRUNE = 1;
            foreach my $file ( @_ ) {
                    File::Flat->remove( $file ) or die "Failed to delete $file";
            }
      }

  Non-Unix platforms
    As of version 0.97 File::Flat should work correctly on Win32. Other
    platforms (such as VMS) are believed to work, but require confirmation.

METHODS
  exists $filename
    Tests for the existance of the file. This is an exact duplicate of the
    -e function.

  isaFile $filename
    Tests whether "filename" is a file. This is an exact duplicate of the -f
    function.

  isaDirectory $filename
    Test whether "filename" is a directory. This is an exact duplicate of
    the -d function.

  canRead $filename
    Does the file or directory exist, and can we read from it.

  canWrite $filename
    Does the file or directory exist, and can we write to it OR can we
    create the file or directory.

  canReadWrite $filename
    Does a file or directory exist, and can we both read and write it.

  canExecute $filename
    Does a file or directory exist, and can we execute it.

  canOpen $filename
    Is this something we can open a filehandle to. Returns true if filename
    exists, is a file, and we can read from it.

  canRemove $filename
    Can we remove the file or directory.

  isaText $filename
    Does the file "filename" exist, and is it a text file.

  isaBinary $filename
    Does the file "filename" exist, and is it a binary file.

  fileSize $filename
    If the file exists, returns its size in bytes. Returns undef if the file
    does not exist.

  open [ $mode, ] $filename
    Rough analogue of the open function, but creates directories on demand
    as needed. Supports most of the normal options to the normal open
    function.

    In the single argument form, it takes modes in the form [mode]filename.
    For example, all the following are valid.

      File::Flat->open( 'filename' );
      File::Flat->open( '<filename' );
      File::Flat->open( '>filename' );
      File::Flat->open( '>>filename' );
      File::Flat->open( '+<filename' );

    In the two argument form, it takes the following

      File::Flat->open( '<', 'filename' );
      File::Flat->open( '>', 'filename' );
      File::Flat->open( '>>', 'filename' );
      File::Flat->open( '+<', 'filename' );

    It does not support the more esoteric forms of open, such us opening to
    a pipe or other such things.

    On successfully opening the file, it returns it as an IO::File object.
    Returns undef on error.

  getReadHandle $filename
    The same as File::Flat->open( '<', 'filename' )

  getWriteHandle $filename
    The same as File::Flat->open( '>', 'filename' )

  getAppendHandle $filename
    The same as File::Flat->open( '>>', 'filename' )

  getReadWriteHandle $filename
    The same as File::Flat->open( '+<', 'filename' )

  read $filename
    Opens and reads in an entire file, chomping as needed.

    In array context, it returns an array containing each line of the file.
    In scalar context, it returns a reference to an array containing each
    line of the file. It returns undef on error.

  slurp $filename
    The "slurp" method 'slurps' a file in. That is it attempts to read the
    entire file into a variable in as quick and memory efficient method as
    possible.

    On success, returns a reference to a scalar, containing the entire file.
    Returns undef on error.

  write $filename, ( $content | \$content | \@content )
    The "write" method is the main method for writing content to a file. It
    takes two arguments, the location to write to, and the content to write,
    in several forms.

    If the file already exists, it will be clobered before writing starts.
    If the file doesn't exists, the file and any directories will be created
    as needed.

    Content can be provided in three forms. The contents of a scalar
    argument will be written directly to the file. You can optionally pass a
    reference to the scalar. This is recommended when the file size is
    bigger than a few thousand characters, is it does not duplicate the file
    contents in memory. Alternatively, you can pass the content as a
    reference to an array containing the contents. To ensure uniformity,
    "write" will add a newline to each line, replacing any existing newline
    as needed.

    Returns true on success, and undef on error.

  append $filename, ( $content | \$content | \@content )
    This method is the same as "write", except that it appends to the end of
    an existing file ( or creates the file as needed ).

    This is the method you should be using to write to log files, etc.

  overwrite $filename, ( $content | \$content | \@content )
    Performs an atomic write over a file. It does this by writing to a
    temporary file, and moving the completed file over the top of the
    existing file ( or creating a new file as needed ). When writing to a
    file that is on the same partition as /tmp, this should always be
    atomic.

    This method otherwise acts the same as "write".

  copy $source, $target
    The "copy" method attempts to copy a file or directory from the source
    to the target. New directories to contain the target will be created as
    needed.

    For example "<File::Flat-"( './this', './a/b/c/d/that' );>> will create
    the directory structure required as needed.

    In the file copy case, if the target already exists, and is a writable
    file, we replace the existing file, retaining file mode and owners. If
    the target is a directory, we do NOT copy into that directory, unlike
    with the 'cp' unix command. And error is instead returned.

    "copy" will also do limited recursive copying or directories. If source
    is a directory, and target does not exists, a recursive copy of source
    will be made to target. If target already exists ( file or directory ),
    "copy" will returns with an error.

  move $source, $target
    The "move" method follows the conventions of the 'mv' command, with the
    exception that the directories containing target will of course be
    created on demand.

  remove $filename [, $prune ]
    The "remove" method will remove a file, or recursively remove a
    directory.

    If a second (true) argument is provided, then once the file or directory
    has been deleted, the method will the automatically work its way upwards
    pruning (deleting) empty and thus assumably useless directories.

    Returns true if the deletion (and pruning if requested) was a success,
    or "undef" otherwise.

  prune $filename
    For a file that has already been delete, "prune" will work upwards,
    removing any empty directories it finds.

    For anyone familiar with CVS, it is similar to the "update -P" flag.

    Returns true, or "undef" on error.

  truncate $filename [, $size ]
    The "truncate" method will truncate an existing file to partular size. A
    size of 0 ( zero ) is used if no size is provided. If the file does not
    exists, it will be created, and set to 0. Attempting to truncate a
    directory will fail.

    Returns true on success, or undef on error.

  makeDirectory $directory [, mode ]
    In the case where you do actually have to create a directory only, the
    "makeDirectory" method can be used to create a directory or any depth.

    An optional file mode ( default 0755 ) can be provided.

    Returns true on success, returns undef on error.

TO DO
    Function interface to be written, like File::Spec::Functions, to provide
    importable functions.

    There's something bigger here too, I'm not exactly sure what it is, but
    I think there might be the beginings of a unified filesystem interface
    here... FSI.pm

SUPPORT
    Bugs should be filed at via the CPAN bug tracker at:

    <http://rt.cpan.org/NoAuth/ReportBug.html?Queue=File-Flat>

    For other issues or comments, contact the author

AUTHORS
    Adam Kennedy <adamk@cpan.org>

SEE ALSO
    File::Spec, <http://ali.as/>

COPYRIGHT
    Copyright (c) 2002 - 2006 Adam Kennedy. All rights reserved. This
    program is free software; you can redistribute it and/or modify it under
    the same terms as Perl itself.

    The full text of the license can be found in the LICENSE file included
    with this module.

