We have learned about modules and how to load them to memory, but I have not explained the difference between use and require, and you probably have seen use in most places and I have only explained about require in the previous episode.

require

We saw

require Math::Calc;

when the script is running and it reaches the above expression, it will go over the directories listed in the @INC array, check if any of them has a subdirectory called Math and if that subdirectory there is a file called Calc.pm. When it finds the fist such file, it loads it into memory, compiles it and stops the search. This will let you use the functions of the module with their fully qualified name (eg. Math::Calc::add())

use

If you have either of these expressions in the code:

use Math::Calc;

use Math::Calc qw(add);

then perl will load and compile the module during the compilation time of the script. That's because having use in the script will be replaced by the following piece of code in the file:

BEGIN { require Math::Calc; Math::Calc->import( qw(add) ); }

The BEGIN block means that we ask perl to run the code inside the block immediately when that part of the script has finished compiling.

So during the compilation for phase, when perl finished compiling the code in the BEGIN-block, it will pause the compilation and execute the code inside the block. The first statement there is the require statement that means, find the Math/Calc.pm file, load it and compile it. The second statement in the BEGIN runs the import method of the newly loaded module if there is such a method. (If there is no import method then nothing happens.)

If the user who typed in use Math::Calc ... also added a list of values, as we did in the second example with the qw(add), then this list is passed to the import method.

What the import method does is up to the author of the (Math::Calc) module, but in most cases it will arrange for the add function to be inserted in the name-space of the code where the use statement was located so that the author of that code can call add without providing the fully qualified name Math::Calc::add() of the function.

In other words, the import method imports the add function to the name-space of the user.

So that's the difference. require happens at run-time, and use happens and compile-time and the use, in addition to loading the module, it also imports some functions into the current name-space.

Load conditionally

So some people might think they want to load a module conditionally so they write:

if ($holiday) { use Vacation::Mode; }

but this does NOT work as we expect because the use statement, regardless of its location(!) will be executed during compile time. So when perl compiles this script and reaches the if-statement in the compilation, it will load the Vacation::Mode module and import its function, regardless of what value the variable $holiday will hold during run-time.

If you want to load modules on condition, in order to save on start-up time, or save on memory consumption hoping that you won't need to load all the modules in a give process, then you can write the following:

if ($holiday) { require Vacation::Mode; Vacation::Mode->import; }

Because requires is only executed during run-time, this piece of code will be executed only during run-time and only if the $holiday variable holds something that is considered True by Perl.

Then you can call the import method of the module. If you want to.