How Do You Use a Module?

To use a member of a module, just prefix the member name with the module name and a dot. For example, we have already used the standard input, which is called Stdio.stdin. That means that it is the member stdin in the module Stdio. In this example, we read a string from the standard input by calling the method gets in the object Stdio.stdin:

We have also used the class Protocols.HTTP.Query, which is the member Query in the module Protocols.HTTP. Note that the module Protocols.HTTP is actually the module HTTP, which is a member of the module Protocols. In this example, we use the class Protocols.HTTP.Query as the data type when defining a variable:

If we don't want to write the module name every time we use something from that module, we can import the module.

import Stdio;
import Protocols.HTTP;

After importing those two modules, we can use both stdin and Query without prefixing them with anything:

string name = stdin->gets();
Query web_page;

Importing can be done anywhere in a program, but we usually do it at the top of the program.

If we import two modules that contain the same name, that name will refer to the module that was imported latest. An example where the modules canvas_window and chess_game both contain the method draw:

import canvas_window;
draw(); // Lets you draw pictures
import chess_game;
draw(); // A draw in a chess game: nobody wins

Even if you have imported a module, you can use the module name to determine which module you mean:

You can import all the modules in a directory by giving the directory name as a string:

If you refer to a module with the module name prefixed by just a dot, Pike will look for the module in the same directory as the program that used the module:

import .florble;
.gnooble.droop(7, 3);