Modules & Libraries

Modules and libraries provide the structure of a Dylan program. Modules represent namespaces and control access to objects and functions. Libraries contain modules, and act as units of compilation in a Dylan program.

Simple Modules

Modules import names (or bindings) from other modules and export names for use by other modules. The names that may be imported/exported are the module-level (also called “global”) variables such as those created by define variable, define class, define generic, etc.

The dependencies between modules must form a directed, acyclic graph. Two modules may not use each other, and no circular dependencies may exist. A sample module containing the vehicle classes from earlier chapters might look like this:

define module vehicles
  use dylan;
  export
    <vehicle>,
      serial-number,
      owner, owner-setter,
      tax,
    <car>,
    <truck>,
      capacity;
end module;

Like all normal modules, this one uses the dylan module, which contains all of the standard built-in functions and classes. In turn, the vehicles module exports all three of the vehicle classes, the generic function tax, several getter functions and a single setter function.

To control access to a slot, export some combination of its getter and setter functions. To make a slot public, export both. To make it read-only, export just the getter function. To make it private, export neither. In the above example, the slot serial-number is read-only, while the slot owner is read/write.

Note that when a module adds a method to an imported generic function, the change affects all modules using that function. define method adds the new method to the existing generic function object, which may be referenced by any module importing its binding. The module that originally defined the generic function may prevent this behavior by “sealing” it over specific argument types.

Import Options

Dylan allows very precise control over how bindings are imported from other modules. For example, individual bindings may be imported by name. They may be renamed, either one at a time, or by adding a prefix to all of a module’s names at once. Some or all of them may be re-exported immediately. See the DRM for specific examples.

Dylan’s import system has a number of advantages. Name conflicts occur rarely. Programmers don’t need to define or maintain function prototypes. There’s no need for header files. Modules may also provide different interfaces to the same objects – one module exports a complete interface, which another module imports, redefines and re-exports.

Libraries

Libraries contain modules. For example, the dylan library contains the dylan module described earlier, the extensions module, and possibly several other implementation-dependent modules. Note that a library and a module may share the same name. Modules with the same name may also appear in more than one library.

By default, a Dylan environment provides a library called dylan-user for the convenience of the programmer. This is typically used for short, single library programs which depend only on modules found in the Dylan library.

Additionally, every library contains an implicit module, also known as dylan-user, which imports all of the modules found in the dylan library. This may be used for single module programs. Many Dylan environments, however, use it to bootstrap new library definitions. The vehicle library, for example, might be defined as follows in a dylan-user module:

define library vehicles
  use dylan;            // This is the library!
  export                // These are modules.
    vehicles,           // (Defined above.)
    traffic-simulation,
    crash-testing,
    inspection;         // (Hypothetical.)
end library vehicles;

This library could in turn be imported by another library:

define library vehicle-application
  use dylan;
  use my-gui-classes;
  use vehicles;
end;

Libraries import other libraries and export modules, whereas modules import other modules and export variables. In general, a module may import any module found in its own library or exported from a library imported by its own library. The following module, for example, could belong to the vehicle-application library.

define module sample-module
  // module name         source library
  use dylan;          // dylan
  use extensions;     // dylan
  use menus;          // my-gui-classes
  use vehicles;       // vehicles
  use inspection;     // vehicles
end module;

Sealing

Classes and generic functions may be sealed, preventing code in other libraries from subclassing objects or adding methods to generic functions. This allows the compiler optimize more effectively. Both classes and generic functions are sealed by default.

To allow code in other libraries to subclass a given class, declare it as open:

define open class <sample> (<object>) end;

To allow other libraries to add methods to a generic function, use a similar syntax:

define open generic sample-function (o :: <object>) => ();

A third form, define sealed domain, partially seals a generic function, disallowing only some additions from outside a library.

For more information on sealing, see "Sealing" in the DRM.