Regexp::Ethiopic - Regular Expressions Support for Ethiopic Script.

 #
 #  Overloading Perl REs:
 #
 use utf8;
 use Regexp::Ethiopic qw(:forms overload setForm);

 :

 s/([#2#])/setForm($1,$ሳድስ)/eg;
 s/([መረበወ]{#2#})/setForm($1,$ሳድስ)/eg;
 s/([መረበወ]{#1,3#})/setForm($1,$ሳድስ)/eg;
 s/([መረበወ]{#1-3,7#})/setForm($1,$ሳድስ)/eg;
 s/([#ፀ#])/subForm('ጸ',$1)/eg;  # substitute, a 'ጸ' for a 'ፀ' in the form found for the 'ፀ'

 if ( /[#ኘ#]/ ) {
   #
   # do something
   #
   :
 }

 :
 :

 #
 #  Without overloading:
 #
 use utf8;
 require Regexp::Ethiopic;

 my $string = "[መረበወ]{#1-3,7#}";
 my $re = Regexp::Ethiopic::getRe ( $string );

 s/abc($re)xyz/"abc".Regexp::Ethipic::setForm($1,6)."xyz"/eg;

The Regexp::Ethiopic module provides POSIX style character class definitions for working with the Ethiopic syllabary. The character classes provided by the Regexp::Ethiopic package correspond to inate properties of the script and are language independent.

The Regexp::Ethiopic package is NOT derived from the Regexp class and may not be instantiated into an object. Regexp::Ethiopic can optionally export the utility functions getForm, setForm, subForm and formatForms (or all with the :utils pragma) to query or set the form of an Ethiopic character. Tags of variables in the form names set to form values may be exported under the :forms pragma.

See the files in the doc/ and examples/ directories that are included with this package.

A utility function to query the "form" of an Ethiopic syllable. It will return an integer between 1 and 12 corresponding to the [#\d+#] classes.

  print getForm ( "አ" ), "\n";  # prints 1

A utility function to set the form number of a syllable. The form number must be an integer between 1 and 12 corresponding to the [#\d+#] classes.

  s/(.)/setForm($1, 1)/eg;

A utility function to set the form number of a syllable based on the form of another syllable.

  s/(\w+)([#ፀ#])/$1.subForm('ጸ', $2)/eg;

A utility function somewhat analogous to sprintf for a sequence of syllables:

  print formatForms ( "%1%2%3%4", "አበገደ" ), "\n";  # prints አቡጊዳ

The overloading mechanism only applies to the constant part of the RE. The following would not be handled by the Regexp::Ethipic package as expected:

  use Regexp::Ethiopic 'overload';

  my $x = "ከ";
        :
        :
  if ( /[#$x#]/ ) {
        :
        :
  }

The package never gets to see the variable $x to then perform the RE expansion. The work around is to use the package as per:

  use Regexp::Ethiopic 'overload';

  my $x = "ከ";
        :
        :
  my $re = Regexp::Ethiopic::getRe ( "[#$x#]" );

  if ( /$re/ ) {
        :
        :
  }

This works as expected at the cost of one extra step. The overloading and functional modes of the Regexp::Ethiopic package may be used together without conflict.

Works perfectly with Perl 5.8.0, may work with Perl 5.6.x but has not yet been tested.

None presently known.

Daniel Yacob, dyacob@cpan.org

Included with this package:

  doc/index.html       examples/overload.pl
  examples/utils.pl    examples/asfunction.pl