PERL/C2/Functions-in-Perl/English-timed

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Time Narration
00:01 Welcome to the spoken tutorial on Functions in PERL.
00:06 In this tutorial, we will learn about:
00:10 PERL functions, functions with arguments
00:13 functions with return values.
00:16 For this tutorial, I am using:
00:18 Ubuntu Linux 12.04 operating system
00:22 Perl 5.14.2 and
00:24 gedit Text Editor.
00:27 You can use any text editor of your choice.
00:31 You should have basic knowledge of variables, comments, loops, conditional statements and data Structures in PERL.
00:41 Please go through the relevant spoken tutorials on the Spoken Tutorial website.
00:47 We will first see some simple PERL functions.
00:51 In PERL, functions, also called as subroutines, are declared with sub keyword.
00:57 The definition of a declared function is written between curly braces.
01:03 This function does not take any arguments.
01:07 And, it does not return anything.
01:10 Note: function definition can be written anywhere in the script or in another module.
01:17 This module must then be included in the script, to use this function.
01:24 To include the module file in the script, one has to use the following syntax:
01:31 use ModuleFileName semicolon
01:35 Let us understand this using a sample program.
01:39 Open a file in your text editor and name it as simpleFunction dot pl.
01:46 Here is my simpleFunction dot pl file in gedit.
01:51 Type the code as displayed on the screen.
01:55 Here, we are just calling a function which we have defined.
02:00 Then the execution control is passed to that function.
02:06 This is the declaration & definition of the function.
02:10 This function will print out the given text.
02:14 Save your file.
02:17 Then switch to the terminal and execute the PERL script by typing:
02:24 perl simpleFunction dot pl
02:28 and press Enter.
02:30 The output will be as shown on the terminal.
02:38 Now, let us see a function with arguments.
02:44 Let us understand this function using a sample program.
02:48 Open a file in your text editor and name it as functionWithArgs dot pl.
02:57 Here is my functionWithArgs script in gedit.
03:02 Type the following piece of code as shown on the screen.
03:07 Here, we are calling the function with arguments 10 and 20.
03:13 The passed arguments are caught in '$var1' & '$var2'.
03:20 @_ is a special Perl variable. We will cover its details in future tutorials.
03:29 This function performs the addition of 2 variables and prints the answer.
03:37 Save your file.
03:42 @_is a special Perl array.
03:46 This array is used to store the passed arguments.
03:51 Similarly, we can catch the passed arguments in variables as:
03:56 $var1 space = space shift @_ semicolon
04:04 $var2 space = space shift @_ semicolon
04:12 shift @_ removes the element at first position from @_ array
04:21 and assigns it to a variable.
04:24 Another way is: $var1 space = space dollar underscore open square bracket zero close square bracket semicolon.
04:38 $var2 space = space dollar underscore open square bracket 1 close square bracket semicolon.
04:49 The above mentioned way is similar to the fetching elements of @_ array using index.
04:59 Now, switch to terminal and execute the script by typing:
05:06 perl functionWithArgs dot pl and press Enter .
05:14 The output is as displayed on the screen.
05:23 Now, let us look at a function which returns a single value.
05:32 Let us understand the same, using a sample program.
05:35 Let me switch to funcWithSingleRtrnVal dot pl script in gedit.
05:46 Open a file in your text editor and type the following piece of code as shown.
05:52 Here, we are calling addVariables function with parameters 10 and 20.
06:01 The return value of the function is caught in '$addition' variable.
06:09 This function does the addition of the passed parameters and returns the answer.
06:15 Save the file.
06:17 Now, let us execute the script.
06:20 So, switch to terminal and type:
06:24 perl funcWithSingleRtrnVal dot pl and press Enter.
06:35 The output is as displayed on the terminal.
06:43 Now, let us see a function which returns multiple values.
06:48 Let us understand the same, using a sample program.
06:53 In gedit, I have opened a file and named it as funcWithMultipleRtrnVals dot pl.
07:04 Please do like-wise in your text editor.
07:08 Now, type the following piece of code as shown.
07:13 Here, we are calling addVariables function with parameters 10 and 20.
07:21 The return values of the function are caught in variables $var1, $var2 and $addition.
07:31 This function does the addition and returns the passed parameters and the resultant answer.
07:42 This illustration demonstrates how we can return an array from a function.
07:53 Similarly, this demonstrates how hash can be returned from a function.
08:00 Save your file.
08:03 Now let us execute the Perl script on the terminal by typing:
08:10 perl funcWithMultipleRtrnVals dot pl
08:18 and press Enter.
08:20 The output is as displayed on the terminal.
08:32 Perl provides several inbuilt functions.
08:36 We learnt some of them in earlier tutorials. For e.g- arrays, Hash, sort, scalar, each, keys etc.
08:49 Calling inbuilt functions is similar to calling any other function which we define.
08:57 e.g sort open bracket @arrayName close bracket semicolon.
09:04 Try incorporating some inbuilt functions in the sample programs we used.
09:10 And observe their outputs.
09:13 Let us summarize.
09:15 In this tutorial, we have learnt:
09:17 functions in Perl
09:19 functions with arguments and
09:22 functions which return values using sample programs.
09:27 Here is an assignment for you:
09:29 Write a function which takes 3 arguments.
09:33 Perform some action on these arguments.
09:37 Return the result of the action performed on the arguments and print the same.
09:43 Watch the video available at the following link.
09:47 It summarizes the Spoken Tutorial project.
09:51 If you do not have good bandwidth, you can download and watch it.
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10:19 It is supported by the National Mission on Education through ICT, MHRD, Government of India.
10:28 More information on this mission is available at: spoken hyphen tutorial dot org slash NMEICT hyphen Intro.
10:40 Hope you enjoyed this Perl tutorial.
10:43 This is Amol, signing off.
10:46 Thanks for joining.

Contributors and Content Editors

Gaurav, PoojaMoolya, Sandhya.np14