This file is indexed.

/usr/share/perl5/Config/General.pm is in libconfig-general-perl 2.56-1.

This file is owned by root:root, with mode 0o644.

The actual contents of the file can be viewed below.

   1
   2
   3
   4
   5
   6
   7
   8
   9
  10
  11
  12
  13
  14
  15
  16
  17
  18
  19
  20
  21
  22
  23
  24
  25
  26
  27
  28
  29
  30
  31
  32
  33
  34
  35
  36
  37
  38
  39
  40
  41
  42
  43
  44
  45
  46
  47
  48
  49
  50
  51
  52
  53
  54
  55
  56
  57
  58
  59
  60
  61
  62
  63
  64
  65
  66
  67
  68
  69
  70
  71
  72
  73
  74
  75
  76
  77
  78
  79
  80
  81
  82
  83
  84
  85
  86
  87
  88
  89
  90
  91
  92
  93
  94
  95
  96
  97
  98
  99
 100
 101
 102
 103
 104
 105
 106
 107
 108
 109
 110
 111
 112
 113
 114
 115
 116
 117
 118
 119
 120
 121
 122
 123
 124
 125
 126
 127
 128
 129
 130
 131
 132
 133
 134
 135
 136
 137
 138
 139
 140
 141
 142
 143
 144
 145
 146
 147
 148
 149
 150
 151
 152
 153
 154
 155
 156
 157
 158
 159
 160
 161
 162
 163
 164
 165
 166
 167
 168
 169
 170
 171
 172
 173
 174
 175
 176
 177
 178
 179
 180
 181
 182
 183
 184
 185
 186
 187
 188
 189
 190
 191
 192
 193
 194
 195
 196
 197
 198
 199
 200
 201
 202
 203
 204
 205
 206
 207
 208
 209
 210
 211
 212
 213
 214
 215
 216
 217
 218
 219
 220
 221
 222
 223
 224
 225
 226
 227
 228
 229
 230
 231
 232
 233
 234
 235
 236
 237
 238
 239
 240
 241
 242
 243
 244
 245
 246
 247
 248
 249
 250
 251
 252
 253
 254
 255
 256
 257
 258
 259
 260
 261
 262
 263
 264
 265
 266
 267
 268
 269
 270
 271
 272
 273
 274
 275
 276
 277
 278
 279
 280
 281
 282
 283
 284
 285
 286
 287
 288
 289
 290
 291
 292
 293
 294
 295
 296
 297
 298
 299
 300
 301
 302
 303
 304
 305
 306
 307
 308
 309
 310
 311
 312
 313
 314
 315
 316
 317
 318
 319
 320
 321
 322
 323
 324
 325
 326
 327
 328
 329
 330
 331
 332
 333
 334
 335
 336
 337
 338
 339
 340
 341
 342
 343
 344
 345
 346
 347
 348
 349
 350
 351
 352
 353
 354
 355
 356
 357
 358
 359
 360
 361
 362
 363
 364
 365
 366
 367
 368
 369
 370
 371
 372
 373
 374
 375
 376
 377
 378
 379
 380
 381
 382
 383
 384
 385
 386
 387
 388
 389
 390
 391
 392
 393
 394
 395
 396
 397
 398
 399
 400
 401
 402
 403
 404
 405
 406
 407
 408
 409
 410
 411
 412
 413
 414
 415
 416
 417
 418
 419
 420
 421
 422
 423
 424
 425
 426
 427
 428
 429
 430
 431
 432
 433
 434
 435
 436
 437
 438
 439
 440
 441
 442
 443
 444
 445
 446
 447
 448
 449
 450
 451
 452
 453
 454
 455
 456
 457
 458
 459
 460
 461
 462
 463
 464
 465
 466
 467
 468
 469
 470
 471
 472
 473
 474
 475
 476
 477
 478
 479
 480
 481
 482
 483
 484
 485
 486
 487
 488
 489
 490
 491
 492
 493
 494
 495
 496
 497
 498
 499
 500
 501
 502
 503
 504
 505
 506
 507
 508
 509
 510
 511
 512
 513
 514
 515
 516
 517
 518
 519
 520
 521
 522
 523
 524
 525
 526
 527
 528
 529
 530
 531
 532
 533
 534
 535
 536
 537
 538
 539
 540
 541
 542
 543
 544
 545
 546
 547
 548
 549
 550
 551
 552
 553
 554
 555
 556
 557
 558
 559
 560
 561
 562
 563
 564
 565
 566
 567
 568
 569
 570
 571
 572
 573
 574
 575
 576
 577
 578
 579
 580
 581
 582
 583
 584
 585
 586
 587
 588
 589
 590
 591
 592
 593
 594
 595
 596
 597
 598
 599
 600
 601
 602
 603
 604
 605
 606
 607
 608
 609
 610
 611
 612
 613
 614
 615
 616
 617
 618
 619
 620
 621
 622
 623
 624
 625
 626
 627
 628
 629
 630
 631
 632
 633
 634
 635
 636
 637
 638
 639
 640
 641
 642
 643
 644
 645
 646
 647
 648
 649
 650
 651
 652
 653
 654
 655
 656
 657
 658
 659
 660
 661
 662
 663
 664
 665
 666
 667
 668
 669
 670
 671
 672
 673
 674
 675
 676
 677
 678
 679
 680
 681
 682
 683
 684
 685
 686
 687
 688
 689
 690
 691
 692
 693
 694
 695
 696
 697
 698
 699
 700
 701
 702
 703
 704
 705
 706
 707
 708
 709
 710
 711
 712
 713
 714
 715
 716
 717
 718
 719
 720
 721
 722
 723
 724
 725
 726
 727
 728
 729
 730
 731
 732
 733
 734
 735
 736
 737
 738
 739
 740
 741
 742
 743
 744
 745
 746
 747
 748
 749
 750
 751
 752
 753
 754
 755
 756
 757
 758
 759
 760
 761
 762
 763
 764
 765
 766
 767
 768
 769
 770
 771
 772
 773
 774
 775
 776
 777
 778
 779
 780
 781
 782
 783
 784
 785
 786
 787
 788
 789
 790
 791
 792
 793
 794
 795
 796
 797
 798
 799
 800
 801
 802
 803
 804
 805
 806
 807
 808
 809
 810
 811
 812
 813
 814
 815
 816
 817
 818
 819
 820
 821
 822
 823
 824
 825
 826
 827
 828
 829
 830
 831
 832
 833
 834
 835
 836
 837
 838
 839
 840
 841
 842
 843
 844
 845
 846
 847
 848
 849
 850
 851
 852
 853
 854
 855
 856
 857
 858
 859
 860
 861
 862
 863
 864
 865
 866
 867
 868
 869
 870
 871
 872
 873
 874
 875
 876
 877
 878
 879
 880
 881
 882
 883
 884
 885
 886
 887
 888
 889
 890
 891
 892
 893
 894
 895
 896
 897
 898
 899
 900
 901
 902
 903
 904
 905
 906
 907
 908
 909
 910
 911
 912
 913
 914
 915
 916
 917
 918
 919
 920
 921
 922
 923
 924
 925
 926
 927
 928
 929
 930
 931
 932
 933
 934
 935
 936
 937
 938
 939
 940
 941
 942
 943
 944
 945
 946
 947
 948
 949
 950
 951
 952
 953
 954
 955
 956
 957
 958
 959
 960
 961
 962
 963
 964
 965
 966
 967
 968
 969
 970
 971
 972
 973
 974
 975
 976
 977
 978
 979
 980
 981
 982
 983
 984
 985
 986
 987
 988
 989
 990
 991
 992
 993
 994
 995
 996
 997
 998
 999
1000
1001
1002
1003
1004
1005
1006
1007
1008
1009
1010
1011
1012
1013
1014
1015
1016
1017
1018
1019
1020
1021
1022
1023
1024
1025
1026
1027
1028
1029
1030
1031
1032
1033
1034
1035
1036
1037
1038
1039
1040
1041
1042
1043
1044
1045
1046
1047
1048
1049
1050
1051
1052
1053
1054
1055
1056
1057
1058
1059
1060
1061
1062
1063
1064
1065
1066
1067
1068
1069
1070
1071
1072
1073
1074
1075
1076
1077
1078
1079
1080
1081
1082
1083
1084
1085
1086
1087
1088
1089
1090
1091
1092
1093
1094
1095
1096
1097
1098
1099
1100
1101
1102
1103
1104
1105
1106
1107
1108
1109
1110
1111
1112
1113
1114
1115
1116
1117
1118
1119
1120
1121
1122
1123
1124
1125
1126
1127
1128
1129
1130
1131
1132
1133
1134
1135
1136
1137
1138
1139
1140
1141
1142
1143
1144
1145
1146
1147
1148
1149
1150
1151
1152
1153
1154
1155
1156
1157
1158
1159
1160
1161
1162
1163
1164
1165
1166
1167
1168
1169
1170
1171
1172
1173
1174
1175
1176
1177
1178
1179
1180
1181
1182
1183
1184
1185
1186
1187
1188
1189
1190
1191
1192
1193
1194
1195
1196
1197
1198
1199
1200
1201
1202
1203
1204
1205
1206
1207
1208
1209
1210
1211
1212
1213
1214
1215
1216
1217
1218
1219
1220
1221
1222
1223
1224
1225
1226
1227
1228
1229
1230
1231
1232
1233
1234
1235
1236
1237
1238
1239
1240
1241
1242
1243
1244
1245
1246
1247
1248
1249
1250
1251
1252
1253
1254
1255
1256
1257
1258
1259
1260
1261
1262
1263
1264
1265
1266
1267
1268
1269
1270
1271
1272
1273
1274
1275
1276
1277
1278
1279
1280
1281
1282
1283
1284
1285
1286
1287
1288
1289
1290
1291
1292
1293
1294
1295
1296
1297
1298
1299
1300
1301
1302
1303
1304
1305
1306
1307
1308
1309
1310
1311
1312
1313
1314
1315
1316
1317
1318
1319
1320
1321
1322
1323
1324
1325
1326
1327
1328
1329
1330
1331
1332
1333
1334
1335
1336
1337
1338
1339
1340
1341
1342
1343
1344
1345
1346
1347
1348
1349
1350
1351
1352
1353
1354
1355
1356
1357
1358
1359
1360
1361
1362
1363
1364
1365
1366
1367
1368
1369
1370
1371
1372
1373
1374
1375
1376
1377
1378
1379
1380
1381
1382
1383
1384
1385
1386
1387
1388
1389
1390
1391
1392
1393
1394
1395
1396
1397
1398
1399
1400
1401
1402
1403
1404
1405
1406
1407
1408
1409
1410
1411
1412
1413
1414
1415
1416
1417
1418
1419
1420
1421
1422
1423
1424
1425
1426
1427
1428
1429
1430
1431
1432
1433
1434
1435
1436
1437
1438
1439
1440
1441
1442
1443
1444
1445
1446
1447
1448
1449
1450
1451
1452
1453
1454
1455
1456
1457
1458
1459
1460
1461
1462
1463
1464
1465
1466
1467
1468
1469
1470
1471
1472
1473
1474
1475
1476
1477
1478
1479
1480
1481
1482
1483
1484
1485
1486
1487
1488
1489
1490
1491
1492
1493
1494
1495
1496
1497
1498
1499
1500
1501
1502
1503
1504
1505
1506
1507
1508
1509
1510
1511
1512
1513
1514
1515
1516
1517
1518
1519
1520
1521
1522
1523
1524
1525
1526
1527
1528
1529
1530
1531
1532
1533
1534
1535
1536
1537
1538
1539
1540
1541
1542
1543
1544
1545
1546
1547
1548
1549
1550
1551
1552
1553
1554
1555
1556
1557
1558
1559
1560
1561
1562
1563
1564
1565
1566
1567
1568
1569
1570
1571
1572
1573
1574
1575
1576
1577
1578
1579
1580
1581
1582
1583
1584
1585
1586
1587
1588
1589
1590
1591
1592
1593
1594
1595
1596
1597
1598
1599
1600
1601
1602
1603
1604
1605
1606
1607
1608
1609
1610
1611
1612
1613
1614
1615
1616
1617
1618
1619
1620
1621
1622
1623
1624
1625
1626
1627
1628
1629
1630
1631
1632
1633
1634
1635
1636
1637
1638
1639
1640
1641
1642
1643
1644
1645
1646
1647
1648
1649
1650
1651
1652
1653
1654
1655
1656
1657
1658
1659
1660
1661
1662
1663
1664
1665
1666
1667
1668
1669
1670
1671
1672
1673
1674
1675
1676
1677
1678
1679
1680
1681
1682
1683
1684
1685
1686
1687
1688
1689
1690
1691
1692
1693
1694
1695
1696
1697
1698
1699
1700
1701
1702
1703
1704
1705
1706
1707
1708
1709
1710
1711
1712
1713
1714
1715
1716
1717
1718
1719
1720
1721
1722
1723
1724
1725
1726
1727
1728
1729
1730
1731
1732
1733
1734
1735
1736
1737
1738
1739
1740
1741
1742
1743
1744
1745
1746
1747
1748
1749
1750
1751
1752
1753
1754
1755
1756
1757
1758
1759
1760
1761
1762
1763
1764
1765
1766
1767
1768
1769
1770
1771
1772
1773
1774
1775
1776
1777
1778
1779
1780
1781
1782
1783
1784
1785
1786
1787
1788
1789
1790
1791
1792
1793
1794
1795
1796
1797
1798
1799
1800
1801
1802
1803
1804
1805
1806
1807
1808
1809
1810
1811
1812
1813
1814
1815
1816
1817
1818
1819
1820
1821
1822
1823
1824
1825
1826
1827
1828
1829
1830
1831
1832
1833
1834
1835
1836
1837
1838
1839
1840
1841
1842
1843
1844
1845
1846
1847
1848
1849
1850
1851
1852
1853
1854
1855
1856
1857
1858
1859
1860
1861
1862
1863
1864
1865
1866
1867
1868
1869
1870
1871
1872
1873
1874
1875
1876
1877
1878
1879
1880
1881
1882
1883
1884
1885
1886
1887
1888
1889
1890
1891
1892
1893
1894
1895
1896
1897
1898
1899
1900
1901
1902
1903
1904
1905
1906
1907
1908
1909
1910
1911
1912
1913
1914
1915
1916
1917
1918
1919
1920
1921
1922
1923
1924
1925
1926
1927
1928
1929
1930
1931
1932
1933
1934
1935
1936
1937
1938
1939
1940
1941
1942
1943
1944
1945
1946
1947
1948
1949
1950
1951
1952
1953
1954
1955
1956
1957
1958
1959
1960
1961
1962
1963
1964
1965
1966
1967
1968
1969
1970
1971
1972
1973
1974
1975
1976
1977
1978
1979
1980
1981
1982
1983
1984
1985
1986
1987
1988
1989
1990
1991
1992
1993
1994
1995
1996
1997
1998
1999
2000
2001
2002
2003
2004
2005
2006
2007
2008
2009
2010
2011
2012
2013
2014
2015
2016
2017
2018
2019
2020
2021
2022
2023
2024
2025
2026
2027
2028
2029
2030
2031
2032
2033
2034
2035
2036
2037
2038
2039
2040
2041
2042
2043
2044
2045
2046
2047
2048
2049
2050
2051
2052
2053
2054
2055
2056
2057
2058
2059
2060
2061
2062
2063
2064
2065
2066
2067
2068
2069
2070
2071
2072
2073
2074
2075
2076
2077
2078
2079
2080
2081
2082
2083
2084
2085
2086
2087
2088
2089
2090
2091
2092
2093
2094
2095
2096
2097
2098
2099
2100
2101
2102
2103
2104
2105
2106
2107
2108
2109
2110
2111
2112
2113
2114
2115
2116
2117
2118
2119
2120
2121
2122
2123
2124
2125
2126
2127
2128
2129
2130
2131
2132
2133
2134
2135
2136
2137
2138
2139
2140
2141
2142
2143
2144
2145
2146
2147
2148
2149
2150
2151
2152
2153
2154
2155
2156
2157
2158
2159
2160
2161
2162
2163
2164
2165
2166
2167
2168
2169
2170
2171
2172
2173
2174
2175
2176
2177
2178
2179
2180
2181
2182
2183
2184
2185
2186
2187
2188
2189
2190
2191
2192
2193
2194
2195
2196
2197
2198
2199
2200
2201
2202
2203
2204
2205
2206
2207
2208
2209
2210
2211
2212
2213
2214
2215
2216
2217
2218
2219
2220
2221
2222
2223
2224
2225
2226
2227
2228
2229
2230
2231
2232
2233
2234
2235
2236
2237
2238
2239
2240
2241
2242
2243
2244
2245
2246
2247
2248
2249
2250
2251
2252
2253
2254
2255
2256
2257
2258
2259
2260
2261
2262
2263
2264
2265
2266
2267
2268
2269
2270
2271
2272
2273
2274
2275
2276
2277
2278
2279
2280
2281
2282
2283
2284
2285
2286
2287
2288
2289
2290
2291
2292
2293
2294
2295
2296
2297
2298
2299
2300
2301
2302
2303
2304
2305
2306
2307
2308
2309
2310
2311
2312
2313
2314
2315
2316
2317
2318
2319
2320
2321
2322
2323
2324
2325
2326
2327
2328
2329
2330
2331
2332
2333
2334
2335
2336
2337
2338
2339
2340
2341
2342
2343
2344
2345
2346
2347
2348
2349
2350
2351
2352
2353
2354
2355
2356
2357
2358
2359
2360
2361
2362
2363
2364
2365
2366
2367
2368
2369
2370
2371
2372
2373
2374
2375
2376
2377
2378
2379
2380
2381
2382
2383
2384
2385
2386
2387
2388
2389
2390
2391
2392
2393
2394
2395
2396
2397
2398
2399
2400
2401
2402
2403
2404
2405
2406
2407
2408
2409
2410
2411
2412
2413
2414
2415
2416
2417
2418
2419
2420
2421
2422
2423
2424
2425
2426
2427
2428
2429
2430
2431
2432
2433
2434
2435
2436
2437
2438
2439
2440
2441
2442
2443
2444
2445
2446
2447
2448
2449
2450
2451
2452
2453
2454
2455
2456
2457
2458
2459
2460
2461
2462
2463
2464
2465
2466
2467
2468
2469
2470
2471
2472
2473
2474
2475
2476
2477
2478
2479
2480
2481
2482
2483
2484
2485
2486
2487
2488
2489
2490
2491
2492
2493
2494
2495
2496
2497
2498
2499
2500
2501
2502
2503
2504
2505
2506
2507
2508
2509
2510
2511
2512
2513
2514
2515
2516
2517
2518
2519
2520
2521
2522
2523
2524
2525
2526
2527
2528
2529
2530
2531
2532
2533
2534
2535
2536
2537
2538
2539
2540
2541
2542
2543
2544
2545
2546
2547
2548
2549
2550
2551
2552
2553
2554
2555
2556
2557
2558
2559
2560
2561
2562
2563
2564
2565
2566
2567
2568
2569
2570
2571
2572
2573
2574
2575
2576
2577
2578
2579
2580
2581
2582
2583
2584
2585
2586
2587
2588
2589
2590
2591
2592
2593
2594
2595
2596
2597
2598
2599
2600
2601
2602
2603
2604
2605
2606
2607
2608
2609
2610
2611
2612
2613
2614
2615
2616
2617
2618
2619
2620
2621
2622
2623
2624
2625
2626
2627
2628
2629
2630
2631
2632
2633
2634
2635
2636
2637
2638
2639
2640
2641
2642
2643
2644
2645
2646
2647
2648
2649
2650
2651
2652
2653
2654
2655
2656
2657
2658
2659
2660
2661
2662
2663
2664
2665
2666
2667
2668
2669
2670
2671
2672
2673
2674
2675
2676
2677
2678
2679
2680
2681
2682
2683
2684
2685
2686
2687
2688
2689
2690
2691
2692
2693
2694
2695
2696
2697
2698
2699
2700
2701
2702
2703
2704
2705
2706
2707
2708
2709
2710
2711
2712
2713
2714
2715
2716
2717
2718
2719
2720
2721
2722
2723
2724
2725
2726
2727
2728
2729
2730
2731
2732
2733
2734
2735
2736
2737
2738
2739
2740
2741
2742
2743
2744
2745
2746
2747
2748
2749
2750
2751
2752
2753
#
# Config::General.pm - Generic Config Module
#
# Purpose: Provide a convenient way for loading
#          config values from a given file and
#          return it as hash structure
#
# Copyright (c) 2000-2014 Thomas Linden <tlinden |AT| cpan.org>.
# All Rights Reserved. Std. disclaimer applies.
# Artistic License, same as perl itself. Have fun.
#
# namespace
package Config::General;

use strict;
use warnings;
use English '-no_match_vars';

use IO::File;
use FileHandle;
use File::Spec::Functions qw(splitpath file_name_is_absolute catfile catpath);
use File::Glob qw/:glob/;


# on debian with perl > 5.8.4 croak() doesn't work anymore without this.
# There is some require statement which dies 'cause it can't find Carp::Heavy,
# I really don't understand, what the hell they made, but the debian perl
# installation is definitely bullshit, damn!
use Carp::Heavy;


use Carp;
use Exporter;

$Config::General::VERSION = "2.56";

use vars  qw(@ISA @EXPORT_OK);
use base qw(Exporter);
@EXPORT_OK = qw(ParseConfig SaveConfig SaveConfigString);

sub new {
  #
  # create new Config::General object
  #
  my($this, @param ) = @_;
  my $class = ref($this) || $this;

  # define default options
  my $self = {
	      # sha256 of current date
	      # hopefully this lowers the probability that
	      # this matches any configuration key or value out there
	      # bugfix for rt.40925
	      EOFseparator          => 'ad7d7b87f5b81d2a0d5cb75294afeb91aa4801b1f8e8532dc1b633c0e1d47037',
	      SlashIsDirectory      => 0,
	      AllowMultiOptions     => 1,
	      MergeDuplicateOptions => 0,
	      MergeDuplicateBlocks  => 0,
	      LowerCaseNames        => 0,
	      ApacheCompatible      => 0,
	      UseApacheInclude      => 0,
	      IncludeRelative       => 0,
	      IncludeDirectories    => 0,
	      IncludeGlob           => 0,
              IncludeAgain          => 0,
	      AutoLaunder           => 0,
	      AutoTrue              => 0,
	      AutoTrueFlags         => {
					true  => '^(on|yes|true|1)$',
					false => '^(off|no|false|0)$',
				       },
	      DefaultConfig         => {},
	      String                => '',
	      level                 => 1,
	      InterPolateVars       => 0,
	      InterPolateEnv        => 0,
	      ExtendedAccess        => 0,
	      SplitPolicy           => 'guess', # also possible: whitespace, equalsign and custom
	      SplitDelimiter        => 0,       # must be set by the user if SplitPolicy is 'custom'
	      StoreDelimiter        => 0,       # will be set by me unless user uses 'custom' policy
	      CComments             => 1,       # by default turned on
	      BackslashEscape       => 0,       # deprecated
	      StrictObjects         => 1,       # be strict on non-existent keys in OOP mode
	      StrictVars            => 1,       # be strict on undefined variables in Interpolate mode
	      Tie                   => q(),      # could be set to a perl module for tie'ing new hashes
	      parsed                => 0,       # internal state stuff for variable interpolation
	      files                 => {},      # which files we have read, if any
	      UTF8                  => 0,
	      SaveSorted            => 0,
              ForceArray            => 0,       # force single value array if value enclosed in []
              AllowSingleQuoteInterpolation => 0,
              NoEscape              => 0,
              NormalizeBlock        => 0,
              NormalizeOption       => 0,
              NormalizeValue        => 0,
              Plug                  => {}
	     };

  # create the class instance
  bless $self, $class;

  if ($#param >= 1) {
    # use of the new hash interface!
    $self->_prepare(@param);
  }
  elsif ($#param == 0) {
    # use of the old style
    $self->{ConfigFile} = $param[0];
    if (ref($self->{ConfigFile}) eq 'HASH') {
      $self->{ConfigHash} = delete $self->{ConfigFile};
    }
  }
  else {
    # this happens if $#param == -1,1 thus no param was given to new!
    $self->{config} = $self->_hashref();
    $self->{parsed} = 1;
  }

  # find split policy to use for option/value separation
  $self->_splitpolicy();

  # bless into variable interpolation module if necessary
  $self->_blessvars();

  # process as usual
  if (!$self->{parsed}) {
    $self->_process();
  }

  if ($self->{InterPolateVars}) {
    $self->{config} = $self->_clean_stack($self->{config});
  }

  # bless into OOP namespace if required
  $self->_blessoop();

  return $self;
}



sub _process {
  #
  # call _read() and _parse() on the given config
  my($self) = @_;

  if ($self->{DefaultConfig} && $self->{InterPolateVars}) {
    $self->{DefaultConfig} = $self->_interpolate_hash($self->{DefaultConfig}); # FIXME: _hashref() ?
  }
  if (exists $self->{StringContent}) {
    # consider the supplied string as config file
    $self->_read($self->{StringContent}, 'SCALAR');
    $self->{config} = $self->_parse($self->{DefaultConfig}, $self->{content});
  }
  elsif (exists $self->{ConfigHash}) {
    if (ref($self->{ConfigHash}) eq 'HASH') {
      # initialize with given hash
      $self->{config} = $self->{ConfigHash};
      $self->{parsed} = 1;
    }
    else {
      croak "Config::General: Parameter -ConfigHash must be a hash reference!\n";
    }
  }
  elsif (ref($self->{ConfigFile}) eq 'GLOB' || ref($self->{ConfigFile}) eq 'FileHandle') {
    # use the file the glob points to
    $self->_read($self->{ConfigFile});
    $self->{config} = $self->_parse($self->{DefaultConfig}, $self->{content});
  }
  else {
    if ($self->{ConfigFile}) {
      # open the file and read the contents in
      $self->{configfile} = $self->{ConfigFile};
      if ( file_name_is_absolute($self->{ConfigFile}) ) {
	# look if this is an absolute path and save the basename if it is absolute
	my ($volume, $path, undef) = splitpath($self->{ConfigFile});
	$path =~ s#/$##; # remove eventually existing trailing slash
	if (! $self->{ConfigPath}) {
	  $self->{ConfigPath} = [];
	}
	unshift @{$self->{ConfigPath}}, catpath($volume, $path, q());
      }
      $self->_open($self->{configfile});
      # now, we parse immediately, getall simply returns the whole hash
      $self->{config} = $self->_hashref();
      $self->{config} = $self->_parse($self->{DefaultConfig}, $self->{content});
    }
    else {
      # hm, no valid config file given, so try it as an empty object
      $self->{config} = $self->_hashref();
      $self->{parsed} = 1;
    }
  }
}


sub _blessoop {
  #
  # bless into ::Extended if necessary
  my($self) = @_;
  if ($self->{ExtendedAccess}) {
    # we are blessing here again, to get into the ::Extended namespace
    # for inheriting the methods available over there, which we doesn't have.
    bless $self, 'Config::General::Extended';
    eval {
      require Config::General::Extended;
    };
    if ($EVAL_ERROR) {
      croak "Config::General: " . $EVAL_ERROR;
    }
  }
#  return $self;
}

sub _blessvars {
  #
  # bless into ::Interpolated if necessary
  my($self) = @_;
  if ($self->{InterPolateVars} || $self->{InterPolateEnv}) {
    # InterPolateEnv implies InterPolateVars
    $self->{InterPolateVars} = 1;

    # we are blessing here again, to get into the ::InterPolated namespace
    # for inheriting the methods available overthere, which we doesn't have here.
    bless $self, 'Config::General::Interpolated';
    eval {
      require Config::General::Interpolated;
    };
    if ($EVAL_ERROR) {
      croak "Config::General: " . $EVAL_ERROR;
    }
    # pre-compile the variable regexp
    $self->{regex} = $self->_set_regex();
  }
#  return $self;
}


sub _splitpolicy {
  #
  # find out what split policy to use
  my($self) = @_;
  if ($self->{SplitPolicy} ne 'guess') {
    if ($self->{SplitPolicy} eq 'whitespace') {
      $self->{SplitDelimiter} = '\s+';
      if (!$self->{StoreDelimiter}) {
	$self->{StoreDelimiter} = q(   );
      }
    }
    elsif ($self->{SplitPolicy} eq 'equalsign') {
      $self->{SplitDelimiter} = '\s*=\s*';
      if (!$self->{StoreDelimiter}) {
	$self->{StoreDelimiter} = ' = ';
      }
    }
    elsif ($self->{SplitPolicy} eq 'custom') {
      if (! $self->{SplitDelimiter} ) {
	croak "Config::General: SplitPolicy set to 'custom' but no SplitDelimiter set.\n";
      }
    }
    else {
      croak "Config::General: Unsupported SplitPolicy: $self->{SplitPolicy}.\n";
    }
  }
  else {
    if (!$self->{StoreDelimiter}) {
      $self->{StoreDelimiter} = q(   );
    }
  }
}

sub _prepare {
  #
  # prepare the class parameters, mangle them, if there
  # are options to reset or to override, do it here.
  my ($self, %conf) = @_;

  # save the parameter list for ::Extended's new() calls
  $self->{Params} = \%conf;

  # be backwards compatible
  if (exists $conf{-file}) {
    $self->{ConfigFile} = delete $conf{-file};
  }
  if (exists $conf{-hash}) {
    $self->{ConfigHash} = delete $conf{-hash};
  }

  # store input, file, handle, or array
  if (exists $conf{-ConfigFile}) {
    $self->{ConfigFile} = delete $conf{-ConfigFile};
  }
  if (exists $conf{-ConfigHash}) {
    $self->{ConfigHash} = delete $conf{-ConfigHash};
  }

  # store search path for relative configs, if any
  if (exists $conf{-ConfigPath}) {
    my $configpath = delete $conf{-ConfigPath};
    $self->{ConfigPath} = ref $configpath eq 'ARRAY' ? $configpath : [$configpath];
  }

  # handle options which contains values we need (strings, hashrefs or the like)
  if (exists $conf{-String} ) {
    #if (ref(\$conf{-String}) eq 'SCALAR') {
    if (not ref $conf{-String}) {
      if ( $conf{-String}) {
	$self->{StringContent} = $conf{-String};
      }
      delete $conf{-String};
    }
    # re-implement arrayref support, removed after 2.22 as _read were
    # re-organized
    # fixed bug#33385
    elsif(ref($conf{-String}) eq 'ARRAY') {
      $self->{StringContent} = join "\n", @{$conf{-String}};
    }
    else {
      croak "Config::General: Parameter -String must be a SCALAR or ARRAYREF!\n";
    }
    delete $conf{-String};
  }
  if (exists $conf{-Tie}) {
    if ($conf{-Tie}) {
      $self->{Tie} = delete $conf{-Tie};
      $self->{DefaultConfig} = $self->_hashref();
    }
  }

  if (exists $conf{-FlagBits}) {
    if ($conf{-FlagBits} && ref($conf{-FlagBits}) eq 'HASH') {
      $self->{FlagBits} = 1;
      $self->{FlagBitsFlags} = $conf{-FlagBits};
    }
    delete $conf{-FlagBits};
  }

  if (exists $conf{-DefaultConfig}) {
    if ($conf{-DefaultConfig} && ref($conf{-DefaultConfig}) eq 'HASH') {
      $self->{DefaultConfig} = $conf{-DefaultConfig};
    }
    elsif ($conf{-DefaultConfig} && ref($conf{-DefaultConfig}) eq q()) {
      $self->_read($conf{-DefaultConfig}, 'SCALAR');
      $self->{DefaultConfig} = $self->_parse($self->_hashref(), $self->{content});
      $self->{content} = ();
    }
    delete $conf{-DefaultConfig};
  }

  # handle options which may either be true or false
  # allowing "human" logic about what is true and what is not
  foreach my $entry (keys %conf) {
    my $key = $entry;
    $key =~ s/^\-//;
    if (! exists $self->{$key}) {
      croak "Config::General: Unknown parameter: $entry => \"$conf{$entry}\" (key: <$key>)\n";
    }
    if ($conf{$entry} =~ /$self->{AutoTrueFlags}->{true}/io) {
      $self->{$key} = 1;
    }
    elsif ($conf{$entry} =~ /$self->{AutoTrueFlags}->{false}/io) {
      $self->{$key} = 0;
    }
    else {
      # keep it untouched
      $self->{$key} = $conf{$entry};
    }
  }

  if ($self->{MergeDuplicateOptions}) {
    # override if not set by user
    if (! exists $conf{-AllowMultiOptions}) {
      $self->{AllowMultiOptions} = 0;
    }
  }

  if ($self->{ApacheCompatible}) {
    # turn on all apache compatibility options which has
    # been incorporated during the years...
    $self->{UseApacheInclude}   = 1;
    $self->{IncludeRelative}    = 1;
    $self->{IncludeDirectories} = 1;
    $self->{IncludeGlob}        = 1;
    $self->{SlashIsDirectory}   = 1;
    $self->{SplitPolicy}        = 'whitespace';
    $self->{CComments}          = 0;
  }
}

sub getall {
  #
  # just return the whole config hash
  #
  my($this) = @_;
  return (exists $this->{config} ? %{$this->{config}} : () );
}


sub files {
  #
  # return a list of files opened so far
  #
  my($this) = @_;
  return (exists $this->{files} ? keys %{$this->{files}} : () );
}


sub _open {
  #
  # open the config file, or expand a directory or glob
  #
  my($this, $basefile, $basepath) = @_;
  my $cont;

  ($cont, $basefile, $basepath) = $this->_hook('pre_open', $basefile, $basepath);
  return if(!$cont);

  my($fh, $configfile);

  if($basepath) {
    # if this doesn't work we can still try later the global config path to use
    $configfile = catfile($basepath, $basefile);
  }
  else {
    $configfile = $basefile;
  }

  if ($this->{IncludeGlob} and $configfile =~ /[*?\[\{\\]/) {
    # Something like: *.conf (or maybe dir/*.conf) was included; expand it and
    # pass each expansion through this method again.
    my @include = grep { -f $_ } bsd_glob($configfile, GLOB_BRACE | GLOB_QUOTE);

    # applied patch by AlexK fixing rt.cpan.org#41030
    if ( !@include && defined $this->{ConfigPath} ) {
    	foreach my $dir (@{$this->{ConfigPath}}) {
		my ($volume, $path, undef) = splitpath($basefile);
		if ( -d catfile( $dir, $path )  ) {
	    		push @include, grep { -f $_ } bsd_glob(catfile($dir, $basefile), GLOB_BRACE | GLOB_QUOTE);
			last;
		}
    	}
    }

    if (@include == 1) {
      $configfile = $include[0];
    }
    else {
      # Multiple results or no expansion results (which is fine,
      # include foo/* shouldn't fail if there isn't anything matching)
      # rt.cpan.org#79869: local $this->{IncludeGlob};
      for (@include) {
	$this->_open($_);
      }
      return;
    }
  }

  if (!-e $configfile) {
    my $found;
    if (defined $this->{ConfigPath}) {
      # try to find the file within ConfigPath
      foreach my $dir (@{$this->{ConfigPath}}) {
	if( -e catfile($dir, $basefile) ) {
	  $configfile = catfile($dir, $basefile);
	  $found = 1;
	  last; # found it
	}
      }
    }
    if (!$found) {
      my $path_message = defined $this->{ConfigPath} ? q( within ConfigPath: ) . join(q(.), @{$this->{ConfigPath}}) : q();
      croak qq{Config::General The file "$basefile" does not exist$path_message!};
    }
  }

  local ($RS) = $RS;
  if (! $RS) {
    carp(q(\$RS (INPUT_RECORD_SEPARATOR) is undefined.  Guessing you want a line feed character));
    $RS = "\n";
  }

  if (-d $configfile and $this->{IncludeDirectories}) {
    # A directory was included; include all the files inside that directory in ASCII order
    local *INCLUDEDIR;
    opendir INCLUDEDIR, $configfile or croak "Config::General: Could not open directory $configfile!($!)\n";
    my @files = sort grep { -f catfile($configfile, $_) } catfile($configfile, $_), readdir INCLUDEDIR;
    closedir INCLUDEDIR;
    local $this->{CurrentConfigFilePath} = $configfile;
    for (@files) {
      my $file = catfile($configfile, $_);
      if (! exists $this->{files}->{$file} or $this->{IncludeAgain} ) {
        # support re-read if used urged us to do so, otherwise ignore the file
	if ($this->{UTF8}) {
	  $fh = IO::File->new;
	  open( $fh, "<:utf8", $file)
	    or croak "Config::General: Could not open $file in UTF8 mode!($!)\n";
	}
	else {
	  $fh = IO::File->new( $file, 'r') or croak "Config::General: Could not open $file!($!)\n";
	}
	$this->{files}->{"$file"} = 1;
	$this->_read($fh);
      }
      else {
        warn "File $file already loaded.  Use -IncludeAgain to load it again.\n";
      }
    }
  }
  elsif (-d $configfile) {
    croak "Config::General: config file argument is a directory, expecting a file!\n";
  }
  elsif (-e _) {
    if (exists $this->{files}->{$configfile} and not $this->{IncludeAgain}) {
      # do not read the same file twice, just return
      warn "File $configfile already loaded.  Use -IncludeAgain to load it again.\n";
      return;
    }
    else {
      if ($this->{UTF8}) {
	$fh = IO::File->new;
	open( $fh, "<:utf8", $configfile)
	  or croak "Config::General: Could not open $configfile in UTF8 mode!($!)\n";
      }
      else {
	$fh = IO::File->new( "$configfile", 'r')
	  or croak "Config::General: Could not open $configfile!($!)\n";
      }

      $this->{files}->{$configfile}    = 1;

      my ($volume, $path, undef)           = splitpath($configfile);
      local $this->{CurrentConfigFilePath} = catpath($volume, $path, q());

      $this->_read($fh);
    }
  }
  return;
}


sub _read {
  #
  # store the config contents in @content
  # and prepare it somewhat for easier parsing later
  # (comments, continuing lines, and stuff)
  #
  my($this, $fh, $flag) = @_;


  my(@stuff, @content, $c_comment, $longline, $hier, $hierend, @hierdoc);
  local $_ = q();

  if ($flag && $flag eq 'SCALAR') {
    if (ref($fh) eq 'ARRAY') {
      @stuff = @{$fh};
    }
    else {
      @stuff = split /\n/, $fh;
    }
  }
  else {
    @stuff = <$fh>;
  }

  my $cont;
  ($cont, $fh, @stuff) = $this->_hook('pre_read', $fh, @stuff);
  return if(!$cont);

  foreach (@stuff) {
    if ($this->{AutoLaunder}) {
      if (m/^(.*)$/) {
	$_ = $1;
      }
    }

    chomp;


    if ($hier) {
      # inside here-doc, only look for $hierend marker
      if (/^(\s*)\Q$hierend\E\s*$/) {
	my $indent = $1;                 # preserve indentation
	$hier .= ' ' . $this->{EOFseparator}; # bugfix of rt.40925
	                                 # _parse will also preserver indentation
	if ($indent) {
	  foreach (@hierdoc) {
	    s/^$indent//;                # i.e. the end was: "    EOF" then we remove "    " from every here-doc line
	    $hier .= $_ . "\n";          # and store it in $hier
	  }
	}
	else {
	  $hier .= join "\n", @hierdoc;  # there was no indentation of the end-string, so join it 1:1
	}
	push @{$this->{content}}, $hier; # push it onto the content stack
	@hierdoc = ();
	undef $hier;
	undef $hierend;
      }
      else {
	# everything else onto the stack
	push @hierdoc, $_;
      }
      next;
    }

    if ($this->{CComments}) {
      # look for C-Style comments, if activated
      if (/(\s*\/\*.*\*\/\s*)/) {
       # single c-comment on one line
       s/\s*\/\*.*\*\/\s*//;
      }
      elsif (/^\s*\/\*/) {
       # the beginning of a C-comment ("/*"), from now on ignore everything.
       if (/\*\/\s*$/) {
         # C-comment end is already there, so just ignore this line!
         $c_comment = 0;
       }
       else {
         $c_comment = 1;
       }
      }
      elsif (/\*\//) {
       if (!$c_comment) {
         warn "invalid syntax: found end of C-comment without previous start!\n";
       }
       $c_comment = 0;    # the current C-comment ends here, go on
       s/^.*\*\///;       # if there is still stuff, it will be read
      }
      next if($c_comment); # ignore EVERYTHING from now on, IF it IS a C-Comment
    }

    # Remove comments and empty lines
    s/(?<!\\)#.*$//; # .+ => .* bugfix rt.cpan.org#44600
    next if /^\s*#/;
    #next if /^\s*$/;


    # look for multiline option, indicated by a trailing backslash
    if (/(?<!\\)\\$/) {
      chop; # remove trailing backslash
      s/^\s*//;
      $longline .= $_;
      next;
    }

    # transform explicit-empty blocks to conforming blocks
    # rt.cpan.org#80006 added \s* before $/
    if (!$this->{ApacheCompatible} && /\s*<([^\/]+?.*?)\/>\s*$/) {
      my $block = $1;
      if ($block !~ /\"/) {
	if ($block !~ /\s[^\s]/) {
	  # fix of bug 7957, add quotation to pure slash at the
	  # end of a block so that it will be considered as directory
	  # unless the block is already quoted or contains whitespaces
	  # and no quotes.
	  if ($this->{SlashIsDirectory}) {
	    push @{$this->{content}}, '<' . $block . '"/">';
	    next;
	  }
	}
      }
      my $orig  = $_;
      $orig     =~ s/\/>$/>/;
      $block    =~ s/\s\s*.*$//;
      push @{$this->{content}}, $orig, "</${block}>";
      next;
    }


    # look for here-doc identifier
    if ($this->{SplitPolicy} eq 'guess') {
      if (/^\s*([^=]+?)\s*=\s*<<\s*(.+?)\s*$/) {
	# try equal sign (fix bug rt#36607)
	$hier    = $1;  # the actual here-doc variable name
	$hierend = $2;  # the here-doc identifier, i.e. "EOF"
	next;
      }
      elsif (/^\s*(\S+?)\s+<<\s*(.+?)\s*$/) {
	# try whitespace
	$hier    = $1;  # the actual here-doc variable name
	$hierend = $2;  # the here-doc identifier, i.e. "EOF"
	next;
      }
    }
    else {
      # no guess, use one of the configured strict split policies
      if (/^\s*(.+?)($this->{SplitDelimiter})<<\s*(.+?)\s*$/) {
	$hier    = $1;  # the actual here-doc variable name
	$hierend = $3;  # the here-doc identifier, i.e. "EOF"
	next;
      }
    }



    ###
    ### any "normal" config lines from now on
    ###

    if ($longline) {
      # previous stuff was a longline and this is the last line of the longline
      s/^\s*//;
      $longline .= $_;
      push @{$this->{content}}, $longline;    # push it onto the content stack
      undef $longline;
      next;
    }
    else {
      # ignore empty lines
      next if /^\s*$/;

      # look for include statement(s)
      my $incl_file;
      my $path = '';
      if ( $this->{IncludeRelative} and defined $this->{CurrentConfigFilePath}) {
      	$path = $this->{CurrentConfigFilePath};
      }
      elsif (defined $this->{ConfigPath}) {
	# fetch pathname of base config file, assuming the 1st one is the path of it
	$path = $this->{ConfigPath}->[0];
      }

      # bugfix rt.cpan.org#38635: support quoted filenames
      if ($this->{UseApacheInclude}) {
         if (/^\s*include\s*(["'])(.*?)(?<!\\)\1$/i) {
           $incl_file = $2;
         }
         elsif (/^\s*include\s+(.+?)\s*$/i) {
           $incl_file = $1;
         }
      }
      else {
	if (/^\s*<<include\s+(["'])(.+?)>>\\s*$/i) {
	  $incl_file = $2;
	}
        elsif (/^\s*<<include\s+(.+?)>>\s*$/i) {
          $incl_file = $1;
        }
      }

      if ($incl_file) {
	if ( $this->{IncludeRelative} && $path && !file_name_is_absolute($incl_file) ) {
	  # include the file from within location of $this->{configfile}
	  $this->_open( $incl_file, $path );
	}
	else {
	  # include the file from within pwd, or absolute
	  $this->_open($incl_file);
	}
      }
      else {
	# standard entry, (option = value)
	push @{$this->{content}}, $_;
      }

    }

  }

  ($cont, $this->{content}) = $this->_hook('post_read', $this->{content});
  return 1;
}





sub _parse {
  #
  # parse the contents of the file
  #
  my($this, $config, $content) = @_;
  my(@newcontent, $block, $blockname, $chunk,$block_level);
  local $_;

  foreach (@{$content}) {                                  # loop over content stack
    chomp;
    $chunk++;
    $_ =~ s/^\s+//;                                        # strip spaces @ end and begin
    $_ =~ s/\s+$//;

    #
    # build option value assignment, split current input
    # using whitespace, equal sign or optionally here-doc
    # separator EOFseparator
    my ($option,$value);
    if (/$this->{EOFseparator}/) {
      ($option,$value) = split /\s*$this->{EOFseparator}\s*/, $_, 2;   # separated by heredoc-finding in _open()
    }
    else {
      if ($this->{SplitPolicy} eq 'guess') {
	# again the old regex. use equalsign SplitPolicy to get the
	# 2.00 behavior. the new regexes were too odd.
	($option,$value) = split /\s*=\s*|\s+/, $_, 2;
      }
      else {
	# no guess, use one of the configured strict split policies
	($option,$value) = split /$this->{SplitDelimiter}/, $_, 2;
      }
    }

    if($this->{NormalizeOption}) {
      $option = $this->{NormalizeOption}($option);
    }

    if ($value && $value =~ /^"/ && $value =~ /"$/) {
      $value =~ s/^"//;                                    # remove leading and trailing "
      $value =~ s/"$//;
    }
    if (! defined $block) {                                # not inside a block @ the moment
      if (/^<([^\/]+?.*?)>$/) {                            # look if it is a block
	$block = $1;                                       # store block name
	if ($block =~ /^"([^"]+)"$/) {
	  # quoted block, unquote it and do not split
	  $block =~ s/"//g;
	}
	else {
	  # If it is a named block store the name separately; allow the block and name to each be quoted
	  if ($block =~ /^(?:"([^"]+)"|(\S+))(?:\s+(?:"([^"]+)"|(.*)))?$/) {
	    $block = $1 || $2;
	    $blockname = $3 || $4;
	  }
	}
        if($this->{NormalizeBlock}) {
          $block = $this->{NormalizeBlock}($block);
	  if (defined $blockname) {
            $blockname = $this->{NormalizeBlock}($blockname);
            if($blockname eq "") {
              # if, after normalization no blockname is left, remove it
              $blockname = undef;
            }
	  }
        }
	if ($this->{InterPolateVars}) {
	  # interpolate block(name), add "<" and ">" to the key, because
	  # it is sure that such keys does not exist otherwise.
	  $block     = $this->_interpolate($config, "<$block>", $block);
	  if (defined $blockname) {
	    $blockname = $this->_interpolate($config, "<$blockname>", "$blockname");
	  }
	}
	if ($this->{LowerCaseNames}) {
	  $block = lc $block;    # only for blocks lc(), if configured via new()
	}
	$this->{level} += 1;
	undef @newcontent;
	next;
      }
      elsif (/^<\/(.+?)>$/) { # it is an end block, but we don't have a matching block!
	croak "Config::General: EndBlock \"<\/$1>\" has no StartBlock statement (level: $this->{level}, chunk $chunk)!\n";
      }
      else {                                               # insert key/value pair into actual node
	if ($this->{LowerCaseNames}) {
	  $option = lc $option;
	}

	if (exists $config->{$option}) {
	  if ($this->{MergeDuplicateOptions}) {
	    $config->{$option} = $this->_parse_value($config, $option, $value);

	    # bugfix rt.cpan.org#33216
	    if ($this->{InterPolateVars}) {
	      # save pair on local stack
	      $config->{__stack}->{$option} = $config->{$option};
	    }
	  }
	  else {
	    if (! $this->{AllowMultiOptions} ) {
	      # no, duplicates not allowed
	      croak "Config::General: Option \"$option\" occurs more than once (level: $this->{level}, chunk $chunk)!\n";
	    }
	    else {
	      # yes, duplicates allowed
	      if (ref($config->{$option}) ne 'ARRAY') {      # convert scalar to array
		my $savevalue = $config->{$option};
		delete $config->{$option};
		push @{$config->{$option}}, $savevalue;
	      }
	      eval {
		# check if arrays are supported by the underlying hash
		my $i = scalar @{$config->{$option}};
	      };
	      if ($EVAL_ERROR) {
		$config->{$option} = $this->_parse_value($config, $option, $value);
	      }
	      else {
		# it's already an array, just push
		push @{$config->{$option}}, $this->_parse_value($config, $option, $value);
	      }
	    }
	  }
	}
	else {
          if($this->{ForceArray} && defined $value && $value =~ /^\[\s*(.+?)\s*\]$/) {
            # force single value array entry
            push @{$config->{$option}}, $this->_parse_value($config, $option, $1);
          }
          else {
	    # standard config option, insert key/value pair into node
	    $config->{$option} = $this->_parse_value($config, $option, $value);

	    if ($this->{InterPolateVars}) {
	      # save pair on local stack
	      $config->{__stack}->{$option} = $config->{$option};
	    }
          }
	}
      }
    }
    elsif (/^<([^\/]+?.*?)>$/) {    # found a start block inside a block, don't forget it
      $block_level++;               # $block_level indicates wether we are still inside a node
      push @newcontent, $_;         # push onto new content stack for later recursive call of _parse()
    }
    elsif (/^<\/(.+?)>$/) {
      if ($block_level) {           # this endblock is not the one we are searching for, decrement and push
	$block_level--;             # if it is 0, then the endblock was the one we searched for, see below
	push @newcontent, $_;       # push onto new content stack
      }
      else {                        # calling myself recursively, end of $block reached, $block_level is 0
	if (defined $blockname) {
	  # a named block, make it a hashref inside a hash within the current node

	  if (! exists $config->{$block}) {
	    # Make sure that the hash is not created implicitly
	    $config->{$block} = $this->_hashref();

	    if ($this->{InterPolateVars}) {
	      # inherit current __stack to new block
	      $config->{$block}->{__stack} = $this->_copy($config->{__stack});
	    }
	  }

	  if (ref($config->{$block}) eq '') {
	    croak "Config::General: Block <$block> already exists as scalar entry!\n";
	  }
	  elsif (ref($config->{$block}) eq 'ARRAY') {
	    croak "Config::General: Cannot append named block <$block $blockname> to array of scalars!\n"
	         ."Block <$block> or scalar '$block' occurs more than once.\n"
	         ."Turn on -MergeDuplicateBlocks or make sure <$block> occurs only once in the config.\n";
	  }
	  elsif (exists $config->{$block}->{$blockname}) {
	    # the named block already exists, make it an array
	    if ($this->{MergeDuplicateBlocks}) {
	      # just merge the new block with the same name as an existing one into
              # this one.
	      $config->{$block}->{$blockname} = $this->_parse($config->{$block}->{$blockname}, \@newcontent);
	    }
	    else {
	      if (! $this->{AllowMultiOptions}) {
		croak "Config::General: Named block \"<$block $blockname>\" occurs more than once (level: $this->{level}, chunk $chunk)!\n";
	      }
	      else {                                       # preserve existing data
		my $savevalue = $config->{$block}->{$blockname};
		delete $config->{$block}->{$blockname};
		my @ar;
		if (ref $savevalue eq 'ARRAY') {
		  push @ar, @{$savevalue};                   # preserve array if any
		}
		else {
		  push @ar, $savevalue;
		}
		push @ar, $this->_parse( $this->_hashref(), \@newcontent);  # append it
		$config->{$block}->{$blockname} = \@ar;
	      }
	    }
	  }
	  else {
	    # the first occurrence of this particular named block
	    my $tmphash = $this->_hashref();

	    if ($this->{InterPolateVars}) {
	      # inherit current __stack to new block
	      $tmphash->{__stack} = $this->_copy($config->{__stack});
	    }

	    $config->{$block}->{$blockname} = $this->_parse($tmphash, \@newcontent);
	  }
	}
	else {
	  # standard block
	  if (exists $config->{$block}) {
	    if (ref($config->{$block}) eq '') {
	      croak "Config::General: Cannot create hashref from <$block> because there is\n"
		   ."already a scalar option '$block' with value '$config->{$block}'\n";
	    }

	    # the block already exists, make it an array
	    if ($this->{MergeDuplicateBlocks}) {
	      # just merge the new block with the same name as an existing one into
              # this one.
	      $config->{$block} = $this->_parse($config->{$block}, \@newcontent);
            }
            else {
	      if (! $this->{AllowMultiOptions}) {
	        croak "Config::General: Block \"<$block>\" occurs more than once (level: $this->{level}, chunk $chunk)!\n";
	      }
	      else {
		my $savevalue = $config->{$block};
		delete $config->{$block};
		my @ar;
		if (ref $savevalue eq "ARRAY") {
		  push @ar, @{$savevalue};
		}
		else {
		  push @ar, $savevalue;
		}

		# fixes rt#31529
		my $tmphash = $this->_hashref();
		if ($this->{InterPolateVars}) {
		  # inherit current __stack to new block
		  $tmphash->{__stack} = $this->_copy($config->{__stack});
		}

		push @ar, $this->_parse( $tmphash, \@newcontent);

		$config->{$block} = \@ar;
	      }
	    }
	  }
	  else {
	    # the first occurrence of this particular block
	    my $tmphash = $this->_hashref();

	    if ($this->{InterPolateVars}) {
	      # inherit current __stack to new block
	      $tmphash->{__stack} = $this->_copy($config->{__stack});
	    }

	    $config->{$block} = $this->_parse($tmphash, \@newcontent);
	  }
	}
	undef $blockname;
	undef $block;
	$this->{level} -= 1;
	next;
      }
    }
    else { # inside $block, just push onto new content stack
      push @newcontent, $_;
    }
  }
  if ($block) {
    # $block is still defined, which means, that it had
    # no matching endblock!
    croak "Config::General: Block \"<$block>\" has no EndBlock statement (level: $this->{level}, chunk $chunk)!\n";
  }
  return $config;
}


sub _copy {
  #
  # copy the contents of one hash into another
  # to circumvent invalid references
  # fixes rt.cpan.org bug #35122
  my($this, $source) = @_;
  my %hash = ();
  while (my ($key, $value) = each %{$source}) {
    $hash{$key} = $value;
  }
  return \%hash;
}


sub _parse_value {
  #
  # parse the value if value parsing is turned on
  # by either -AutoTrue and/or -FlagBits
  # otherwise just return the given value unchanged
  #
  my($this, $config, $option, $value) =@_;

  my $cont;
  ($cont, $option, $value) = $this->_hook('pre_parse_value', $option, $value);
  return $value if(!$cont);

  # avoid "Use of uninitialized value"
  if (! defined $value) {
    # patch fix rt#54583
    # Return an input undefined value without trying transformations
    return $value;
  }

  if($this->{NormalizeValue}) {
    $value = $this->{NormalizeValue}($value);
  }

  if ($this->{InterPolateVars}) {
    $value = $this->_interpolate($config, $option, $value);
  }

  # make true/false values to 1 or 0 (-AutoTrue)
  if ($this->{AutoTrue}) {
    if ($value =~ /$this->{AutoTrueFlags}->{true}/io) {
      $value = 1;
    }
    elsif ($value =~ /$this->{AutoTrueFlags}->{false}/io) {
      $value = 0;
    }
  }

  # assign predefined flags or undef for every flag | flag ... (-FlagBits)
  if ($this->{FlagBits}) {
    if (exists $this->{FlagBitsFlags}->{$option}) {
      my %__flags = map { $_ => 1 } split /\s*\|\s*/, $value;
      foreach my $flag (keys %{$this->{FlagBitsFlags}->{$option}}) {
	if (exists $__flags{$flag}) {
	  $__flags{$flag} = $this->{FlagBitsFlags}->{$option}->{$flag};
	}
	else {
	  $__flags{$flag} = undef;
	}
      }
      $value = \%__flags;
    }
  }

  if (!$this->{NoEscape}) {
    # are there any escaped characters left? put them out as is
    $value =~ s/\\([\$\\\"#])/$1/g;
  }

  ($cont, $option, $value) = $this->_hook('post_parse_value', $option, $value);
  
  return $value;
}



sub _hook {
  my ($this, $hook, @arguments) = @_;
  if(exists $this->{Plug}->{$hook}) {
    my $sub = $this->{Plug}->{$hook};
    my @hooked = &$sub(@arguments);
    return @hooked;
  }
  return (1, @arguments);
}








sub NoMultiOptions {
  #
  # turn AllowMultiOptions off, still exists for backward compatibility.
  # Since we do parsing from within new(), we must
  # call it again if one turns NoMultiOptions on!
  #
  croak q(Config::General: The NoMultiOptions() method is deprecated. Set 'AllowMultiOptions' to 'no' instead!);
}


sub save {
  #
  # this is the old version of save() whose API interface
  # has been changed. I'm very sorry 'bout this.
  #
  # I'll try to figure out, if it has been called correctly
  # and if yes, feed the call to Save(), otherwise croak.
  #
  my($this, $one, @two) = @_;

  if ( (@two && $one) && ( (scalar @two) % 2 == 0) ) {
    # @two seems to be a hash
    my %h = @two;
    $this->save_file($one, \%h);
  }
  else {
    croak q(Config::General: The save() method is deprecated. Use the new save_file() method instead!);
  }
  return;
}


sub save_file {
  #
  # save the config back to disk
  #
  my($this, $file, $config) = @_;
  my $fh;
  my $config_string;

  if (!$file) {
    croak "Config::General: Filename is required!";
  }
  else {
    if ($this->{UTF8}) {
      $fh = IO::File->new;
      open($fh, ">:utf8", $file)
	or croak "Config::General: Could not open $file in UTF8 mode!($!)\n";
    }
    else {
      $fh = IO::File->new( "$file", 'w')
	or croak "Config::General: Could not open $file!($!)\n";
    }
    if (!$config) {
      if (exists $this->{config}) {
	$config_string = $this->_store(0, $this->{config});
      }
      else {
	croak "Config::General: No config hash supplied which could be saved to disk!\n";
      }
    }
    else {
      $config_string = $this->_store(0, $config);
    }

    if ($config_string) {
      print {$fh} $config_string;
    }
    else {
      # empty config for whatever reason, I don't care
      print {$fh} q();
    }

    close $fh;
  }
  return;
}



sub save_string {
  #
  # return the saved config as a string
  #
  my($this, $config) = @_;

  if (!$config || ref($config) ne 'HASH') {
    if (exists $this->{config}) {
      return $this->_store(0, $this->{config});
    }
    else {
      croak "Config::General: No config hash supplied which could be saved to disk!\n";
    }
  }
  else {
    return $this->_store(0, $config);
  }
  return;
}



sub _store {
  #
  # internal sub for saving a block
  #
  my($this, $level, $config) = @_;
  local $_;
  my $indent = q(    ) x $level;

  my $config_string = q();

  foreach my $entry ( $this->{SaveSorted} ? sort keys %$config : keys %$config ) {
    if (ref($config->{$entry}) eq 'ARRAY') {
      if( $this->{ForceArray} && scalar @{$config->{$entry}} == 1 && ! ref($config->{$entry}->[0]) ) {
        # a single value array forced to stay as array
        $config_string .= $this->_write_scalar($level, $entry, '[' . $config->{$entry}->[0] . ']');
      }
      else {
        foreach my $line ( $this->{SaveSorted} ? sort @{$config->{$entry}} : @{$config->{$entry}} ) {
          if (ref($line) eq 'HASH') {
            $config_string .= $this->_write_hash($level, $entry, $line);
          }
          else {
            $config_string .= $this->_write_scalar($level, $entry, $line);
          }
        }
      }
    }
    elsif (ref($config->{$entry}) eq 'HASH') {
      $config_string .= $this->_write_hash($level, $entry, $config->{$entry});
    }
    else {
      $config_string .= $this->_write_scalar($level, $entry, $config->{$entry});
    }
  }

  return $config_string;
}


sub _write_scalar {
  #
  # internal sub, which writes a scalar
  # it returns it, in fact
  #
  my($this, $level, $entry, $line) = @_;

  my $indent = q(    ) x $level;

  my $config_string;

  # patch fix rt#54583
  if ( ! defined $line ) {
    $config_string .= $indent . $entry . "\n";
  }
  elsif ($line =~ /\n/ || $line =~ /\\$/) {
    # it is a here doc
    my $delimiter;
    my $tmplimiter = 'EOF';
    while (!$delimiter) {
      # create a unique here-doc identifier
      if ($line =~ /$tmplimiter/s) {
	$tmplimiter .= '%';
      }
      else {
	$delimiter = $tmplimiter;
      }
    }
    my @lines = split /\n/, $line;
    $config_string .= $indent . $entry . $this->{StoreDelimiter} . "<<$delimiter\n";
    foreach (@lines) {
      $config_string .= $indent . $_ . "\n";
    }
    $config_string .= $indent . "$delimiter\n";
  }
  else {
    # a simple stupid scalar entry

    if (!$this->{NoEscape}) {
      # re-escape contained $ or # or \ chars
      $line =~ s/([#\$\\\"])/\\$1/g;
    }

    # bugfix rt.cpan.org#42287
    if ($line =~ /^\s/ or $line =~ /\s$/) {
      # need to quote it
      $line = "\"$line\"";
    }
    $config_string .= $indent . $entry . $this->{StoreDelimiter} . $line . "\n";
  }

  return $config_string;
}

sub _write_hash {
  #
  # internal sub, which writes a hash (block)
  # it returns it, in fact
  #
  my($this, $level, $entry, $line) = @_;

  my $indent = q(    ) x $level;
  my $config_string;

  if ($entry =~ /\s/) {
    # quote the entry if it contains whitespaces
    $entry = q(") . $entry . q(");
  }

  # check if the next level key points to a hash and is the only one
  # in this case put out a named block
  # fixes rt.77667
  my $num = scalar keys %{$line};
  if($num == 1) {
    my $key = (keys %{$line})[0];
    if(ref($line->{$key}) eq 'HASH') {
      $config_string .= $indent . qq(<$entry $key>\n);
      $config_string .= $this->_store($level + 1, $line->{$key});
      $config_string .= $indent . qq(</) . $entry . ">\n";
      return $config_string;
    }
  }
 
  $config_string .= $indent . q(<) . $entry . ">\n";
  $config_string .= $this->_store($level + 1, $line);
  $config_string .= $indent . q(</) . $entry . ">\n";

  return $config_string
}


sub _hashref {
  #
  # return a probably tied new empty hash ref
  #
  my($this) = @_;
  if ($this->{Tie}) {
    eval {
      eval qq{require $this->{Tie}};
    };
    if ($EVAL_ERROR) {
      croak q(Config::General: Could not create a tied hash of type: ) . $this->{Tie} . q(: ) . $EVAL_ERROR;
    }
    my %hash;
    tie %hash, $this->{Tie};
    return \%hash;
  }
  else {
    return {};
  }
}



#
# Procedural interface
#
sub ParseConfig {
  #
  # @_ may contain everything which is allowed for new()
  #
  return (new Config::General(@_))->getall();
}

sub SaveConfig {
  #
  # 2 parameters are required, filename and hash ref
  #
  my ($file, $hash) = @_;

  if (!$file || !$hash) {
    croak q{Config::General::SaveConfig(): filename and hash argument required.};
  }
  else {
    if (ref($hash) ne 'HASH') {
      croak q(Config::General::SaveConfig() The second parameter must be a reference to a hash!);
    }
    else {
      (new Config::General(-ConfigHash => $hash))->save_file($file);
    }
  }
  return;
}

sub SaveConfigString {
  #
  # same as SaveConfig, but return the config,
  # instead of saving it
  #
  my ($hash) = @_;

  if (!$hash) {
    croak q{Config::General::SaveConfigString(): Hash argument required.};
  }
  else {
    if (ref($hash) ne 'HASH') {
      croak q(Config::General::SaveConfigString() The parameter must be a reference to a hash!);
    }
    else {
      return (new Config::General(-ConfigHash => $hash))->save_string();
    }
  }
  return;
}



# keep this one
1;
__END__





=head1 NAME

Config::General - Generic Config Module

=head1 SYNOPSIS

 #
 # the OOP way
 use Config::General;
 $conf = Config::General->new("rcfile");
 my %config = $conf->getall;

 #
 # the procedural way
 use Config::General qw(ParseConfig SaveConfig SaveConfigString);
 my %config = ParseConfig("rcfile");

=head1 DESCRIPTION

This module opens a config file and parses its contents for you. The B<new> method
requires one parameter which needs to be a filename. The method B<getall> returns a hash
which contains all options and its associated values of your config file.

The format of config files supported by B<Config::General> is inspired by the well known Apache config
format, in fact, this module is 100% compatible to Apache configs, but you can also just use simple
 name/value pairs in your config files.

In addition to the capabilities of an Apache config file it supports some enhancements such as here-documents,
C-style comments or multiline options.


=head1 SUBROUTINES/METHODS

=over

=item new()

Possible ways to call B<new()>:

 $conf = Config::General->new("rcfile");

 $conf = Config::General->new(\%somehash);

 $conf = Config::General->new( %options ); # see below for description of possible options


This method returns a B<Config::General> object (a hash blessed into "Config::General" namespace.
All further methods must be used from that returned object. see below.

You can use the new style with hash parameters or the old style which is of course
still supported. Possible parameters to B<new()> are:

* a filename of a configfile, which will be opened and parsed by the parser

or

* a hash reference, which will be used as the config.

An alternative way to call B<new()> is supplying an option- hash with one or more of
the following keys set:

=over

=item B<-ConfigFile>

A filename or a filehandle, i.e.:

 -ConfigFile => "rcfile" or -ConfigFile => \$FileHandle



=item B<-ConfigHash>

A hash reference, which will be used as the config, i.e.:

 -ConfigHash => \%somehash



=item B<-String>

A string which contains a whole config, or an arrayref
containing the whole config line by line.
The parser will parse the contents of the string instead
of a file. i.e:

 -String => $complete_config

it is also possible to feed an array reference to -String:

 -String => \@config_lines



=item B<-AllowMultiOptions>

If the value is "no", then multiple identical options are disallowed.
The default is "yes".
i.e.:

 -AllowMultiOptions => "yes"

see B<IDENTICAL OPTIONS> for details.

=item B<-LowerCaseNames>

If set to a true value, then all options found in the config will be converted
to lowercase. This allows you to provide case-in-sensitive configs. The
values of the options will B<not> lowercased.



=item B<-UseApacheInclude>

If set to a true value, the parser will consider "include ..." as valid include
statement (just like the well known Apache include statement).



=item B<-IncludeRelative>

If set to a true value, included files with a relative path (i.e. "cfg/blah.conf")
will be opened from within the location of the configfile instead from within the
location of the script($0). This works only if the configfile has a absolute pathname
(i.e. "/etc/main.conf").

If the variable B<-ConfigPath> has been set and if the file to be included could
not be found in the location relative to the current config file, the module
will search within B<-ConfigPath> for the file. See the description of B<-ConfigPath>
for more details.


=item B<-IncludeDirectories>

If set to a true value, you may specify include a directory, in which case all
files inside the directory will be loaded in ASCII order.  Directory includes
will not recurse into subdirectories.  This is comparable to including a
directory in Apache-style config files.


=item B<-IncludeGlob>

If set to a true value, you may specify a glob pattern for an include to
include all matching files (e.g. <<include conf.d/*.conf>>).  Also note that as
with standard file patterns, * will not match dot-files, so <<include dir/*>>
is often more desirable than including a directory with B<-IncludeDirectories>.


=item B<-IncludeAgain>

If set to a true value, you will be able to include a sub-configfile
multiple times.  With the default, false, you will get a warning about
duplicate includes and only the first include will succeed.

Reincluding a configfile can be useful if it contains data that you want to
be present in multiple places in the data tree.  See the example under
L</INCLUDES>.

Note, however, that there is currently no check for include recursion.


=item B<-ConfigPath>

As mentioned above, you can use this variable to specify a search path for relative
config files which have to be included. Config::General will search within this
path for the file if it cannot find the file at the location relative to the
current config file.

To provide multiple search paths you can specify an array reference for the
path.  For example:

 @path = qw(/usr/lib/perl /nfs/apps/lib /home/lib);
 ..
 -ConfigPath => \@path



=item B<-MergeDuplicateBlocks>

If set to a true value, then duplicate blocks, that means blocks and named blocks,
will be merged into a single one (see below for more details on this).
The default behavior of Config::General is to create an array if some junk in a
config appears more than once.


=item B<-MergeDuplicateOptions>

If set to a true value, then duplicate options will be merged. That means, if the
same option occurs more than once, the last one will be used in the resulting
config hash.

Setting this option implies B<-AllowMultiOptions == false> unless you set
B<-AllowMultiOptions> explicit to 'true'. In this case duplicate blocks are
allowed and put into an array but duplicate options will be merged.


=item B<-AutoLaunder>

If set to a true value, then all values in your config file will be laundered
to allow them to be used under a -T taint flag.  This could be regarded as circumventing
the purpose of the -T flag, however, if the bad guys can mess with your config file,
you have problems that -T will not be able to stop.  AutoLaunder will only handle
a config file being read from -ConfigFile.



=item B<-AutoTrue>

If set to a true value, then options in your config file, whose values are set to
true or false values, will be normalised to 1 or 0 respectively.

The following values will be considered as B<true>:

 yes, on, 1, true

The following values will be considered as B<false>:

 no, off, 0, false

This effect is case-insensitive, i.e. both "Yes" or "No" will result in 1.


=item B<-FlagBits>

This option takes one required parameter, which must be a hash reference.

The supplied hash reference needs to define variables for which you
want to preset values. Each variable you have defined in this hash-ref
and which occurs in your config file, will cause this variable being
set to the preset values to which the value in the config file refers to.

Multiple flags can be used, separated by the pipe character |.

Well, an example will clarify things:

 my $conf = Config::General->new(
         -ConfigFile => "rcfile",
         -FlagBits => {
              Mode => {
                 CLEAR    => 1,
                 STRONG   => 1,
                 UNSECURE => "32bit" }
         }
 );

In this example we are defining a variable named I<"Mode"> which
may contain one or more of "CLEAR", "STRONG" and "UNSECURE" as value.

The appropriate config entry may look like this:

 # rcfile
 Mode = CLEAR | UNSECURE

The parser will create a hash which will be the value of the key "Mode". This
hash will contain B<all> flags which you have pre-defined, but only those
which were set in the config will contain the pre-defined value, the other
ones will be undefined.

The resulting config structure would look like this after parsing:

 %config = (
             Mode => {
                       CLEAR    => 1,
                       UNSECURE => "32bit",
                       STRONG   => undef,
                     }
           );

This method allows the user (or, the "maintainer" of the configfile for your
application) to set multiple pre-defined values for one option.

Please beware, that all occurrences of those variables will be handled this
way, there is no way to distinguish between variables in different scopes.
That means, if "Mode" would also occur inside a named block, it would
also parsed this way.

Values which are not defined in the hash-ref supplied to the parameter B<-FlagBits>
and used in the corresponding variable in the config will be ignored.

Example:

 # rcfile
 Mode = BLAH | CLEAR

would result in this hash structure:

  %config = (
             Mode => {
                       CLEAR    => 1,
                       UNSECURE => undef,
                       STRONG   => undef,
                     }
           );

"BLAH" will be ignored silently.


=item B<-DefaultConfig>

This can be a hash reference or a simple scalar (string) of a config. This
causes the module to preset the resulting config hash with the given values,
which allows you to set default values for particular config options directly.

Note that you probably want to use this with B<-MergeDuplicateOptions>, otherwise
a default value already in the configuration file will produce an array of two
values.

=item B<-Tie>

B<-Tie> takes the name of a Tie class as argument that each new hash should be
based off of.

This hash will be used as the 'backing hash' instead of a standard Perl hash,
which allows you to affect the way, variable storing will be done. You could, for
example supply a tied hash, say Tie::DxHash, which preserves ordering of the
keys in the config (which a standard Perl hash won't do). Or, you could supply
a hash tied to a DBM file to save the parsed variables to disk.

There are many more things to do in tie-land, see L<tie> to get some interesting
ideas.

If you want to use the B<-Tie> feature together with B<-DefaultConfig> make sure
that the hash supplied to B<-DefaultConfig> must be tied to the same Tie class.

Make sure that the hash which receives the generated hash structure (e.g. which
you are using in the assignment: %hash = $config->getall()) must be tied to
the same Tie class.

Example:

 use Config::General qw(ParseConfig);
 use Tie::IxHash;
 tie my %hash, "Tie::IxHash";
 %hash = ParseConfig(
           -ConfigFile => shift(),
           -Tie => "Tie::IxHash"
	 );


=item B<-InterPolateVars>

If set to a true value, variable interpolation will be done on your config
input. See L<Config::General::Interpolated> for more information.

=item B<-InterPolateEnv>

If set to a true value, environment variables can be used in
configs.

This implies B<-InterPolateVars>.

=item B<-AllowSingleQuoteInterpolation>

By default variables inside single quotes will not be interpolated. If
you turn on this option, they will be interpolated as well.

=item B<-ExtendedAccess>

If set to a true value, you can use object oriented (extended) methods to
access the parsed config. See L<Config::General::Extended> for more information.

=item B<-StrictObjects>

By default this is turned on, which causes Config::General to croak with an
error if you try to access a non-existent key using the OOP-way (B<-ExtendedAcess>
enabled). If you turn B<-StrictObjects> off (by setting to 0 or "no") it will
just return an empty object/hash/scalar. This is valid for OOP-access 8via AUTOLOAD
and for the methods obj(), hash() and value().


=item B<-StrictVars>

By default this is turned on, which causes Config::General to croak with an
error if an undefined variable with B<InterPolateVars> turned on occurs
in a config. Set to I<false> (i.e. 0) to avoid such error messages.

=item B<-SplitPolicy>

You can influence the way how Config::General decides which part of a line
in a config file is the key and which one is the value. By default it tries
its best to guess. That means you can mix equalsign assignments and whitespace
assignments.

However, sometime you may wish to make it more strictly for some reason. In
this case you can set B<-SplitPolicy>. The possible values are: 'guess' which
is the default, 'whitespace' which causes the module to split by whitespace,
'equalsign' which causes it to split strictly by equal sign, or 'custom'. In the
latter case you must also set B<-SplitDelimiter> to some regular expression
of your choice. For example:

 -SplitDelimiter => '\s*:\s*'

will cause the module to split by colon while whitespace which surrounds
the delimiter will be removed.

Please note that the delimiter used when saving a config (save_file() or save_string())
will be chosen according to the current B<-SplitPolicy>. If -SplitPolicy is
set to 'guess' or 'whitespace', 3 spaces will be used to delimit saved
options. If 'custom' is set, then you need to set B<-StoreDelimiter>.

=item B<-SplitDelimiter>

Set this to any arbitrary regular expression which will be used for option/value
splitting. B<-SplitPolicy> must be set to 'custom' to make this work.

=item B<-StoreDelimiter>

You can use this parameter to specify a custom delimiter to use when saving
configs to a file or string. You only need to set it if you want to store
the config back to disk and if you have B<-SplitPolicy> set to 'custom'.

Be very careful with this parameter.


=item B<-CComments>

Config::General is able to notice c-style comments (see section COMMENTS).
But for some reason you might no need this. In this case you can turn
this feature off by setting B<-CComments> to a false value('no', 0, 'off').

By default B<-CComments> is turned on.


=item B<-BackslashEscape>

B<Deprecated Option>.

=item B<-SlashIsDirectory>

If you turn on this parameter, a single slash as the last character
of a named block will be considered as a directory name.

By default this flag is turned off, which makes the module somewhat
incompatible to Apache configs, since such a setup will be normally
considered as an explicit empty block, just as XML defines it.

For example, if you have the following config:

 <Directory />
   Index index.awk
 </Directory>

you will get such an error message from the parser:

 EndBlock "</Directory>" has no StartBlock statement (level: 1, chunk 10)!

This is caused by the fact that the config chunk below will be
internally converted to:

 <Directory></Directory>
   Index index.awk
 </Directory>

Now there is one '</Directory>' too much. The proper solution is
to use quotation to circumvent this error:

 <Directory "/">
   Index index.awk
 </Directory>

However, a raw apache config comes without such quotes. In this
case you may consider to turn on B<-SlashIsDirectory>.

Please note that this is a new option (incorporated in version 2.30),
it may lead to various unexpected side effects or other failures.
You've been warned.

=item B<-ApacheCompatible>

Over the past years a lot of options has been incorporated
into Config::General to be able to parse real Apache configs.

The new B<-ApacheCompatible> option now makes it possible to
tweak all options in a way that Apache configs can be parsed.

This is called "apache compatibility mode" - if you will ever
have problems with parsing Apache configs without this option
being set, you'll get no help by me. Thanks :)

The following options will be set:

 UseApacheInclude   = 1
 IncludeRelative    = 1
 IncludeDirectories = 1
 IncludeGlob        = 1
 SlashIsDirectory   = 1
 SplitPolicy        = 'whitespace'
 CComments          = 0

Take a look into the particular documentation sections what
those options are doing.

Beside setting some options it also turns off support for
explicit empty blocks.

=item B<-UTF8>

If turned on, all files will be opened in utf8 mode. This may
not work properly with older versions of Perl.

=item B<-SaveSorted>

If you want to save configs in a sorted manner, turn this
parameter on. It is not enabled by default.

=item B<-NoEscape>

If you want to use the data ( scalar or final leaf ) without escaping special character, turn this
parameter on. It is not enabled by default.

=item B<-NormalizeBlock>

Takes a subroutine reference as parameter and gets the current
block or blockname passed as parameter and is expected to return
it in some altered way as a scalar string. The sub will be called
before anything else will be done by the module itself (e.g. interpolation).

Example:

 -NormalizeBlock => sub { my $x = shift; $x =~ s/\s*$//; $x; }

This removes trailing whitespaces of block names.

=item B<-NormalizeOption>

Same as B<-NormalizeBlock> but applied on options only.

=item B<-NormalizeValue>

Same as B<-NormalizeBlock> but applied on values only.

=back




=item getall()

Returns a hash structure which represents the whole config.

=item files()

Returns a list of all files read in.

=item save_file()

Writes the config hash back to the hard disk. This method takes one or two
parameters. The first parameter must be the filename where the config
should be written to. The second parameter is optional, it must be a
reference to a hash structure, if you set it. If you do not supply this second parameter
then the internal config hash, which has already been parsed, will be
used.

Please note that any occurrence of comments will be ignored by getall()
and thus be lost after you call this method.

You need also to know that named blocks will be converted to nested blocks
(which is the same from the perl point of view). An example:

 <user hans>
   id 13
 </user>

will become the following after saving:

 <user>
   <hans>
      id 13
   </hans>
 </user>

Example:

 $conf_obj->save_file("newrcfile", \%config);

or, if the config has already been parsed, or if it didn't change:

 $conf_obj->save_file("newrcfile");


=item save_string()

This method is equivalent to the previous save_file(), but it does not
store the generated config to a file. Instead it returns it as a string,
which you can save yourself afterwards.

It takes one optional parameter, which must be a reference to a hash structure.
If you omit this parameter, the internal config hash, which has already been parsed,
will be used.

Example:

 my $content = $conf_obj->save_string(\%config);

or:

 my $content = $conf_obj->save_string();


=back


=head1 CONFIG FILE FORMAT

Lines beginning with B<#> and empty lines will be ignored. (see section COMMENTS!)
Spaces at the beginning and the end of a line will also be ignored as well as tabulators.
If you need spaces at the end or the beginning of a value you can surround it with
double quotes.
An option line starts with its name followed by a value. An equal sign is optional.
Some possible examples:

 user    max
 user  = max
 user            max

If there are more than one statements with the same name, it will create an array
instead of a scalar. See the example below.

The method B<getall> returns a hash of all values.


=head1 BLOCKS

You can define a B<block> of options. A B<block> looks much like a block
in the wellknown Apache config format. It starts with E<lt>B<blockname>E<gt> and ends
with E<lt>/B<blockname>E<gt>. An example:

 <database>
    host   = muli
    user   = moare
    dbname = modb
    dbpass = D4r_9Iu
 </database>

Blocks can also be nested. Here is a more complicated example:

 user   = hans
 server = mc200
 db     = maxis
 passwd = D3rf$
 <jonas>
        user    = tom
        db      = unknown
        host    = mila
        <tablestructure>
                index   int(100000)
                name    char(100)
                prename char(100)
                city    char(100)
                status  int(10)
                allowed moses
                allowed ingram
                allowed joice
        </tablestructure>
 </jonas>

The hash which the method B<getall> returns look like that:

 print Data::Dumper(\%hash);
 $VAR1 = {
          'passwd' => 'D3rf$',
          'jonas'  => {
                       'tablestructure' => {
                                             'prename' => 'char(100)',
                                             'index'   => 'int(100000)',
                                             'city'    => 'char(100)',
                                             'name'    => 'char(100)',
                                             'status'  => 'int(10)',
                                             'allowed' => [
                                                            'moses',
                                                            'ingram',
                                                            'joice',
                                                          ]
                                           },
                       'host'           => 'mila',
                       'db'             => 'unknown',
                       'user'           => 'tom'
                     },
          'db'     => 'maxis',
          'server' => 'mc200',
          'user'   => 'hans'
        };

If you have turned on B<-LowerCaseNames> (see new()) then blocks as in the
following example:

 <Dir>
   <AttriBUTES>
     Owner  root
   </attributes>
 </dir>

would produce the following hash structure:

 $VAR1 = {
          'dir' => {
                    'attributes' => {
                                     'owner  => "root",
                                    }
                   }
         };

As you can see, the keys inside the config hash are normalized.

Please note, that the above config block would result in a
valid hash structure, even if B<-LowerCaseNames> is not set!
This is because I<Config::General> does not
use the block names to check if a block ends, instead it uses an internal
state counter, which indicates a block end.

If the module cannot find an end-block statement, then this block will be ignored.



=head1 NAMED BLOCKS

If you need multiple blocks of the same name, then you have to name every block.
This works much like Apache config. If the module finds a named block, it will
create a hashref with the left part of the named block as the key containing
one or more hashrefs with the right part of the block as key containing everything
inside the block(which may again be nested!). As examples says more than words:

 # given the following sample
 <Directory /usr/frisco>
        Limit Deny
        Options ExecCgi Index
 </Directory>
 <Directory /usr/frik>
        Limit DenyAll
        Options None
 </Directory>

 # you will get:
 $VAR1 = {
          'Directory' => {
                           '/usr/frik' => {
                                            'Options' => 'None',
                                            'Limit' => 'DenyAll'
                                          },
                           '/usr/frisco' => {
                                              'Options' => 'ExecCgi Index',
                                              'Limit' => 'Deny'
                                            }
                         }
        };

You cannot have more than one named block with the same name because it will
be stored in a hashref and therefore be overwritten if a block occurs once more.


=head1 WHITESPACE IN BLOCKS

The normal behavior of Config::General is to look for whitespace in
block names to decide if it's a named block or just a simple block.

Sometimes you may need blocknames which have whitespace in their names.

With named blocks this is no problem, as the module only looks for the
first whitespace:

 <person hugo gera>
 </person>

would be parsed to:

 $VAR1 = {
          'person' => {
                       'hugo gera' => {
                                      },
                      }
         };

The problem occurs, if you want to have a simple block containing whitespace:

 <hugo gera>
 </hugo gera>

This would be parsed as a named block, which is not what you wanted. In this
very case you may use quotation marks to indicate that it is not a named block:

 <"hugo gera">
 </"hugo gera">

The save() method of the module inserts automatically quotation marks in such
cases.


=head1 EXPLICIT EMPTY BLOCKS

Beside the notation of blocks mentioned above it is possible to use
explicit empty blocks.

Normally you would write this in your config to define an empty
block:

 <driver Apache>
 </driver>

To save writing you can also write:

 <driver Apache/>

which is the very same as above. This works for normal blocks and
for named blocks.



=head1 IDENTICAL OPTIONS (ARRAYS)

You may have more than one line of the same option with different values.

Example:
 log  log1
 log  log2
 log  log2

You will get a scalar if the option occurred only once or an array if it occurred
more than once. If you expect multiple identical options, then you may need to
check if an option occurred more than once:

 $allowed = $hash{jonas}->{tablestructure}->{allowed};
 if(ref($allowed) eq "ARRAY") {
     @ALLOWED = @{$allowed};
 else {
     @ALLOWED = ($allowed);
 }

The same applies to blocks and named blocks too (they are described in more detail
below). For example, if you have the following config:

 <dir blah>
   user max
 </dir>
 <dir blah>
   user hannes
 </dir>

then you would end up with a data structure like this:

 $VAR1 = {
          'dir' => {
                    'blah' => [
                                {
                                  'user' => 'max'
                                },
                                {
                                  'user' => 'hannes'
                                }
                              ]
                    }
          };

As you can see, the two identical blocks are stored in a hash which contains
an array(-reference) of hashes.

Under some rare conditions you might not want this behavior with blocks (and
named blocks too). If you want to get one single hash with the contents of
both identical blocks, then you need to turn the B<new()> parameter B<-MergeDuplicateBlocks>
on (see above). The parsed structure of the example above would then look like
this:

 $VAR1 = {
          'dir' => {
                    'blah' => {
			       'user' => [
					   'max',
					   'hannes'
					 ]
                              }
                    }
          };

As you can see, there is only one hash "dir->{blah}" containing multiple
"user" entries. As you can also see, turning on  B<-MergeDuplicateBlocks>
does not affect scalar options (i.e. "option = value"). In fact you can
tune merging of duplicate blocks and options independent from each other.

If you don't want to allow more than one identical options, you may turn it off
by setting the flag I<AllowMultiOptions> in the B<new()> method to "no".
If turned off, Config::General will complain about multiple occurring options
with identical names!

=head2 FORCE SINGLE VALUE ARRAYS

You may also force a single config line to get parsed into an array by
turning on the option B<-ForceArray> and by surrounding the value of the
config entry by []. Example:

 hostlist = [ foo.bar ]

Will be a singlevalue array entry if the option is turned on. If you want
it to remain to be an array you have to turn on B<-ForceArray> during save too.

=head1 LONG LINES

If you have a config value, which is too long and would take more than one line,
you can break it into multiple lines by using the backslash character at the end
of the line. The Config::General module will concatenate those lines to one single-value.

Example:

command = cat /var/log/secure/tripwire | \
           mail C<-s> "report from tripwire" \
           honey@myotherhost.nl

command will become:
 "cat /var/log/secure/tripwire | mail C<-s> 'report from twire' honey@myotherhost.nl"


=head1 HERE DOCUMENTS

You can also define a config value as a so called "here-document". You must tell
the module an identifier which indicates the end of a here document. An
identifier must follow a "<<".

Example:

 message <<EOF
   we want to
   remove the
   homedir of
   root.
 EOF

Everything between the two "EOF" strings will be in the option I<message>.

There is a special feature which allows you to use indentation with here documents.
You can have any amount of whitespace or tabulators in front of the end
identifier. If the module finds spaces or tabs then it will remove exactly those
amount of spaces from every line inside the here-document.

Example:

 message <<EOF
         we want to
         remove the
         homedir of
         root.
      EOF

After parsing, message will become:

   we want to
   remove the
   homedir of
   root.

because there were the string "     " in front of EOF, which were cut from every
line inside the here-document.



=head1 INCLUDES

You can include an external file at any position in your config file using the following statement
in your config file:

 <<include externalconfig.rc>>

If you turned on B<-UseApacheInclude> (see B<new()>), then you can also use the following
statement to include an external file:

 include externalconfig.rc

This file will be inserted at the position where it was found as if the contents of this file
were directly at this position.

You can also recursively include files, so an included file may include another one and so on.
Beware that you do not recursively load the same file, you will end with an error message like
"too many open files in system!".

By default included files with a relative pathname will be opened from within the current
working directory. Under some circumstances it maybe possible to
open included files from the directory, where the configfile resides. You need to turn on
the option B<-IncludeRelative> (see B<new()>) if you want that. An example:

 my $conf = Config::General(
                             -ConfigFile => "/etc/crypt.d/server.cfg"
                             -IncludeRelative => 1
                           );

 /etc/crypt.d/server.cfg:
  <<include acl.cfg>>

In this example Config::General will try to include I<acl.cfg> from I</etc/crypt.d>:

 /etc/crypt.d/acl.cfg

The default behavior (if B<-IncludeRelative> is B<not> set!) will be to open just I<acl.cfg>,
wherever it is, i.e. if you did a chdir("/usr/local/etc"), then Config::General will include:

 /usr/local/etc/acl.cfg

Include statements can be case insensitive (added in version 1.25).

Include statements will be ignored within C-Comments and here-documents.

By default, a config file will only be included the first time it is
referenced.  If you wish to include a file in multiple places, set
B</-IncludeAgain> to true. But be warned: this may lead to infinite loops,
so make sure, you're not including the same file from within itself!

Example:

    # main.cfg
    <object billy>
        class=Some::Class
        <printers>
            include printers.cfg
        </printers>
        # ...
    </object>
    <object bob>
        class=Another::Class
        <printers>
            include printers.cfg
        </printers>
        # ...
    </object>

Now C<printers.cfg> will be include in both the C<billy> and C<bob> objects.

You will have to be careful to not recursively include a file.  Behaviour
in this case is undefined.



=head1 COMMENTS

A comment starts with the number sign B<#>, there can be any number of spaces and/or
tab stops in front of the #.

A comment can also occur after a config statement. Example:

 username = max  # this is the comment

If you want to comment out a large block you can use C-style comments. A B</*> signals
the begin of a comment block and the B<*/> signals the end of the comment block.
Example:

 user  = max # valid option
 db    = tothemax
 /*
 user  = andors
 db    = toand
 */

In this example the second options of user and db will be ignored. Please beware of the fact,
if the Module finds a B</*> string which is the start of a comment block, but no matching
end block, it will ignore the whole rest of the config file!

B<NOTE:> If you require the B<#> character (number sign) to remain in the option value, then
you can use a backslash in front of it, to escape it. Example:

 bgcolor = \#ffffcc

In this example the value of $config{bgcolor} will be "#ffffcc", Config::General will not treat
the number sign as the begin of a comment because of the leading backslash.

Inside here-documents escaping of number signs is NOT required!


=head1 PARSER PLUGINS

You can alter the behavior of the parser by supplying closures
which will be called on certain hooks during config file processing
and parsing.

The general aproach works like this:

 sub ck {
  my($file, $base) = @_;
  print "_open() tries $file ... ";
  if($file =~ /blah/) {
    print "ignored\n";
    return (0);
  }
  else {
    print "allowed\n";
    return (1, @_);
  }
 }
 
 my %c = ParseConfig(
              -IncludeGlob => 1,
              -UseApacheInclude => 1,
              -ConfigFile => shift,
              -Plug => { pre_open => *ck }
 );
 
Output:

 _open() tries cfg ... allowed
 _open() tries x/*.conf ... allowed
 _open() tries x/1.conf ... allowed
 _open() tries x/2.conf ... allowed
 _open() tries x/blah.conf ... ignored

As you can see, we wrote a little sub which takes a filename
and a base directory as parameters. We tell Config::General via
the B<Plug> parameter of B<new()> to call this sub everytime
before it attempts to open a file.

General processing continues as usual if the first value of
the returned array is true. The second value of that array
depends on the kind of hook being called.

The following hooks are available so far:

=over

=item B<pre_open>

Takes two parameters: filename and basedirectory.

Has to return an array consisting of 3 values:

 - 1 or 0 (continue processing or not)
 - filename
 - base directory

=item B<pre_read>

Takes two parameters: the filehandle of the file to be read
and an array containing the raw contents of said file.

This hook will be applied in _read(). File contents are already
available at this stage, comments will be removed, here-docs normalized
and the like. This hook gets the unaltered, original contents.

Has to return an array of 3 values:

 - 1 or 0 (continue processing or not)
 - the filehandle
 - an array of strings

You can use this hook to apply your own normalizations or whatever.

Be careful when returning the abort value (1st value of returned array 0),
since in this case nothing else would be done on the contents. If it still
contains comments or something, they will be parsed as legal config options.

=item B<post_read>

Takes one parameter: a reference to an array containing the prepared
config lines (after being processed by _read()).

This hook will be applied in _read() when everything else has been done.

Has to return an array of 2 values:

 - 1 or 0 (continue processing or not) [Ignored for post hooks]
 - a reference to an array containing the config lines

=item B<pre_parse_value>

Takes 2 parameters: an option name and its value.

This hook will be applied in _parse_value() before any processing.

Has to return an array of 3 values:

 - 1 or 0 (continue processing or not)
 - option name
 - value of the option

=item B<post_parse_value>

Almost identical to pre_parse_value, but will be applied after _parse_value()
is finished and all usual processing and normalization is done.

=back

Not implemented yet: hooks for variable interpolation and block
parsing.


=head1 OBJECT ORIENTED INTERFACE

There is a way to access a parsed config the OO-way.
Use the module B<Config::General::Extended>, which is
supplied with the Config::General distribution.

=head1 VARIABLE INTERPOLATION

You can use variables inside your config files if you like. To do
that you have to use the module B<Config::General::Interpolated>,
which is supplied with the Config::General distribution.


=head1 EXPORTED FUNCTIONS

Config::General exports some functions too, which makes it somewhat
easier to use it, if you like this.

How to import the functions:

 use Config::General qw(ParseConfig SaveConfig SaveConfigString);

=over

=item B<ParseConfig()>

This function takes exactly all those parameters, which are
allowed to the B<new()> method of the standard interface.

Example:

 use Config::General qw(ParseConfig);
 my %config = ParseConfig(-ConfigFile => "rcfile", -AutoTrue => 1);


=item B<SaveConfig()>

This function requires two arguments, a filename and a reference
to a hash structure.

Example:

 use Config::General qw(SaveConfig);
 ..
 SaveConfig("rcfile", \%some_hash);


=item B<SaveConfigString()>

This function requires a reference to a config hash as parameter.
It generates a configuration based on this hash as the object-interface
method B<save_string()> does.

Example:

 use Config::General qw(ParseConfig SaveConfigString);
 my %config = ParseConfig(-ConfigFile => "rcfile");
 .. # change %config something
 my $content = SaveConfigString(\%config);


=back

=head1 CONFIGURATION AND ENVIRONMENT

No environment variables will be used.

=head1 SEE ALSO

I recommend you to read the following documents, which are supplied with Perl:

 perlreftut                     Perl references short introduction
 perlref                        Perl references, the rest of the story
 perldsc                        Perl data structures intro
 perllol                        Perl data structures: arrays of arrays

 Config::General::Extended      Object oriented interface to parsed configs
 Config::General::Interpolated  Allows one to use variables inside config files

=head1 LICENSE AND COPYRIGHT

Copyright (c) 2000-2014 Thomas Linden

This library is free software; you can redistribute it and/or
modify it under the same terms as Perl itself.

=head1 BUGS AND LIMITATIONS

See rt.cpan.org for current bugs, if any.

=head1 INCOMPATIBILITIES

None known.

=head1 DIAGNOSTICS

To debug Config::General use the Perl debugger, see L<perldebug>.

=head1 DEPENDENCIES

Config::General depends on the modules L<FileHandle>,
L<File::Spec::Functions>, L<File::Glob>, which all are
shipped with Perl.

=head1 AUTHOR

Thomas Linden <tlinden |AT| cpan.org>

=head1 VERSION

2.56

=cut