NAME

       Ace::Model - Get information about AceDB models

SYNOPSIS

         use Ace;
         my $db = Ace->connect(-path=>'/usr/local/acedb/elegans');
         my $model = $db->model('Author');
         print $model;
         $name = $model->name;
         @tags = $model->tags;
         print "Paper is a valid tag" if $model->valid_tag('Paper');

DESCRIPTION

       This class is provided for access to AceDB class models.  It provides the model in human-
       readable form, and does some limited but useful parsing on your behalf.

       Ace::Model objects are obtained either by calling an Ace database handle's model() method
       to retrieve the model of a named class, or by calling an Ace::Object's model() method to
       retrieve the object's particular model.

METHODS

   new()
         $model = Ace::Model->new($model_data);

       This is a constructor intended only for use by Ace and Ace::Object classes.  It constructs
       a new Ace::Model object from the raw string data in models.wrm.

   name()
         $name = $model->name;

       This returns the class name for the model.

   tags()
          @tags = $model->tags;

       This returns a list of all the valid tags in the model.

   valid_tag()
          $boolean  = $model->valid_tag($tag);

       This returns true if the given tag is part of the model.

   path()
          @path = $model->path($tag)

       Returns the path to the indicated tag, returning a list of intermediate tags.  For
       example, in the C elegans ?Locus model, the path for 'Compelementation_data" will return
       the list ('Type','Gene').

   asString()
          print $model->asString;

       asString() returns the human-readable representation of the model with comments stripped
       out.  Internally this method is called to automatically convert the model into a string
       when appropriate.  You need only to start performing string operations on the model object
       in order to convert it into a string automatically:

          print "Paper is unique" if $model=~/Paper ?Paper UNIQUE/;

SEE ALSO

       Ace

AUTHOR

       Lincoln Stein <lstein@w3.org> with extensive help from Jean Thierry-Mieg
       <mieg@kaa.crbm.cnrs-mop.fr>

       Copyright (c) 1997-1998, Lincoln D. Stein

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