NAME

       Hash::Merge::Simple - Recursively merge two or more hashes, simply

VERSION

       version 0.051

SYNOPSIS

           use Hash::Merge::Simple qw/ merge /;

           my $a = { a => 1 };
           my $b = { a => 100, b => 2};

           # Merge with righthand hash taking precedence
           my $c = merge $a, $b;
           # $c is { a => 100, b => 2 } ... Note: a => 100 has overridden => 1

           # Also, merge will take care to recursively merge any subordinate hashes found
           my $a = { a => 1, c => 3, d => { i => 2 }, r => {} };
           my $b = { b => 2, a => 100, d => { l => 4 } };
           my $c = merge $a, $b;
           # $c is { a => 100, b => 2, c => 3, d => { i => 2, l => 4 }, r => {} }

           # You can also merge more than two hashes at the same time
           # The precedence increases from left to right (the rightmost has the most precedence)
           my $everything = merge $this, $that, $mine, $yours, $kitchen_sink, ...;

DESCRIPTION

       Hash::Merge::Simple will recursively merge two or more hashes and return the result as a
       new hash reference. The merge function will descend and merge hashes that exist under the
       same node in both the left and right hash, but doesn't attempt to combine arrays, objects,
       scalars, or anything else. The rightmost hash also takes precedence, replacing whatever
       was in the left hash if a conflict occurs.

       This code was pretty much taken straight from Catalyst::Utils, and modified to handle more
       than 2 hashes at the same time.

USAGE

   Hash::Merge::Simple->merge( <hash1>, <hash2>, <hash3>, ..., <hashN> )
   Hash::Merge::Simple::merge( <hash1>, <hash2>, <hash3>, ..., <hashN> )
       Merge <hash1> through <hashN>, with the nth-most (rightmost) hash taking precedence.

       Returns a new hash reference representing the merge.

       NOTE: The code does not currently check for cycles, so infinite loops are possible:

           my $a = {};
           $a->{b} = $a;
           merge $a, $a;

       NOTE: If you want to avoid giving/receiving side effects with the merged result, use
       "clone_merge" or "dclone_merge" An example of this problem (thanks Uri):

           my $left = { a => { b => 2 } } ;
           my $right = { c => 4 } ;

           my $result = merge( $left, $right ) ;

           $left->{a}{b} = 3 ;
           $left->{a}{d} = 5 ;

           # $result->{a}{b} == 3 !
           # $result->{a}{d} == 5 !

   Hash::Merge::Simple->clone_merge( <hash1>, <hash2>, <hash3>, ..., <hashN> )
   Hash::Merge::Simple::clone_merge( <hash1>, <hash2>, <hash3>, ..., <hashN> )
       Perform a merge, clone the merge, and return the result

       This is useful in cases where you need to ensure that the result can be tweaked without
       fear of giving/receiving any side effects

       This method will use Clone to do the cloning

   Hash::Merge::Simple->dclone_merge( <hash1>, <hash2>, <hash3>, ..., <hashN> )
   Hash::Merge::Simple::dclone_merge( <hash1>, <hash2>, <hash3>, ..., <hashN> )
       Perform a merge, clone the merge, and return the result

       This is useful in cases where you need to ensure that the result can be tweaked without
       fear of giving/receiving any side effects

       This method will use Storable (dclone) to do the cloning

SEE ALSO

       Hash::Merge

       Catalyst::Utils

       Clone

       Storable

ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS

       This code was pretty much taken directly from Catalyst::Utils:

       Sebastian Riedel "sri@cpan.org"

       Yuval Kogman "nothingmuch@woobling.org"

AUTHOR

       Robert Krimen <robertkrimen@gmail.com>

COPYRIGHT AND LICENSE

       This software is copyright (c) 2010 by Robert Krimen.

       This is free software; you can redistribute it and/or modify it under the same terms as
       the Perl 5 programming language system itself.