NAME

       Heap::Elem::Ref - Object Reference Heap Elements

SYNOPSIS

         use Heap::Elem::Ref( RefElem );
         use Heap::Fibonacci;

         my $heap = Heap::Fibonacci->new;
         my $elem;

         foreach $i ( 1..100 ) {
             $obj = myObject->new( $i );
             $elem = RefElem( $obj );
             $heap->add( $elem );
         }

         while( defined( $elem = $heap->extract_top ) ) {
             # assume that myObject object have a method I<printable>
             print "Smallest is ", $elem->val->printable, "\n";
         }

DESCRIPTION

       Heap::Elem::Ref is used to wrap object reference values into an element that can be
       managed on a heap.  Each referenced object must have a method cmp which can compare itself
       with any of the other objects that have references on the same heap.  These comparisons
       must be consistant with normal arithmetic.  The top of the heap will have the smallest
       (according to cmp) element still remaining.  (See Heap::Elem::RefRev if you want the heap
       to always return the largest element.)

       The details of the Elem interface are described in Heap::Elem.

       The details of using a Heap interface are described in Heap.

AUTHOR

       John Macdonald, john@perlwolf.com

COPYRIGHT

       Copyright 1998-2007, O'Reilly & Associates.

       This code is distributed under the same copyright terms as perl itself.

SEE ALSO

       Heap(3), Heap::Elem(3), Heap::Elem::RefRev(3).