Provided by: libtext-bibtex-perl_0.66-2_amd64 bug

NAME

       Text::BibTeX::Structure - provides base classes for user structure modules

SYNOPSIS

          # Define a 'Foo' structure for BibTeX databases: first, the
          # structure class:

          package Text::BibTeX::FooStructure;
          @ISA = ('Text::BibTeX::Structure');

          sub known_option
          {
             my ($self, $option) = @_;

             ...
          }

          sub default_option
          {
             my ($self, $option) = @_;

             ...
          }

          sub describe_entry
          {
             my $self = shift;

             $self->set_fields ($type,
                                \@required_fields,
                                \@optional_fields,
                                [$constraint_1, $constraint_2, ...]);
             ...
          }

          # Now, the structured entry class

          package Text::BibTeX::FooEntry;
          @ISA = ('Text::BibTeX::StructuredEntry');

          # define whatever methods you like

DESCRIPTION

       The module "Text::BibTeX::Structure" provides two classes that form the basis of the btOOL
       "structure module" system.  This system is how database structures are defined and imposed
       on BibTeX files, and provides an elegant synthesis of object-oriented techniques with
       BibTeX-style database structures.  Nothing described here is particularly deep or subtle;
       anyone familiar with object-oriented programming should be able to follow it.  However, a
       fair bit of jargon in invented and tossed around, so pay attention.

       A database structure, in btOOL parlance, is just a set of allowed entry types and the
       rules for fields in each of those entry types.  Currently, there are three kinds of rules
       that apply to fields: some fields are required, meaning they must be present in every
       entry for a given type; some are optional, meaning they may be present, and will be used
       if they are; other fields are members of constraint sets, which are explained in "Field
       lists and constraint sets" below.

       A btOOL structure is implemented with two classes: the structure class and the structured
       entry class.  The former defines everything that applies to the structure as a whole
       (allowed types and field rules).  The latter provides methods that operate on individual
       entries which conform (or are supposed to conform) to the structure.  The two classes
       provided by the "Text::BibTeX::Structure" module are "Text::BibTeX::Structure" and
       "Text::BibTeX::StructuredEntry"; these serve as base classes for, respectively, all
       structure classes and all structured entry classes.  One canonical structure is provided
       as an example with btOOL: the "Bib" structure, which (via the "BibStructure" and
       "BibEntry" classes) provides the same functionality as the standard style files of BibTeX
       0.99.  It is hoped that other programmers will write new bibliography-related structures,
       possibly deriving from the "Bib" structure, to emulate some of the functionality that is
       available through third-party BibTeX style files.

       The purpose of this manual page is to describe the whole "structure module" system.  It is
       mainly for programmers wishing to implement a new database structure for data files with
       BibTeX syntax; if you are interested in the particular rules for the BibTeX-emulating
       "Bib" structure, see Text::BibTeX::Bib.

       Please note that the "Text::BibTeX" prefix is dropped from most module and class names in
       this manual page, except where necessary.

STRUCTURE CLASSES

       Structure classes have two roles: to define the list of allowed types and field rules, and
       to handle structure options.

   Field lists and constraint sets
       Field lists and constraint sets define the database structure for a particular entry type:
       that is, they specify the rules which an entry must follow to conform to the structure
       (assuming that entry is of an allowed type).  There are three components to the field
       rules for each entry type: a list of required fields, a list of optional fields, and field
       constraints.  Required and optional fields should be obvious to anyone with BibTeX
       experience: all required fields must be present, and any optional fields that are present
       have some meaning to the structure.  (One could conceive of a "strict" interpretation,
       where any field not mentioned in the official definition is disallowed; this would be
       contrary to the open spirit of BibTeX databases, but could be useful in certain
       applications where a stricter level of control is desired.  Currently, btOOL does not
       offer such an option.)

       Field constraints capture the "one or the other, but not both" type of relationships
       present for some entry types in the BibTeX standard style files.  Most BibTeX
       documentation glosses over the distinction between mutually constrained fields and
       required/optional fields.  For instance, one of the standard entry types is "book", and
       ""author" or "editor"" is given in the list of required fields for that type.  The meaning
       of this is that an entry of type "book" must have either the "author" or "editor" fields,
       but not both.  Likewise, the ""volume" or "number"" are listed under the "optional fields"
       heading for "book" entries; it would be more accurate to say that every "book" entry may
       have one or the other, or neither, of "volume" or "number"---but not both.

       btOOL attempts to clarify this situation by creating a third category of fields, those
       that are mutually constrained.  For instance, neither "author" nor "editor" appears in the
       list of required fields for the "inbook" type according to btOOL; rather, a field
       constraint is created to express this relationship:

          [1, 1, ['author', 'editor']]

       That is, a field constraint is a reference to a three-element list.  The last element is a
       reference to the constraint set, the list of fields to which the constraint applies.
       (Calling this a set is a bit inaccurate, as there are conditions in which the order of
       fields matters---see the "check_field_constraints" method in "METHODS 2: BASE STRUCTURED
       ENTRY CLASS".)  The first two elements are the minimum and maximum number of fields from
       the constraint set that must be present for an entry to conform to the constraint.  This
       constraint thus expresses that there must be exactly one (>= 1 and <= 1) of the fields
       "author" and "editor" in a "book" entry.

       The "either one or neither, but not both" constraint that applies to the "volume" and
       "number" fields for "book" entries is expressed slightly differently:

          [0, 1, ['volume', 'number']]

       That is, either 0 or 1, but not the full 2, of "volume" and "number" may be present.

       It is important to note that checking and enforcing field constraints is based purely on
       counting which fields from a set are actually present; this mechanism can't capture "x
       must be present if y is" relationships.

       The requirements imposed on the actual structure class are simple: it must provide a
       method "describe_entry" which sets up a fancy data structure describing the allowed entry
       types and all the field rules for those types.  The "Structure" class provides methods
       (inherited by a particular structure class) to help particular structure classes create
       this data structure in a consistent, controlled way.  For instance, the
       "describe_structure" method in the BibTeX 0.99-emulating "BibStructure" class is quite
       simple:

          sub describe_entry
          {
             my $self = shift;

             # series of 13 calls to $self->set_fields (one for each standard
             # entry type)
          }

       One of those calls to the "set_fields" method defines the rules for "book" entries:

          $self->set_fields ('book',
                             [qw(title publisher year)],
                             [qw(series address edition month note)],
                             [1, 1, [qw(author editor)]],
                             [0, 1, [qw(volume number)]]);

       The first field list is the list of required fields, and the second is the list of
       optional fields.  Any number of field constraints may follow the list of optional fields;
       in this case, there are two, one for each of the constraints ("author"/"editor" and
       "volume"/"number") described above.  At no point is a list of allowed types explicitly
       supplied; rather, each call to "set_fields" adds one more allowed type.

       New structure modules that derive from existing ones will probably use the "add_fields"
       method (and possibly "add_constraints") to augment an existing entry type.  Adding new
       types should be done with "set_fields", though.

   Structure options
       The other responsibility of structure classes is to handle structure options.  These are
       scalar values that let the user customize the behaviour of both the structure class and
       the structured entry class.  For instance, one could have an option to enable "extended
       structure", which might add on a bunch of new entry types and new fields.  (In this case,
       the "describe_entry" method would have to pay attention to this option and modify its
       behaviour accordingly.)  Or, one could have options to control how the structured entry
       class sorts or formats entries (for bibliography structures such as "Bib").

       The easy way to handle structure options is to provide two methods, "known_option" and
       "default_option".  These return, respectively, whether a given option is supported, and
       what its default value is.  (If your structure doesn't support any options, you can just
       inherit these methods from the "Structure" class.  The default "known_option" returns
       false for all options, and its companion "default_option" crashes with an "unknown option"
       error.)

       Once "known_option" and "default_option" are provided, the structure class can sit back
       and inherit the more visible "set_options" and "get_options" methods from the "Structure"
       class.  These are the methods actually used to modify/query options, and will be used by
       application programs to customize the structure module's behaviour, and by the structure
       module itself to pay attention to the user's wishes.

       Options should generally have pure string values, so that the generic set_options method
       doesn't have to parse user-supplied strings into some complicated structure.  However,
       "set_options" will take any scalar value, so if the structure module clearly documents its
       requirements, the application program could supply a structure that meets its needs.  Keep
       in mind that this requires cooperation between the application and the structure module;
       the intermediary code in "Text::BibTeX::Structure" knows nothing about the format or
       syntax of your structure's options, and whatever scalar the application passes via
       "set_options" will be stored for your module to retrieve via "get_options".

       As an example, the "Bib" structure supports a number of "markup" options that allow
       applications to control the markup language used for formatting bibliographic entries.
       These options are naturally paired, as formatting commands in markup languages generally
       have to be turned on and off.  The "Bib" structure thus expects references to two-element
       lists for markup options; to specify LaTeX 2e-style emphasis for book titles, an
       application such as "btformat" would set the "btitle_mkup" option as follows:

          $structure->set_options (btitle_mkup => ['\emph{', '}']);

       Other options for other structures might have a more complicated structure, but it's up to
       the structure class to document and enforce this.

STRUCTURED ENTRY CLASSES

       A structured entry class defines the behaviour of individual entries under the regime of a
       particular database structure.  This is the raison d'etre for any database structure: the
       structure class merely lays out the rules for entries to conform to the structure, but the
       structured entry class provides the methods that actually operate on individual entries.
       Because this is completely open-ended, the requirements of a structured entry class are
       much less rigid than for a structure class.  In fact, all of the requirements of a
       structured entry class can be met simply by inheriting from
       "Text::BibTeX::StructuredEntry", the other class provided by the "Text::BibTeX::Structure"
       module.  (For the record, those requirements are: a structured entry class must provide
       the entry parse/query/manipulate methods of the "Entry" class, and it must provide the
       "check", "coerce", and "silently_coerce" methods of the "StructuredEntry" class.  Since
       "StructuredEntry" inherits from "Entry", both of these requirements are met "for free" by
       structured entry classes that inherit from "Text::BibTeX::StructuredEntry", so naturally
       this is the recommended course of action!)

       There are deliberately no other methods required of structured entry classes.  A
       particular application (eg. "btformat" for bibliography structures) will require certain
       methods, but it's up to the application and the structure module to work out the
       requirements through documentation.

CLASS INTERACTIONS

       Imposing a database structure on your entries sets off a chain reaction of interactions
       between various classes in the "Text::BibTeX" library that should be transparent when all
       goes well.  It could prove confusing if things go wrong and you have to go wading through
       several levels of application program, core "Text::BibTeX" classes, and some structure
       module.

       The justification for this complicated behaviour is that it allows you to write programs
       that will use a particular structured module without knowing the name of the structure
       when you write the program.  Thus, the user can supply a database structure, and
       ultimately the entry objects you manipulate will be blessed into a class supplied by the
       structure module.  A short example will illustrate this.

       Typically, a "Text::BibTeX"-based program is based around a kernel of code like this:

          $bibfile = new Text::BibTeX::File "foo.bib";
          while ($entry = new Text::BibTeX::Entry $bibfile)
          {
             # process $entry
          }

       In this case, nothing fancy is happening behind the scenes: the $bibfile object is blessed
       into the "Text::BibTeX::File" class, and $entry is blessed into "Text::BibTeX::Entry".
       This is the conventional behaviour of Perl classes, but it is not the only possible
       behaviour.  Let us now suppose that $bibfile is expected to conform to a database
       structure specified by $structure (presumably a user-supplied value, and thus unknown at
       compile-time):

          $bibfile = new Text::BibTeX::File "foo.bib";
          $bibfile->set_structure ($structure);
          while ($entry = new Text::BibTeX::Entry $bibfile)
          {
             # process $entry
          }

       A lot happens behind the scenes with the call to $bibfile's "set_structure" method.
       First, a new structure object is created from $structure.  The structure name implies the
       name of a Perl module---the structure module---which is "require"'d by the "Structure"
       constructor.  (The main consequence of this is that any compile-time errors in your
       structure module will not be revealed until a "Text::BibTeX::File::set_structure" or
       "Text::BibTeX::Structure::new" call attempts to load it.)

       Recall that the first responsibility of a structure module is to define a structure class.
       The "structure object" created by the "set_structure" method call is actually an object of
       this class; this is the first bit of trickery---the structure object (buried behind the
       scenes) is blessed into a class whose name is not known until run-time.

       Now, the behaviour of the "Text::BibTeX::Entry::new" constructor changes subtly: rather
       than returning an object blessed into the "Text::BibTeX::Entry" class as you might expect
       from the code, the object is blessed into the structured entry class associated with
       $structure.

       For example, if the value of $structure is "Foo", that means the user has supplied a
       module implementing the "Foo" structure.  (Ordinarily, this module would be called
       "Text::BibTeX::Foo"---but you can customize this.)  Calling the "set_structure" method on
       $bibfile will attempt to create a new structure object via the "Text::BibTeX::Structure"
       constructor, which loads the structure module "Text::BibTeX::Foo".  Once this module is
       successfully loaded, the new object is blessed into its structure class, which will
       presumably be called "Text::BibTeX::FooStructure" (again, this is customizable).  The new
       object is supplied with the user's structure options via the "set_options" method (usually
       inherited), and then it is asked to describe the actual entry layout by calling its
       "describe_entry" method.  This, in turn, will usually call the inherited "set_fields"
       method for each entry type in the database structure.  When the "Structure" constructor is
       finished, the new structure object is stored in the "File" object (remember, we started
       all this by calling "set_structure" on a "File" object) for future reference.

       Then, when a new "Entry" object is created and parsed from that particular "File" object,
       some more trickery happens.  Trivially, the structure object stored in the "File" object
       is also stored in the "Entry" object.  (The idea is that entries could belong to a
       database structure independently of any file, but usually they will just get the structure
       that was assigned to their database file.)  More importantly, the new "Entry" object is
       re-blessed into the structured entry class supplied by the structure module---presumably,
       in this case, "Text::BibTeX::FooEntry" (also customizable).

       Once all this sleight-of-hand is accomplished, the application may treat its entry objects
       as objects of the structured entry class for the "Foo" structure---they may call the
       check/coerce methods inherited from "Text::BibTeX::StructuredEntry", and they may also
       call any methods specific to entries for this particular database structure.  What these
       methods might be is up to the structure implementor to decide and document; thus,
       applications may be specific to one particular database structure, or they may work on all
       structures that supply certain methods.  The choice is up to the application developer,
       and the range of options open to him depends on which methods structure implementors
       provide.

EXAMPLE

       For example code, please refer to the source of the "Bib" module and the "btcheck",
       "btsort", and "btformat" applications supplied with "Text::BibTeX".

METHODS 1: BASE STRUCTURE CLASS

       The first class provided by the "Text::BibTeX::Structure" module is
       "Text::BibTeX::Structure".  This class is intended to provide methods that will be
       inherited by user-supplied structure classes; such classes should not override any of the
       methods described here (except "known_option" and "default_option") without very good
       reason.  Furthermore, overriding the "new" method would be useless, because in general
       applications won't know the name of your structure class---they can only call
       "Text::BibTeX::Structure::new" (usually via "Text::BibTeX::File::set_structure").

       Finally, there are three methods that structure classes should implement: "known_option",
       "default_option", and "describe_entry".  The first two are described in "Structure
       options" above, the latter in "Field lists and constraint sets".  Note that
       "describe_entry" depends heavily on the "set_fields", "add_fields", and "add_constraints"
       methods described here.

   Constructor/simple query methods
       new (STRUCTURE, [OPTION => VALUE, ...])
           Constructs a new structure object---not a "Text::BibTeX::Structure" object, but rather
           an object blessed into the structure class associated with STRUCTURE.  More precisely:

           •   Loads (with "require") the module implementing STRUCTURE.  In the absence of other
               information, the module name is derived by appending STRUCTURE to
               "Text::BibTeX::"---thus, the module "Text::BibTeX::Bib" implements the "Bib"
               structure.  Use the pseudo-option "module" to override this module name.  For
               instance, if the structure "Foo" is implemented by the module "Foo":

                  $structure = new Text::BibTeX::Structure
                     ('Foo', module => 'Foo');

               This method "die"s if there are any errors loading/compiling the structure module.

           •   Verifies that the structure module provides a structure class and a structured
               entry class.  The structure class is named by appending "Structure" to the name of
               the module, and the structured entry class by appending "Entry".  Thus, in the
               absence of a "module" option, these two classes (for the "Bib" structure) would be
               named "Text::BibTeX::BibStructure" and "Text::BibTeX::BibEntry".  Either or both
               of the default class names may be overridden by having the structure module return
               a reference to a hash (as opposed to the traditional 1 returned by modules).  This
               hash could then supply a "structure_class" element to name the structure class,
               and an "entry_class" element to name the structured entry class.

               Apart from ensuring that the two classes actually exist, "new" verifies that they
               inherit correctly (from "Text::BibTeX::Structure" and
               "Text::BibTeX::StructuredEntry" respectively), and that the structure class
               provides the required "known_option", "default_option", and "describe_entry"
               methods.

           •   Creates the new structure object, and blesses it into the structure class.
               Supplies it with options by passing all (OPTION, VALUE) pairs to its "set_options"
               method.  Calls its "describe_entry" method, which should list the field
               requirements for all entry types recognized by this structure.  "describe_entry"
               will most likely use some or all of the "set_fields", "add_fields", and
               "add_constraints" methods---described below---for this.

       name ()
           Returns the name of the structure described by the object.

       entry_class ()
           Returns the name of the structured entry class associated with this structure.

   Field structure description methods
       add_constraints (TYPE, CONSTRAINT, ...)
           Adds one or more field constraints to the structure.  A field constraint is specified
           as a reference to a three-element list; the last element is a reference to the list of
           fields affected, and the first two elements are the minimum and maximum number of
           fields from the constraint set allowed in an entry of type TYPE.  See "Field lists and
           constraint sets" for a full explanation of field constraints.

       add_fields (TYPE, REQUIRED [, OPTIONAL [, CONSTRAINT, ...]])
           Adds fields to the required/optional lists for entries of type TYPE.  Can also add
           field constraints, but you can just as easily use "add_constraints" for that.

           REQUIRED and OPTIONAL, if defined, should be references to lists of fields to add to
           the respective field lists.  The CONSTRAINTs, if given, are exactly as described for
           "add_constraints" above.

       set_fields (TYPE, REQUIRED [, OPTIONAL [, CONSTRAINTS, ...]])
           Sets the lists of required/optional fields for entries of type TYPE.  Identical to
           "add_fields", except that the field lists and list of constraints are set from scratch
           here, rather than being added to.

   Field structure query methods
       types ()
           Returns the list of entry types supported by the structure.

       known_type (TYPE)
           Returns true if TYPE is a supported entry type.

       known_field (TYPE, FIELD)
           Returns true if FIELD is in the required list, optional list, or one of the constraint
           sets for entries of type TYPE.

       required_fields (TYPE)
           Returns the list of required fields for entries of type TYPE.

       optional_fields ()
           Returns the list of optional fields for entries of type TYPE.

       field_constraints ()
           Returns the list of field constraints (in the format supplied to "add_constraints")
           for entries of type TYPE.

   Option methods
       known_option (OPTION)
           Returns false.  This is mainly for the use of derived structures that don't have any
           options, and thus don't need to provide their own "known_option" method.  Structures
           that actually offer options should override this method; it should return true if
           OPTION is a supported option.

       default_option (OPTION)
           Crashes with an "unknown option" message.  Again, this is mainly for use by derived
           structure classes that don't actually offer any options.  Structures that handle
           options should override this method; every option handled by "known_option" should
           have a default value (which might just be "undef") that is returned by
           "default_option".  Your "default_options" method should crash on an unknown option,
           perhaps by calling "SUPER::default_option" (in order to ensure consistent error
           messages).  For example:

              sub default_option
              {
                 my ($self, $option) = @_;
                 return $default_options{$option}
                    if exists $default_options{$option};
                 $self->SUPER::default_option ($option);   # crash
              }

           The default value for an option is returned by "get_options" when that options has not
           been explicitly set with "set_options".

       set_options (OPTION => VALUE, ...)
           Sets one or more option values.  (You can supply as many "OPTION => VALUE" pairs as
           you like, just so long as there are an even number of arguments.)  Each OPTION must be
           handled by the structure module (as indicated by the "known_option" method); if not
           "set_options" will "croak".  Each VALUE may be any scalar value; it's up to the
           structure module to validate them.

       get_options (OPTION, ...)
           Returns the value(s) of one or more options.  Any OPTION that has not been set by
           "set_options" will return its default value, fetched using the "default_value" method.
           If OPTION is not supported by the structure module, then your program either already
           crashed (when it tried to set it with "set_option"), or it will crash here (thanks to
           calling "default_option").

METHODS 2: BASE STRUCTURED ENTRY CLASS

       The other class provided by the "Structure" module is "StructuredEntry", the base class
       for all structured entry classes.  This class inherits from "Entry", so all of its entry
       query/manipulation methods are available.  "StructuredEntry" adds methods for checking
       that an entry conforms to the database structure defined by a structure class.

       It only makes sense for "StructuredEntry" to be used as a base class; you would never
       create standalone "StructuredEntry" objects.  The superficial reason for this is that only
       particular structured-entry classes have an actual structure class associated with them,
       "StructuredEntry" on its own doesn't have any information about allowed types, required
       fields, field constraints, and so on.  For a deeper understanding, consult "CLASS
       INTERACTIONS" above.

       Since "StructuredEntry" derives from "Entry", it naturally operates on BibTeX entries.
       Hence, the following descriptions refer to "the entry"---this is just the object (entry)
       being operated on.  Note that these methods are presented in bottom-up order, meaning that
       the methods you're most likely to actually use---"check", "coerce", and "silently_coerce"
       are at the bottom.  On a first reading, you'll probably want to skip down to them for a
       quick summary.

       structure ()
           Returns the object that defines the structure the entry to which is supposed to
           conform.  This will be an instantiation of some structure class, and exists mainly so
           the check/coerce methods can query the structure about the types and fields it
           recognizes.  If, for some reason, you wanted to query an entry's structure about the
           validity of type "foo", you might do this:

              # assume $entry is an object of some structured entry class, i.e.
              # it inherits from Text::BibTeX::StructuredEntry
              $structure = $entry->structure;
              $foo_known = $structure->known_type ('foo');

       check_type ([WARN])
           Returns true if the entry has a valid type according to its structure.  If WARN is
           true, then an invalid type results in a warning being printed.

       check_required_fields ([WARN [, COERCE]])
           Checks that all required fields are present in the entry.  If WARN is true, then a
           warning is printed for every missing field.  If COERCE is true, then missing fields
           are set to the empty string.

           This isn't generally used by other code; see the "check" and "coerce" methods below.

       check_field_constraints ([WARN [, COERCE]])
           Checks that the entry conforms to all of the field constraints imposed by its
           structure.  Recall that a field constraint consists of a list of fields, and a minimum
           and maximum number of those fields that must be present in an entry.  For each
           constraint, "check_field_constraints" simply counts how many fields in the
           constraint's field set are present.  If this count falls below the minimum or above
           the maximum for that constraint and WARN is true, a warning is issued.  In general,
           this warning is of the form "between x and y of fields foo, bar, and baz must be
           present".  The more common cases are handled specially to generate more useful and
           human-friendly warning messages.

           If COERCE is true, then the entry is modified to force it into conformance with all
           field constraints.  How this is done depends on whether the violation is a matter of
           not enough fields present in the entry, or of too many fields present.  In the former
           case, just enough fields are added (as empty strings) to meet the requirements of the
           constraint; in the latter case, fields are deleted.  Which fields to add or delete is
           controlled by the order of fields in the constraint's field list.

           An example should clarify this.  For instance, a field constraint specifying that
           exactly one of "author" or "editor" must appear in an entry would look like this:

              [1, 1, ['author', 'editor']]

           Suppose the following entry is parsed and expected to conform to this structure:

              @inbook{unknown:1997a,
                title = "An Unattributed Book Chapter",
                booktitle = "An Unedited Book",
                publisher = "Foo, Bar \& Company",
                year = 1997
              }

           If "check_field_constraints" is called on this method with COERCE true (which is done
           by any of the "full_check", "coerce", and "silently_coerce" methods), then the
           "author" field is set to the empty string.  (We go through the list of fields in the
           constraint's field set in order -- since "author" is the first missing field, we
           supply it; with that done, the entry now conforms to the "author"/"editor" constraint,
           so we're done.)

           However, if the same structure was applied to this entry:

              @inbook{smith:1997a,
                author = "John Smith",
                editor = "Fred Jones",
                ...
              }

           then the "editor" field would be deleted.  In this case, we allow the first field in
           the constraint's field list---"author".  Since only one field from the set may be
           present, all fields after the first one are in violation, so they are deleted.

           Again, this method isn't generally used by other code; rather, it is called by
           "full_check" and its friends below.

       full_check ([WARN [, COERCE]])
           Returns true if an entry's type and fields are all valid.  That is, it calls
           "check_type", "check_required_fields", and "check_field_constraints"; if all of them
           return true, then so does "full_check".  WARN and COERCE are simply passed on to the
           three "check_*" methods: the first controls the printing of warnings, and the second
           decides whether we should modify the entry to force it into conformance.

       check ()
           Checks that the entry conforms to the requirements of its associated database
           structure: the type must be known, all required fields must be present, and all field
           constraints must be met.  See "check_type", "check_required_fields", and
           "check_field_constraints" for details.

           Calling "check" is the same as calling "full_check" with WARN true and COERCE false.

       coerce ()
           Same as "check", except entries are coerced into conformance with the database
           structure---that is, it's just like "full_check" with both WARN and COERCE true.

       silently_coerce ()
           Same as "coerce", except warnings aren't printed---that is, it's just like
           "full_check" with WARN false and COERCE true.

SEE ALSO

       Text::BibTeX, Text::BibTeX::Entry, Text::BibTeX::File

AUTHOR

       Greg Ward <gward@python.net>

COPYRIGHT

       Copyright (c) 1997-2000 by Gregory P. Ward.  All rights reserved.  This file is part of
       the Text::BibTeX library.  This library is free software; you may redistribute it and/or
       modify it under the same terms as Perl itself.