First draft of lexical namespace PPC

Author: Ovid

ppcs/ppc0022-lexical-require.md

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+# A short and accurate title
+
+## Preamble
+
+    Author:  Ovid
+    Sponsor:
+    ID:      
+    Status:  Draft
+
+## Abstract
+
+When writing a module, the `use` and `require` statements make the modules
+available globally. This leads to strange bugs where you can write
+`my $object = Some::Class->new` and have it work, even if you didn't
+require that module. This transitive dependency is fragile and will break
+if the code requiring `Some::Class` decides to no longer require it.
+
+This PPC proposes:
+
+```perl
+package Foo;
+use feature 'lexical_require`;
+use Some::Module;
+```
+
+With the above, code outside of the above scope cannot see `Some::Module` unless
+it explicitly requires it.
+
+## Motivation
+
+* Accidentally relying on transitive dependencies is fragile because, unless
+  documented, transitive dependencies are not guaranteed to exist.
+* Currently, loading a module injects it into a global namespace, so it's not
+  easy to prevent this problem.
+* Transitive dependencies are even more fragile is the code is conditionally
+  required:
+
+```perl
+if ($true) {
+    require Some::Module;
+}
+```
+
+In the above, the transitive dependency can fail if `$true` is never true.
+
+The initial discussion is on [the P5P mailing
+list](https://www.nntp.perl.org/group/perl.perl5.porters/2023/07/msg266678.html).
+
+## Rationale
+
+* The new syntax ensures that the module author can `require` or `use` a module and not
+worry that other code will accidentally be dependent on internal implementation details.
+
+## Specification
+
+For the given lexical scope—block or file—`use feature 'lexical_require'` will
+allow code to use the required module. Code _outside_ of that scope cannot use
+the required module unless it explicitly uses it, or there's another
+transitive dependency injecting that module into the global namespace.
+
+```perl
+package Foo {
+    use feature 'lexical_require';
+    use Hash::Ordered;
+    no feature 'lexical_require';
+    use Some::Class;
+    ...
+}
+my $object = Some::Class->new; # succeeds if `Some::Class` has a `new` method
+my $cache  = Hash::Ordered->new; # fails
+```
+
+## Backwards Compatibility
+
+This feature should be 100% backwards compatible for new code. If retrofitted
+into existing code, any code relying on a transitive dependency might break
+and need to explicitly declare that dependency.
+
+These are probably going to be runtime errors, not compile-time.
+
+Other than the above caveats, I am not aware of any tooling which will be
+negatively impacted by this. However, I don't know the
+[`Devel::Cover`](https://metacpan.org/pod/Devel::Cover) internals and I
+suspect there might be an issue there.
+
+I suspect (hope), that the following will not be impacted:
+
+* [`B::Deparse`](https://metacpan.org/pod/B::Deparse)
+* [`Devel::NYTProf`](https://metacpan.org/pod/Devel::NYTProf)
+* [`PPI`](https://metacpan.org/pod/PPI) (hence [`Perl::Critic`](https://metacpan.org/pod/Perl::Critic) etc)
+
+## Security Implications
+
+If anything, this might improve security by not allowing code to have an
+accidental dependency on code it doesn't explicitly use.
+
+## Examples
+
+From the above:
+
+```perl
+package Foo {
+    use feature 'lexical_require';
+    use Hash::Ordered;
+    no feature 'lexical_require';
+    use Some::Class;
+    ...
+}
+my $object = Some::Class->new; # succeeds if `Some::Class` has a `new` method
+my $cache  = Hash::Ordered->new; # fails
+```
+
+## Prototype Implementation
+
+None.
+
+## Future Scope
+
+In the future, it might be nice to have `namespace` declarations.
+
+```perl
+namespace Las::Vegas;
+package ::Casino; # package Las::Vegas::Casino
+
+```
+
+For the above, what happens in `Las::Vegas` stays in `Las::Vegas`.
+
+The above allows you to declare a new namespace and everything within that
+namespace is private to it. Only code that is officially exposed can be used.
+Companies can have teams using separate namespaces and only official APIs can
+be accessed. You can't "reach in" and override subroutines. This would require
+developers to plan their designs more carefully, including a better
+understanding of dependency injection and building flexible interfaces.
+
+## Rejected Ideas
+
+There really hasn't been any previous solutions on the CPAN that I've seen.
+I've seen closure-based solutions using lexical subs, but they're harder to
+write.
+
+## Open Issues
+
+We may have issues with test suites. They often take advantage of locally
+overriding/replacing a subroutine and if that's declared in a transitive
+dependency, it might fail.
+
+## Copyright
+
+Copyright (C) 2023, Curtis "Ovid" Poe
+
+This document and code and documentation within it may be used, redistributed and/or modified under the same terms as Perl itself.