Reverse Complement utility, Bio::Alg, return value problem

Steven E. Brenner brenner@hyper.stanford.edu
Wed, 6 Aug 1997 12:19:02 -0700 (PDT)


> Actually, this sort of thing would be a great way to showcase Bioperl
> modules. Allowing users to see first-hand what the modules can do 
> (requiring minimal effort on their part) is a powerful advertisement.
> (Would you want to buy a car without taking it out for a test ride?)
> We could include the URL for the driver in the on-line poster,    
> the module distribution site, and in the POD. The driver could 
> illustrate new features as they are added to the package.

That's a great idea!  I think that providing "yet another revcom utility
on the Web" has little value of its own -- there are also such features at
many other sites.  However, if we write a little Web interface to most of
the convenient and useful feaures of Bio::PreSeq, it could act as both an
advertisement ("bioperl can do this") and a tutorial ("here's how you use
bioperl to do this")

> $myseq->revcom($myseq->inplace($beg,$end))

The former is weird: what does the inplace function do?

> $myseq->revcom($beg,$end,'inplace')

This makes sense, but is pretty verbose.  Also, this would suggest that
the return would alwasy be the object itself, whereas you might want to be
returned the actual sequence, or some status value. 

Steve