[Bioperl-l] New package: Bio::Constants/Bio::Root::Constants?

[Stefan Kirov]

Hi guys!
I thought it might be useful if we had a module with common constants 
that are used across all other packages. Something a bit like 
Bio::Root::Version, but expanded.
For example:
$Bio::Root::Constants::Gap_character='-';
This means that any parser should convert the format specific gap 
character to $Bio::Root::Constants::Gap_character, therefore any other 
module/script will know to expect only Bio::Root::Constants::Gap_character.
This can go further with versions and subformats. For example:
@Bio::Root::Constants::ParsableMemeVer=qw(3.0.3 3.0.4);
@Bio::Root::Constants::ParsableMemeSF=qw(text);
So we'll know that only MEME reports in text format, generated by MEME 
3.0.3/3.0.4 can be pasred. This could help especially with packages that 
are not maintained any more I guess... One can even do something like:
throw unless ($constant->can_parse('meme','3.0.5'));
At some moment we could even pass params to parsers, so they could 
possibly  adapt ot a new format version...
This is just an idea. There are a lot of people who will know to what 
extent this is going to be useful and I would love to hear from them.
Stefan