# This is a .pm just to (try to) make some CPAN document converters
#  convert it happily as part of the dist's documentation tree.
package HTML::Element::traverse;
 # Time-stamp: "2002-11-22 23:53:39 MST"
use HTML::Element ();
$VERSION = $VERSION = $HTML::Element::VERSION;
1;

__END__

=head1 NAME

HTML::Element::traverse - discussion of HTML::Element's traverse method

=head1 SYNOPSIS

  # $element->traverse is unnecessary and obscure.
  #   Don't use it in new code.

=head1 DESCRIPTION

C<HTML::Element> provides a method C<traverse> that traverses the tree
and calls user-specified callbacks for each node, in pre- or
post-order.  However, use of the method is quite superfluous: if you
want to recursively visit every node in the tree, it's almost always
simpler to write a subroutine does just that, than it is to bundle up
the pre- and/or post-order code in callbacks for the C<traverse>
method.

=head1 EXAMPLES

Suppose you want to traverse at/under a node $tree and give elements
an 'id' attribute unless they already have one.

You can use the C<traverse> method:

  {
    my $counter = 'x0000';
    $start_node->traverse(
      [ # Callbacks;
        # pre-order callback:
        sub {
          my $x = $_[0];
          $x->attr('id', $counter++) unless defined $x->attr('id');
          return HTML::Element::OK; # keep traversing
        },
        # post-order callback:
        undef
      ],
      1, # don't call the callbacks for text nodes
    );
  }

or you can just be simple and clear (and not have to understand the
calling format for C<traverse>) by writing a sub that traverses the
tree by just calling itself:

  {
    my $counter = 'x0000';
    sub give_id {
      my $x = $_[0];
      $x->attr('id', $counter++) unless defined $x->attr('id');
      foreach my $c ($x->content_list) {
        give_id($c) if ref $c; # ignore text nodes
      }
    };
    give_id($start_node);
  }

See, isn't that nice and clear?

But, if you really need to know:

=head1 THE TRAVERSE METHOD

The C<traverse()> method is a general object-method for traversing a
tree or subtree and calling user-specified callbacks.  It accepts the
following syntaxes:

=over

=item $h->traverse(\&callback)

=item or $h->traverse(\&callback, $ignore_text)

=item or $h->traverse( [\&pre_callback,\&post_callback] , $ignore_text)

=back

These all mean to traverse the element and all of its children.  That
is, this method starts at node $h, "pre-order visits" $h, traverses its
children, and then will "post-order visit" $h.  "Visiting" means that
the callback routine is called, with these arguments:

    $_[0] : the node (element or text segment),
    $_[1] : a startflag, and
    $_[2] : the depth

If the $ignore_text parameter is given and true, then the pre-order