Perl class::dbi - multiple connections

Question

I have a class library I have developed over the last few years that uses Perl's Class::DBI to wrap a relational database (the DB scheme for Prestashop, not that that matters)

Is anyone aware of anyway in a single perl script to create multiple "instances" of this class, pointing to different database? E.g. now I do something like:

use MyClassLib;
MyClassLib->connection('dbi:mysql:mydatabase', 'username', 'password');
MyClassLib->some_method()

All that works nicely.

What I'm trying to do is essentially alias MyClassLib to be able to use another "instance" of it pointing at a different database. Which is a pain as Class::DBI stores its database connection as static state.

Something like this in pseudo code

use MyClassLib;
use MyClassLib as MyClassLibAlias;
MyClassLib->connection('dbi:mysql:mydatabase', 'username', 'password');
MyClassLibAlias->connection('dbi:mysql:mynewdatabase', 'username', 'password');
MyClassLib->some_method()

And then from code access MyClassLib and MyClassLibAlias. Im aware Class::DBI is legacy and a solution that uses DBIx::Class would also be appreciated if non exists for Class::DBI

Thanks

Ben Grimm · Accepted Answer · 2015-03-16T14:47:45.290

The Class::DBI docs tell you to provide your own db_Main() method in lieu of using connection(). I believe this could return a standard DBI handle, but Class::DBI uses Ima::DBI internally. You could use a single class for this, but to mirror your pseudo code:

package MyClassLibAlias;
use base qw(MyClassLib);

sub db_Main {
    my $self = shift;        
    my ($dsn, $username, $password) = ...;
    return Ima::DBI->connect_cached($dsn, $username, $password);
}

You'll likely want to reference the dsn, username and password using class attributes.

Perl class::dbi - multiple connections

1 Answers1