Here's one that caused me to sit back and go, "Hmmmm...".

Reading through some well-distributed code I found this near the top of the main script:

use lib qw(./include);
use Cwd;

# avoid needing to refer to SnortSnarf packages as SnortSnarf::*, even
+ if
# that is where they really are:
sub BEGIN { push(@INC,map("$_/SnortSnarf",grep(-d "$_/SnortSnarf",@INC
+))); }

use SnortFileInput;
use HTMLMemStorage;
use HTMLAnomMemStorage;
use SnortRules;
etc. etc.
[download]

Now, although I have never seen the little meme in that BEGIN block before, I understand what it is doing. (That's not the question.) My question is this: "is this a Good Practice?" What is the point?

So far as I can see, this bit of source-hiding simply saves a few keystrokes near the top of the file. And if done to access it could lead to some maintainance annoyances. Imagine adding several module paths to @INC and then trying to find the modules later: "Let's see, I wonder if the module referred to in 'use Parser' is XML::Parser or HTML::Parser..."

It's cute. It's slick. But is it Good?

David

Update: Thanks to the responders below for confirming my misgivings. I'm open to learn new approaches, but this one felt wrong from the get-go.