=head1 NAME

Exporter - module to control namespace manipulations

import - import functions into callers namespace

=head1 SYNOPSYS

    package WhatEver;
    require Exporter;
    @ISA = (Exporter);
    @EXPORT    = qw(func1, $foo, %tabs);
    @EXPORT_OK = qw(sin cos);
    ...
    use Whatever;
    use WhatEver 'sin';

=head1 DESCRIPTION

The Exporter module is used by well-behaved Perl modules to 
control what they will export into their user's namespace.
The WhatEver module above has placed in its export list
the function C<func1()>, the scalar C<$foo>, and the
hash C<%tabs>.  When someone decides to 
C<use WhatEver>, they get those identifier grafted
onto their own namespace.  That means the user of 
package whatever can use the function func1() instead
of fully qualifying it as WhatEver::func1().  

You should be careful of such namespace pollution.
Of course, the user of the WhatEver module is free to 
use a C<require> instead of a C<use>, which will 
preserve the sanctity of their namespace.

In particular, you almost certainly shouldn't
automatically export functions whose names are 
already used in the language.  For this reason,
the @EXPORT_OK list contains those function which 
may be selectively imported, as the sin() function 
was above.
See L<perlsub/Overriding builtin functions>.

You can't import names that aren't in either the @EXPORT
or the @EXPORT_OK list.

Remember that these two constructs are identical:

    use WhatEver;

    BEGIN {
	require WhatEver;
	import Module;
    } 

The import() function above is not predefined in the
language.  Rather, it's a method in the Exporter module.
A sneaky library writer could conceivably have an import()
method that behaved differently from the standard one, but
that's not very friendly.