NAME
    Date::Holidays::Abstract - an abstract class for Date::Holidays::*
    modules

SYNOPSIS
            package Date::Holidays::NN;
            use base qw(Date::Holidays::Abstract);
        
            sub holidays {
            ...
            }
        
            sub is_holiday {
            ...
            }

VERSION
    This POD describes version 0.04 of Date::Holidays::Abstract

DESCRIPTION
    This module is an abstract class intended for Date::Holidays::*

    The goal is to have all the existing and future modules implement the
    same methods, so they will have a uniform usage and can be used in
    polymorphic context or can be easily adapted into the Date::Holidays
    class.

    If you want to use Date::Holidays::Abstract and want to comply with my
    suggestions to the methods that ought to be implemented, you should
    implement:

    is_holiday
    holidays

  is_holiday
    Should at least take 3 arguments:

    year, four digits
    month, between 1-12
    day, between 1-31

    The return value from is holiday is either a 1 or 0 indicating true of
    false, indicating whether the specified date is a holiday in the given
    country's national calendar.

    Additional arguments are at the courtesy of the author of the using
    module/class.

  holidays
    Should at least take one argument:

    year, four digits

    Returns a reference to a hash, where the keys are date represented as
    four digits. The two first representing month (01-12) and the last two
    representing day (01-31).

    The value for the key in question is the local name for the holiday
    indicated by the day. The resultset will of course vary depending on the
    given country's national holiday.

    Additional arguments are at the courtesy of the author of the using
    module/class.

    --

    Date::Holidays uses the requirements defined by this module and this
    module can therefor be used with success in conjunction with this.

    This is an alternative to a SUPER class. I have given a lot of thought
    to programming a SUPER class, but since creating a super class for a
    bunch of modules implementing handling of national holidays, an abstract
    class seemed a better choice.

    A proposed SUPER class for Date::Holidays::* is however implemented see:
    Date::Holidays::Super implement is_holiday and holidays and expect these
    to be overloaded.

    Overloading would be necessary since nothing intelligent can be said
    about holidays without specifying a nationality (a part from holidays
    being nice but too few), and the implemented methods would be empty
    bodies returning empty result sets.

    So I am more for an abstract class and as stated I consider this class
    an experiment and I have implemented Date::Holidays::Super as an
    alternative.

    Suggestions for changes and extensions are more than welcome.

SUBROUTINES/METHODS
    This class does not implement any methods, it is a abstract class.

DIAGNOSTICS
    This class does not implement any exceptions or error, it is a abstract
    class.

CONFIGURATION AND ENVIRONMENT
    This class does not implement or require any special environment or
    configuration apart from what is mentioned in DEPENDENCIES

DEPENDENCIES
    This class is subclassed from Class::Virtual, but holds not direct
    dependencies apart from that class/module.

INCOMPATIBILITIES
    None known to the author

BUGS AND LIMITATIONS
    None known to the author

SEE ALSO
    Date::Holidays
    Date::Holidays::Super
    Date::Holidays::DE
    Date::Holidays::DK
    Date::Holidays::FR
    Date::Holidays::UK
    Date::Holiday::PT
    Date::Japanese::Holiday
    Class::Virtual

BUGS
    Please report issues via CPAN RT:

      http://rt.cpan.org/NoAuth/Bugs.html?Dist=Date-Holidays-Abstract

    or by sending mail to

      bug-Date-Holidays-Abstract@rt.cpan.org

TEST/COVERAGE
    This module is currently at 100% test coverage

AUTHOR
    Jonas B. Nielsen, (jonasbn) - "<jonasbn@cpan.org>"

LICENSE AND COPYRIGHT
    Date-Holidays-Abstract is (C) by Jonas B. Nielsen, (jonasbn) 2004-2007

    Date-Holidays-Abstract is released under the Artistic License See:
    (http://www.perl.com/language/misc/Artistic.html) for details.