use Bio::SearchIO;
  # for default format output from megablast
  my $in = new Bio::SearchIO(-file   => 'file.mbl',
                             -format => 'megablast',
                             -report_format => 0);

  while( my $r = $in->next_result ) {
    while( my $hit = $r->next_hit ) {
      while( my $hsp = $hit->next_hsp ) {
      }
    }
  }

    # mapping of MegaBlast terms to Bioperl hash keys
    %MODEMAP = ('MegaBlastOutput' => 'result',
		'Hit'         => 'hit',
		'Hsp'         => 'hsp'
		);

    # This should really be done more intelligently, like with
    # XSLT

    %MAPPING =
	(
	  'Hsp_query-from' => 'HSP-query_start',
	  'Hsp_query-to'   => 'HSP-query_end',
	  'Hsp_hit-from'   => 'HSP-hit_start',
	  'Hsp_hit-to'     => 'HSP-hit_end',
	  'Hit_score'      => 'HIT-score',
	  'Hsp_score'      => 'HSP-score',
	
	  'Hsp_identity'   => 'HSP-identical',
	  'Hsp_positive'   => 'HSP-conserved',

	  'Hit_id'         => 'HIT-name',
	
	  'MegaBlastOutput_program'  => 'RESULT-algorithm_name',
	  'MegaBlastOutput_query-def'=> 'RESULT-query_name',
	  );


    $DEFAULT_BLAST_WRITER_CLASS = 'Bio::Search::Writer::HitTableWriter';

    my ($self,@args) = @_;
    $self->SUPER::_initialize(@args);
    my ($fmt) = $self->_rearrange([qw(REPORT_FORMAT)], @args);

    $self->throw("Must have provided a value for -report_format when initializing a megablast parser") unless defined $fmt ;
    $self->report_format($fmt);
    return 1;

   my ($self) = @_;

   my $fmt = $self->report_format;
   my ($lastquery,$lasthit);
   while( defined($_ = $self->_readline) ) {
       if( $fmt == 0 ) {
	   if( /^\'(\S+)\'\=\=\'(\+|\-)(\S+)\'\s+
	       \((\d+)\s+(\d+)\s+(\d+)\s+(\d+)\)\s+
	       (\d+)/ox )
	   {
	       my ($hit,$strand,$query,
		   $h_start,$q_start,$h_end,$q_end,
		   $score) = ($1,$2,$3,$4,$5,$6,$7,$8);
	       if( ! defined $lastquery ) {
		   $self->start_element({'Name' => 'MegaBlastOutput'});
		   $self->element({'Name' => 'MegaBlastOutput_program',
				   'Data' => 'MEGABLAST'});
		   $self->element({'Name' => 'MegaBlastOutput_query-def',
				   'Data' => $query});
	       } elsif( $lastquery ne $query ) {
		   $self->_pushback($_);
		   $self->end_element({'Name' => 'Hit'}) if( defined $lasthit);
		   $self->end_element({ 'Name' => 'MegaBlastOutput'});
		   $lasthit = undef;
		   $lastquery = undef;
		   return $self->end_document();
	       }

	       if( ! defined $lasthit || $lasthit ne $hit  ) {
		   $self->end_element({'Name' => 'Hit'}) if( defined $lasthit);
		   $self->start_element({'Name' => 'Hit'});
		   $self->element({'Name' => 'Hit_id',
				   'Data' => $hit});
	       }
	       $self->start_element({'Name' => 'Hsp'});
	       $self->element({'Name' => 'Hsp_score',
			       'Data' => $score});

	       # flip flop start/end if strand is < 0
	       # since strandedness is inferred from the query
	       # because of the way it is coded all queries will
	       # be on the forward strand and hits will be either
	       # +/-

	       # also the NCBI docs state:
#   0: Produce one-line output for each alignment, in the form
#
#   'subject-id'=='[+-]query-id' (s_off q_off s_end q_end) score
#
#   Here subject(query)-id is a gi number, an accession or some other type of
#   identifier found in the FASTA definition line of the respective sequence.
#
#   + or - corresponds to same or different strand alignment.
#
#   Score for non-affine gapping parameters means the total number of
#   differences (mismatches + gaps). For affine case it is the actual (raw)
#   score of the alignment.
	
	       # and yet when rev strand hits are made I see
	       # (MBL 2.2.4)
	       # 'Contig634'=='-503384' (1 7941 321 7620) 19
	       # so the query is on the rev strand and the
	       # subject is on the fwd strand
	       # so I am flip-flopping everything when I see a '-'
	       if( $strand eq '-' ) {
		   ($h_start,$h_end) = ( $h_end,$h_start);
		   ($q_start,$q_end) = ( $q_end,$q_start);
	       }
	       $self->element({'Name' => 'Hsp_hit-from',
			       'Data' => $h_start});
	       $self->element({'Name' => 'Hsp_hit-to',
			       'Data' => $h_end});
	       $self->element({'Name' => 'Hsp_query-from',
			       'Data' => $q_start});
	       $self->element({'Name' => 'Hsp_query-to',
			       'Data' => $q_end});
	       # might not be quite right -- need to know length of the HSP
	       my $numid = (abs($q_end - $q_start) - $score);

	       $self->element({'Name' => 'Hsp_identity',
			       'Data' => $numid});
	       $self->element({'Name' => 'Hsp_positive',
			       'Data' => $numid});

	       $self->end_element({'Name' => 'Hsp'});
	       $lasthit   = $hit;
	       $lastquery = $query;
	   } else {
	       $self->debug("Unknown line in fmt0 parsing: $_");
	   }
       }
   }
   if( defined $lastquery && $fmt == 0 ) {
       $self->end_element({'Name' => 'Hit'}) if( defined $lasthit);
       $self->end_element({ 'Name' => 'MegaBlastOutput'});
       return $self->end_document();
   }
   return 0;

    my $self = shift;
    return $self->{'_report_format'} = shift if @_;
    return $self->{'_report_format'};

   my ($self,$data) = @_;
    # we currently do not care about attributes
    my $nm = $data->{'Name'};
   if( my $type = $MODEMAP{$nm} ) {
	$self->_mode($type);
	if( $self->_eventHandler->will_handle($type) ) {
	    my $func = sprintf("start_%s",lc $type);
	    $self->_eventHandler->$func($data->{'Attributes'});
	}
	unshift @{$self->{'_elements'}}, $type;
    }

    if($nm eq 'MegaBlastOutput') {
	$self->{'_values'} = {};
	$self->{'_result'}= undef;
	$self->{'_mode'} = '';
    }

    my ($self,$data) = @_;
    my $nm = $data->{'Name'};
    my $rc;

    if( my $type = $MODEMAP{$nm} ) {
	if( $self->_eventHandler->will_handle($type) ) {
	    my $func = sprintf("end_%s",lc $type);
	    $rc = $self->_eventHandler->$func($self->{'_reporttype'},
					      $self->{'_values'});
	}
	shift @{$self->{'_elements'}};

    } elsif( $MAPPING{$nm} ) {
	if ( ref($MAPPING{$nm}) =~ /hash/i ) {
	    my $key = (keys %{$MAPPING{$nm}})[0];
	    $self->{'_values'}->{$key}->{$MAPPING{$nm}->{$key}} = $self->{'_last_data'};
	} else {
	    $self->{'_values'}->{$MAPPING{$nm}} = $self->{'_last_data'};
	}
    } else {
	$self->warn( "unknown nm $nm ignoring\n");
    }
    $self->{'_last_data'} = ''; # remove read data if we are at
				# end of an element
    $self->{'_result'} = $rc if( $nm eq 'MegaBlastOutput' );
    return $rc;

   my ($self,$data) = @_;
   $self->start_element($data);
   $self->characters($data);
   $self->end_element($data);

   my ($self,$data) = @_;
   return unless defined $data->{'Data'};
   $self->{'_last_data'} = $data->{'Data'};

    my ($self,$value) = @_;
    if( defined $value) {
	$self->{'_mode'} = $value;
    }
    return $self->{'_mode'};

   my ($self,$name) = @_;
   return 0 if ( ! defined $name &&
		 ! defined  $self->{'_elements'} ||
		 scalar @{$self->{'_elements'}} == 0) ;
   foreach (  @{$self->{'_elements'}} ) {
       if( $_ eq $name  ) {
	   return 1;
       }
   }
   return 0;

   my ($self,$name) = @_;
   return 0 if ! defined $self->{'_elements'}->[0];
   return ( $self->{'_elements'}->[0] eq $name)

    my ($self) = @_;
    $self->{'_lasttype'} = '';
    $self->{'_values'} = {};
    $self->{'_result'}= undef;
    $self->{'_mode'} = '';
    $self->{'_elements'} = [];

   my ($self,@args) = @_;
   return $self->{'_result'};

    my $self = shift;
    return $self->{'_result_count'};

 shift->result_count

  bioperl-l@bioperl.org              - General discussion
  http://bioperl.org/MailList.shtml  - About the mailing lists

  bioperl-bugs@bioperl.org
  http://bioperl.org/bioperl-bugs/

 Title   : new
 Usage   : my $obj = new Bio::SearchIO::blast();
 Function: Builds a new Bio::SearchIO::blast object
 Returns : Bio::SearchIO::blast
 Args    : -fh/-file => filehandle/filename to BLAST file
           -format   => 'blast'