API for import?

Answer

When you write your own import() you get to define your own API!

In older versions of Perl you needed to do version checking but this is now handled by a separate VERSION method.

Old modules' import() still may need keep the legacy version checking code to support the legacy syntax:

use Module VERSION, LIST

New modules don't need to worry about this as new code uses one of:

use Module VERSION LIST
use Module VERSION

Next