Insight on SWIG?
SWIG is available for some time to create bindings automagically for C and C++ applications. It supports code generation in different languages, including Python, TCL and Perl.
Curiously, in my years of Perl community I can't recall a talk on a YAPC about SWIG, and I can't recall any post on the usual community blogs about it as well. I would be grateful if any experienced XS user could comment on how good (or filth) is this tool and the generated bindings.
I blog about Perl. D'uh!
http://perl.org.il/presentations/offer_kaye_swig/index.html
My friend (and person who introduced me to Perl :)) Shlomo Yona, pushed me to write the above lightning talk and give it at one of the YAPC::IL::2003.
SuffixTree is a fairly simple library so if I recall correctly, wrapping it using SWIG was fairly painless. Although even in this simple case there was some manual work required. Also the wrapper which is generated is not very "Perl-ish".
See also the module CPAN page:
http://search.cpan.org/dist/SuffixTree/