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=head1 NAME

perlfaq4 - Data Manipulation ($Revision: 1.67 $, $Date: 2005/08/10 15:55:49 $)

=head1 DESCRIPTION

This section of the FAQ answers questions related to manipulating
numbers, dates, strings, arrays, hashes, and miscellaneous data issues.

=head1 Data: Numbers

=head2 Why am I getting long decimals (eg, 19.9499999999999) instead of the numbers I should be getting (eg, 19.95)?

Internally, your computer represents floating-point numbers
in binary. Digital (as in powers of two) computers cannot
store all numbers exactly.  Some real numbers lose precision
in the process.  This is a problem with how computers store
numbers and affects all computer languages, not just Perl.

L<perlnumber> show the gory details of number
representations and conversions.

To limit the number of decimal places in your numbers, you
can use the printf or sprintf function.  See the
L<"Floating Point Arithmetic"|perlop> for more details.

        printf "%.2f", 10/3;

        my $number = sprintf "%.2f", 10/3;

=head2 Why is int() broken?

Your int() is most probably working just fine.  It's the numbers that
aren't quite what you think.

First, see the above item "Why am I getting long decimals
(eg, 19.9499999999999) instead of the numbers I should be getting
(eg, 19.95)?".

For example, this

    print int(0.6/0.2-2), "\n";

will in most computers print 0, not 1, because even such simple
numbers as 0.6 and 0.2 cannot be presented exactly by floating-point
numbers.  What you think in the above as 'three' is really more like
2.9999999999999995559.

=head2 Why isn't my octal data interpreted correctly?

Perl only understands octal and hex numbers as such when they occur as
literals in your program.  Octal literals in perl must start with a
leading "0" and hexadecimal literals must start with a leading "0x".
If they are read in from somewhere and assigned, no automatic
conversion takes place.  You must explicitly use oct() or hex() if you
want the values converted to decimal.  oct() interprets hex ("0x350"),
octal ("0350" or even without the leading "0", like "377") and binary
("0b1010") numbers, while hex() only converts hexadecimal ones, with
or without a leading "0x", like "0x255", "3A", "ff", or "deadbeef".
The inverse mapping from decimal to octal can be done with either the
"%o" or "%O" sprintf() formats.

This problem shows up most often when people try using chmod(), mkdir(),
umask(), or sysopen(), which by widespread tradition typically take
permissions in octal.

    chmod(644,  $file); # WRONG
    chmod(0644, $file); # right

Note the mistake in the first line was specifying the decimal literal
644, rather than the intended octal literal 0644.  The problem can
be seen with:

    printf("%#o",644); # prints 01204

Surely you had not intended C<chmod(01204, $file);> - did you?  If you
want to use numeric literals as arguments to chmod() et al. then please
try to express them as octal constants, that is with a leading zero and
with the following digits restricted to the set 0..7.

=head2 Does Perl have a round() function?  What about ceil() and floor()?  Trig functions?

Remember that int() merely truncates toward 0.  For rounding to a
certain number of digits, sprintf() or printf() is usually the easiest
route.

    printf("%.3f", 3.1415926535);       # prints 3.142

The POSIX module (part of the standard Perl distribution) implements
ceil(), floor(), and a number of other mathematical and trigonometric
functions.

    use POSIX;
    $ceil   = ceil(3.5);                        # 4
    $floor  = floor(3.5);                       # 3

In 5.000 to 5.003 perls, trigonometry was done in the Math::Complex
module.  With 5.004, the Math::Trig module (part of the standard Perl
distribution) implements the trigonometric functions. Internally it
uses the Math::Complex module and some functions can break out from
the real axis into the complex plane, for example the inverse sine of
2.

Rounding in financial applications can have serious implications, and
the rounding method used should be specified precisely.  In these
cases, it probably pays not to trust whichever system rounding is
being used by Perl, but to instead implement the rounding function you
need yourself.

To see why, notice how you'll still have an issue on half-way-point
alternation:

    for ($i = 0; $i < 1.01; $i += 0.05) { printf "%.1f ",$i}

    0.0 0.1 0.1 0.2 0.2 0.2 0.3 0.3 0.4 0.4 0.5 0.5 0.6 0.7 0.7
    0.8 0.8 0.9 0.9 1.0 1.0

Don't blame Perl.  It's the same as in C.  IEEE says we have to do this.
Perl numbers whose absolute values are integers under 2**31 (on 32 bit
machines) will work pretty much like mathematical integers.  Other numbers
are not guaranteed.

=head2 How do I convert between numeric representations/bases/radixes?

As always with Perl there is more than one way to do it.  Below
are a few examples of approaches to making common conversions
between number representations.  This is intended to be representational
rather than exhaustive.

Some of the examples below use the Bit::Vector module from CPAN.
The reason you might choose Bit::Vector over the perl built in
functions is that it works with numbers of ANY size, that it is
optimized for speed on some operations, and for at least some
programmers the notation might be familiar.

=over 4

=item How do I convert hexadecimal into decimal

Using perl's built in conversion of 0x notation:

    $dec = 0xDEADBEEF;

Using the hex function:

    $dec = hex("DEADBEEF");

Using pack:

    $dec = unpack("N", pack("H8", substr("0" x 8 . "DEADBEEF", -8)));

Using the CPAN module Bit::Vector:

    use Bit::Vector;
    $vec = Bit::Vector->new_Hex(32, "DEADBEEF");
    $dec = $vec->to_Dec();

=item How do I convert from decimal to hexadecimal

Using sprintf:

    $hex = sprintf("%X", 3735928559); # upper case A-F
    $hex = sprintf("%x", 3735928559); # lower case a-f

Using unpack:

    $hex = unpack("H*", pack("N", 3735928559));

Using Bit::Vector:

    use Bit::Vector;
    $vec = Bit::Vector->new_Dec(32, -559038737);
    $hex = $vec->to_Hex();

And Bit::Vector supports odd bit counts:

    use Bit::Vector;
    $vec = Bit::Vector->new_Dec(33, 3735928559);
    $vec->Resize(32); # suppress leading 0 if unwanted
    $hex = $vec->to_Hex();

=item How do I convert from octal to decimal

Using Perl's built in conversion of numbers with leading zeros:

    $dec = 033653337357; # note the leading 0!

Using the oct function:

    $dec = oct("33653337357");

Using Bit::Vector:

    use Bit::Vector;
    $vec = Bit::Vector->new(32);
    $vec->Chunk_List_Store(3, split(//, reverse "33653337357"));
    $dec = $vec->to_Dec();

=item How do I convert from decimal to octal

Using sprintf:

    $oct = sprintf("%o", 3735928559);

Using Bit::Vector:

    use Bit::Vector;
    $vec = Bit::Vector->new_Dec(32, -559038737);
    $oct = reverse join('', $vec->Chunk_List_Read(3));

=item How do I convert from binary to decimal

Perl 5.6 lets you write binary numbers directly with
the 0b notation:

    $number = 0b10110110;

Using oct:

    my $input = "10110110";
    $decimal = oct( "0b$input" );

Using pack and ord:

    $decimal = ord(pack('B8', '10110110'));

Using pack and unpack for larger strings:

    $int = unpack("N", pack("B32",
        substr("0" x 32 . "11110101011011011111011101111", -32)));
    $dec = sprintf("%d", $int);

    # substr() is used to left pad a 32 character string with zeros.

Using Bit::Vector:

    $vec = Bit::Vector->new_Bin(32, "11011110101011011011111011101111");
    $dec = $vec->to_Dec();

=item How do I convert from decimal to binary

Using sprintf (perl 5.6+):

    $bin = sprintf("%b", 3735928559);

Using unpack:

    $bin = unpack("B*", pack("N", 3735928559));

Using Bit::Vector:

    use Bit::Vector;
    $vec = Bit::Vector->new_Dec(32, -559038737);
    $bin = $vec->to_Bin();

The remaining transformations (e.g. hex -> oct, bin -> hex, etc.)
are left as an exercise to the inclined reader.

=back

=head2 Why doesn't & work the way I want it to?

The behavior of binary arithmetic operators depends on whether they're
used on numbers or strings.  The operators treat a string as a series
of bits and work with that (the string C<"3"> is the bit pattern
C<00110011>).  The operators work with the binary form of a number
(the number C<3> is treated as the bit pattern C<00000011>).

So, saying C<11 & 3> performs the "and" operation on numbers (yielding
C<3>).  Saying C<"11" & "3"> performs the "and" operation on strings
(yielding C<"1">).

Most problems with C<&> and C<|> arise because the programmer thinks
they have a number but really it's a string.  The rest arise because
the programmer says:

    if ("\020\020" & "\101\101") {
        # ...
    }

but a string consisting of two null bytes (the result of C<"\020\020"
& "\101\101">) is not a false value in Perl.  You need:

    if ( ("\020\020" & "\101\101") !~ /[^\000]/) {
        # ...
    }

=head2 How do I multiply matrices?

Use the Math::Matrix or Math::MatrixReal modules (available from CPAN)
or the PDL extension (also available from CPAN).

=head2 How do I perform an operation on a series of integers?

To call a function on each element in an array, and collect the
results, use:

    @results = map { my_func($_) } @array;

For example:

    @triple = map { 3 * $_ } @single;

To call a function on each element of an array, but ignore the
results:

    foreach $iterator (@array) {
        some_func($iterator);
    }

To call a function on each integer in a (small) range, you B<can> use:

    @results = map { some_func($_) } (5 .. 25);

but you should be aware that the C<..> operator creates an array of
all integers in the range.  This can take a lot of memory for large
ranges.  Instead use:

    @results = ();
    for ($i=5; $i < 500_005; $i++) {
        push(@results, some_func($i));
    }

This situation has been fixed in Perl5.005. Use of C<..> in a C<for>
loop will iterate over the range, without creating the entire range.

    for my $i (5 .. 500_005) {
        push(@results, some_func($i));
    }

will not create a list of 500,000 integers.

=head2 How can I output Roman numerals?

Get the http://www.cpan.org/modules/by-module/Roman module.

=head2 Why aren't my random numbers random?

If you're using a version of Perl before 5.004, you must call C<srand>
once at the start of your program to seed the random number generator.

         BEGIN { srand() if $] < 5.004 }

5.004 and later automatically call C<srand> at the beginning.  Don't
call C<srand> more than once---you make your numbers less random, rather
than more.

Computers are good at being predictable and bad at being random
(despite appearances caused by bugs in your programs :-).  see the
F<random> article in the "Far More Than You Ever Wanted To Know"
collection in http://www.cpan.org/misc/olddoc/FMTEYEWTK.tgz , courtesy of
Tom Phoenix, talks more about this.  John von Neumann said, "Anyone
who attempts to generate random numbers by deterministic means is, of
course, living in a state of sin."

If you want numbers that are more random than C<rand> with C<srand>
provides, you should also check out the Math::TrulyRandom module from
CPAN.  It uses the imperfections in your system's timer to generate
random numbers, but this takes quite a while.  If you want a better
pseudorandom generator than comes with your operating system, look at
"Numerical Recipes in C" at http://www.nr.com/ .

=head2 How do I get a random number between X and Y?

C<rand($x)> returns a number such that
C<< 0 <= rand($x) < $x >>. Thus what you want to have perl
figure out is a random number in the range from 0 to the
difference between your I<X> and I<Y>.

That is, to get a number between 10 and 15, inclusive, you
want a random number between 0 and 5 that you can then add
to 10.

    my $number = 10 + int rand( 15-10+1 );

Hence you derive the following simple function to abstract
that. It selects a random integer between the two given
integers (inclusive), For example: C<random_int_in(50,120)>.

   sub random_int_in ($$) {
     my($min, $max) = @_;
      # Assumes that the two arguments are integers themselves!
     return $min if $min == $max;
     ($min, $max) = ($max, $min)  if  $min > $max;
     return $min + int rand(1 + $max - $min);
   }

=head1 Data: Dates

=head2 How do I find the day or week of the year?

The localtime function returns the day of the year.  Without an
argument localtime uses the current time.

    $day_of_year = (localtime)[7];

The POSIX module can also format a date as the day of the year or
week of the year.

        use POSIX qw/strftime/;
        my $day_of_year  = strftime "%j", localtime;
        my $week_of_year = strftime "%W", localtime;

To get the day of year for any date, use the Time::Local module to get
a time in epoch seconds for the argument to localtime.

        use POSIX qw/strftime/;
        use Time::Local;
        my $week_of_year = strftime "%W",
                localtime( timelocal( 0, 0, 0, 18, 11, 1987 ) );

The Date::Calc module provides two functions to calculate these.

        use Date::Calc;
        my $day_of_year  = Day_of_Year(  1987, 12, 18 );
        my $week_of_year = Week_of_Year( 1987, 12, 18 );

=head2 How do I find the current century or millennium?

Use the following simple functions:

    sub get_century    {
        return int((((localtime(shift || time))[5] + 1999))/100);
    }

    sub get_millennium {
        return 1+int((((localtime(shift || time))[5] + 1899))/1000);
    }

On some systems, the POSIX module's strftime() function has
been extended in a non-standard way to use a C<%C> format,
which they sometimes claim is the "century".  It isn't,
because on most such systems, this is only the first two
digits of the four-digit year, and thus cannot be used to
reliably determine the current century or millennium.

=head2 How can I compare two dates and find the difference?

(contributed by brian d foy)

You could just store all your dates as a number and then subtract. Life
isn't always that simple though. If you want to work with formatted
dates, the Date::Manip, Date::Calc, or DateTime modules can help you.


=head2 How can I take a string and turn it into epoch seconds?

If it's a regular enough string that it always has the same format,
you can split it up and pass the parts to C<timelocal> in the standard
Time::Local module.  Otherwise, you should look into the Date::Calc
and Date::Manip modules from CPAN.

=head2 How can I find the Julian Day?

(contributed by brian d foy and Dave Cross)

You can use the Time::JulianDay module available on CPAN.  Ensure that
you really want to find a Julian day, though, as many people have
different ideas about Julian days.  See
http://www.hermetic.ch/cal_stud/jdn.htm for instance.

You can also try the DateTime module, which can convert a date/time
to a Julian Day.

  $ perl -MDateTime -le'print DateTime->today->jd'
  2453401.5

Or the modified Julian Day

  $ perl -MDateTime -le'print DateTime->today->mjd'
  53401

Or even the day of the year (which is what some people think of as a
Julian day)

  $ perl -MDateTime -le'print DateTime->today->doy'
  31

=head2 How do I find yesterday's date?

(contributed by brian d foy)

Use one of the Date modules. The C<DateTime> module makes it simple, and
give you the same time of day, only the day before.

        use DateTime;
        
        my $yesterday = DateTime->now->subtract( days => 1 );
        
        print "Yesterday was $yesterday\n";

You can also use the C<Date::Calc> module using its Today_and_Now
function.

        use Date::Calc qw( Today_and_Now Add_Delta_DHMS );
        
        my @date_time = Add_Delta_DHMS( Today_and_Now(), -1, 0, 0, 0 );
        
        print "@date\n";
        
Most people try to use the time rather than the calendar to figure out
dates, but that assumes that days are twenty-four hours each.  For
most people, there are two days a year when they aren't: the switch to
and from summer time throws this off. Let the modules do the work.

=head2 Does Perl have a Year 2000 problem?  Is Perl Y2K compliant?

Short answer: No, Perl does not have a Year 2000 problem.  Yes, Perl is
Y2K compliant (whatever that means).  The programmers you've hired to
use it, however, probably are not.

Long answer: The question belies a true understanding of the issue.
Perl is just as Y2K compliant as your pencil--no more, and no less.
Can you use your pencil to write a non-Y2K-compliant memo?  Of course
you can.  Is that the pencil's fault?  Of course it isn't.

The date and time functions supplied with Perl (gmtime and localtime)
supply adequate information to determine the year well beyond 2000
(2038 is when trouble strikes for 32-bit machines).  The year returned
by these functions when used in a list context is the year minus 1900.
For years between 1910 and 1999 this I<happens> to be a 2-digit decimal
number. To avoid the year 2000 problem simply do not treat the year as
a 2-digit number.  It isn't.

When gmtime() and localtime() are used in scalar context they return
a timestamp string that contains a fully-expanded year.  For example,
C<$timestamp = gmtime(1005613200)> sets $timestamp to "Tue Nov 13 01:00:00
2001".  There's no year 2000 problem here.

That doesn't mean that Perl can't be used to create non-Y2K compliant
programs.  It can.  But so can your pencil.  It's the fault of the user,
not the language.  At the risk of inflaming the NRA: "Perl doesn't
break Y2K, people do."  See http://www.perl.org/about/y2k.html for
a longer exposition.

=head1 Data: Strings

=head2 How do I validate input?

(contributed by brian d foy)

There are many ways to ensure that values are what you expect or
want to accept. Besides the specific examples that we cover in the
perlfaq, you can also look at the modules with "Assert" and "Validate"
in their names, along with other modules such as C<Regexp::Common>.

Some modules have validation for particular types of input, such
as C<Business::ISBN>, C<Business::CreditCard>, C<Email::Valid>,
and C<Data::Validate::IP>.

=head2 How do I unescape a string?

It depends just what you mean by "escape".  URL escapes are dealt
with in L<perlfaq9>.  Shell escapes with the backslash (C<\>)
character are removed with

    s/\\(.)/$1/g;

This won't expand C<"\n"> or C<"\t"> or any other special escapes.

=head2 How do I remove consecutive pairs of characters?

(contributed by brian d foy)

You can use the substitution operator to find pairs of characters (or
runs of characters) and replace them with a single instance. In this
substitution, we find a character in C<(.)>. The memory parentheses
store the matched character in the back-reference C<\1> and we use
that to require that the same thing immediately follow it. We replace
that part of the string with the character in C<$1>.

    s/(.)\1/$1/g;

We can also use the transliteration operator, C<tr///>. In this
example, the search list side of our C<tr///> contains nothing, but
the C<c> option complements that so it contains everything. The
replacement list also contains nothing, so the transliteration is
almost a no-op since it won't do any replacements (or more exactly,
replace the character with itself). However, the C<s> option squashes
duplicated and consecutive characters in the string so a character
does not show up next to itself

        my $str = 'Haarlem';   # in the Netherlands
    $str =~ tr///cs;       # Now Harlem, like in New York

=head2 How do I expand function calls in a string?

(contributed by brian d foy)

This is documented in L<perlref>, and although it's not the easiest
thing to read, it does work. In each of these examples, we call the
function inside the braces of used to dereference a reference. If we
have a more than one return value, we can construct and dereference an
anonymous array. In this case, we call the function in list context.

    print "The time values are @{ [localtime] }.\n";

If we want to call the function in scalar context, we have to do a bit
more work. We can really have any code we like inside the braces, so
we simply have to end with the scalar reference, although how you do
that is up to you, and you can use code inside the braces.

        print "The time is ${\(scalar localtime)}.\n"
        
        print "The time is ${ my $x = localtime; \$x }.\n";
        
If your function already returns a reference, you don't need to create
the reference yourself.

        sub timestamp { my $t = localtime; \$t }
        
        print "The time is ${ timestamp() }.\n";
        
In most cases, it is probably easier to simply use string
concatenation, which also forces scalar context.

        print "The time is " . localtime . ".\n";

=head2 How do I find matching/nesting anything?

This isn't something that can be done in one regular expression, no
matter how complicated.  To find something between two single
characters, a pattern like C</x([^x]*)x/> will get the intervening
bits in $1. For multiple ones, then something more like
C</alpha(.*?)omega/> would be needed.  But none of these deals with
nested patterns.  For balanced expressions using C<(>, C<{>, C<[> or
C<< < >> as delimiters, use the CPAN module Regexp::Common, or see
L<perlre/(??{ code })>.  For other cases, you'll have to write a
parser.

If you are serious about writing a parser, there are a number of
modules or oddities that will make your life a lot easier.  There are
the CPAN modules Parse::RecDescent, Parse::Yapp, and Text::Balanced;
and the byacc program.   Starting from perl 5.8 the Text::Balanced is
part of the standard distribution.

One simple destructive, inside-out approach that you might try is to
pull out the smallest nesting parts one at a time:

    while (s/BEGIN((?:(?!BEGIN)(?!END).)*)END//gs) {
        # do something with $1
    }

A more complicated and sneaky approach is to make Perl's regular
expression engine do it for you.  This is courtesy Dean Inada, and
rather has the nature of an Obfuscated Perl Contest entry, but it
really does work:

    # $_ contains the string to parse
    # BEGIN and END are the opening and closing markers for the
    # nested text.

    @( = ('(','');
    @) = (')','');
    ($re=$_)=~s/((BEGIN)|(END)|.)/$)[!$3]\Q$1\E$([!$2]/gs;
    @$ = (eval{/$re/},$@!~/unmatched/i);
    print join("\n",@$[0..$#$]) if( $$[-1] );

=head2 How do I reverse a string?

Use reverse() in scalar context, as documented in
L<perlfunc/reverse>.

    $reversed = reverse $string;

=head2 How do I expand tabs in a string?

You can do it yourself:

    1 while $string =~ s/\t+/' ' x (length($&) * 8 - length($`) % 8)/e;

Or you can just use the Text::Tabs module (part of the standard Perl
distribution).

    use Text::Tabs;
    @expanded_lines = expand(@lines_with_tabs);

=head2 How do I reformat a paragraph?

Use Text::Wrap (part of the standard Perl distribution):

    use Text::Wrap;
    print wrap("\t", '  ', @paragraphs);

The paragraphs you give to Text::Wrap should not contain embedded
newlines.  Text::Wrap doesn't justify the lines (flush-right).

Or use the CPAN module Text::Autoformat.  Formatting files can be easily
done by making a shell alias, like so:

    alias fmt="perl -i -MText::Autoformat -n0777 \
        -e 'print autoformat $_, {all=>1}' $*"

See the documentation for Text::Autoformat to appreciate its many
capabilities.

=head2 How can I access or change N characters of a string?

You can access the first characters of a string with substr().
To get the first character, for example, start at position 0
and grab the string of length 1.


        $string = "Just another Perl Hacker";
    $first_char = substr( $string, 0, 1 );  #  'J'

To change part of a string, you can use the optional fourth
argument which is the replacement string.

    substr( $string, 13, 4, "Perl 5.8.0" );

You can also use substr() as an lvalue.

    substr( $string, 13, 4 ) =  "Perl 5.8.0";

=head2 How do I change the Nth occurrence of something?

You have to keep track of N yourself.  For example, let's say you want
to change the fifth occurrence of C<"whoever"> or C<"whomever"> into
C<"whosoever"> or C<"whomsoever">, case insensitively.  These
all assume that $_ contains the string to be altered.

    $count = 0;
    s{((whom?)ever)}{
        ++$count == 5           # is it the 5th?
            ? "${2}soever"      # yes, swap
            : $1                # renege and leave it there
    }ige;

In the more general case, you can use the C</g> modifier in a C<while>
loop, keeping count of matches.

    $WANT = 3;
    $count = 0;
    $_ = "One fish two fish red fish blue fish";
    while (/(\w+)\s+fish\b/gi) {
        if (++$count == $WANT) {
            print "The third fish is a $1 one.\n";
        }
    }

That prints out: C<"The third fish is a red one.">  You can also use a
repetition count and repeated pattern like this:

    /(?:\w+\s+fish\s+){2}(\w+)\s+fish/i;

=head2 How can I count the number of occurrences of a substring within a string?

There are a number of ways, with varying efficiency.  If you want a
count of a certain single character (X) within a string, you can use the
C<tr///> function like so:

    $string = "ThisXlineXhasXsomeXx'sXinXit";
    $count = ($string =~ tr/X//);
    print "There are $count X characters in the string";

This is fine if you are just looking for a single character.  However,
if you are trying to count multiple character substrings within a
larger string, C<tr///> won't work.  What you can do is wrap a while()
loop around a global pattern match.  For example, let's count negative
integers:

    $string = "-9 55 48 -2 23 -76 4 14 -44";
    while ($string =~ /-\d+/g) { $count++ }
    print "There are $count negative numbers in the string";

Another version uses a global match in list context, then assigns the
result to a scalar, producing a count of the number of matches.

        $count = () = $string =~ /-\d+/g;

=head2 How do I capitalize all the words on one line?

To make the first letter of each word upper case:

        $line =~ s/\b(\w)/\U$1/g;

This has the strange effect of turning "C<don't do it>" into "C<Don'T
Do It>".  Sometimes you might want this.  Other times you might need a
more thorough solution (Suggested by brian d foy):

    $string =~ s/ (
                 (^\w)    #at the beginning of the line
                   |      # or
                 (\s\w)   #preceded by whitespace
                   )
                /\U$1/xg;
    $string =~ /([\w']+)/\u\L$1/g;

To make the whole line upper case:

        $line = uc($line);

To force each word to be lower case, with the first letter upper case:

        $line =~ s/(\w+)/\u\L$1/g;

You can (and probably should) enable locale awareness of those
characters by placing a C<use locale> pragma in your program.
See L<perllocale> for endless details on locales.

This is sometimes referred to as putting something into "title
case", but that's not quite accurate.  Consider the proper
capitalization of the movie I<Dr. Strangelove or: How I Learned to
Stop Worrying and Love the Bomb>, for example.

Damian Conway's L<Text::Autoformat> module provides some smart
case transformations:

    use Text::Autoformat;
    my $x = "Dr. Strangelove or: How I Learned to Stop ".
      "Worrying and Love the Bomb";

    print $x, "\n";
    for my $style (qw( sentence title highlight ))
    {
        print autoformat($x, { case => $style }), "\n";
    }

=head2 How can I split a [character] delimited string except when inside [character]?

Several modules can handle this sort of pasing---Text::Balanced,
Text::CSV, Text::CSV_XS, and Text::ParseWords, among others.

Take the example case of trying to split a string that is
comma-separated into its different fields. You can't use C<split(/,/)>
because you shouldn't split if the comma is inside quotes.  For
example, take a data line like this:

    SAR001,"","Cimetrix, Inc","Bob Smith","CAM",N,8,1,0,7,"Error, Core Dumped"

Due to the restriction of the quotes, this is a fairly complex
problem.  Thankfully, we have Jeffrey Friedl, author of
I<Mastering Regular Expressions>, to handle these for us.  He
suggests (assuming your string is contained in $text):

     @new = ();
     push(@new, $+) while $text =~ m{
         "([^\"\\]*(?:\\.[^\"\\]*)*)",?  # groups the phrase inside the quotes
       | ([^,]+),?
       | ,
     }gx;
     push(@new, undef) if substr($text,-1,1) eq ',';

If you want to represent quotation marks inside a
quotation-mark-delimited field, escape them with backslashes (eg,
C<"like \"this\"">.

Alternatively, the Text::ParseWords module (part of the standard Perl
distribution) lets you say:

    use Text::ParseWords;
    @new = quotewords(",", 0, $text);

There's also a Text::CSV (Comma-Separated Values) module on CPAN.

=head2 How do I strip blank space from the beginning/end of a string?

(contributed by brian d foy)

A substitution can do this for you. For a single line, you want to
replace all the leading or trailing whitespace with nothing. You
can do that with a pair of substitutions.

        s/^\s+//;
        s/\s+$//;

You can also write that as a single substitution, although it turns
out the combined statement is slower than the separate ones. That
might not matter to you, though.

        s/^\s+|\s+$//g;

In this regular expression, the alternation matches either at the
beginning or the end of the string since the anchors have a lower
precedence than the alternation. With the C</g> flag, the substitution
makes all possible matches, so it gets both. Remember, the trailing
newline matches the C<\s+>, and  the C<$> anchor can match to the
physical end of the string, so the newline disappears too. Just add
the newline to the output, which has the added benefit of preserving
"blank" (consisting entirely of whitespace) lines which the C<^\s+>
would remove all by itself.

        while( <> )
                {
                s/^\s+|\s+$//g;
                print "$_\n";
                }

For a multi-line string, you can apply the regular expression
to each logical line in the string by adding the C</m> flag (for
"multi-line"). With the C</m> flag, the C<$> matches I<before> an
embedded newline, so it doesn't remove it. It still removes the
newline at the end of the string.

    $string =~ s/^\s+|\s+$//gm;

Remember that lines consisting entirely of whitespace will disappear,
since the first part of the alternation can match the entire string
and replace it with nothing. If need to keep embedded blank lines,
you have to do a little more work. Instead of matching any whitespace
(since that includes a newline), just match the other whitespace.

        $string =~ s/^[\t\f ]+|[\t\f ]+$//mg;

=head2 How do I pad a string with blanks or pad a number with zeroes?

In the following examples, C<$pad_len> is the length to which you wish
to pad the string, C<$text> or C<$num> contains the string to be padded,
and C<$pad_char> contains the padding character. You can use a single
character string constant instead of the C<$pad_char> variable if you
know what it is in advance. And in the same way you can use an integer in
place of C<$pad_len> if you know the pad length in advance.

The simplest method uses the C<sprintf> function. It can pad on the left
or right with blanks and on the left with zeroes and it will not
truncate the result. The C<pack> function can only pad strings on the
right with blanks and it will truncate the result to a maximum length of
C<$pad_len>.

    # Left padding a string with blanks (no truncation):
        $padded = sprintf("%${pad_len}s", $text);
        $padded = sprintf("%*s", $pad_len, $text);  # same thing

    # Right padding a string with blanks (no truncation):
        $padded = sprintf("%-${pad_len}s", $text);
        $padded = sprintf("%-*s", $pad_len, $text); # same thing

    # Left padding a number with 0 (no truncation):
        $padded = sprintf("%0${pad_len}d", $num);
        $padded = sprintf("%0*d", $pad_len, $num); # same thing

    # Right padding a string with blanks using pack (will truncate):
    $padded = pack("A$pad_len",$text);

If you need to pad with a character other than blank or zero you can use
one of the following methods.  They all generate a pad string with the
C<x> operator and combine that with C<$text>. These methods do
not truncate C<$text>.

Left and right padding with any character, creating a new string:

    $padded = $pad_char x ( $pad_len - length( $text ) ) . $text;
    $padded = $text . $pad_char x ( $pad_len - length( $text ) );

Left and right padding with any character, modifying C<$text> directly:

    substr( $text, 0, 0 ) = $pad_char x ( $pad_len - length( $text ) );
    $text .= $pad_char x ( $pad_len - length( $text ) );

=head2 How do I extract selected columns from a string?

Use substr() or unpack(), both documented in L<perlfunc>.
If you prefer thinking in terms of columns instead of widths,
you can use this kind of thing:

    # determine the unpack format needed to split Linux ps output
    # arguments are cut columns
    my $fmt = cut2fmt(8, 14, 20, 26, 30, 34, 41, 47, 59, 63, 67, 72);

    sub cut2fmt {
        my(@positions) = @_;
        my $template  = '';
        my $lastpos   = 1;
        for my $place (@positions) {
            $template .= "A" . ($place - $lastpos) . " ";
            $lastpos   = $place;
        }
        $template .= "A*";
        return $template;
    }

=head2 How do I find the soundex value of a string?

(contributed by brian d foy)

You can use the Text::Soundex module. If you want to do fuzzy or close
matching, you might also try the String::Approx, and Text::Metaphone,
and Text::DoubleMetaphone modules.

=head2 How can I expand variables in text strings?

Let's assume that you have a string that contains placeholder
variables.

    $text = 'this has a $foo in it and a $bar';

You can use a substitution with a double evaluation.  The
first /e turns C<$1> into C<$foo>, and the second /e turns
C<$foo> into its value.  You may want to wrap this in an
C<eval>: if you try to get the value of an undeclared variable
while running under C<use strict>, you get a fatal error.

    eval { $text =~ s/(\$\w+)/$1/eeg };
    die if $@;

It's probably better in the general case to treat those
variables as entries in some special hash.  For example:

    %user_defs = (
        foo  => 23,
        bar  => 19,
    );
    $text =~ s/\$(\w+)/$user_defs{$1}/g;

=head2 What's wrong with always quoting "$vars"?

The problem is that those double-quotes force stringification--
coercing numbers and references into strings--even when you
don't want them to be strings.  Think of it this way: double-quote
expansion is used to produce new strings.  If you already
have a string, why do you need more?

If you get used to writing odd things like these:

    print "$var";       # BAD
    $new = "$old";      # BAD
    somefunc("$var");   # BAD

You'll be in trouble.  Those should (in 99.8% of the cases) be
the simpler and more direct:

    print $var;
    $new = $old;
    somefunc($var);

Otherwise, besides slowing you down, you're going to break code when
the thing in the scalar is actually neither a string nor a number, but
a reference:

    func(\@array);
    sub func {
        my $aref = shift;
        my $oref = "$aref";  # WRONG
    }

You can also get into subtle problems on those few operations in Perl
that actually do care about the difference between a string and a
number, such as the magical C<++> autoincrement operator or the
syscall() function.

Stringification also destroys arrays.

    @lines = `command`;
    print "@lines";             # WRONG - extra blanks
    print @lines;               # right

=head2 Why don't my E<lt>E<lt>HERE documents work?

Check for these three things:

=over 4

=item There must be no space after the E<lt>E<lt> part.

=item There (probably) should be a semicolon at the end.

=item You can't (easily) have any space in front of the tag.

=back

If you want to indent the text in the here document, you
can do this:

    # all in one
    ($VAR = <<HERE_TARGET) =~ s/^\s+//gm;
        your text
        goes here
    HERE_TARGET

But the HERE_TARGET must still be flush against the margin.
If you want that indented also, you'll have to quote
in the indentation.

    ($quote = <<'    FINIS') =~ s/^\s+//gm;
            ...we will have peace, when you and all your works have
            perished--and the works of your dark master to whom you
            would deliver us. You are a liar, Saruman, and a corrupter
            of men's hearts.  --Theoden in /usr/src/perl/taint.c
        FINIS
    $quote =~ s/\s+--/\n--/;

A nice general-purpose fixer-upper function for indented here documents
follows.  It expects to be called with a here document as its argument.
It looks to see whether each line begins with a common substring, and
if so, strips that substring off.  Otherwise, it takes the amount of leading
whitespace found on the first line and removes that much off each
subsequent line.

    sub fix {
        local $_ = shift;
        my ($white, $leader);  # common whitespace and common leading string
        if (/^\s*(?:([^\w\s]+)(\s*).*\n)(?:\s*\1\2?.*\n)+$/) {
            ($white, $leader) = ($2, quotemeta($1));
        } else {
            ($white, $leader) = (/^(\s+)/, '');
        }
        s/^\s*?$leader(?:$white)?//gm;
        return $_;
    }

This works with leading special strings, dynamically determined:

    $remember_the_main = fix<<'    MAIN_INTERPRETER_LOOP';
        @@@ int
        @@@ runops() {
        @@@     SAVEI32(runlevel);
        @@@     runlevel++;
        @@@     while ( op = (*op->op_ppaddr)() );
        @@@     TAINT_NOT;
        @@@     return 0;
        @@@ }
    MAIN_INTERPRETER_LOOP

Or with a fixed amount of leading whitespace, with remaining
indentation correctly preserved:

    $poem = fix<<EVER_ON_AND_ON;
       Now far ahead the Road has gone,
          And I must follow, if I can,
       Pursuing it with eager feet,
          Until it joins some larger way
       Where many paths and errands meet.
          And whither then? I cannot say.
                --Bilbo in /usr/src/perl/pp_ctl.c
    EVER_ON_AND_ON

=head1 Data: Arrays

=head2 What is the difference between a list and an array?

An array has a changeable length.  A list does not.  An array is something
you can push or pop, while a list is a set of values.  Some people make
the distinction that a list is a value while an array is a variable.
Subroutines are passed and return lists, you put things into list
context, you initialize arrays with lists, and you foreach() across
a list.  C<@> variables are arrays, anonymous arrays are arrays, arrays
in scalar context behave like the number of elements in them, subroutines
access their arguments through the array C<@_>, and push/pop/shift only work
on arrays.

As a side note, there's no such thing as a list in scalar context.
When you say

    $scalar = (2, 5, 7, 9);

you're using the comma operator in scalar context, so it uses the scalar
comma operator.  There never was a list there at all!  This causes the
last value to be returned: 9.

=head2 What is the difference between $array[1] and @array[1]?

The former is a scalar value; the latter an array slice, making
it a list with one (scalar) value.  You should use $ when you want a
scalar value (most of the time) and @ when you want a list with one
scalar value in it (very, very rarely; nearly never, in fact).

Sometimes it doesn't make a difference, but sometimes it does.
For example, compare:

    $good[0] = `some program that outputs several lines`;

with

    @bad[0]  = `same program that outputs several lines`;

The C<use warnings> pragma and the B<-w> flag will warn you about these
matters.

=head2 How can I remove duplicate elements from a list or array?

(contributed by brian d foy)

Use a hash. When you think the words "unique" or "duplicated", think
"hash keys".

If you don't care about the order of the elements, you could just
create the hash then extract the keys. It's not important how you
create that hash: just that you use C<keys> to get the unique
elements.

   my %hash   = map { $_, 1 } @array;
   # or a hash slice: @hash{ @array } = ();
   # or a foreach: $hash{$_} = 1 foreach ( @array );

   my @unique = keys %hash;

You can also go through each element and skip the ones you've seen
before. Use a hash to keep track. The first time the loop sees an
element, that element has no key in C<%Seen>. The C<next> statement
creates the key and immediately uses its value, which is C<undef>, so
the loop continues to the C<push> and increments the value for that
key. The next time the loop sees that same element, its key exists in
the hash I<and> the value for that key is true (since it's not 0 or
undef), so the next skips that iteration and the loop goes to the next
element.

        my @unique = ();
        my %seen   = ();

        foreach my $elem ( @array )
                {
                next if $seen{ $elem }++;
                push @unique, $elem;
                }

You can write this more briefly using a grep, which does the
same thing.

   my %seen = ();
   my @unique = grep { ! $seen{ $_ }++ } @array;

=head2 How can I tell whether a certain element is contained in a list or array?

Hearing the word "in" is an I<in>dication that you probably should have
used a hash, not a list or array, to store your data.  Hashes are
designed to answer this question quickly and efficiently.  Arrays aren't.

That being said, there are several ways to approach this.  If you
are going to make this query many times over arbitrary string values,
the fastest way is probably to invert the original array and maintain a
hash whose keys are the first array's values.

    @blues = qw/azure cerulean teal turquoise lapis-lazuli/;
    %is_blue = ();
    for (@blues) { $is_blue{$_} = 1 }

Now you can check whether $is_blue{$some_color}.  It might have been a
good idea to keep the blues all in a hash in the first place.

If the values are all small integers, you could use a simple indexed
array.  This kind of an array will take up less space:

    @primes = (2, 3, 5, 7, 11, 13, 17, 19, 23, 29, 31);
    @is_tiny_prime = ();
    for (@primes) { $is_tiny_prime[$_] = 1 }
    # or simply  @istiny_prime[@primes] = (1) x @primes;

Now you check whether $is_tiny_prime[$some_number].

If the values in question are integers instead of strings, you can save
quite a lot of space by using bit strings instead:

    @articles = ( 1..10, 150..2000, 2017 );
    undef $read;
    for (@articles) { vec($read,$_,1) = 1 }

Now check whether C<vec($read,$n,1)> is true for some C<$n>.

Please do not use

    ($is_there) = grep $_ eq $whatever, @array;

or worse yet

    ($is_there) = grep /$whatever/, @array;

These are slow (checks every element even if the first matches),
inefficient (same reason), and potentially buggy (what if there are
regex characters in $whatever?).  If you're only testing once, then
use:

    $is_there = 0;
    foreach $elt (@array) {
        if ($elt eq $elt_to_find) {
            $is_there = 1;
            last;
        }
    }
    if ($is_there) { ... }

=head2 How do I compute the difference of two arrays?  How do I compute the intersection of two arrays?

Use a hash.  Here's code to do both and more.  It assumes that
each element is unique in a given array:

    @union = @intersection = @difference = ();
    %count = ();
    foreach $element (@array1, @array2) { $count{$element}++ }
    foreach $element (keys %count) {
        push @union, $element;
        push @{ $count{$element} > 1 ? \@intersection : \@difference }, $element;
    }

Note that this is the I<symmetric difference>, that is, all elements in
either A or in B but not in both.  Think of it as an xor operation.

=head2 How do I test whether two arrays or hashes are equal?

The following code works for single-level arrays.  It uses a stringwise
comparison, and does not distinguish defined versus undefined empty
strings.  Modify if you have other needs.

    $are_equal = compare_arrays(\@frogs, \@toads);

    sub compare_arrays {
        my ($first, $second) = @_;
        no warnings;  # silence spurious -w undef complaints
        return 0 unless @$first == @$second;
        for (my $i = 0; $i < @$first; $i++) {
            return 0 if $first->[$i] ne $second->[$i];
        }
        return 1;
    }

For multilevel structures, you may wish to use an approach more
like this one.  It uses the CPAN module FreezeThaw:

    use FreezeThaw qw(cmpStr);
    @a = @b = ( "this", "that", [ "more", "stuff" ] );

    printf "a and b contain %s arrays\n",
        cmpStr(\@a, \@b) == 0
            ? "the same"
            : "different";

This approach also works for comparing hashes.  Here
we'll demonstrate two different answers:

    use FreezeThaw qw(cmpStr cmpStrHard);

    %a = %b = ( "this" => "that", "extra" => [ "more", "stuff" ] );
    $a{EXTRA} = \%b;
    $b{EXTRA} = \%a;

    printf "a and b contain %s hashes\n",
        cmpStr(\%a, \%b) == 0 ? "the same" : "different";

    printf "a and b contain %s hashes\n",
        cmpStrHard(\%a, \%b) == 0 ? "the same" : "different";


The first reports that both those the hashes contain the same data,
while the second reports that they do not.  Which you prefer is left as
an exercise to the reader.

=head2 How do I find the first array element for which a condition is true?

To find the first array element which satisfies a condition, you can
use the first() function in the List::Util module, which comes with
Perl 5.8.  This example finds the first element that contains "Perl".

        use List::Util qw(first);

        my $element = first { /Perl/ } @array;

If you cannot use List::Util, you can make your own loop to do the
same thing.  Once you find the element, you stop the loop with last.

        my $found;
        foreach ( @array )
                {
                if( /Perl/ ) { $found = $_; last }
                }

If you want the array index, you can iterate through the indices
and check the array element at each index until you find one
that satisfies the condition.

        my( $found, $index ) = ( undef, -1 );
        for( $i = 0; $i < @array; $i++ )
                {
                if( $array[$i] =~ /Perl/ )
                        {
                        $found = $array[$i];
                        $index = $i;
                        last;
                        }
                }

=head2 How do I handle linked lists?

In general, you usually don't need a linked list in Perl, since with
regular arrays, you can push and pop or shift and unshift at either end,
or you can use splice to add and/or remove arbitrary number of elements at
arbitrary points.  Both pop and shift are both O(1) operations on Perl's
dynamic arrays.  In the absence of shifts and pops, push in general
needs to reallocate on the order every log(N) times, and unshift will
need to copy pointers each time.

If you really, really wanted, you could use structures as described in
L<perldsc> or L<perltoot> and do just what the algorithm book tells you
to do.  For example, imagine a list node like this:

    $node = {
        VALUE => 42,
        LINK  => undef,
    };

You could walk the list this way:

    print "List: ";
    for ($node = $head;  $node; $node = $node->{LINK}) {
        print $node->{VALUE}, " ";
    }
    print "\n";

You could add to the list this way:

    my ($head, $tail);
    $tail = append($head, 1);       # grow a new head
    for $value ( 2 .. 10 ) {
        $tail = append($tail, $value);
    }

    sub append {
        my($list, $value) = @_;
        my $node = { VALUE => $value };
        if ($list) {
            $node->{LINK} = $list->{LINK};
            $list->{LINK} = $node;
        } else {
            $_[0] = $node;      # replace caller's version
        }
        return $node;
    }

But again, Perl's built-in are virtually always good enough.

=head2 How do I handle circular lists?

Circular lists could be handled in the traditional fashion with linked
lists, or you could just do something like this with an array:

    unshift(@array, pop(@array));  # the last shall be first
    push(@array, shift(@array));   # and vice versa

=head2 How do I shuffle an array randomly?

If you either have Perl 5.8.0 or later installed, or if you have
Scalar-List-Utils 1.03 or later installed, you can say:

    use List::Util 'shuffle';

        @shuffled = shuffle(@list);

If not, you can use a Fisher-Yates shuffle.

    sub fisher_yates_shuffle {
        my $deck = shift;  # $deck is a reference to an array
        my $i = @$deck;
        while (--$i) {
            my $j = int rand ($i+1);
            @$deck[$i,$j] = @$deck[$j,$i];
        }
    }

    # shuffle my mpeg collection
    #
    my @mpeg = <audio/*/*.mp3>;
    fisher_yates_shuffle( \@mpeg );    # randomize @mpeg in place
    print @mpeg;

Note that the above implementation shuffles an array in place,
unlike the List::Util::shuffle() which takes a list and returns
a new shuffled list.

You've probably seen shuffling algorithms that work using splice,
randomly picking another element to swap the current element with

    srand;
    @new = ();
    @old = 1 .. 10;  # just a demo
    while (@old) {
        push(@new, splice(@old, rand @old, 1));
    }

This is bad because splice is already O(N), and since you do it N times,
you just invented a quadratic algorithm; that is, O(N**2).  This does
not scale, although Perl is so efficient that you probably won't notice
this until you have rather largish arrays.

=head2 How do I process/modify each element of an array?

Use C<for>/C<foreach>:

    for (@lines) {
                s/foo/bar/;     # change that word
                tr/XZ/ZX/;      # swap those letters
    }

Here's another; let's compute spherical volumes:

    for (@volumes = @radii) {   # @volumes has changed parts
                $_ **= 3;
                $_ *= (4/3) * 3.14159;  # this will be constant folded
    }

which can also be done with map() which is made to transform
one list into another:

        @volumes = map {$_ ** 3 * (4/3) * 3.14159} @radii;

If you want to do the same thing to modify the values of the
hash, you can use the C<values> function.  As of Perl 5.6
the values are not copied, so if you modify $orbit (in this
case), you modify the value.

    for $orbit ( values %orbits ) {
                ($orbit **= 3) *= (4/3) * 3.14159;
    }

Prior to perl 5.6 C<values> returned copies of the values,
so older perl code often contains constructions such as
C<@orbits{keys %orbits}> instead of C<values %orbits> where
the hash is to be modified.

=head2 How do I select a random element from an array?

Use the rand() function (see L<perlfunc/rand>):

    $index   = rand @array;
    $element = $array[$index];

Or, simply:
    my $element = $array[ rand @array ];

=head2 How do I permute N elements of a list?

Use the List::Permutor module on CPAN.  If the list is
actually an array, try the Algorithm::Permute module (also
on CPAN).  It's written in XS code and is very efficient.

        use Algorithm::Permute;
        my @array = 'a'..'d';
        my $p_iterator = Algorithm::Permute->new ( \@array );
        while (my @perm = $p_iterator->next) {
           print "next permutation: (@perm)\n";
        }

For even faster execution, you could do:

   use Algorithm::Permute;
   my @array = 'a'..'d';
   Algorithm::Permute::permute {
      print "next permutation: (@array)\n";
   } @array;

Here's a little program that generates all permutations of
all the words on each line of input. The algorithm embodied
in the permute() function is discussed in Volume 4 (still
unpublished) of Knuth's I<The Art of Computer Programming>
and will work on any list:

        #!/usr/bin/perl -n
        # Fischer-Kause ordered permutation generator

        sub permute (&@) {
                my $code = shift;
                my @idx = 0..$#_;
                while ( $code->(@_[@idx]) ) {
                        my $p = $#idx;
                        --$p while $idx[$p-1] > $idx[$p];
                        my $q = $p or return;
                        push @idx, reverse splice @idx, $p;
                        ++$q while $idx[$p-1] > $idx[$q];
                        @idx[$p-1,$q]=@idx[$q,$p-1];
                }
        }

        permute {print"@_\n"} split;

=head2 How do I sort an array by (anything)?

Supply a comparison function to sort() (described in L<perlfunc/sort>):

    @list = sort { $a <=> $b } @list;

The default sort function is cmp, string comparison, which would
sort C<(1, 2, 10)> into C<(1, 10, 2)>.  C<< <=> >>, used above, is
the numerical comparison operator.

If you have a complicated function needed to pull out the part you
want to sort on, then don't do it inside the sort function.  Pull it
out first, because the sort BLOCK can be called many times for the
same element.  Here's an example of how to pull out the first word
after the first number on each item, and then sort those words
case-insensitively.

    @idx = ();
    for (@data) {
        ($item) = /\d+\s*(\S+)/;
        push @idx, uc($item);
    }
    @sorted = @data[ sort { $idx[$a] cmp $idx[$b] } 0 .. $#idx ];

which could also be written this way, using a trick
that's come to be known as the Schwartzian Transform:

    @sorted = map  { $_->[0] }
              sort { $a->[1] cmp $b->[1] }
              map  { [ $_, uc( (/\d+\s*(\S+)/)[0]) ] } @data;

If you need to sort on several fields, the following paradigm is useful.

    @sorted = sort { field1($a) <=> field1($b) ||
                     field2($a) cmp field2($b) ||
                     field3($a) cmp field3($b)
                   }     @data;

This can be conveniently combined with precalculation of keys as given
above.

See the F<sort> article in the "Far More Than You Ever Wanted
To Know" collection in http://www.cpan.org/misc/olddoc/FMTEYEWTK.tgz for
more about this approach.

See also the question below on sorting hashes.

=head2 How do I manipulate arrays of bits?

Use pack() and unpack(), or else vec() and the bitwise operations.

For example, this sets $vec to have bit N set if $ints[N] was set:

    $vec = '';
    foreach(@ints) { vec($vec,$_,1) = 1 }

Here's how, given a vector in $vec, you can
get those bits into your @ints array:

    sub bitvec_to_list {
        my $vec = shift;
        my @ints;
        # Find null-byte density then select best algorithm
        if ($vec =~ tr/\0// / length $vec > 0.95) {
            use integer;
            my $i;
            # This method is faster with mostly null-bytes
            while($vec =~ /[^\0]/g ) {
                $i = -9 + 8 * pos $vec;
                push @ints, $i if vec($vec, ++$i, 1);
                push @ints, $i if vec($vec, ++$i, 1);
                push @ints, $i if vec($vec, ++$i, 1);
                push @ints, $i if vec($vec, ++$i, 1);
                push @ints, $i if vec($vec, ++$i, 1);
                push @ints, $i if vec($vec, ++$i, 1);
                push @ints, $i if vec($vec, ++$i, 1);
                push @ints, $i if vec($vec, ++$i, 1);
            }
        } else {
            # This method is a fast general algorithm
            use integer;
            my $bits = unpack "b*", $vec;
            push @ints, 0 if $bits =~ s/^(\d)// && $1;
            push @ints, pos $bits while($bits =~ /1/g);
        }
        return \@ints;
    }

This method gets faster the more sparse the bit vector is.
(Courtesy of Tim Bunce and Winfried Koenig.)

You can make the while loop a lot shorter with this suggestion
from Benjamin Goldberg:

        while($vec =~ /[^\0]+/g ) {
           push @ints, grep vec($vec, $_, 1), $-[0] * 8 .. $+[0] * 8;
        }

Or use the CPAN module Bit::Vector:

    $vector = Bit::Vector->new($num_of_bits);
    $vector->Index_List_Store(@ints);
    @ints = $vector->Index_List_Read();

Bit::Vector provides efficient methods for bit vector, sets of small integers
and "big int" math.

Here's a more extensive illustration using vec():

    # vec demo
    $vector = "\xff\x0f\xef\xfe";
    print "Ilya's string \\xff\\x0f\\xef\\xfe represents the number ",
        unpack("N", $vector), "\n";
    $is_set = vec($vector, 23, 1);
    print "Its 23rd bit is ", $is_set ? "set" : "clear", ".\n";
    pvec($vector);

    set_vec(1,1,1);
    set_vec(3,1,1);
    set_vec(23,1,1);

    set_vec(3,1,3);
    set_vec(3,2,3);
    set_vec(3,4,3);
    set_vec(3,4,7);
    set_vec(3,8,3);
    set_vec(3,8,7);

    set_vec(0,32,17);
    set_vec(1,32,17);

    sub set_vec {
        my ($offset, $width, $value) = @_;
        my $vector = '';
        vec($vector, $offset, $width) = $value;
        print "offset=$offset width=$width value=$value\n";
        pvec($vector);
    }

    sub pvec {
        my $vector = shift;
        my $bits = unpack("b*", $vector);
        my $i = 0;
        my $BASE = 8;

        print "vector length in bytes: ", length($vector), "\n";
        @bytes = unpack("A8" x length($vector), $bits);
        print "bits are: @bytes\n\n";
    }

=head2 Why does defined() return true on empty arrays and hashes?

The short story is that you should probably only use defined on scalars or
functions, not on aggregates (arrays and hashes).  See L<perlfunc/defined>
in the 5.004 release or later of Perl for more detail.

=head1 Data: Hashes (Associative Arrays)

=head2 How do I process an entire hash?

Use the each() function (see L<perlfunc/each>) if you don't care
whether it's sorted:

    while ( ($key, $value) = each %hash) {
        print "$key = $value\n";
    }

If you want it sorted, you'll have to use foreach() on the result of
sorting the keys as shown in an earlier question.

=head2 What happens if I add or remove keys from a hash while iterating over it?

(contributed by brian d foy)

The easy answer is "Don't do that!"

If you iterate through the hash with each(), you can delete the key
most recently returned without worrying about it.  If you delete or add
other keys, the iterator may skip or double up on them since perl
may rearrange the hash table.  See the
entry for C<each()> in L<perlfunc>.

=head2 How do I look up a hash element by value?

Create a reverse hash:

    %by_value = reverse %by_key;
    $key = $by_value{$value};

That's not particularly efficient.  It would be more space-efficient
to use:

    while (($key, $value) = each %by_key) {
        $by_value{$value} = $key;
    }

If your hash could have repeated values, the methods above will only find
one of the associated keys.   This may or may not worry you.  If it does
worry you, you can always reverse the hash into a hash of arrays instead:

     while (($key, $value) = each %by_key) {
         push @{$key_list_by_value{$value}}, $key;
     }

=head2 How can I know how many entries are in a hash?

If you mean how many keys, then all you have to do is
use the keys() function in a scalar context:

    $num_keys = keys %hash;

The keys() function also resets the iterator, which means that you may
see strange results if you use this between uses of other hash operators
such as each().

=head2 How do I sort a hash (optionally by value instead of key)?

Internally, hashes are stored in a way that prevents you from imposing
an order on key-value pairs.  Instead, you have to sort a list of the
keys or values:

    @keys = sort keys %hash;    # sorted by key
    @keys = sort {
                    $hash{$a} cmp $hash{$b}
            } keys %hash;       # and by value

Here we'll do a reverse numeric sort by value, and if two keys are
identical, sort by length of key, or if that fails, by straight ASCII
comparison of the keys (well, possibly modified by your locale--see
L<perllocale>).

    @keys = sort {
                $hash{$b} <=> $hash{$a}
                          ||
                length($b) <=> length($a)
                          ||
                      $a cmp $b
    } keys %hash;

=head2 How can I always keep my hash sorted?

You can look into using the DB_File module and tie() using the
$DB_BTREE hash bindings as documented in L<DB_File/"In Memory Databases">.
The Tie::IxHash module from CPAN might also be instructive.

=head2 What's the difference between "delete" and "undef" with hashes?

Hashes contain pairs of scalars: the first is the key, the
second is the value.  The key will be coerced to a string,
although the value can be any kind of scalar: string,
number, or reference.  If a key $key is present in
%hash, C<exists($hash{$key})> will return true.  The value
for a given key can be C<undef>, in which case
C<$hash{$key}> will be C<undef> while C<exists $hash{$key}>
will return true.  This corresponds to (C<$key>, C<undef>)
being in the hash.

Pictures help...  here's the %hash table:

          keys  values
        +------+------+
        |  a   |  3   |
        |  x   |  7   |
        |  d   |  0   |
        |  e   |  2   |
        +------+------+

And these conditions hold

        $hash{'a'}                       is true
        $hash{'d'}                       is false
        defined $hash{'d'}               is true
        defined $hash{'a'}               is true
        exists $hash{'a'}                is true (Perl5 only)
        grep ($_ eq 'a', keys %hash)     is true

If you now say

        undef $hash{'a'}

your table now reads:


          keys  values
        +------+------+
        |  a   | undef|
        |  x   |  7   |
        |  d   |  0   |
        |  e   |  2   |
        +------+------+

and these conditions now hold; changes in caps:

        $hash{'a'}                       is FALSE
        $hash{'d'}                       is false
        defined $hash{'d'}               is true
        defined $hash{'a'}               is FALSE
        exists $hash{'a'}                is true (Perl5 only)
        grep ($_ eq 'a', keys %hash)     is true

Notice the last two: you have an undef value, but a defined key!

Now, consider this:

        delete $hash{'a'}

your table now reads:

          keys  values
        +------+------+
        |  x   |  7   |
        |  d   |  0   |
        |  e   |  2   |
        +------+------+

and these conditions now hold; changes in caps:

        $hash{'a'}                       is false
        $hash{'d'}                       is false
        defined $hash{'d'}               is true
        defined $hash{'a'}               is false
        exists $hash{'a'}                is FALSE (Perl5 only)
        grep ($_ eq 'a', keys %hash)     is FALSE

See, the whole entry is gone!

=head2 Why don't my tied hashes make the defined/exists distinction?

This depends on the tied hash's implementation of EXISTS().
For example, there isn't the concept of undef with hashes
that are tied to DBM* files. It also means that exists() and
defined() do the same thing with a DBM* file, and what they
end up doing is not what they do with ordinary hashes.

=head2 How do I reset an each() operation part-way through?

Using C<keys %hash> in scalar context returns the number of keys in
the hash I<and> resets the iterator associated with the hash.  You may
need to do this if you use C<last> to exit a loop early so that when you
re-enter it, the hash iterator has been reset.

=head2 How can I get the unique keys from two hashes?

First you extract the keys from the hashes into lists, then solve
the "removing duplicates" problem described above.  For example:

    %seen = ();
    for $element (keys(%foo), keys(%bar)) {
        $seen{$element}++;
    }
    @uniq = keys %seen;

Or more succinctly:

    @uniq = keys %{{%foo,%bar}};

Or if you really want to save space:

    %seen = ();
    while (defined ($key = each %foo)) {
        $seen{$key}++;
    }
    while (defined ($key = each %bar)) {
        $seen{$key}++;
    }
    @uniq = keys %seen;

=head2 How can I store a multidimensional array in a DBM file?

Either stringify the structure yourself (no fun), or else
get the MLDBM (which uses Data::Dumper) module from CPAN and layer
it on top of either DB_File or GDBM_File.

=head2 How can I make my hash remember the order I put elements into it?

Use the Tie::IxHash from CPAN.

    use Tie::IxHash;
    tie my %myhash, 'Tie::IxHash';
    for (my $i=0; $i<20; $i++) {
        $myhash{$i} = 2*$i;
    }
    my @keys = keys %myhash;
    # @keys = (0,1,2,3,...)

=head2 Why does passing a subroutine an undefined element in a hash create it?

If you say something like:

    somefunc($hash{"nonesuch key here"});

Then that element "autovivifies"; that is, it springs into existence
whether you store something there or not.  That's because functions
get scalars passed in by reference.  If somefunc() modifies C<$_[0]>,
it has to be ready to write it back into the caller's version.

This has been fixed as of Perl5.004.

Normally, merely accessing a key's value for a nonexistent key does
I<not> cause that key to be forever there.  This is different than
awk's behavior.

=head2 How can I make the Perl equivalent of a C structure/C++ class/hash or array of hashes or arrays?

Usually a hash ref, perhaps like this:

    $record = {
        NAME   => "Jason",
        EMPNO  => 132,
        TITLE  => "deputy peon",
        AGE    => 23,
        SALARY => 37_000,
        PALS   => [ "Norbert", "Rhys", "Phineas"],
    };

References are documented in L<perlref> and the upcoming L<perlreftut>.
Examples of complex data structures are given in L<perldsc> and
L<perllol>.  Examples of structures and object-oriented classes are
in L<perltoot>.

=head2 How can I use a reference as a hash key?

You can't do this directly, but you could use the standard Tie::RefHash
module distributed with Perl.

=head1 Data: Misc

=head2 How do I handle binary data correctly?

Perl is binary clean, so this shouldn't be a problem.  For example,
this works fine (assuming the files are found):

    if (`cat /vmunix` =~ /gzip/) {
        print "Your kernel is GNU-zip enabled!\n";
    }

On less elegant (read: Byzantine) systems, however, you have
to play tedious games with "text" versus "binary" files.  See
L<perlfunc/"binmode"> or L<perlopentut>.

If you're concerned about 8-bit ASCII data, then see L<perllocale>.

If you want to deal with multibyte characters, however, there are
some gotchas.  See the section on Regular Expressions.

=head2 How do I determine whether a scalar is a number/whole/integer/float?

Assuming that you don't care about IEEE notations like "NaN" or
"Infinity", you probably just want to use a regular expression.

   if (/\D/)            { print "has nondigits\n" }
   if (/^\d+$/)         { print "is a whole number\n" }
   if (/^-?\d+$/)       { print "is an integer\n" }
   if (/^[+-]?\d+$/)    { print "is a +/- integer\n" }
   if (/^-?\d+\.?\d*$/) { print "is a real number\n" }
   if (/^-?(?:\d+(?:\.\d*)?|\.\d+)$/) { print "is a decimal number\n" }
   if (/^([+-]?)(?=\d|\.\d)\d*(\.\d*)?([Ee]([+-]?\d+))?$/)
                        { print "a C float\n" }

There are also some commonly used modules for the task.
L<Scalar::Util> (distributed with 5.8) provides access to perl's
internal function C<looks_like_number> for determining
whether a variable looks like a number.  L<Data::Types>
exports functions that validate data types using both the
above and other regular expressions. Thirdly, there is
C<Regexp::Common> which has regular expressions to match
various types of numbers. Those three modules are available
from the CPAN.

If you're on a POSIX system, Perl supports the C<POSIX::strtod>
function.  Its semantics are somewhat cumbersome, so here's a C<getnum>
wrapper function for more convenient access.  This function takes
a string and returns the number it found, or C<undef> for input that
isn't a C float.  The C<is_numeric> function is a front end to C<getnum>
if you just want to say, "Is this a float?"

    sub getnum {
        use POSIX qw(strtod);
        my $str = shift;
        $str =~ s/^\s+//;
        $str =~ s/\s+$//;
        $! = 0;
        my($num, $unparsed) = strtod($str);
        if (($str eq '') || ($unparsed != 0) || $!) {
            return undef;
        } else {
            return $num;
        }
    }

    sub is_numeric { defined getnum($_[0]) }

Or you could check out the L<String::Scanf> module on the CPAN
instead. The POSIX module (part of the standard Perl distribution) provides
the C<strtod> and C<strtol> for converting strings to double and longs,
respectively.

=head2 How do I keep persistent data across program calls?

For some specific applications, you can use one of the DBM modules.
See L<AnyDBM_File>.  More generically, you should consult the FreezeThaw
or Storable modules from CPAN.  Starting from Perl 5.8 Storable is part
of the standard distribution.  Here's one example using Storable's C<store>
and C<retrieve> functions:

    use Storable;
    store(\%hash, "filename");

    # later on...
    $href = retrieve("filename");        # by ref
    %hash = %{ retrieve("filename") };   # direct to hash

=head2 How do I print out or copy a recursive data structure?

The Data::Dumper module on CPAN (or the 5.005 release of Perl) is great
for printing out data structures.  The Storable module on CPAN (or the
5.8 release of Perl), provides a function called C<dclone> that recursively
copies its argument.

    use Storable qw(dclone);
    $r2 = dclone($r1);

Where $r1 can be a reference to any kind of data structure you'd like.
It will be deeply copied.  Because C<dclone> takes and returns references,
you'd have to add extra punctuation if you had a hash of arrays that
you wanted to copy.

    %newhash = %{ dclone(\%oldhash) };

=head2 How do I define methods for every class/object?

Use the UNIVERSAL class (see L<UNIVERSAL>).

=head2 How do I verify a credit card checksum?

Get the Business::CreditCard module from CPAN.

=head2 How do I pack arrays of doubles or floats for XS code?

The kgbpack.c code in the PGPLOT module on CPAN does just this.
If you're doing a lot of float or double processing, consider using
the PDL module from CPAN instead--it makes number-crunching easy.

=head1 AUTHOR AND COPYRIGHT

Copyright (c) 1997-2005 Tom Christiansen, Nathan Torkington, and
other authors as noted. All rights reserved.

This documentation is free; you can redistribute it and/or modify it
under the same terms as Perl itself.

Irrespective of its distribution, all code examples in this file
are hereby placed into the public domain.  You are permitted and
encouraged to use this code in your own programs for fun
or for profit as you see fit.  A simple comment in the code giving
credit would be courteous but is not required.