-g File has setgid bit set.
-k File has sticky bit set.
- -T File is an ASCII text file (heuristic guess).
+ -T File is an ASCII or UTF-8 text file (heuristic guess).
-B File is a "binary" file (opposite of -T).
-M Script start time minus file modification time, in days.
in effect. Read the documentation for the C<filetest> pragma for more
information.
-The C<-T> and C<-B> switches work as follows. The first block or so of the
-file is examined for odd characters such as strange control codes or
-characters with the high bit set. If too many strange characters (>30%)
-are found, it's a C<-B> file; otherwise it's a C<-T> file. Also, any file
-containing a zero byte in the first block is considered a binary file. If C<-T>
-or C<-B> is used on a filehandle, the current IO buffer is examined
+The C<-T> and C<-B> switches work as follows. The first block or so of
+the file is examined to see if it is valid UTF-8 that includes non-ASCII
+characters. If, so it's a C<-T> file. Otherwise, that same portion of
+the file is examined for odd characters such as strange control codes or
+characters with the high bit set. If more than a third of the
+characters are strange, it's a C<-B> file; otherwise it's a C<-T> file.
+Also, any file containing a zero byte in the examined portion is
+considered a binary file. (If executed within the scope of a L<S<use
+locale>|perllocale> which includes C<LC_CTYPE>, odd characters are
+anything that isn't a printable nor space in the current locale.) If
+C<-T> or C<-B> is used on a filehandle, the current IO buffer is
+examined
rather than the first block. Both C<-T> and C<-B> return true on an empty
file, or a file at EOF when testing a filehandle. Because you have to
read a file to do the C<-T> test, on most occasions you want to use a C<-f>
context, returns the caller's package name if there I<is> a caller (that is, if
we're in a subroutine or C<eval> or C<require>) and the undefined value
otherwise. caller never returns XS subs and they are skipped. The next pure
-perl sub will appear instead of the XS sub in caller's return values. In list
+perl sub will appear instead of the XS
+sub in caller's return values. In list
context, caller returns
# 0 1 2
= caller($i);
Here, $subroutine is the function that the caller called (rather than the
-function containing the caller). Note that $subroutine may be C<(eval)> if
+function containing the caller). Note that $subroutine may be C<(eval)> if
the frame is not a subroutine call, but an C<eval>. In such a case
additional elements $evaltext and
C<$is_require> are set: C<$is_require> is true if the frame is created by a
deleting array elements never changes indices of existing values; use shift()
or splice() for that. However, if any deleted elements fall at the end of an
array, the array's size shrinks to the position of the highest element that
-still tests true for exists(), or to 0 if none do. In other words, an
+still tests true for exists(), or to 0 if none do. In other words, an
array won't have trailing nonexistent elements after a delete.
-B<WARNING:> Calling delete on array values is deprecated and likely to
-be removed in a future version of Perl.
+B<WARNING:> Calling C<delete> on array values is strongly discouraged. The
+notion of deleting or checking the existence of Perl array elements is not
+conceptually coherent, and can lead to surprising behavior.
Deleting from C<%ENV> modifies the environment. Deleting from a hash tied to
a DBM file deletes the entry from the DBM file. Deleting from a C<tied> hash
print "True\n" if $hash{$key};
exists may also be called on array elements, but its behavior is much less
-obvious and is strongly tied to the use of L</delete> on arrays. B<Be aware>
-that calling exists on array values is deprecated and likely to be removed in
-a future version of Perl.
+obvious and is strongly tied to the use of L</delete> on arrays.
+
+B<WARNING:> Calling C<exists> on array values is strongly discouraged. The
+notion of deleting or checking the existence of Perl array elements is not
+conceptually coherent, and can lead to surprising behavior.
print "Exists\n" if exists $array[$index];
print "Defined\n" if defined $array[$index];
"not have a real file descriptor\n";
}
+The behavior of C<fileno> on a directory handle depends on the operating
+system. On a system with dirfd(3) or similar, C<fileno> on a directory
+handle returns the underlying file descriptor associated with the
+handle; on systems with no such support, it returns the undefined value,
+and sets C<$!> (errno).
+
=item flock FILEHANDLE,OPERATION
X<flock> X<lock> X<locking>
$comment, $gcos, $dir, $shell, $expire ) = getpw*
# 5 6 7 8 9
-(If the entry doesn't exist you get an empty list.)
+(If the entry doesn't exist, the return value is a single meaningless true
+value.)
The exact meaning of the $gcos field varies but it usually contains
the real name of the user (as opposed to the login name) and other
rules for the remaining code points (this last can only happen if
the UTF8 flag is also set). See L<perllocale>.
-Starting in v5.20, Perl wil use full Unicode rules if the locale is
+Starting in v5.20, Perl uses full Unicode rules if the locale is
UTF-8. Otherwise, there is a deficiency in this scheme, which is that
case changes that cross the 255/256
boundary are not well-defined. For example, the lower case of LATIN CAPITAL
itself, because 0xDF may not be LATIN SMALL LETTER SHARP S in the
current locale, and Perl has no way of knowing if that character even
exists in the locale, much less what code point it is. Perl returns
-the input character unchanged, for all instances (and there aren't
-many) where the 255/256 boundary would otherwise be crossed.
+a result that is above 255 (almost always the input character unchanged,
+for all instances (and there aren't many) where the 255/256 boundary
+would otherwise be crossed; and starting in v5.22, it raises a
+L<locale|perldiag/Can't do %s("%s") on non-UTF-8 locale; resolved to "%s".> warning.
=item Otherwise, If EXPR has the UTF8 flag set:
doesn't it won't realize something is wrong until it gets to the C<}> and
encounters the missing (or unexpected) comma. The syntax error will be
reported close to the C<}>, but you'll need to change something near the C<{>
-such as using a unary C<+> to give Perl some help:
+such as using a unary C<+> or semicolon to give Perl some help:
%hash = map { "\L$_" => 1 } @array # perl guesses EXPR. wrong
%hash = map { +"\L$_" => 1 } @array # perl guesses BLOCK. right
- %hash = map { ("\L$_" => 1) } @array # this also works
- %hash = map { lc($_) => 1 } @array # as does this.
+ %hash = map {; "\L$_" => 1 } @array # this also works
+ %hash = map { ("\L$_" => 1) } @array # as does this
+ %hash = map { lc($_) => 1 } @array # and this.
%hash = map +( lc($_) => 1 ), @array # this is EXPR and works!
%hash = map ( lc($_), 1 ), @array # evaluates to (1, @array)
This means that when C<use strict 'vars'> is in effect, C<our> lets you use
a package variable without qualifying it with the package name, but only within
-the lexical scope of the C<our> declaration.
+the lexical scope of the C<our>
+declaration. This applies immediately--even
+within the same statement.
package Foo;
use strict;
print $Foo::foo; # prints 23
+Because the variable becomes legal immediately under C<use strict 'vars'>, so
+long as there is no variable with that name is already in scope, you can then
+reference the package variable again even within the same statement.
+
+ package Foo;
+ use strict;
+
+ my $foo = $foo; # error, undeclared $foo on right-hand side
+ our $foo = $foo; # no errors
+
If more than one variable is listed, the list must be placed
in parentheses.
D A float of long-double precision in native format.
(Long doubles are available only if your system supports
long double values _and_ if Perl has been compiled to
- support those. Raises an exception otherwise.)
+ support those. Raises an exception otherwise.
+ Note that there are different long double formats.)
p A pointer to a null-terminated string.
P A pointer to a structure (fixed-length string).
0x56 0x78 0x12 0x34
0x34 0x12 0x78 0x56
+These are called mid-endian, middle-endian, mixed-endian, or just weird.
+
You can determine your system endianness with this incantation:
printf("%#02x ", $_) for unpack("W*", pack L=>0x12345678);
$ perl -V:byteorder
Byteorders C<"1234"> and C<"12345678"> are little-endian; C<"4321">
-and C<"87654321"> are big-endian.
+and C<"87654321"> are big-endian. Systems with multiarchitecture binaries
+will have C<"ffff">, signifying that static information doesn't work,
+one must use runtime probing.
For portably packed integers, either use the formats C<n>, C<N>, C<v>,
and C<V> or else use the C<< > >> and C<< < >> modifiers described
=item *
+Also floating point numbers have endianness. Usually (but not always)
+this agrees with the integer endianness. Even though most platforms
+these days use the IEEE 754 binary format, there are differences,
+especially if the long doubles are involved. You can see the
+C<Config> variables C<doublekind> and C<longdblkind> (also C<doublesize>,
+C<longdblsize>): the "kind" values are enums, unlike C<byteorder>.
+
+Portability-wise the best option is probably to keep to the IEEE 754
+64-bit doubles, and of agreed-upon endianness. Another possibility
+is the C<"%a">) format of C<printf>.
+
+=item *
+
Starting with Perl 5.10.0, integer and floating-point formats, along with
the C<p> and C<P> formats and C<()> groups, may all be followed by the
C<< > >> or C<< < >> endianness modifiers to respectively enforce big-
assumes additional C<""> arguments. If TEMPLATE requires fewer arguments
than given, extra arguments are ignored.
+=item *
+
+Attempting to pack the special floating point values C<Inf> and C<NaN>
+(infinity, also in negative, and not-a-number) into packed integer values
+(like C<"L">) is a fatal error. The reason for this is that there simply
+isn't any sensible mapping for these special values into integers.
+
=back
Examples:
=item prototype FUNCTION
X<prototype>
+=item prototype
+
=for Pod::Functions +5.002 get the prototype (if any) of a subroutine
Returns the prototype of a function as a string (or C<undef> if the
function has no prototype). FUNCTION is a reference to, or the name of,
-the function whose prototype you want to retrieve.
+the function whose prototype you want to retrieve. If FUNCTION is omitted,
+$_ is used.
If FUNCTION is a string starting with C<CORE::>, the rest is taken as a
name for a Perl builtin. If the builtin's arguments
list of its component characters.
As a special case for C<split>, the empty pattern given in
-L<match operator|perlop/"m/PATTERN/msixpodualgc"> syntax (C<//>) specifically matches the empty string, which is contrary to its usual
+L<match operator|perlop/"m/PATTERN/msixpodualngc"> syntax (C<//>)
+specifically matches the empty string, which is contrary to its usual
interpretation as the last successful match.
If PATTERN is C</^/>, then it is treated as if it used the
C<state> variables are enabled only when the C<use feature "state"> pragma
is in effect, unless the keyword is written as C<CORE::state>.
-See also L<feature>.
+See also L<feature>. Alternately, include a C<use v5.10> or later to the
+current scope.
=item study SCALAR
X<study>
C<use>ing library modules that won't work with older versions of Perl.
(We try not to do this more than we have to.)
-C<use VERSION> also enables all features available in the requested
+C<use VERSION> also lexically enables all features available in the requested
version as defined by the C<feature> pragma, disabling any features
not in the requested version's feature bundle. See L<feature>.
Similarly, if the specified Perl version is greater than or equal to
5.12.0, strictures are enabled lexically as
with C<use strict>. Any explicit use of
C<use strict> or C<no strict> overrides C<use VERSION>, even if it comes
-before it. In both cases, the F<feature.pm> and F<strict.pm> files are
-not actually loaded.
+before it. Later use of C<use VERSION>
+will override all behavior of a previous
+C<use VERSION>, possibly removing the C<strict> and C<feature> added by
+C<use VERSION>. C<use VERSION> does not
+load the F<feature.pm> or F<strict.pm>
+files.
The C<BEGIN> forces the C<require> and C<import> to happen at compile time. The
C<require> makes sure the module is loaded into memory if it hasn't been
Note that a return value of C<-1> could mean that child processes are
being automatically reaped, as described in L<perlipc>.
-If you use wait in your handler for $SIG{CHLD} it may accidentally for the
-child created by qx() or system(). See L<perlipc> for details.
+If you use C<wait> in your handler for $SIG{CHLD}, it may accidentally wait
+
for the child created by qx() or system(). See L<perlipc> for details.
Portability issues: L<perlport/wait>.
=item else
-=item elseif
-
=item elsif
=item for
These flow-control keywords are documented in L<perlsyn/"Compound Statements">.
+=item elseif
+
+The "else if" keyword is spelled C<elsif> in Perl. There's no C<elif>
+or C<else if> either. It does parse C<elseif>, but only to warn you
+about not using it.
+
+See the documentation for flow-control keywords in L<perlsyn/"Compound
+Statements">.
+
=back
=over
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