Your problem is caused by an odd ambiguity of the "indirect object" syntax that print uses. That is, when you say:

something $array[$i]
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something {$array} [$i]
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something {$array[$i]}
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something {$array}  [$i]
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something $array[$i] $something_else
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something {$array[$i]} $something_else
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something {$array} [$i] $something_else
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Thus, there are two ways to make that take $handles[$i] be the first argument:

• Use {}s: print {$handles[$i]} "...";
• Use the IO::Handle module and use the -> syntax: use IO::Handle; $handles[$i]->print("...");

update: see also perlobj which discusses this ambiguity under the heading "WARNING".

(update: minor grammatical edit(s) above)

Yes! and the winner is… Thank you for precisely the information I was looking for. I had tried something like your first answer, but the perldoc said parens or plus sign, not curley braces (what are they called anyway?), so I didn't get far. As for answer #2, certainly this works (although as I said, I hadn't gotten around to IO::Handle yet) but then so do a lot of other techniques as well. What I was looking for was what you explained— why it didn't work, not workarounds. Thanks again,
hsm

...not curley braces (what are they called anyway?)

I seem to remember reading this in a previous life:
    () are braces
    {} are brackets

Update: I stand corrected. See pjf's response below.

mr greywolf

#!/usr/bin/perl -w
#
# test.pl -- IO:: test code...

use strict;
use warnings;
use diagnostics;
use IO::File;

my @list = qw[ one.tmp two.tmp three.tmp ];

my @handles = map { IO::File->new(">$_") } @list;

foreach my $handle (@handles)
{
    $handle->print("Hi how the hell are ya!");
    $handle->close();
}
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A few things... First I'm not using IO::Handle, second, I'm fully aware of a variety of workarounds— that is not the point, the question is why the syntax used doesn't work! A question that was well answered in a later reply. Now for the good news, I hadn't gotten around to using IO::Handle, your comments suggest I should investigate post haste, and I will. Thanks
hsm

IO::File inherits from IO::Handle, so the parent methods are also available to you. (You might have better luck with the ambiguous syntax if you use a Perl-style loop. I have not tested that, however.)

Update: PSI::ESP will only be available when the already-complex Perl grammar is complete enough to DWIMHM (might have meant). :)

Anyone who can figure out how to allow post-expression for clauses while retaining the standard procedural loop and adding support for finding missing semicolons in the first case, should feel free to send me a message. We could fix a parser bug. *shiver*

Yeah well, so I'm not using it directly, IO::Handle that is. Insert sheepish grin here[ ____ ]. In defense of self, this whole exercise arose from someone else's code—which same I reduced to a test case, so that we could look at the array reference problem. In real life, I don't mix approaches like that— no really I don't. Nope, not me, my evil twin (who fires from the hip enough to get hip burns) might, but no, not me!
hsm

p.s. thanks again...

A style tip: use foreach instead of for. Also, you have an extraneous comma before the string.

foreach (@handles)
{
    print $_ "Blah blah blah\n";
    close $_;
}
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Thanks for the tip...however, that has nothing to do with the problem I am illustrating. As I said any technique (and there are a whole host of them) that reduces the reference to a simple scalar makes the problem go away. Work arounds are of course our friend, but that still doesn't explain why what should work doesn't. See prize winning answer below... Thanks
hsm