I wrote my first answer to Life, the Universe, and Everything(?) probably about five years ago. In my opinion, although some may disagree, it's easier to do this then to write a Perl module. Some modules are often updating, whereas The Answer has never changed since Douglas Adams's initial discovery and included it in the Hitchhiker's Guide.

Update: Fixed the name and the E2 link.

---

Love is random; fear is inevitable. -- Orson Scott Card
PerlMonks is good for Perl, but JavaJunkies is good for Java

---

---

• Are you posting in the right place? Check out Where do I post X? to know for sure.
• Posts may use any of the Perl Monks Approved HTML tags. Currently these include the following:

  <code> <a> <b> <big> <blockquote> <br /> <dd> <dl> <dt> <em> <font> <h1> <h2> <h3> <h4> <h5> <h6> <hr /> <i> <li> <nbsp> <ol> <p> <small> <strike> <strong> <sub> <sup> <table> <td> <th> <tr> <tt> <u> <ul>

• Snippets of code should be wrapped in <code> tags not <pre> tags. In fact, <pre> tags should generally be avoided. If they must be used, extreme care should be taken to ensure that their contents do not have long lines (<70 chars), in order to prevent horizontal scrolling (and possible janitor intervention).
• Want more info? How to link or How to display code and escape characters are good places to start.