$ demo() { perl -e' use v5.18; use Tie::IxHash qw( ); my %h; tie %h, Tie::IxHash:: if $ARGV[0]; ++$h{ $_ } for "a".."z"; say keys %h; ' -- "$1" } $ demo 0 lukphmweqsiorxvnbdfajyczgt $ demo 0 dpbwuxlvticosyngmrzajefqkh $ demo 1 abcdefghijklmnopqrstuvwxyz $ demo 1 abcdefghijklmnopqrstuvwxyz