my $x = \*FH; x $x # prints: #0 GLOB(0x1d6c408) # -> *main::FH open ($x, "<","somefile") or warn "error\n"; print "open FH ref: <$x>\n"; # prints: 0 GLOB(0x1d6c408) -> *main::FH FileHandle({*main::FH}) => fileno(6)