my @array = qw/1 2 3 4 5 6 7/;
print "number of elements is " . ++$#array . "\n";
print Dumper \@array;

##</code><code>##

number of elements is 7
$VAR1 = [
          '1',
          '2',
          '3',
          '4',
          '5',
          '6',
          '7',
          undef
        ];