When you use strict you need to explicity declare all the variables that you use, as is typical of C or other languages. Not only does this improve programming practice, but also helps to catch typos in variable names (eg, using "$think" instead of "$thing"). This is easily done using the my operator. As a starting point, you can either use multiple 'my' statements for each variable, or one large one as shown below.

my $var1;
my $var2;
my $var3;
#
# OR
#
my ( $var1, $var2, $var3 );
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The "my" function can be used on the left-hand side of an expression as well, but that tends to be an advanced technique to use.

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Dr. Michael K. Neylon - mneylon-pm@masemware.com || "You've left the lens cap of your mind on again, Pinky" - The Brain
It's not what you know, but knowing how to find it if you don't know that's important