Some time ago I have this post: http://blogs.perl.org/users/eugen_konkov/2017/04/soft-call-operator-thoughts.html The only reason that ~> was not implemented because on some terminals it does not look like -> So eight years of ugly coding had go. Now I see other news in other languages about that it is going to be implemented: https://medium.com/@reneecruz/optional-chaining-javascript-es2020-cebae40f7007 It really cool. And it has no matter how it will look. (?.) It really cool possibility to write clean code. Does any know when perl5 will move further and do not stuck in last century?