Perl allocates a whole bunch more in RAM than you would think. For example, when you create a 1 element array, closer to 50 elements are pre-allocated.

As for your immediate question - Perl has these things called SV's, or Scalar Values. It contains an entry for a number as well as a string, among other things. I don't know for sure, but I wouldn't be surprised if those were allocated a little bigger ahead of time for efficiency.

Thus, you can easily go 3-5 times in RAM what it takes on disk. :-)

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