Dotted syntax is just string concatenation. I'd even say my $BRIGHT_SUCCESS = $^O eq 'MSWin32' ? BOLD.GREEN : BRIGHT_GREEN; and use Term::ANSIColor qw/:constants/; unconditionally. Can see no need in OP's coding escape sequences manually. Short answer, above, because I "always" knew it's bold to be used to get bright, on Windows, and don't remember/lazy to search for sources.