update: you are totally right however, about using eq '0', i should have read your node a little more closely! sorry :)

the problem with using == instead of /^0$/ is that what if the input is "william&meyer" instead of "school&0"? if you use == on meyer ($2) then you get a warning about context (== on a string), whereas if you use /^0$/ you dont have to worry about wether $2 is a string (meyer) or a number (0)