raflach has asked for the wisdom of the Perl Monks concerning the following question:

My original code looked like this: 
my $ContactID = somecontactid;
my @rows=$db->select("select HTMLCheck from Contact where ContactID=$C
+ontactID");
my $HTMLCheck = $rows[1]->{HTMLCheck};
# do something with $HTMLCheck

[download]
That works, but seems sloppy and wasteful of resources.

I would like to simplify this by simply obtaining the HTMLCheck element of the hash in the 1st element of the array of hashes returned by the $db->select procedures directly into the $HTMLCheck variable. I tried doing:
my $HTMLCheck = $db->select("select HTMLCheck from Contact where Conta
+ctID=$ContactID")[1]->{HTMLCheck};

[download]
That does not seem to be working as expected. Can anyone advise of a way to simplify the above code?

Replies are listed 'Best First'.
Re: getting a single element from hash result
by Anonymous Monk on Jun 02, 2000 at 22:57 UTC
    Also note that the first row is index 0, not 1.
[reply]
      It would be if the select weren't a company written function that starts at 1... idiots just wastin' space.
[reply]
Re: getting a single element from hash result
by swiftone (Curate) on Jun 02, 2000 at 20:55 UTC 
    my $HTMLCheck = $db->select("select HTMLCheck from Contact where Conta
+ctID=$ContactID")[1]->{HTMLCheck};

    [download]
    That looks basically right. My guess is that Perl got confused as to what was being subreferenced. Try: 
    my $HTMLCheck = {$db->select("select HTMLCheck from Contact where Cont
+actID=$ContactID")}[1]->{HTMLCheck};

    [download]
[reply]
[d/l]
[select]
      I think you meant: my $HTMLCheck = ($db->select("select HTMLCheck from Contact where ContactID=$ContactID"))[1]->{HTMLCheck};
[reply]
[d/l]

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