Good catch. You could force scalar context by simply using ${\( $q->param('real_name') )} though

Bzzzzt.... :-)

That is also list context. Here's a demonstration:

$ perl -le 'sub f{wantarray?"list":"scalar"}print"${\(f())}"'
list
[download]

That code turns the list returned by the subroutine into a list of references. That's because \($foo, $bar) is the same as (\$foo, \$bar). That list of references is itself in scalar context. (All of the deref'ing constructs expect a scalar reference afterall, so it makes no difference whether you use ${} or @{} here.) In scalar context a list yields its last element.

Voila! You dereference the last element in the list of references created from the list returned by the subroutine call.

I think that ${\scalar f()} is the only real way to do that and that's hideous. I'd much prefer to assign to a variable and then just put the variable into the <<HERE document, especially if you need to do that more than once (and it's best to assume you will, right?)

So, was that an even better catch? ;-)

-sauoq
"My two cents aren't worth a dime.";