Cool.

I had previously convinced myself that because BEGIN requires a block, I couldn't fake out 'use warnings' for people who don't have it but then I realized this works fine:

BEGIN {
    if(  eval { require warnings }  ) {
        warnings->import();
    } else {
        $^W= 1;
    }
}
[download]

I like this method because it allows the user to install a back-ported warnings.pm or bytes.pm or whatever and use it if they want to and I don't have to trust my knowledge of when the module was added. (:

Anyway, it is another way to do it.

Thanks Tye! Applying this to "use bytes," am I correct that your solution is basically the same approach as the one I originally suggested? In other words, isn't this...
BEGIN {
    if(  eval { require bytes }  ) {
        bytes->import();
    }
}
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...pretty much the same as this:
BEGIN {
eval {require bytes; import bytes; 1}
}
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I'm a bit new to trying to import modules and pragmas outside of the regular "use" function, so I'm just trying to be sure that I understand the difference, if any.

Thanks! Josh

Yes, same result. Here is how I tested it:

 > perl
{ use warnings; }
print $x;
<EOF>

 > perl
BEGIN { if( {require warnings} ) { warnings->import(); } }
print $x;
<EOF>
Use of uninitialized value in print at - line 3.

 > perl
BEGIN { eval { require warnings; import warnings; } }
print $x;
<EOF>
Use of uninitialized value in print at - line 3.

 >
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First is the "control" case to show that 'use warnings' inside of a block doesn't have an effect outside of the block. Next is my method, and the warning generated shows that there is an effect (since I have warnings.pm in this version of Perl). Last is your method, which also works.

The 'hint' pragmas all work very much the same so this trick works for 'strict', 'warnings', 'bytes', etc.

                - tye