Others have pointed out that your %colours hash would be much more suitable if it was reversed. However, you can still obtain the colour from the chosen number with the hash as it stands by using keys and grep.

johngg@shiraz:~ > perl -Mstrict -Mwarnings -E '
my %colours    = (
   blue   => q{1},
   green  => q{2},
   red    => q{3},
   pink   => q{4},
   purple => q{5},
   );

my @numbers    = qw{ 1 2 3 4 5 };
my $pick       = $numbers[ int rand @numbers ];
say qq{Number $pick chosen};

my( $colour )  = grep { $colours{ $_ } eq $pick } keys %colours;
say qq{Colour is $colour};'
Number 2 chosen
Colour is green

[download]

Of course, building the hash the right way in the first place is by far the best approach.

Cheers,

JohnGG

In reply to Re: How to print specific word from array/hash? by johngg
in thread How to print specific word from array/hash? by bananabread

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