Ok, I'll try a better translation from my thoughts in italian to a better english :-)

Maybe I should restate the question this way:

is it possible , and how, to distinguish if a sub/method is returning a single scalar (

return
$this

[download]
, which my test script should consider wrong) or a list (return ($this) or return qw(a bunch of values)) or an array (return @this) which my test script should both consider good?

I'm writing a test script (one of those that make test runs) that checks if a class of mine or a subclass of it behaves like it should.

My check detects the case return @this but fails on return qw(this list).

use strict ;
use warnings ;

sub test {  return ('a','test') }

my $test = test() ;
my @test = test() ;

print ">>> $test\n" ;
print map "[$_]\n",@test ;
print $test == scalar(@test)? "Yepa!\n" : "Nope!\n" ;

[download]

This one fails:

$ perl test.pl
>>> test
[a]
[test]
Argument "test" isn't numeric in numeric eq (==) at test.pl line 11.
Nope!

[download]

(even if I consider test's return value ok for my class...)

I hope I explained now. Do I?

Ciao!
--bronto

# Another Perl edition of a song:
# The End, by The Beatles
END {
  $you->take($love) eq $you->made($love) ;
}

In reply to Re: Re: Did I get what I expected (an array)? by Anonymous Monk
in thread Did I get what I expected (an array)? by bronto

Title:
Use:  <p> text here (a paragraph) </p>
and:  <code> code here </code>
to format your post, it's "PerlMonks-approved HTML":


  • Posts are HTML formatted. Put <p> </p> tags around your paragraphs. Put <code> </code> tags around your code and data!
  • Titles consisting of a single word are discouraged, and in most cases are disallowed outright.
  • Read Where should I post X? if you're not absolutely sure you're posting in the right place.
  • Please read these before you post! —
  • Posts may use any of the Perl Monks Approved HTML tags:
    a, abbr, b, big, blockquote, br, caption, center, col, colgroup, dd, del, details, div, dl, dt, em, font, h1, h2, h3, h4, h5, h6, hr, i, ins, li, ol, p, pre, readmore, small, span, spoiler, strike, strong, sub, summary, sup, table, tbody, td, tfoot, th, thead, tr, tt, u, ul, wbr
  • You may need to use entities for some characters, as follows. (Exception: Within code tags, you can put the characters literally.)
            For:     Use:
    & &amp;
    < &lt;
    > &gt;
    [ &#91;
    ] &#93;
  • Link using PerlMonks shortcuts! What shortcuts can I use for linking?
  • See Writeup Formatting Tips and other pages linked from there for more info.