If anyone knows of a different way to go directly from real element to real element that'd really keen.

Easy-peasy: 
foreach my $element (@sparse) {
    if ( defined $element ) {
        # YOUR CODE HERE #
    }
}

[download]
defined() should be fast enough that calling it even a million times is no big deal.
--
Spring: Forces, Coiled Again!

In reply to Re: Re^2: Sparse arrays? by paulbort
in thread Sparse arrays? by diotalevi

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