The term "binding" is often used when talking about the process of unification. A set of entities are assigned values at once, but only if values for each entity can be found. The destination (left-hand side) entities cannot be assigned if an insufficient set of source (right-hand side) values are found.

If you understand databases, you can think of it like a transaction: if any of the portions of the database insertion fails, the whole transaction is rolled back as if it was never attempted.

You may want to look at my CPAN module Data::Binder which provides a similar, simplistic method of maintaining a set of entities, which can be bound against each other.

--
[ e d @ h a l l e y . c c ]

In reply to Re: Why do we say the =~ operator "binds"? by halley
in thread Why do we say the =~ operator "binds"? by Cody Pendant

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.