You have to ask yourself what is slower...passing the array/hash, or the extra deference everytime you assess it. Typically, passing by reference is a win, but now always.

Remember: 
    $foo{'bob'};

[download]
is faster than: 
    $bar->{'bob'};  # Slower, extra dereference

[download]
So if you have a small array/hash, and dereference it alot, code it both ways, and see what Benchmark tells you. I'm betting the difference will be small enough, you should be optimizing for readability instead.

Also, remember using reference allows you to modify the actual variable, where normally you will just modify a copy. This, and not performance, will usually determine which you should use.

In reply to Re: passing refs to subs by indigo
in thread passing refs to subs by jptxs

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.