I can't think of a better title (please feel free to suggest mods). This question is about both logic and style.

I have spent the past few days working with Win32::Daemon. I have been using code (from the docs and examples provided) that looks like so 

while( SERVICE_STOPPED != ( $State = Win32::Daemon::State() ) ){
    if( SERVICE_STARTING == $State ) {

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Q1. What is this use of barewords? I almost feel compelled to single quote all the words in UPPERCASE above. Should this not be 'SERVICE_STOPPED' etc.? And won't this fail under use strict?

Q2. Are the UPPERCASE words above just proxy for numbers? For example, in the situation above, the State() returned is actually a number. Of course, having the -w switch on complains that 

Argument "SERVICE_STARTING" isn't numeric in numeric eq (==) at ...

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Q3. (this one is the style-related question) I feel the urge to reverse the above tests as in 

    if( $State == SERVICE_STARTING  )

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since I am used to testing the value that a variable holds against certain "measures" that are fixed as in 
if ($color eq 'red') { 
 print 'angry';
} elsif ($color eq 'green') {
 print 'money';
} elsif ($color eq 'blue') {
 print 'sad';
}

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I guess this is new idiom for me, and I need to understand what is going on here.

In reply to Barewords and equality tests by punkish

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