If there's one key in the hash, keys(%hash) will return a single element array (excuse me, I've gone into lecture mode...).

If you really don't care about which key you get from a hash with more than one entry, wouldn't

$key = shift(keys(%hash)); 
($key) = keys(%hash);

[download]

be perfectly adequate?

Incidentally, if there is going to be only one key in a hash or, if you've multiple keys and don't care which one you get, why are you using a hash?

Thanks to Perl Mouse for pointing out a horrid error on my part; for some inane reason I thought shift(keys(%hash)) was valid Perl.

emc

In reply to Re: how to find a key from a hash by swampyankee
in thread how to find a key from a hash by jeanluca

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