By its very own words and form it shows that this small piece of script is already buggy!
# first argument is a -f; collect it and ignore it for now my $optionalArgument = shift;
  1. If one knows that the first argument is always -f why collect and save it? It is always there, so deal with it and don't force your users to type unnecessary arguments!
  2. If this argument is always there, why is it then called $optionalArgument?
  3. If the argument is really optional, shifting the non existing optional argument will really screw up your code!
So the question is not "How could this code be buggy?" but "How could this code be not buggy?"

CountZero

"If you have four groups working on a compiler, you'll get a 4-pass compiler." - Conway's Law


In reply to Re: Parsing the command line: manual or module? by CountZero
in thread Parsing the command line: manual or module? by bobf

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.