So, if I have a function that returns undef on error, else an array with results, I should assign it to a scalar and and see if it is undef, if not, then hope it's a reference to an array?

If I'm "in" the function, and I return an array to a scalar won't perl coerce the array into a scalar length and assign that to my scaler instead? So I'll end up with either the number of elements in the array, or 'unef', but not the array?

Seems like this is pushing me in the direction of not being able to return an array with a list of found values or 'undef' ... I think I 'resent' the syntax that @a=1, is an assignment to $a[0]...I can understand why it happens, but I'm not sure how useful it is given that by using the "@" and no index, I'm only wanting an array to be assigned. It seems a perversity to coerce undef into a defined array with value undef in the first element....

Under what situations is this commonly useful? Or are there too many to number? Sigh. ...

If I want to return 'undef' and have it be interpreted as an undef array, then I need to return ()....a bit of a pain, since I wanted higher level routines to not care about the type of a return unless they needed to use it, with undef always being 'undef'.....

Just seems to complicate matters a bit.

In reply to Re^2: undef==defined sometimes? (body question) by perl-diddler
in thread undef==defined sometimes? by perl-diddler

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.