Maybe you could try a two-step approach:

%hash = ();
undef %hash;

[download]
to see if it improves the situation.

update

May you can also try delete. It is supposed to be slower but it would be interesting to compare. I have tried your example on Windows XP and Redhat (both Perl 5.8) and it runs fine. Strangely enough it takes a bit longer under Redhat?! Unfortunately I don't have FreeBSD available.

In reply to Re: Bug when undefining a large hash by dHarry
in thread Bug when undefining a large hash by oxone

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