so perl fails when it tries to dereference the string

Interestingly, the code 

my $package = "Compress::Zlib::";
print "$package defined\n" if defined %$package;

[download]

works fine with 5.8.8 (with strictures enabled), while 5.10.1 complains as shown in the OP...

Update: and with 5.12.0 you get 

defined(%hash) is deprecated at ./835534.pl line 10.
        (Maybe you should just omit the defined()?)

[download]

...which also does work fine (with strictures) when you do so, i.e. when you write ... if %$package;  nonsense (I had forgotten to comment out the no strict 'refs', which I had added in the meantime...) — in other words, for both 5.10 and 5.12 (but not 5.8) you do need the no strict 'refs', even without the deprecated defined %...

In reply to Re^2: zlib error by almut
in thread zlib error by Anonymous Monk

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