I seem to be forgetting basic symbolic reference usage. I don't understand why the following attempt at using a symbolic reference for an array name doesn't produce correct output. I'm trying to pass array names of interest to a subroutine that prints the subname and it's length. Seems simple enough. But no luck... 
#!/usr/bin/perl -w
use strict;

my ($Devel, $Debuff_Output) = (1,1);
if ($Debuff_Output) { select STDERR; $| = 1; select STDOUT; $| = 1; }
if ($Devel) { use Carp qw(cluck confess);
    $SIG{__WARN__} = $SIG{__DIE__} = sub {confess @_} }

my @array        = (1, 2, 3, 4);
my @array2    =    (3, 5, 7);

sub arlen ($) {
    my $ar_nam=$_[0];
    no strict 'refs';
    my $ar_len = eval $#$ar_nam;
    sprintf "name=%s, length=%d", $ar_nam, $ar_len;
}

foreach ('array', 'array2') {
    no strict 'refs';
    printf "Array %s\n", arlen $_;
}

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In reply to simple symbolic reference Q by perl-diddler

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