Thanks for the cogent response -- although I expect someone has come up with a term for this kind of annoying representation of a hash.

PS: I understand the "reason" for the pathological representation. The non-pathological representation would have:  $hash{$key}=[$value1, $value2, $value3,...] and the distinction between array and scalar fields would be handled by the schema.

In reply to Re^4: the annoying keys "key" and "value" by jabowery
in thread the annoying keys "key" and "value" by jabowery

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