Hi,

I'm trying to make a bit of code (to save on memory, and unrequired "returns" etc), so that I can edit the value directly. Kinda like so: 
my $test = "foo bar";

print "Test is now: $test \n";
test($test);
print "Test is now: $test \n";

sub test {
    $_[0] =~ s/foo/whatever/g;
}

[download]
...but instead of using $_[0], I wanna use a variable name. I know we can do this with hashrefs and arrayrefs using: 
my @test_array = qw/foo bar test/;
print Dumper(@test_array);
test_array(\@test_array);
print Dumper(@test_array);

sub test_array {
    my $array_ref = $_[0];
    $array_ref->[1] ="whatever";
}

[download]
..and: 
my %test_array;
$test_array{foo} = 1;
$test_array{bar} = 2;
$test_array{test} = 3;

print Dumper(%test_array);
test_hash(\%test_array);
print Dumper(%test_array);

sub test_hash {
    my $array_ref = $_[0];
    $array_ref->{foo} = "whatever";
}

[download]
But I can't work out how to do it with a string, using a proper string name? (instead of $_[0], which will make it confusing when coming back to the code)

TIA!

Andy

In reply to Way to do a "scalar ref"? by ultranerds

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