in reply to array assignment

In your specific case, I would use something like Date::Calc to handle the uglies. Or, you could write a function that wraps that. :-)

As for the coolness factors ... you could use mapcar -- map for more than one list. That way, you might end up with something like: 

my ($dd, $mm, $yyyy) =
    map {
        $_->[0] + $_->[1]
    } mapcar(
        [(localtime)[3..5]],
        [0, 1, 1900],
    );

[download]

Of course, you now have to explain how mapcar works and ... well, maybe it's too cool. :-)

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