input record separator

stabu has asked for the wisdom of the Perl Monks concerning the following question:

when reading in a file, how come if I $/='', the file is read in by paragraphs?
I mean, a paragraph is essentially two contiguous newlines, not merely *nothing*, which is what $/='' sets the input record separator to.
I would have thought $/='\x0A\x0A' would read the file in by paragraphs.

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Re: input record separator by itub (Priest) on Jul 29, 2005 at 23:47 UTC
perldoc perlvar	[reply]
Re: input record separator by fauria (Deacon) on Jul 30, 2005 at 00:29 UTC
Well, a paragraph is not exatly two \n's, but blank spaces till next character. By using '' (null), a paragraph is meant to be the next text section, no matter how many new lines are in between. You are right if assuming paragraphs delimited by a single blank line, but this is not true for every single paragraph.	[reply]
Re: input record separator by holli (Abbot) on Jul 30, 2005 at 09:13 UTC
It's magic ;-) holli, /regexed monk/	[reply]