for a long time, Getopt::Std has supported an interface which doesn't require the use of package variables. You can pass in a reference to a hash and that hash will be populated with the options.

use Getopt::Std;

my %opts;

getopts('h', \%opts);

help() if $opts{h};
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I think that's a much nicer interface.

Also, I think your call to getopts uses the Getopt::Long interface, not the Getopt::Std one. Getopt::Std only supports single letter options.