Yes, as mentioned in the OP, my current method of clearing _ is to do an lstat() on the empty string. I was hoping there was a "more correct" way to clear the stat cache, because, while some implementations of the lstat() system call do optimize a stat of the empty string to not bother going to the file system, I'm skeptical about that in the general case.

It is interesting to note that the file tests, such as -e do not exhibit the same behaviour, with respect to warnings, as stat() and lstat():

  $ perl -we'-e _'
  $ perl -we'stat _'
  stat() on unopened filehandle _ at -e line 1.
[download]

That's a better solution than what I was using before, but I wonder if, as above, there's a "more correct" way to do it.

Cheers,