An array is a form of list. To assign an array value into scalars then you use a list of scalars, like my($stuff1, $stuff2, $stuff3) = @array;. If you want to assign only the first few elements, just use a number of scalars you need, so ignoring the rest. This is better than you assign all of them but never use one or more of scalars.

my($stuff1, $stuff2) = @array; # eventough it has more than two elemen
+ts
my($stuff1, $stuff2) = @array;
# if you never use $stuff2 for the rest of your program, then you're w
+asting memory used by $stuff2.
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Instead, you can write my($stuff1) = @array;, or, my $stuff1 = $array[0];, or even my $stuff1 = shift @array; if you don't have to care to preserve @array. However, if you will never be interested in some elements in the middle, you can use undef, such as

# skipping the second and third elements
my($stuff1, undef, undef, $stuff4) = @array;
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If @array contains many elements, then it's probably wiser to use a hash instead of a bunch of scalar variables.

# using scalars
my($name, $age, $birthday, $address, $zipcode, $city, $country) = @arr
+ay;

# using hash
my @keys = qw(name age birthday address zipcode city country);
my %user;
@user{ @keys } = @array;

# so, instead of
print "name = $name\n";

# you can write
print "name = $user{name}\n";
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