What "dire warnings" about using our?

Also, you claim that the below parse function works. How does it actually "work"? What do you believe that you're saving in $self->{$var1} and how are you planning on using it?

my $var1;
my $var2;
my $var3;

#set values -- this part works
sub parse{
   ...
   $self->{$var1} = 'a';
   $self->{$var2} = 'b';
   $self->{$var3} = 'c';
   ...
}
[download]

If you're doing true Object Oriented programming, I believe that what you truly want is just the following

package parser;

...
# Some constructor here
...

#set values -- this part works
sub parse{
   ...
   $self->{var1} = 'a';
   $self->{var2} = 'b';
   $self->{var3} = 'c';
   ...
}

sub get_var{
   my ($self, $var_name) = @_;
   return $self->{$var_name};
}
[download]