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

Hi,

I have the following code 


my @array = ("a","b","c","d","e");
my %hash;

$hash{'key'} = @array;

[download]

This is all dandy, but when I try to print it, I only get the scalars out (number of values inside the array)

while (my ($key, @value) = each(%hash)){

   my @extracted_array = @value;

}

[download]

So how can I access the array inside of the hash for further manipulation?

Replies are listed 'Best First'.
Re: Accessing and printing an array, INSIDE of a hash
by Corion (Patriarch) on Sep 25, 2011 at 14:36 UTC

    This line:

    $hash{'key'} = @array;

    [download]

    ... does not do what you think it does. Hashes can only take scalar values, not arrays. You can store a reference to the array:

    $hash{'key'} = \@array;

    [download]

    ... and then retrieve it back. See Data::Dumper for inspecting your data structures, References Quick Reference on how to get at the data.

[reply]
[d/l]
[select]
Re: Accessing and printing an array, INSIDE of a hash
by RichardK (Parson) on Sep 25, 2011 at 14:40 UTC
    It's also worth having a look at the perldsc -- Perl Data Structures Cookbook
[reply]
Re: Accessing and printing an array, INSIDE of a hash
by planetscape (Chancellor) on Sep 26, 2011 at 17:06 UTC
[reply]

Back to Seekers of Perl Wisdom