Dr.Ruud schreef: > Why gamble that "0" is a valid index, or even the minimal index, if > there is "$["? > > Of course "the others" should use a local "$[" if they change it from > the default 0 to some other value, but you just can't be sure that it > will never bite you. Unless you use "$[" with "$#ary", because "$#ary" > depends on "$[" like this: ($#ary -$[ +1) == scalar(@ary).
I totally overlooked that $[ is file-based (Perl 5), which means that there are no "others". perldoc perlvar [...] As of release 5 of Perl, assignment to $[ is treated as a com- piler directive, and cannot influence the behavior of any other file. (That's why you can only assign compile-time constants to it.) *Its use is highly discouraged.* [...] -- Affijn, Ruud "Gewoon is een tijger." -- To unsubscribe, e-mail: [EMAIL PROTECTED] For additional commands, e-mail: [EMAIL PROTECTED] <http://learn.perl.org/> <http://learn.perl.org/first-response>