This and other RFCs are available on the web at http://dev.perl.org/rfc/ =head1 TITLE No overloading of f($arg) basing on ref($arg) =head1 VERSION Maintainer: Ilya Zakharevich <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> Date: 15 Sep 2000 Mailing List: [EMAIL PROTECTED] Number: 242 Version: 1 Status: Developing =head1 ABSTRACT This RFC proposes that the meaning of function calls and operators should not be subtly changed basing on whether the argument is a reference or not. =head1 DESCRIPTION There are several proposals to switch the meaning of C<f($arg)> basing on the whether $arg is an array reference or not. For example, it is tempting to allow C<$array[[2,3]]> denote the same as C<$array[2][3]>. Unfortunately, this prohibits the usage of overloaded data in $arg. For example my $i23 = new Math::BigInt 23; print $array[$i23] will not access C<$array[23]>, but C<$array[2][3]> if the internal representation if $i23 is (blessed) C<[2,3]>. Keeping in mind that overloaded objects can be made to behave as array references even if they are not (see the key C<'@{}'> of overloading) makes things yet more confusing. =head1 MIGRATION ISSUES None. =head1 IMPLEMENTATION None. =head1 REFERENCES None.
