Perlsecret – Perl secret operators and constants
4 months ago
- #Obfuscation
- #Programming
- #Perl
- Perl secret operators and constants are nicknamed based on their appearance rather than function.
- Secret operators are not officially recognized by Perl but are used by Perl golfers and obfuscators for concise coding.
- Examples include the Venus operator (0+) for numification, Babycart (@{[ ]}) for list interpolation, and Bang bang (!!) for boolean conversion.
- Other notable operators include the Eskimo greeting (}{) for one-liner END blocks, Maori farewell (-M5;) for BEGIN blocks, and Inchworm (~~) for scalar context.
- Secret constants like Space fleet (<=><=><=>) and Amphisbaena (<~>) provide quirky functionalities.
- Warning: Many secret operators are obscure and not suitable for production code.
- The document also covers deprecated operators due to Perl's evolution, like those affected by the 'bitwise' feature in Perl 5.028.