Reference basic in Perl

Making references

References can be created in several ways.

By using the backslash operator on a variable, subroutine, or value. (This works much like the & (address-of) Operator in C.) This typically createsAnotherReference to a variable, because there's already a reference to the variable in the symbol table. but the symbol table reference might go away, and you'll still have the reference that the backslash returned. here are some examples:

 
 

  
  
 $scalarref = \$foo;
  
  
 $arrayref = \@ARGV;
  
  
 $hashref = \%ENV;
  
  
 $coderef = \&handler;
  
  
 $globref = \*foo;
 
 

Using references

That's it for creating references. By now you're probably dying
Know how to use references to get back to your long-lost data. There
Are several basic methods.

1. Anywhere you 'd put an identifier (or chain of identifiers) as part of

   Variable or subroutine name, you can replace the identifier with
   Block returning a reference of the correct type. In other words,
   Previous examples cocould be written like this:

      
      
   
       
       
    $bar = ${$scalarref};
       
       
    push(@{$arrayref}, $filename);
       
       
    ${$arrayref}[0] = "January";
       
       
    ${$hashref}{"KEY"} = "VALUE";
       
       
    &{$coderef}(1,2,3);
       
       
    $globref->print("output\n"); # iff IO::Handle is loaded