Re: proposed addition to perlvar

[email protected] ("Chas. Owens")
Newsgroups perl.perl5.porters
Message-ID <[email protected]>
On Wed, Jun 9, 2010 at 07:14, David Golden <[email protected]> wrote:
> I like what you have below for both, particularly the bit about the
> warnings.  Could you please re-submit them in patch format?
snip

I moved both variables into a new section named "Deprecated Names"
between "Predefined Names" and "Error Indicators".  I also change one
of the examples in $# based on concern raised by some of the other
emails.


-- 
Chas. Owens
wonkden.net
The most important skill a programmer can have is the ability to read.
perlvar.patch (application/octet-stream, 1.1 KB)
diff --git a/pod/perlvar.pod b/pod/perlvar.pod
index ed90610..59a19f3 100644
--- a/pod/perlvar.pod
+++ b/pod/perlvar.pod
@@ -1629,6 +1629,41 @@ L<warnings> for additional information.
 
 =back
 
+=head2 Deprecated Names
+
+=over 8
+
+=item $#
+
+C<$#> used to be a variable that could be used to format printed number.
+After a deprecation cycle, its magic was removed in 5.10 and using it
+now triggers a severe warning: C<$# is no longer supported>.
+
+C<$#> is also used as sigil, which, when prepended on the name of an
+array gives the index of the last element in that array.
+
+    my @a            = ("a", "b", "c");
+    my $last_index   = $#a;     # $last_index is 2
+
+    my @list = (1, 3, 4, 2, 5);
+    for my $i (1 .. $#list) {
+        die "not sorted" unless $ints[$i - 1] < $ints[$i];
+    }
+
+Also see L<perldata>.
+
+=item $*
+
+C<$*> used to be a variable that enabled multiline matching.
+After a deprecated cycle, its magic was removed in 5.10.
+Using it now triggers a severe warning: C<$* is no longer
+supported>.  Use the C</s> and C</m> regexp modifiers
+instead.
+
+Also see L<perlre>.
+
+=back
+
 =head2 Error Indicators
 X<error> X<exception>
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