Re: hash keys

On Jun 12, 12:15 am, [email protected] (Beast) wrote:

> Why this following code has not working as expected?
>
>     print "Number of element(s) : " . sprintf("%10d", keys(%hash) ) . "\n";

The keys() function does two different things, depending on context.

In scalar context, it returns the number of key/value pairs in the
hash.

In list context, it returns a list of the keys.

You probably knew that, but didn't realize that you're using it in a
list context here.   The arguments to a function are a list, and so
Perl is expecting a list of values to be passed to sprintf().
Anywhere Perl expects a list, if it sees a function/subroutine, it
calls that function/subroutine in list context.

Paul Lalli