PPC0014 - What about alphabetical Perl variables?

[book]

PPC0014 contains this example:

my %signals = %SIG;
my %signals = %{^SIG};

which seems to imply we also want control character versions of the alphabetical Perl variables.

I've compiled the full list from perlvar, and came up with this list:
$a, $b, %ENV, @F, @INC, %INC, $INC, @ISA, %SIG, $ARGV, @ARGV.

Does this imply that the corresponding control character variables should exist? Namely:
$^a, $^b, %{^ENV}, @^F, @{^INC}, %{^INC}, ${^INC}, @{^ISA}, %{^SIG}, ${^ARGV}, @{^ARGV}.

[book]

Thinking a bit more about this: $a, $b, @ISA are package variables, and therefore are probably out of scope.

[haarg]

Yes, that is what I had in mind when writing the PPC.

[ajmetz]

Had a notification of this discussion, and hadn't known about the PPC, so went and read it. What follows is a general comment, not necessarily related to this issue thread. If there is somewhere better to post feedback on a PPC, I'll be happy to learn of it.

---

I try to use English.pm in all my code, so am grateful thought has been given to allowing my existing code to continue to work via aliases. I do agree I may be the exception. The last Perl job I had used legacy perl, and the team I worked with didn't necessarily know $ARG was $_.

I always use English, as I believe it addresses the criticism of Perl as line noise, and addressing criticisms should help Perl get a better reputation, =). I realise there may be a tradeoff in conciseness. So as always, decisions should be made based on what aligns best with one's goals on any given project.

[book]

Yes, that is what I had in mind when writing the PPC.

After some more consideration, I think I will only need to add control character aliases for ENV, INC, SIG and ARGV.

[ajmetz]

Yes, that is what I had in mind when writing the PPC.

After some more consideration, I think I will only need to add control character aliases for ENV, INC, SIG and ARGV.

That's basically your original list in the first post ( #76 (comment) ), minus the $a, $b, and @ISA you mention in your second post, and also minus the @F. Ergo:

%{^ENV}, @{^INC}, %{^INC}, ${^INC}, %{^SIG}, ${^ARGV}, @{^ARGV}

I assume @F is a package variable like $a, $b and @ISA also then...?

Thinking a bit more about this: $a, $b, @ISA are package variables, and therefore are probably out of scope.

I learn from peers by throwing myself into stuff, including this thread, which is the first time I've discovered/come across autosplit and @F
https://perldoc.perl.org/perlrun#-a

So if I didn't know, now I know, =). Thanks!
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_JZom_gVfuw

[haarg]

@F is not implicitly forced into main like the punctuation variables. Instead it is declared like an our variable for the main compilation unit. It shouldn't need a PPC0014 variant.

[book]

I eventually put aliases for ARGV, ENV, INC and SIG in Perl/perl5#24179.

[haarg]

Filed #77 to clarify the PPC.