Perl Tutorial for Beginners

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 Perl Tutorial for Beginners

Perl Tutorial
Perl is a programming language developed by Larry Wall, especially designed for text processing.
It stands for Practical Extraction and Report Language. It runs on a variety of platforms, such
as Windows, Mac OS, and the various versions of UNIX. This tutorial provides a complete
understanding on Perl.

Audience
This reference has been prepared for beginners to help them understand the basic to advanced
concepts related to Perl Scripting languages.

Prerequisites
Before you start practicing with various types of examples given in this reference, we are making
an assumption that you have prior exposure to C programming and Unix Shell.

Perl - Introduction
Perl is a general-purpose programming language originally developed for text manipulation and
now used for a wide range of tasks including system administration, web development, network
programming, GUI development, and more.

What is Perl?
• Perl is a stable, cross platform programming language.
• Though Perl is not officially an acronym but few people used it as Practical Extraction and Report
Language.
• It is used for mission critical projects in the public and private sectors.
• Perl is an Open Source software, licensed under its Artistic License, or the GNU General Public License
(GPL).
• Perl was created by Larry Wall.
• Perl 1.0 was released to usenet's alt.comp.sources in 1987.
• At the time of writing this tutorial, the latest version of perl was 5.16.2.
• Perl is listed in the Oxford English Dictionary.
PC Magazine announced Perl as the finalist for its 1998 Technical Excellence Award in the
Development Tool category.

Perl Features
• Perl takes the best features from other languages, such as C, awk, sed, sh, and BASIC, among others.
• Perls database integration interface DBI supports third-party databases including Oracle, Sybase,
Postgres, MySQL and others.
• Perl works with HTML, XML, and other mark-up languages.
• Perl supports Unicode.
• Perl is Y2K compliant.

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 Perl Tutorial for Beginners

• Perl supports both procedural and object-oriented programming.

• Perl interfaces with external C/C++ libraries through XS or SWIG.
• Perl is extensible. There are over 20,000 third party modules available from the Comprehensive Perl
Archive Network (CPAN).
• The Perl interpreter can be embedded into other systems.

Perl and the Web

• Perl used to be the most popular web programming language due to its text manipulation capabilities and
rapid development cycle.
• Perl is widely known as "the duct-tape of the Internet".
• Perl can handle encrypted Web data, including e-commerce transactions.
• Perl can be embedded into web servers to speed up processing by as much as 2000%.
• Perl's mod_perl allows the Apache web server to embed a Perl interpreter.
• Perl's DBI package makes web-database integration easy.

Perl is Interpreted
Perl is an interpreted language, which means that your code can be run as is, without a compilation
stage that creates a non portable executable program.
Traditional compilers convert programs into machine language. When you run a Perl program, it's
first compiled into a byte code, which is then converted ( as the program runs) into machine
instructions. So it is not quite the same as shells, or Tcl, which are strictlyinterpreted without an
intermediate representation.
It is also not like most versions of C or C++, which are compiled directly into a machine dependent
format. It is somewhere in between, along with Python and awk and Emacs .elc files.

Perl - Environment
Before we start writing our Perl programs, let's understand how to setup our Perl environment. Perl
is available on a wide variety of platforms −

• Unix (Solaris, Linux, FreeBSD, AIX, HP/UX, SunOS, IRIX etc.)

• Win 9x/NT/2000/
• WinCE
• Macintosh (PPC, 68K)
• Solaris (x86, SPARC)
• OpenVMS
• Alpha (7.2 and later)
• Symbian
• Debian GNU/kFreeBSD
• MirOS BSD
• And many more...
This is more likely that your system will have perl installed on it. Just try giving the following
command at the $ prompt −
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 Perl Tutorial for Beginners

$perl -v
If you have perl installed on your machine, then you will get a message something as follows −
This is perl 5, version 16, subversion 2 (v5.16.2) built for i686-linux

Copyright 1987-2012, Larry Wall

Perl may be copied only under the terms of either the Artistic License or
the
GNU General Public License, which may be found in the Perl 5 source kit.

Complete documentation for Perl, including FAQ lists, should be found on

this system using "man perl" or "perldoc perl". If you have access to the
Internet, point your browser at http://www.perl.org/, the Perl Home Page.
If you do not have perl already installed, then proceed to the next section.

Getting Perl Installation

The most up-to-date and current source code, binaries, documentation, news, etc. are available at
the official website of Perl.
Perl Official Website − https://www.perl.org/
You can download Perl documentation from the following site.
Perl Documentation Website − https://perldoc.perl.org

Install Perl
Perl distribution is available for a wide variety of platforms. You need to download only the binary
code applicable for your platform and install Perl.
If the binary code for your platform is not available, you need a C compiler to compile the source
code manually. Compiling the source code offers more flexibility in terms of choice of features that
you require in your installation.
Here is a quick overview of installing Perl on various platforms.

Unix and Linux Installation

Here are the simple steps to install Perl on Unix/Linux machine.
• Open a Web browser and go to https://www.perl.org/get.html.
• Follow the link to download zipped source code available for Unix/Linux.
• Download perl-5.x.y.tar.gz file and issue the following commands at $ prompt.
$tar -xzf perl-5.x.y.tar.gz
$cd perl-5.x.y
$./Configure -de
$make
$make test
$make install

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NOTE − Here $ is a Unix prompt where you type your command, so make sure you are not typing
$ while typing the above mentioned commands.
This will install Perl in a standard location /usr/local/bin and its libraries are installed
in /usr/local/lib/perlXX, where XX is the version of Perl that you are using.
It will take a while to compile the source code after issuing the make command. Once installation
is done, you can issue perl -v command at $ prompt to check perl installation. If everything is fine,
then it will display message like we have shown above.

Windows Installation
Here are the steps to install Perl on Windows machine.
• Follow the link for the Strawberry Perl installation on Windows http://strawberryperl.com
• Download either 32bit or 64bit version of installation.
• Run the downloaded file by double-clicking it in Windows Explorer. This brings up the Perl install wizard,
which is really easy to use. Just accept the default settings, wait until the installation is finished, and you're
ready to roll!

Macintosh Installation
In order to build your own version of Perl, you will need 'make', which is part of the Apples developer
tools usually supplied with Mac OS install DVDs. You do not need the latest version of Xcode (which
is now charged for) in order to install make.
Here are the simple steps to install Perl on Mac OS X machine.
• Open a Web browser and go to https://www.perl.org/get.html.
• Follow the link to download zipped source code available for Mac OS X.
• Download perl-5.x.y.tar.gz file and issue the following commands at $ prompt.
$tar -xzf perl-5.x.y.tar.gz
$cd perl-5.x.y
$./Configure -de
$make
$make test
$make install
This will install Perl in a standard location /usr/local/bin and its libraries are installed
in /usr/local/lib/perlXX, where XX is the version of Perl that you are using.

Running Perl
The following are the different ways to start Perl.

Interactive Interpreter
You can enter perl and start coding right away in the interactive interpreter by starting it from the
command line. You can do this from Unix, DOS, or any other system, which provides you a
command-line interpreter or shell window.
$perl -e <perl code> # Unix/Linux
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or

C:>perl -e <perl code> # Windows/DOS

Here is the list of all the available command line options −

Sr.No. Option & Description

1
-d[:debugger]
Runs program under debugger

2
-Idirectory
Specifies @INC/#include directory

3
-T
Enables tainting checks

4
-t
Enables tainting warnings

5
-U
Allows unsafe operations

6
-w
Enables many useful warnings

7
-W
Enables all warnings

8
-X
Disables all warnings

9
-e program
Runs Perl script sent in as program

10
file
Runs Perl script from a given file

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Script from the Command-line

A Perl script is a text file, which keeps perl code in it and it can be executed at the command line
by invoking the interpreter on your application, as in the following −
$perl script.pl # Unix/Linux

or

C:>perl script.pl # Windows/DOS

Integrated Development Environment

You can run Perl from a graphical user interface (GUI) environment as well. All you need is a GUI
application on your system that supports Perl. You can download Padre, the Perl IDE. You can
also use Eclipse Plugin EPIC - Perl Editor and IDE for Eclipse if you are familiar with Eclipse.
Before proceeding to the next chapter, make sure your environment is properly setup and working
perfectly fine. If you are not able to setup the environment properly then you can take help from
your system admininstrator.
All the examples given in subsequent chapters have been executed with v5.16.2 version available
on the CentOS flavor of Linux.

Perl - Syntax Overview Before we start writing our Perl programs, let's unde
Perl borrows syntax and concepts from many languages: awk, sed, C, Bourne Shell, Smalltalk,
Lisp and even English. However, there are some definite differences between the languages. This
chapter is designd to quickly get you up to speed on the syntax that is expected in Perl.
A Perl program consists of a sequence of declarations and statements, which run from the top to
the bottom. Loops, subroutines, and other control structures allow you to jump around within the
code. Every simple statement must end with a semicolon (;).
Perl is a free-form language: you can format and indent it however you like. Whitespace serves
mostly to separate tokens, unlike languages like Python where it is an important part of the syntax,
or Fortran where it is immaterial.

First Perl Program

Interactive Mode Programming

You can use Perl interpreter with -e option at command line, which lets you execute Perl statements
from the command line. Let's try something at $ prompt as follows −
$perl -e 'print "Hello World\n"'
This execution will produce the following result −
Hello, world

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Script Mode Programming

Assuming you are already on $ prompt, let's open a text file hello.pl using vi or vim editor and put
the following lines inside your file.
Live Demo

#!/usr/bin/perl

# This will print "Hello, World"

print "Hello, world\n";
Here /usr/bin/perl is actual the perl interpreter binary. Before you execute your script, be sure to
change the mode of the script file and give execution priviledge, generally a setting of 0755 works
perfectly and finally you execute the above script as follows −
$chmod 0755 hello.pl
$./hello.pl
This execution will produce the following result −
Hello, world
You can use parentheses for functions arguments or omit them according to your personal taste.
They are only required occasionally to clarify the issues of precedence. Following two statements
produce the same result.
print("Hello, world\n");
print "Hello, world\n";

Perl File Extension

A Perl script can be created inside of any normal simple-text editor program. There are several
programs available for every type of platform. There are many programs designd for programmers
available for download on the web.
As a Perl convention, a Perl file must be saved with a .pl or .PL file extension in order to be
recognized as a functioning Perl script. File names can contain numbers, symbols, and letters but
must not contain a space. Use an underscore (_) in places of spaces.

Comments in Perl
Comments in any programming language are friends of developers. Comments can be used to
make program user friendly and they are simply skipped by the interpreter without impacting the
code functionality. For example, in the above program, a line starting with hash # is a comment.
Simply saying comments in Perl start with a hash symbol and run to the end of the line −
# This is a comment in perl
Lines starting with = are interpreted as the start of a section of embedded documentation (pod),
and all subsequent lines until the next =cut are ignored by the compiler. Following is the example
−
Live Demo

#!/usr/bin/perl
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 Perl Tutorial for Beginners

# This is a single line comment

print "Hello, world\n";

=begin comment
This is all part of multiline comment.
You can use as many lines as you like
These comments will be ignored by the
compiler until the next =cut is encountered.
=cut
This will produce the following result −
Hello, world

Whitespaces in Perl
A Perl program does not care about whitespaces. Following program works perfectly fine −
#!/usr/bin/perl

print "Hello, world\n";

But if spaces are inside the quoted strings, then they would be printed as is. For example −
Live Demo

#!/usr/bin/perl

# This would print with a line break in the middle

print "Hello
world\n";
This will produce the following result −
Hello
world
All types of whitespace like spaces, tabs, newlines, etc. are equivalent for the interpreter when they
are used outside of the quotes. A line containing only whitespace, possibly with a comment, is
known as a blank line, and Perl totally ignores it.

Single and Double Quotes in Perl

You can use double quotes or single quotes around literal strings as follows −
Live Demo

#!/usr/bin/perl

print "Hello, world\n";

print 'Hello, world\n';
This will produce the following result −
Hello, world
Hello, world\n$

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There is an important difference in single and double quotes. Only double

quotes interpolatevariables and special characters such as newlines \n, whereas single quote
does not interpolate any variable or special character. Check below example where we are using
$a as a variable to store a value and later printing that value −
Live Demo

#!/usr/bin/perl

$a = 10;
print "Value of a = $a\n";
print 'Value of a = $a\n';
This will produce the following result −
Value of a = 10
Value of a = $a\n$

"Here" Documents
You can store or print multiline text with a great comfort. Even you can make use of variables inside
the "here" document. Below is a simple syntax, check carefully there must be no space between
the << and the identifier.
An identifier may be either a bare word or some quoted text like we used EOF below. If identifier is
quoted, the type of quote you use determines the treatment of the text inside the here docoment,
just as in regular quoting. An unquoted identifier works like double quotes.
Live Demo

#!/usr/bin/perl

$a = 10;
$var = <<"EOF";
This is the syntax for here document and it will continue
until it encounters a EOF in the first line.
This is case of double quote so variable value will be
interpolated. For example value of a = $a
EOF
print "$var\n";

$var = <<'EOF';
This is case of single quote so variable value will be
interpolated. For example value of a = $a
EOF
print "$var\n";
This will produce the following result −
This is the syntax for here document and it will continue
until it encounters a EOF in the first line.
This is case of double quote so variable value will be
interpolated. For example value of a = 10

This is case of single quote so variable value will be

interpolated. For example value of a = $a
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Escaping Characters
Perl uses the backslash (\) character to escape any type of character that might interfere with our
code. Let's take one example where we want to print double quote and $ sign −
Live Demo

#!/usr/bin/perl

$result = "This is \"number\"";

print "$result\n";
print "\$result\n";
This will produce the following result −
This is "number"
$result

Perl Identifiers
A Perl identifier is a name used to identify a variable, function, class, module, or other object. A
Perl variable name starts with either $, @ or % followed by zero or more letters, underscores, and
digits (0 to 9).
Perl does not allow punctuation characters such as @, $, and % within identifiers. Perl is a case
sensitive programming language. Thus $Manpower and $manpower are two different identifiers
in Perl.

Perl - Data Types

Perl is a loosely typed language and there is no need to specify a type for your data while using in
your program. The Perl interpreter will choose the type based on the context of the data itself.
Perl has three basic data types: scalars, arrays of scalars, and hashes of scalars, also known as
associative arrays. Here is a little detail about these data types.

Sr.No. Types & Description

1
Scalar
Scalars are simple variables. They are preceded by a dollar sign ($). A scalar is either a
number, a string, or a reference. A reference is actually an address of a variable, which
we will see in the upcoming chapters.

2
Arrays
Arrays are ordered lists of scalars that you access with a numeric index, which starts with
0. They are preceded by an "at" sign (@).

3
Hashes

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Hashes are unordered sets of key/value pairs that you access using the keys as
subscripts. They are preceded by a percent sign (%).

Numeric Literals
Perl stores all the numbers internally as either signed integers or double-precision floating-point
values. Numeric literals are specified in any of the following floating-point or integer formats −

Type Value

Integer 1234

Negative integer -100

Floating point 2000

Scientific notation 16.12E14

Hexadecimal 0xffff

Octal 0577

String Literals
Strings are sequences of characters. They are usually alphanumeric values delimited by either
single (') or double (") quotes. They work much like UNIX shell quotes where you can use single
quoted strings and double quoted strings.
Double-quoted string literals allow variable interpolation, and single-quoted strings are not. There
are certain characters when they are proceeded by a back slash, have special meaning and they
are used to represent like newline (\n) or tab (\t).
You can embed newlines or any of the following Escape sequences directly in your double quoted
strings −

Escape sequence Meaning

\\ Backslash

\' Single quote

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\" Double quote

\a Alert or bell

\b Backspace

\f Form feed

\n Newline

\r Carriage return

\t Horizontal tab

\v Vertical tab

\0nn Creates Octal formatted numbers

\xnn Creates Hexideciamal formatted numbers

\cX Controls characters, x may be any character

\u Forces next character to uppercase

\l Forces next character to lowercase

\U Forces all following characters to uppercase

\L Forces all following characters to lowercase

\Q Backslash all following non-alphanumeric characters

\E End \U, \L, or \Q

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Example
Let's see again how strings behave with single quotation and double quotation. Here we will use
string escapes mentioned in the above table and will make use of the scalar variable to assign
string values.
Live Demo

#!/usr/bin/perl

# This is case of interpolation.

$str = "Welcome to \ntutorialspoint.com!";
print "$str\n";

# This is case of non-interpolation.

$str = 'Welcome to \ntutorialspoint.com!';
print "$str\n";

# Only W will become upper case.

$str = "\uwelcome to tutorialspoint.com!";
print "$str\n";

# Whole line will become capital.

$str = "\UWelcome to tutorialspoint.com!";
print "$str\n";

# A portion of line will become capital.

$str = "Welcome to \Ututorialspoint\E.com!";
print "$str\n";

# Backsalash non alpha-numeric including spaces.

$str = "\QWelcome to tutorialspoint's family";
print "$str\n";
This will produce the following result −
Welcome to
tutorialspoint.com!
Welcome to \ntutorialspoint.com!
Welcome to tutorialspoint.com!
WELCOME TO TUTORIALSPOINT.COM!
Welcome to TUTORIALSPOINT.com!
Welcome\ to\ tutorialspoint\'s\ family

Perl - Variables
Variables are the reserved memory locations to store values. This means that when you create a
variable you reserve some space in memory.
Based on the data type of a variable, the interpreter allocates memory and decides what can be
stored in the reserved memory. Therefore, by assigning different data types to variables, you can
store integers, decimals, or strings in these variables.
We have learnt that Perl has the following three basic data types −

• Scalars

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• Arrays
• Hashes
Accordingly, we are going to use three types of variables in Perl. A scalar variable will precede by
a dollar sign ($) and it can store either a number, a string, or a reference. An array variable will
precede by sign @ and it will store ordered lists of scalars. Finaly, the Hashvariable will precede
by sign % and will be used to store sets of key/value pairs.
Perl maintains every variable type in a separate namespace. So you can, without fear of conflict,
use the same name for a scalar variable, an array, or a hash. This means that $foo and @foo are
two different variables.

Creating Variables
Perl variables do not have to be explicitly declared to reserve memory space. The declaration
happens automatically when you assign a value to a variable. The equal sign (=) is used to assign
values to variables.
Keep a note that this is mandatory to declare a variable before we use it if we use use
strictstatement in our program.
The operand to the left of the = operator is the name of the variable, and the operand to the right
of the = operator is the value stored in the variable. For example −
$age = 25; # An integer assignment
$name = "John Paul"; # A string
$salary = 1445.50; # A floating point
Here 25, "John Paul" and 1445.50 are the values assigned to $age, $name and $salaryvariables,
respectively. Shortly we will see how we can assign values to arrays and hashes.

Scalar Variables
A scalar is a single unit of data. That data might be an integer number, floating point, a character,
a string, a paragraph, or an entire web page. Simply saying it could be anything, but only a single
thing.
Here is a simple example of using scalar variables −
Live Demo

#!/usr/bin/perl

$age = 25; # An integer assignment

$name = "John Paul"; # A string
$salary = 1445.50; # A floating point

print "Age = $age\n";

print "Name = $name\n";
print "Salary = $salary\n";
This will produce the following result −
Age = 25
Name = John Paul
Salary = 1445.5

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Array Variables
An array is a variable that stores an ordered list of scalar values. Array variables are preceded by
an "at" (@) sign. To refer to a single element of an array, you will use the dollar sign ($) with the
variable name followed by the index of the element in square brackets.
Here is a simple example of using array variables −
Live Demo

#!/usr/bin/perl

@ages = (25, 30, 40);

@names = ("John Paul", "Lisa", "Kumar");

print "\$ages[0] = $ages[0]\n";

print "\$ages[1] = $ages[1]\n";
print "\$ages[2] = $ages[2]\n";
print "\$names[0] = $names[0]\n";
print "\$names[1] = $names[1]\n";
print "\$names[2] = $names[2]\n";
Here we used escape sign (\) before the $ sign just to print it. Other Perl will understand it as a
variable and will print its value. When executed, this will produce the following result −
$ages[0] = 25
$ages[1] = 30
$ages[2] = 40
$names[0] = John Paul
$names[1] = Lisa
$names[2] = Kumar

Hash Variables
A hash is a set of key/value pairs. Hash variables are preceded by a percent (%) sign. To refer to
a single element of a hash, you will use the hash variable name followed by the "key" associated
with the value in curly brackets.
Here is a simple example of using hash variables −
Live Demo

#!/usr/bin/perl

%data = ('John Paul', 45, 'Lisa', 30, 'Kumar', 40);

print "\$data{'John Paul'} = $data{'John Paul'}\n";

print "\$data{'Lisa'} = $data{'Lisa'}\n";
print "\$data{'Kumar'} = $data{'Kumar'}\n";
This will produce the following result −
$data{'John Paul'} = 45
$data{'Lisa'} = 30
$data{'Kumar'} = 40

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Variable Context
Perl treats same variable differently based on Context, i.e., situation where a variable is being used.
Let's check the following example −
Live Demo

#!/usr/bin/perl

@names = ('John Paul', 'Lisa', 'Kumar');

@copy = @names;
$size = @names;

print "Given names are : @copy\n";

print "Number of names are : $size\n";
This will produce the following result −
Given names are : John Paul Lisa Kumar
Number of names are : 3
Here @names is an array, which has been used in two different contexts. First we copied it into
anyother array, i.e., list, so it returned all the elements assuming that context is list context. Next
we used the same array and tried to store this array in a scalar, so in this case it returned just the
number of elements in this array assuming that context is scalar context. Following table lists down
the various contexts −

Sr.No. Context & Description

1
Scalar
Assignment to a scalar variable evaluates the right-hand side in a scalar context.

2
List
Assignment to an array or a hash evaluates the right-hand side in a list context.

3
Boolean
Boolean context is simply any place where an expression is being evaluated to see
whether it's true or false.

4
Void
This context not only doesn't care what the return value is, it doesn't even want a return
value.

5
Interpolative
This context only happens inside quotes, or things that work like quotes.

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Perl - Scalars
A scalar is a single unit of data. That data might be an integer number, floating point, a character,
a string, a paragraph, or an entire web page.
Here is a simple example of using scalar variables −
Live Demo

#!/usr/bin/perl

$age = 25; # An integer assignment

$name = "John Paul"; # A string
$salary = 1445.50; # A floating point

print "Age = $age\n";

print "Name = $name\n";
print "Salary = $salary\n";
This will produce the following result −
Age = 25
Name = John Paul
Salary = 1445.5

Numeric Scalars
A scalar is most often either a number or a string. Following example demonstrates the usage of
various types of numeric scalars −
Live Demo

#!/usr/bin/perl

$integer = 200;
$negative = -300;
$floating = 200.340;
$bigfloat = -1.2E-23;

# 377 octal, same as 255 decimal

$octal = 0377;

# FF hex, also 255 decimal

$hexa = 0xff;

print "integer = $integer\n";

print "negative = $negative\n";
print "floating = $floating\n";
print "bigfloat = $bigfloat\n";
print "octal = $octal\n";
print "hexa = $hexa\n";
This will produce the following result −

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integer = 200
negative = -300
floating = 200.34
bigfloat = -1.2e-23
octal = 255
hexa = 255

String Scalars
Following example demonstrates the usage of various types of string scalars. Notice the difference
between single quoted strings and double quoted strings −
Live Demo

#!/usr/bin/perl

$var = "This is string scalar!";

$quote = 'I m inside single quote - $var';
$double = "This is inside single quote - $var";

$escape = "This example of escape -\tHello, World!";

print "var = $var\n";

print "quote = $quote\n";
print "double = $double\n";
print "escape = $escape\n";
This will produce the following result −
var = This is string scalar!
quote = I m inside single quote - $var
double = This is inside single quote - This is string scalar!
escape = This example of escape - Hello, World

Scalar Operations
You will see a detail of various operators available in Perl in a separate chapter, but here we are
going to list down few numeric and string operations.
Live Demo

#!/usr/bin/perl

$str = "hello" . "world"; # Concatenates strings.

$num = 5 + 10; # adds two numbers.
$mul = 4 * 5; # multiplies two numbers.
$mix = $str . $num; # concatenates string and number.

print "str = $str\n";

print "num = $num\n";
print "mul = $mul\n";
print "mix = $mix\n";
This will produce the following result −

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str = helloworld
num = 15
mul = 20
mix = helloworld15

Multiline Strings
If you want to introduce multiline strings into your programs, you can use the standard single quotes
as below −
Live Demo

#!/usr/bin/perl

$string = 'This is
a multiline
string';

print "$string\n";
This will produce the following result −
This is
a multiline
string
You can use "here" document syntax as well to store or print multilines as below −
Live Demo

#!/usr/bin/perl

print <<EOF;
This is
a multiline
string
EOF
This will also produce the same result −
This is
a multiline
string

V-Strings
A literal of the form v1.20.300.4000 is parsed as a string composed of characters with the specified
ordinals. This form is known as v-strings.
A v-string provides an alternative and more readable way to construct strings, rather than use the
somewhat less readable interpolation form "\x{1}\x{14}\x{12c}\x{fa0}".
They are any literal that begins with a v and is followed by one or more dot-separated elements.
For example −
Live Demo

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 Perl Tutorial for Beginners

#!/usr/bin/perl

$smile = v9786;
$foo = v102.111.111;
$martin = v77.97.114.116.105.110;

print "smile = $smile\n";

print "foo = $foo\n";
print "martin = $martin\n";
This will also produce the same result −
smile = ☺
foo = foo
martin = Martin
Wide character in print at main.pl line 7.

Special Literals
So far you must have a feeling about string scalars and its concatenation and interpolation opration.
So let me tell you about three special literals __FILE__, __LINE__, and __PACKAGE__ represent
the current filename, line number, and package name at that point in your program.
They may be used only as separate tokens and will not be interpolated into strings. Check the
below example −
Live Demo

#!/usr/bin/perl

print "File name ". __FILE__ . "\n";

print "Line Number " . __LINE__ ."\n";
print "Package " . __PACKAGE__ ."\n";

# they can not be interpolated

print "__FILE__ __LINE__ __PACKAGE__\n";
This will produce the following result −
File name hello.pl
Line Number 4
Package main
__FILE__ __LINE__ __PACKAGE__

Perl – Arrays
An array is a variable that stores an ordered list of scalar values. Array variables are preceded by
an "at" (@) sign. To refer to a single element of an array, you will use the dollar sign ($) with the
variable name followed by the index of the element in square brackets.
Here is a simple example of using the array variables −
Live Demo

#!/usr/bin/perl

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 Perl Tutorial for Beginners

@ages = (25, 30, 40);

@names = ("John Paul", "Lisa", "Kumar");

print "\$ages[0] = $ages[0]\n";

print "\$ages[1] = $ages[1]\n";
print "\$ages[2] = $ages[2]\n";
print "\$names[0] = $names[0]\n";
print "\$names[1] = $names[1]\n";
print "\$names[2] = $names[2]\n";
Here we have used the escape sign (\) before the $ sign just to print it. Other Perl will understand
it as a variable and will print its value. When executed, this will produce the following result −
$ages[0] = 25
$ages[1] = 30
$ages[2] = 40
$names[0] = John Paul
$names[1] = Lisa
$names[2] = Kumar
In Perl, List and Array terms are often used as if they're interchangeable. But the list is the data,
and the array is the variable.

Array Creation
Array variables are prefixed with the @ sign and are populated using either parentheses or the qw
operator. For example −
@array = (1, 2, 'Hello');
@array = qw/This is an array/;
The second line uses the qw// operator, which returns a list of strings, separating the delimited
string by white space. In this example, this leads to a four-element array; the first element is 'this'
and last (fourth) is 'array'. This means that you can use different lines as follows −
@days = qw/Monday
Tuesday
...
Sunday/;
You can also populate an array by assigning each value individually as follows −
$array[0] = 'Monday';
...
$array[6] = 'Sunday';

Accessing Array Elements

When accessing individual elements from an array, you must prefix the variable with a dollar sign
($) and then append the element index within the square brackets after the name of the variable.
For example −
Live Demo

#!/usr/bin/perl

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 Perl Tutorial for Beginners

@days = qw/Mon Tue Wed Thu Fri Sat Sun/;

print "$days[0]\n";
print "$days[1]\n";
print "$days[2]\n";
print "$days[6]\n";
print "$days[-1]\n";
print "$days[-7]\n";
This will produce the following result −
Mon
Tue
Wed
Sun
Sun
Mon
Array indices start from zero, so to access the first element you need to give 0 as indices. You can
also give a negative index, in which case you select the element from the end, rather than the
beginning, of the array. This means the following −
print $days[-1]; # outputs Sun
print $days[-7]; # outputs Mon

Sequential Number Arrays

Perl offers a shortcut for sequential numbers and letters. Rather than typing out each element when
counting to 100 for example, we can do something like as follows −
Live Demo

#!/usr/bin/perl

@var_10 = (1..10);
@var_20 = (10..20);
@var_abc = (a..z);

print "@var_10\n"; # Prints number from 1 to 10

print "@var_20\n"; # Prints number from 10 to 20
print "@var_abc\n"; # Prints number from a to z
Here double dot (..) is called range operator. This will produce the following result −
1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10
10 11 12 13 14 15 16 17 18 19 20
a b c d e f g h i j k l m n o p q r s t u v w x y z

Array Size
The size of an array can be determined using the scalar context on the array - the returned value
will be the number of elements in the array −
@array = (1,2,3);
print "Size: ",scalar @array,"\n";

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 Perl Tutorial for Beginners

The value returned will always be the physical size of the array, not the number of valid elements.
You can demonstrate this, and the difference between scalar @array and $#array, using this
fragment is as follows −
Live Demo

#!/usr/bin/perl

@array = (1,2,3);
$array[50] = 4;

$size = @array;
$max_index = $#array;

print "Size: $size\n";

print "Max Index: $max_index\n";
This will produce the following result −
Size: 51
Max Index: 50
There are only four elements in the array that contains information, but the array is 51 elements
long, with a highest index of 50.

Adding and Removing Elements in Array

Perl provides a number of useful functions to add and remove elements in an array. You may have
a question what is a function? So far you have used print function to print various values. Similarly
there are various other functions or sometime called sub-routines, which can be used for various
other functionalities.

Sr.No. Types & Description

1
push @ARRAY, LIST
Pushes the values of the list onto the end of the array.

2
pop @ARRAY
Pops off and returns the last value of the array.

3
shift @ARRAY
Shifts the first value of the array off and returns it, shortening the array by 1 and moving
everything down.

4
unshift @ARRAY, LIST
Prepends list to the front of the array, and returns the number of elements in the new
array.

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 Perl Tutorial for Beginners

Live Demo

#!/usr/bin/perl

# create a simple array

@coins = ("Quarter","Dime","Nickel");
print "1. \@coins = @coins\n";

# add one element at the end of the array

push(@coins, "Penny");
print "2. \@coins = @coins\n";

# add one element at the beginning of the array

unshift(@coins, "Dollar");
print "3. \@coins = @coins\n";

# remove one element from the last of the array.

pop(@coins);
print "4. \@coins = @coins\n";

# remove one element from the beginning of the array.

shift(@coins);
print "5. \@coins = @coins\n";
This will produce the following result −
1. @coins = Quarter Dime Nickel
2. @coins = Quarter Dime Nickel Penny
3. @coins = Dollar Quarter Dime Nickel Penny
4. @coins = Dollar Quarter Dime Nickel
5. @coins = Quarter Dime Nickel

Slicing Array Elements

You can also extract a "slice" from an array - that is, you can select more than one item from an
array in order to produce another array.
Live Demo

#!/usr/bin/perl

@days = qw/Mon Tue Wed Thu Fri Sat Sun/;

@weekdays = @days[3,4,5];

print "@weekdays\n";
This will produce the following result −
Thu Fri Sat
The specification for a slice must have a list of valid indices, either positive or negative, each
separated by a comma. For speed, you can also use the .. range operator −
Live Demo

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 Perl Tutorial for Beginners

#!/usr/bin/perl

@days = qw/Mon Tue Wed Thu Fri Sat Sun/;

@weekdays = @days[3..5];

print "@weekdays\n";
This will produce the following result −
Thu Fri Sat

Replacing Array Elements

Now we are going to introduce one more function called splice(), which has the following syntax −
splice @ARRAY, OFFSET [ , LENGTH [ , LIST ] ]
This function will remove the elements of @ARRAY designated by OFFSET and LENGTH, and
replaces them with LIST, if specified. Finally, it returns the elements removed from the array.
Following is the example −
Live Demo

#!/usr/bin/perl

@nums = (1..20);
print "Before - @nums\n";

splice(@nums, 5, 5, 21..25);
print "After - @nums\n";
This will produce the following result −
Before - 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 11 12 13 14 15 16 17 18 19 20
After - 1 2 3 4 5 21 22 23 24 25 11 12 13 14 15 16 17 18 19 20
Here, the actual replacement begins with the 6th number after that five elements are then replaced
from 6 to 10 with the numbers 21, 22, 23, 24 and 25.

Transform Strings to Arrays

Let's look into one more function called split(), which has the following syntax −
split [ PATTERN [ , EXPR [ , LIMIT ] ] ]
This function splits a string into an array of strings, and returns it. If LIMIT is specified, splits into at
most that number of fields. If PATTERN is omitted, splits on whitespace. Following is the example
−
Live Demo

#!/usr/bin/perl

# define Strings
$var_string = "Rain-Drops-On-Roses-And-Whiskers-On-Kittens";
$var_names = "Larry,David,Roger,Ken,Michael,Tom";

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 Perl Tutorial for Beginners

# transform above strings into arrays.

@string = split('-', $var_string);
@names = split(',', $var_names);

print "$string[3]\n"; # This will print Roses

print "$names[4]\n"; # This will print Michael
This will produce the following result −
Roses
Michael

Transform Arrays to Strings

We can use the join() function to rejoin the array elements and form one long scalar string. This
function has the following syntax −
join EXPR, LIST
This function joins the separate strings of LIST into a single string with fields separated by the value
of EXPR, and returns the string. Following is the example −
Live Demo

#!/usr/bin/perl

# define Strings
$var_string = "Rain-Drops-On-Roses-And-Whiskers-On-Kittens";
$var_names = "Larry,David,Roger,Ken,Michael,Tom";

# transform above strings into arrays.

@string = split('-', $var_string);
@names = split(',', $var_names);

$string1 = join( '-', @string );

$string2 = join( ',', @names );

print "$string1\n";
print "$string2\n";
This will produce the following result −
Rain-Drops-On-Roses-And-Whiskers-On-Kittens
Larry,David,Roger,Ken,Michael,Tom

Sorting Arrays
The sort() function sorts each element of an array according to the ASCII Numeric standards. This
function has the following syntax −
sort [ SUBROUTINE ] LIST
This function sorts the LIST and returns the sorted array value. If SUBROUTINE is specified then
specified logic inside the SUBTROUTINE is applied while sorting the elements.
Live Demo
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 Perl Tutorial for Beginners

#!/usr/bin/perl

# define an array
@foods = qw(pizza steak chicken burgers);
print "Before: @foods\n";

# sort this array

@foods = sort(@foods);
print "After: @foods\n";
This will produce the following result −
Before: pizza steak chicken burgers
After: burgers chicken pizza steak
Please note that sorting is performed based on ASCII Numeric value of the words. So the best
option is to first transform every element of the array into lowercase letters and then perform the
sort function.

The $[ Special Variable

So far you have seen simple variable we defined in our programs and used them to store and print
scalar and array values. Perl provides numerous special variables, which have their predefined
meaning.
We have a special variable, which is written as $[. This special variable is a scalar containing the
first index of all arrays. Because Perl arrays have zero-based indexing, $[ will almost always be 0.
But if you set $[ to 1 then all your arrays will use on-based indexing. It is recommended not to use
any other indexing other than zero. However, let's take one example to show the usage of $[
variable −
Live Demo

#!/usr/bin/perl

# define an array
@foods = qw(pizza steak chicken burgers);
print "Foods: @foods\n";

# Let's reset first index of all the arrays.

$[ = 1;

print "Food at \@foods[1]: $foods[1]\n";

print "Food at \@foods[2]: $foods[2]\n";
This will produce the following result −
Foods: pizza steak chicken burgers
Food at @foods[1]: pizza
Food at @foods[2]: steak

Merging Arrays
Because an array is just a comma-separated sequence of values, you can combine them together
as shown below −

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 Perl Tutorial for Beginners

Live Demo

#!/usr/bin/perl

@numbers = (1,3,(4,5,6));

print "numbers = @numbers\n";

This will produce the following result −
numbers = 1 3 4 5 6
The embedded arrays just become a part of the main array as shown below −
Live Demo

#!/usr/bin/perl

@odd = (1,3,5);
@even = (2, 4, 6);

@numbers = (@odd, @even);

print "numbers = @numbers\n";

This will produce the following result −
numbers = 1 3 5 2 4 6

Selecting Elements from Lists

The list notation is identical to that for arrays. You can extract an element from an array by
appending square brackets to the list and giving one or more indices −
Live Demo

#!/usr/bin/perl

$var = (5,4,3,2,1)[4];

print "value of var = $var\n"

This will produce the following result −
value of var = 1
Similarly, we can extract slices, although without the requirement for a leading @ character −
Live Demo

#!/usr/bin/perl

@list = (5,4,3,2,1)[1..3];

print "Value of list = @list\n";

This will produce the following result −
Value of list = 4 3 2
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 Perl Tutorial for Beginners

Perl - Hashes
A hash is a set of key/value pairs. Hash variables are preceded by a percent (%) sign. To refer to
a single element of a hash, you will use the hash variable name preceded by a "$" sign and followed
by the "key" associated with the value in curly brackets..
Here is a simple example of using the hash variables −
Live Demo

#!/usr/bin/perl

%data = ('John Paul', 45, 'Lisa', 30, 'Kumar', 40);

print "\$data{'John Paul'} = $data{'John Paul'}\n";

print "\$data{'Lisa'} = $data{'Lisa'}\n";
print "\$data{'Kumar'} = $data{'Kumar'}\n";
This will produce the following result −
$data{'John Paul'} = 45
$data{'Lisa'} = 30
$data{'Kumar'} = 40

Creating Hashes
Hashes are created in one of the two following ways. In the first method, you assign a value to a
named key on a one-by-one basis −
$data{'John Paul'} = 45;
$data{'Lisa'} = 30;
$data{'Kumar'} = 40;
In the second case, you use a list, which is converted by taking individual pairs from the list: the
first element of the pair is used as the key, and the second, as the value. For example −
%data = ('John Paul', 45, 'Lisa', 30, 'Kumar', 40);
For clarity, you can use => as an alias for , to indicate the key/value pairs as follows −
%data = ('John Paul' => 45, 'Lisa' => 30, 'Kumar' => 40);
Here is one more variant of the above form, have a look at it, here all the keys have been preceded
by hyphen (-) and no quotation is required around them −
%data = (-JohnPaul => 45, -Lisa => 30, -Kumar => 40);
But it is important to note that there is a single word, i.e., without spaces keys have been used in
this form of hash formation and if you build-up your hash this way then keys will be accessed using
hyphen only as shown below.
$val = %data{-JohnPaul}
$val = %data{-Lisa}

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 Perl Tutorial for Beginners

Accessing Hash Elements

When accessing individual elements from a hash, you must prefix the variable with a dollar sign ($)
and then append the element key within curly brackets after the name of the variable. For example
−
Live Demo

#!/usr/bin/perl

%data = ('John Paul' => 45, 'Lisa' => 30, 'Kumar' => 40);

print "$data{'John Paul'}\n";

print "$data{'Lisa'}\n";
print "$data{'Kumar'}\n";
This will produce the following result −
45
30
40

Extracting Slices
You can extract slices of a hash just as you can extract slices from an array. You will need to use
@ prefix for the variable to store the returned value because they will be a list of values −
Live Demo

#!/uer/bin/perl

%data = (-JohnPaul => 45, -Lisa => 30, -Kumar => 40);

@array = @data{-JohnPaul, -Lisa};

print "Array : @array\n";

This will produce the following result −
Array : 45 30

Extracting Keys and Values

You can get a list of all of the keys from a hash by using keys function, which has the following
syntax −
keys %HASH
This function returns an array of all the keys of the named hash. Following is the example −
Live Demo

#!/usr/bin/perl

%data = ('John Paul' => 45, 'Lisa' => 30, 'Kumar' => 40);
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 Perl Tutorial for Beginners

@names = keys %data;

print "$names[0]\n";
print "$names[1]\n";
print "$names[2]\n";
This will produce the following result −
Lisa
John Paul
Kumar
Similarly, you can use values function to get a list of all the values. This function has the following
syntax −
values %HASH
This function returns a normal array consisting of all the values of the named hash. Following is the
example −
Live Demo

#!/usr/bin/perl

%data = ('John Paul' => 45, 'Lisa' => 30, 'Kumar' => 40);

@ages = values %data;

print "$ages[0]\n";
print "$ages[1]\n";
print "$ages[2]\n";
This will produce the following result −
30
45
40

Checking for Existence

If you try to access a key/value pair from a hash that doesn't exist, you'll normally get
the undefined value, and if you have warnings switched on, then you'll get a warning generated at
run time. You can get around this by using the exists function, which returns true if the named key
exists, irrespective of what its value might be −
Live Demo

#!/usr/bin/perl

%data = ('John Paul' => 45, 'Lisa' => 30, 'Kumar' => 40);

if( exists($data{'Lisa'} ) ) {
print "Lisa is $data{'Lisa'} years old\n";
} else {
print "I don't know age of Lisa\n";
}
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Here we have introduced the IF...ELSE statement, which we will study in a separate chapter. For
now you just assume that if( condition ) part will be executed only when the given condition is true
otherwise else part will be executed. So when we execute the above program, it produces the
following result because here the given condition exists($data{'Lisa'}returns true −
Lisa is 30 years old

Getting Hash Size

You can get the size - that is, the number of elements from a hash by using the scalar context on
either keys or values. Simply saying first you have to get an array of either the keys or values and
then you can get the size of array as follows −
Live Demo

#!/usr/bin/perl

%data = ('John Paul' => 45, 'Lisa' => 30, 'Kumar' => 40);

@keys = keys %data;

$size = @keys;
print "1 - Hash size: is $size\n";

@values = values %data;

$size = @values;
print "2 - Hash size: is $size\n";
This will produce the following result −
1 - Hash size: is 3
2 - Hash size: is 3

Add and Remove Elements in Hashes

Adding a new key/value pair can be done with one line of code using simple assignment operator.
But to remove an element from the hash you need to use delete function as shown below in the
example −
Live Demo

#!/usr/bin/perl

%data = ('John Paul' => 45, 'Lisa' => 30, 'Kumar' => 40);
@keys = keys %data;
$size = @keys;
print "1 - Hash size: is $size\n";

# adding an element to the hash;

$data{'Ali'} = 55;
@keys = keys %data;
$size = @keys;
print "2 - Hash size: is $size\n";

# delete the same element from the hash;

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 Perl Tutorial for Beginners

delete $data{'Ali'};
@keys = keys %data;
$size = @keys;
print "3 - Hash size: is $size\n";
This will produce the following result −
1 - Hash size: is 3
2 - Hash size: is 4
3 - Hash size: is 3

Perl Conditional Statements - IF...ELSE

Perl conditional statements helps in the decision making, which require that the programmer
specifies one or more conditions to be evaluated or tested by the program, along with a statement
or statements to be executed if the condition is determined to be true, and optionally, other
statements to be executed if the condition is determined to be false.
Following is the general from of a typical decision making structure found in most of the
programming languages −

The number 0, the strings '0' and "" , the empty list () , and undef are all false in a boolean context
and all other values are true. Negation of a true value by ! or not returns a special false value.
Perl programming language provides the following types of conditional statements.

Sr.No. Statement & Description

1 if statement

An if statement consists of a boolean expression followed by one or more statements.

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 Perl Tutorial for Beginners

2 if...else statement
An if statement can be followed by an optional else statement.

3 if...elsif...else statement
An if statement can be followed by an optional elsif statement and then by an
optional else statement.

4 unless statement
An unless statement consists of a boolean expression followed by one or more
statements.

5 unless...else statement
An unless statement can be followed by an optional else statement.

6 unless...elsif..else statement
An unless statement can be followed by an optional elsif statement and then by an
optional else statement.

7 switch statement
With the latest versions of Perl, you can make use of the switch statement. which allows
a simple way of comparing a variable value against various conditions.

The ? : Operator
Let's check the conditional operator ? :which can be used to replace if...else statements. It has
the following general form −
Exp1 ? Exp2 : Exp3;
Where Exp1, Exp2, and Exp3 are expressions. Notice the use and placement of the colon.
The value of a ? expression is determined like this: Exp1 is evaluated. If it is true, then Exp2 is
evaluated and becomes the value of the entire ? expression. If Exp1 is false, then Exp3 is evaluated
and its value becomes the value of the expression. Below is a simple example making use of this
operator −
Live Demo

#!/usr/local/bin/perl

$name = "Ali";
$age = 10;

$status = ($age > 60 )? "A senior citizen" : "Not a senior citizen";

print "$name is - $status\n";

This will produce the following result −
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 Perl Tutorial for Beginners

Ali is - Not a senior citizen

Perl - Loops
There may be a situation when you need to execute a block of code several number of times. In
general, statements are executed sequentially: The first statement in a function is executed first,
followed by the second, and so on.
Programming languages provide various control structures that allow for more complicated
execution paths.
A loop statement allows us to execute a statement or group of statements multiple times and
following is the general form of a loop statement in most of the programming languages −

Perl programming language provides the following types of loop to handle the looping
requirements.

Sr.No. Loop Type & Description

1 while loop

Repeats a statement or group of statements while a given condition is true. It tests the
condition before executing the loop body.

2 until loop
Repeats a statement or group of statements until a given condition becomes true. It tests
the condition before executing the loop body.

3 for loop

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 Perl Tutorial for Beginners

Executes a sequence of statements multiple times and abbreviates the code that
manages the loop variable.

4 foreach loop
The foreach loop iterates over a normal list value and sets the variable VAR to be each
element of the list in turn.

5 do...while loop
Like a while statement, except that it tests the condition at the end of the loop body

6 nested loops
You can use one or more loop inside any another while, for or do..while loop.

Loop Control Statements

Loop control statements change the execution from its normal sequence. When execution leaves
a scope, all automatic objects that were created in that scope are destroyed.
Perl supports the following control statements. Click the following links to check their detail.

Sr.No. Control Statement & Description

1 next statement

Causes the loop to skip the remainder of its body and immediately retest its condition prior
to reiterating.

2 last statement
Terminates the loop statement and transfers execution to the statement immediately
following the loop.

3 continue statement
A continue BLOCK, it is always executed just before the conditional is about to be
evaluated again.

4 redo statement
The redo command restarts the loop block without evaluating the conditional again. The
continue block, if any, is not executed.

5 goto statement

Perl supports a goto command with three forms: goto label, goto expr, and goto &name.

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 Perl Tutorial for Beginners

The Infinite Loop

A loop becomes infinite loop if a condition never becomes false. The for loop is traditionally used
for this purpose. Since none of the three expressions that form the for loop are required, you can
make an endless loop by leaving the conditional expression empty.
#!/usr/local/bin/perl

for( ; ; ) {
printf "This loop will run forever.\n";
}
You can terminate the above infinite loop by pressing the Ctrl + C keys.
When the conditional expression is absent, it is assumed to be true. You may have an initialization
and increment expression, but as a programmer more commonly use the for (;;) construct to signify
an infinite loop.

Perl - Operators
What is an Operator?
Simple answer can be given using the expression 4 + 5 is equal to 9. Here 4 and 5 are called
operands and + is called operator. Perl language supports many operator types, but following is a
list of important and most frequently used operators −

• Arithmetic Operators
• Equality Operators
• Logical Operators
• Assignment Operators
• Bitwise Operators
• Logical Operators
• Quote-like Operators
• Miscellaneous Operators
Lets have a look at all the operators one by one.

Perl Arithmetic Operators

Assume variable $a holds 10 and variable $b holds 20, then following are the Perl arithmatic
operators −
Show Example

Sr.No. Operator & Description

1
+ ( Addition )
Adds values on either side of the operator
Example − $a + $b will give 30

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 Perl Tutorial for Beginners

2
- (Subtraction)
Subtracts right hand operand from left hand operand
Example − $a - $b will give -10

3
* (Multiplication)
Multiplies values on either side of the operator
Example − $a * $b will give 200

4
/ (Division)
Divides left hand operand by right hand operand
Example − $b / $a will give 2

5
% (Modulus)
Divides left hand operand by right hand operand and returns remainder
Example − $b % $a will give 0

6
** (Exponent)
Performs exponential (power) calculation on operators
Example − $a**$b will give 10 to the power 20

Perl Equality Operators

These are also called relational operators. Assume variable $a holds 10 and variable $b holds 20
then, lets check the following numeric equality operators −
Show Example

Sr.No. Operator & Description

1
== (equal to)
Checks if the value of two operands are equal or not, if yes then condition becomes true.
Example − ($a == $b) is not true.

2
!= (not equal to)
Checks if the value of two operands are equal or not, if values are not equal then condition
becomes true.
Example − ($a != $b) is true.

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 Perl Tutorial for Beginners

3
<=>
Checks if the value of two operands are equal or not, and returns -1, 0, or 1 depending on
whether the left argument is numerically less than, equal to, or greater than the right
argument.
Example − ($a <=> $b) returns -1.

4
> (greater than)
Checks if the value of left operand is greater than the value of right operand, if yes then
condition becomes true.
Example − ($a > $b) is not true.

5
< (less than)
Checks if the value of left operand is less than the value of right operand, if yes then
condition becomes true.
Example − ($a < $b) is true.

6
>= (greater than or equal to)
Checks if the value of left operand is greater than or equal to the value of right operand,
if yes then condition becomes true.
Example − ($a >= $b) is not true.

7
<= (less than or equal to)
Checks if the value of left operand is less than or equal to the value of right operand, if
yes then condition becomes true.
Example − ($a <= $b) is true.

Below is a list of equity operators. Assume variable $a holds "abc" and variable $b holds "xyz" then,
lets check the following string equality operators −
Show Example

Sr.No. Operator & Description

1
lt
Returns true if the left argument is stringwise less than the right argument.
Example − ($a lt $b) is true.

2
gt
Returns true if the left argument is stringwise greater than the right argument.
Example − ($a gt $b) is false.

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 Perl Tutorial for Beginners

3
le
Returns true if the left argument is stringwise less than or equal to the right argument.
Example − ($a le $b) is true.

4
ge
Returns true if the left argument is stringwise greater than or equal to the right argument.
Example − ($a ge $b) is false.

5
eq
Returns true if the left argument is stringwise equal to the right argument.
Example − ($a eq $b) is false.

6
ne
Returns true if the left argument is stringwise not equal to the right argument.
Example − ($a ne $b) is true.

7
cmp
Returns -1, 0, or 1 depending on whether the left argument is stringwise less than, equal
to, or greater than the right argument.
Example − ($a cmp $b) is -1.

Perl Assignment Operators

Assume variable $a holds 10 and variable $b holds 20, then below are the assignment operators
available in Perl and their usage −
Show Example

Sr.No. Operator & Description

1
=
Simple assignment operator, Assigns values from right side operands to left side operand
Example − $c = $a + $b will assigned value of $a + $b into $c

2
+=
Add AND assignment operator, It adds right operand to the left operand and assign the
result to left operand
Example − $c += $a is equivalent to $c = $c + $a

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 Perl Tutorial for Beginners

3
-=
Subtract AND assignment operator, It subtracts right operand from the left operand and
assign the result to left operand
Example − $c -= $a is equivalent to $c = $c - $a

4
*=
Multiply AND assignment operator, It multiplies right operand with the left operand and
assign the result to left operand
Example − $c *= $a is equivalent to $c = $c * $a

5
/=
Divide AND assignment operator, It divides left operand with the right operand and assign
the result to left operand
Example − $c /= $a is equivalent to $c = $c / $a

6
%=
Modulus AND assignment operator, It takes modulus using two operands and assign the
result to left operand
Example − $c %= $a is equivalent to $c = $c % a

7
**=
Exponent AND assignment operator, Performs exponential (power) calculation on
operators and assign value to the left operand
Example − $c **= $a is equivalent to $c = $c ** $a

Perl Bitwise Operators

Bitwise operator works on bits and perform bit by bit operation. Assume if $a = 60; and $b = 13;
Now in binary format they will be as follows −
$a = 0011 1100
$b = 0000 1101
-----------------
$a&$b = 0000 1100
$a|$b = 0011 1101
$a^$b = 0011 0001
~$a = 1100 0011
There are following Bitwise operators supported by Perl language, assume if $a = 60; and $b = 13
Show Example
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 Perl Tutorial for Beginners

Sr.No. Operator & Description

1
&
Binary AND Operator copies a bit to the result if it exists in both operands.
Example − ($a & $b) will give 12 which is 0000 1100

2
|
Binary OR Operator copies a bit if it exists in eather operand.
Example − ($a | $b) will give 61 which is 0011 1101

3
^
Binary XOR Operator copies the bit if it is set in one operand but not both.
Example − ($a ^ $b) will give 49 which is 0011 0001

4
~
Binary Ones Complement Operator is unary and has the efect of 'flipping' bits.
Example − (~$a ) will give -61 which is 1100 0011 in 2's complement form due to a signed
binary number.

5
<<
Binary Left Shift Operator. The left operands value is moved left by the number of bits
specified by the right operand.
Example − $a << 2 will give 240 which is 1111 0000

6
>>
Binary Right Shift Operator. The left operands value is moved right by the number of bits
specified by the right operand.
Example − $a >> 2 will give 15 which is 0000 1111

Perl Logical Operators

There are following logical operators supported by Perl language. Assume variable $a holds true
and variable $b holds false then −
Show Example

Sr.No. Operator & Description

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 Perl Tutorial for Beginners

1
and
Called Logical AND operator. If both the operands are true then then condition becomes
true.
Example − ($a and $b) is false.

2
&&
C-style Logical AND operator copies a bit to the result if it exists in both operands.
Example − ($a && $b) is false.

3
or
Called Logical OR Operator. If any of the two operands are non zero then then condition
becomes true.
Example − ($a or $b) is true.

4
||
C-style Logical OR operator copies a bit if it exists in eather operand.
Example − ($a || $b) is true.

5
not
Called Logical NOT Operator. Use to reverses the logical state of its operand. If a
condition is true then Logical NOT operator will make false.
Example − not($a and $b) is true.

Quote-like Operators
There are following Quote-like operators supported by Perl language. In the following table, a {}
represents any pair of delimiters you choose.
Show Example

Sr.No. Operator & Description

1
q{ }
Encloses a string with-in single quotes
Example − q{abcd} gives 'abcd'

2
qq{ }
Encloses a string with-in double quotes

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 Perl Tutorial for Beginners

Example − qq{abcd} gives "abcd"

3
qx{ }
Encloses a string with-in invert quotes
Example − qx{abcd} gives `abcd`

Miscellaneous Operators
There are following miscellaneous operators supported by Perl language. Assume variable a holds
10 and variable b holds 20 then −
Show Example

Sr.No. Operator & Description

1
.
Binary operator dot (.) concatenates two strings.
Example − If $a = "abc", $b = "def" then $a.$b will give "abcdef"

2
x
The repetition operator x returns a string consisting of the left operand repeated the
number of times specified by the right operand.
Example − ('-' x 3) will give ---.

3
..
The range operator .. returns a list of values counting (up by ones) from the left value to
the right value
Example − (2..5) will give (2, 3, 4, 5)

4
++
Auto Increment operator increases integer value by one
Example − $a++ will give 11

5
--
Auto Decrement operator decreases integer value by one
Example − $a-- will give 9

6
->

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 Perl Tutorial for Beginners

The arrow operator is mostly used in dereferencing a method or variable from an object
or a class name
Example − $obj->$a is an example to access variable $a from object $obj.

Perl Operators Precedence

The following table lists all operators from highest precedence to lowest.
Show Example
left terms and list operators (leftward)
left ->
nonassoc ++ --
right **
right ! ~ \ and unary + and -
left =~ !~
left * / % x
left + - .
left << >>
nonassoc named unary operators
nonassoc < > <= >= lt gt le ge
nonassoc == != <=> eq ne cmp ~~
left &
left | ^
left &&
left || //
nonassoc .. ...
right ?:
right = += -= *= etc.
left , =>
nonassoc list operators (rightward)
right not
left and
left or xor

Perl - Date and Time

This chapter will give you the basic understanding on how to process and manipulate dates and
times in Perl.

Current Date and Time

Let's start with localtime() function, which returns values for the current date and time if given no
arguments. Following is the 9-element list returned by the localtime function while using in list
context −
sec, # seconds of minutes from 0 to 61
min, # minutes of hour from 0 to 59
hour, # hours of day from 0 to 24
mday, # day of month from 1 to 31
mon, # month of year from 0 to 11

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 Perl Tutorial for Beginners

year, # year since 1900

wday, # days since sunday
yday, # days since January 1st
isdst # hours of daylight savings time
Try the following example to print different elements returned by localtime() function −
Live Demo

#!/usr/local/bin/perl

@months = qw( Jan Feb Mar Apr May Jun Jul Aug Sep Oct Nov Dec );
@days = qw(Sun Mon Tue Wed Thu Fri Sat Sun);

($sec,$min,$hour,$mday,$mon,$year,$wday,$yday,$isdst) = localtime();
print "$mday $months[$mon] $days[$wday]\n";
When the above code is executed, it produces the following result −
16 Feb Sat
If you will use localtime() function in scalar context, then it will return date and time from the current
time zone set in the system. Try the following example to print current date and time in full format
−
Live Demo

#!/usr/local/bin/perl

$datestring = localtime();
print "Local date and time $datestring\n";
When the above code is executed, it produces the following result −
Local date and time Sat Feb 16 06:50:45 2013

GMT Time
The function gmtime() works just like localtime() function but the returned values are localized for
the standard Greenwich time zone. When called in list context, $isdst, the last value returned by
gmtime, is always 0. There is no Daylight Saving Time in GMT.
You should make a note on the fact that localtime() will return the current local time on the machine
that runs the script and gmtime() will return the universal Greenwich Mean Time, or GMT (or UTC).
Try the following example to print the current date and time but on GMT scale −
Live Demo

#!/usr/local/bin/perl

$datestring = gmtime();
print "GMT date and time $datestring\n";
When the above code is executed, it produces the following result −
GMT date and time Sat Feb 16 13:50:45 2013

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Format Date and Time

You can use localtime() function to get a list of 9-elements and later you can use the printf()function
to format date and time based on your requirements as follows −
Live Demo

#!/usr/local/bin/perl

($sec,$min,$hour,$mday,$mon,$year,$wday,$yday,$isdst) = localtime();

printf("Time Format - HH:MM:SS\n");

printf("%02d:%02d:%02d", $hour, $min, $sec);
When the above code is executed, it produces the following result −
Time Format - HH:MM:SS
06:58:52

Epoch time
You can use the time() function to get epoch time, i.e., the numbers of seconds that have elapsed
since a given date, in Unix is January 1, 1970.
Live Demo

#!/usr/local/bin/perl

$epoc = time();

print "Number of seconds since Jan 1, 1970 - $epoc\n";

When the above code is executed, it produces the following result −
Number of seconds since Jan 1, 1970 - 1361022130
You can convert a given number of seconds into date and time string as follows −
Live Demo

#!/usr/local/bin/perl

$datestring = localtime();
print "Current date and time $datestring\n";

$epoc = time();
$epoc = $epoc - 24 * 60 * 60; # one day before of current date.

$datestring = localtime($epoc);
print "Yesterday's date and time $datestring\n";
When the above code is executed, it produces the following result −
Current date and time Tue Jun 5 05:54:43 2018
Yesterday's date and time Mon Jun 4 05:54:43 2018

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POSIX Function strftime()

You can use the POSIX function strftime() to format date and time with the help of the following
table. Please note that the specifiers marked with an asterisk (*) are locale-dependent.

Specifier Replaced by Example

%a Abbreviated weekday name * Thu

%A Full weekday name * Thursday

%b Abbreviated month name * Aug

%B Full month name * August

%c Date and time representation * Thu Aug 23 14:55:02

2001

%C Year divided by 100 and truncated to integer (00-99) 20

%d Day of the month, zero-padded (01-31) 23

%D Short MM/DD/YY date, equivalent to %m/%d/%y 08/23/01

%e Day of the month, space-padded ( 1-31) 23

%F Short YYYY-MM-DD date, equivalent to %Y-%m-%d 2001-08-23

%g Week-based year, last two digits (00-99) 01

%G Week-based year 2001

%h Abbreviated month name * (same as %b) Aug

%H Hour in 24h format (00-23) 14

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 Perl Tutorial for Beginners

%I Hour in 12h format (01-12) 02

%j Day of the year (001-366) 235

%m Month as a decimal number (01-12) 08

%M Minute (00-59) 55

%n New-line character ('\n')

%p AM or PM designation PM

%r 12-hour clock time * 02:55:02 pm

%R 24-hour HH:MM time, equivalent to %H:%M 14:55

%S Second (00-61) 02

%t Horizontal-tab character ('\t')

%T ISO 8601 time format (HH:MM:SS), equivalent 14:55

to %H:%M:%S

%u ISO 8601 weekday as number with Monday as 1 (1-7) 4

%U Week number with the first Sunday as the first day of 33

week one (00-53)

%V ISO 8601 week number (00-53) 34

%w Weekday as a decimal number with Sunday as 0 (0-6) 4

%W Week number with the first Monday as the first day of 34

week one (00-53)

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 Perl Tutorial for Beginners

%x Date representation * 08/23/01

%X Time representation * 14:55:02

%y Year, last two digits (00-99) 01

%Y Year 2001

%z +100
ISO 8601 offset from UTC in timezone (1 minute = 1, 1
hour = 100)
If timezone cannot be termined, no characters

%Z CDT
Timezone name or abbreviation *
If timezone cannot be termined, no characters

%% A % sign %

Let's check the following example to understand the usage −

Live Demo

#!/usr/local/bin/perl
use POSIX qw(strftime);

$datestring = strftime "%a %b %e %H:%M:%S %Y", localtime;

printf("date and time - $datestring\n");

# or for GMT formatted appropriately for your locale:

$datestring = strftime "%a %b %e %H:%M:%S %Y", gmtime;
printf("date and time - $datestring\n");
When the above code is executed, it produces the following result −
date and time - Sat Feb 16 07:10:23 2013
date and time - Sat Feb 16 14:10:23 2013

Perl - Subroutines
A Perl subroutine or function is a group of statements that together performs a task. You can divide
up your code into separate subroutines. How you divide up your code among different subroutines
is up to you, but logically the division usually is so each function performs a specific task.
Perl uses the terms subroutine, method and function interchangeably.

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 Perl Tutorial for Beginners

Define and Call a Subroutine

The general form of a subroutine definition in Perl programming language is as follows −
sub subroutine_name {
body of the subroutine
}
The typical way of calling that Perl subroutine is as follows −
subroutine_name( list of arguments );
In versions of Perl before 5.0, the syntax for calling subroutines was slightly different as shown
below. This still works in the newest versions of Perl, but it is not recommended since it bypasses
the subroutine prototypes.
&subroutine_name( list of arguments );
Let's have a look into the following example, which defines a simple function and then call it.
Because Perl compiles your program before executing it, it doesn't matter where you declare your
subroutine.
Live Demo

#!/usr/bin/perl

# Function definition
sub Hello {
print "Hello, World!\n";
}

# Function call
Hello();
When above program is executed, it produces the following result −
Hello, World!

Passing Arguments to a Subroutine

You can pass various arguments to a subroutine like you do in any other programming language
and they can be acessed inside the function using the special array @_. Thus the first argument to
the function is in $_[0], the second is in $_[1], and so on.
You can pass arrays and hashes as arguments like any scalar but passing more than one array or
hash normally causes them to lose their separate identities. So we will use references ( explained
in the next chapter ) to pass any array or hash.
Let's try the following example, which takes a list of numbers and then prints their average −
Live Demo

#!/usr/bin/perl

# Function definition
sub Average {
# get total number of arguments passed.
$n = scalar(@_);
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 Perl Tutorial for Beginners

$sum = 0;

foreach $item (@_) {

$sum += $item;
}
$average = $sum / $n;

print "Average for the given numbers : $average\n";

}

# Function call
Average(10, 20, 30);
When above program is executed, it produces the following result −
Average for the given numbers : 20

Passing Lists to Subroutines

Because the @_ variable is an array, it can be used to supply lists to a subroutine. However,
because of the way in which Perl accepts and parses lists and arrays, it can be difficult to extract
the individual elements from @_. If you have to pass a list along with other scalar arguments, then
make list as the last argument as shown below −
Live Demo

#!/usr/bin/perl

# Function definition
sub PrintList {
my @list = @_;
print "Given list is @list\n";
}
$a = 10;
@b = (1, 2, 3, 4);

# Function call with list parameter

PrintList($a, @b);
When above program is executed, it produces the following result −
Given list is 10 1 2 3 4

Passing Hashes to Subroutines

When you supply a hash to a subroutine or operator that accepts a list, then hash is automatically
translated into a list of key/value pairs. For example −
Live Demo

#!/usr/bin/perl

# Function definition
sub PrintHash {
my (%hash) = @_;
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 Perl Tutorial for Beginners

foreach my $key ( keys %hash ) {

my $value = $hash{$key};
print "$key : $value\n";
}
}
%hash = ('name' => 'Tom', 'age' => 19);

# Function call with hash parameter

PrintHash(%hash);
When above program is executed, it produces the following result −
name : Tom
age : 19

Returning Value from a Subroutine

You can return a value from subroutine like you do in any other programming language. If you are
not returning a value from a subroutine then whatever calculation is last performed in a subroutine
is automatically also the return value.
You can return arrays and hashes from the subroutine like any scalar but returning more than one
array or hash normally causes them to lose their separate identities. So we will use references (
explained in the next chapter ) to return any array or hash from a function.
Let's try the following example, which takes a list of numbers and then returns their average −
Live Demo

#!/usr/bin/perl

# Function definition
sub Average {
# get total number of arguments passed.
$n = scalar(@_);
$sum = 0;

foreach $item (@_) {

$sum += $item;
}
$average = $sum / $n;

return $average;
}

# Function call
$num = Average(10, 20, 30);
print "Average for the given numbers : $num\n";
When above program is executed, it produces the following result −
Average for the given numbers : 20

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Private Variables in a Subroutine

By default, all variables in Perl are global variables, which means they can be accessed from
anywhere in the program. But you can create private variables called lexical variables at any time
with the my operator.
The my operator confines a variable to a particular region of code in which it can be used and
accessed. Outside that region, this variable cannot be used or accessed. This region is called its
scope. A lexical scope is usually a block of code with a set of braces around it, such as those
defining the body of the subroutine or those marking the code blocks of if, while, for,
foreach, and eval statements.
Following is an example showing you how to define a single or multiple private variables
using my operator −
sub somefunc {
my $variable; # $variable is invisible outside somefunc()
my ($another, @an_array, %a_hash); # declaring many variables at once
}
Let's check the following example to distinguish between global and private variables −
Live Demo

#!/usr/bin/perl

# Global variable
$string = "Hello, World!";

# Function definition
sub PrintHello {
# Private variable for PrintHello function
my $string;
$string = "Hello, Perl!";
print "Inside the function $string\n";
}
# Function call
PrintHello();
print "Outside the function $string\n";
When above program is executed, it produces the following result −
Inside the function Hello, Perl!
Outside the function Hello, World!

Temporary Values via local()

The local is mostly used when the current value of a variable must be visible to called subroutines.
A local just gives temporary values to global (meaning package) variables. This is known
as dynamic scoping. Lexical scoping is done with my, which works more like C's auto declarations.
If more than one variable or expression is given to local, they must be placed in parentheses. This
operator works by saving the current values of those variables in its argument list on a hidden stack
and restoring them upon exiting the block, subroutine, or eval.
Let's check the following example to distinguish between global and local variables −
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 Perl Tutorial for Beginners

Live Demo

#!/usr/bin/perl

# Global variable
$string = "Hello, World!";

sub PrintHello {
# Private variable for PrintHello function
local $string;
$string = "Hello, Perl!";
PrintMe();
print "Inside the function PrintHello $string\n";
}
sub PrintMe {
print "Inside the function PrintMe $string\n";
}

# Function call
PrintHello();
print "Outside the function $string\n";
When above program is executed, it produces the following result −
Inside the function PrintMe Hello, Perl!
Inside the function PrintHello Hello, Perl!
Outside the function Hello, World!

State Variables via state()

There are another type of lexical variables, which are similar to private variables but they maintain
their state and they do not get reinitialized upon multiple calls of the subroutines. These variables
are defined using the state operator and available starting from Perl 5.9.4.
Let's check the following example to demonstrate the use of state variables −
Live Demo

#!/usr/bin/perl

use feature 'state';

sub PrintCount {
state $count = 0; # initial value

print "Value of counter is $count\n";

$count++;
}

for (1..5) {
PrintCount();
}
When above program is executed, it produces the following result −
Value of counter is 0
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 Perl Tutorial for Beginners

Value of counter is 1
Value of counter is 2
Value of counter is 3
Value of counter is 4
Prior to Perl 5.10, you would have to write it like this −
Live Demo

#!/usr/bin/perl

{
my $count = 0; # initial value

sub PrintCount {
print "Value of counter is $count\n";
$count++;
}
}

for (1..5) {
PrintCount();
}

Subroutine Call Context

The context of a subroutine or statement is defined as the type of return value that is expected.
This allows you to use a single function that returns different values based on what the user is
expecting to receive. For example, the following localtime() returns a string when it is called in
scalar context, but it returns a list when it is called in list context.
my $datestring = localtime( time );
In this example, the value of $timestr is now a string made up of the current date and time, for
example, Thu Nov 30 15:21:33 2000. Conversely −
($sec,$min,$hour,$mday,$mon, $year,$wday,$yday,$isdst) = localtime(time);
Now the individual variables contain the corresponding values returned by localtime() subroutine.

Perl - References
A Perl reference is a scalar data type that holds the location of another value which could be scalar,
arrays, or hashes. Because of its scalar nature, a reference can be used anywhere, a scalar can
be used.
You can construct lists containing references to other lists, which can contain references to hashes,
and so on. This is how the nested data structures are built in Perl.

Create References
It is easy to create a reference for any variable, subroutine or value by prefixing it with a backslash
as follows −

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 Perl Tutorial for Beginners

$scalarref = \$foo;
$arrayref = \@ARGV;
$hashref = \%ENV;
$coderef = \&handler;
$globref = \*foo;
You cannot create a reference on an I/O handle (filehandle or dirhandle) using the backslash
operator but a reference to an anonymous array can be created using the square brackets as
follows −
$arrayref = [1, 2, ['a', 'b', 'c']];
Similar way you can create a reference to an anonymous hash using the curly brackets as follows
−
$hashref = {
'Adam' => 'Eve',
'Clyde' => 'Bonnie',
};
A reference to an anonymous subroutine can be created by using sub without a subname as follows
−
$coderef = sub { print "Boink!\n" };

Dereferencing
Dereferencing returns the value from a reference point to the location. To dereference a reference
simply use $, @ or % as prefix of the reference variable depending on whether the reference is
pointing to a scalar, array, or hash. Following is the example to explain the concept −
Live Demo

#!/usr/bin/perl

$var = 10;

# Now $r has reference to $var scalar.

$r = \$var;

# Print value available at the location stored in $r.

print "Value of $var is : ", $$r, "\n";

@var = (1, 2, 3);

# Now $r has reference to @var array.
$r = \@var;
# Print values available at the location stored in $r.
print "Value of @var is : ", @$r, "\n";

%var = ('key1' => 10, 'key2' => 20);

# Now $r has reference to %var hash.
$r = \%var;
# Print values available at the location stored in $r.
print "Value of %var is : ", %$r, "\n";
When above program is executed, it produces the following result −

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 Perl Tutorial for Beginners

Value of 10 is : 10
Value of 1 2 3 is : 123
Value of %var is : key220key110
If you are not sure about a variable type, then its easy to know its type using ref, which returns one
of the following strings if its argument is a reference. Otherwise, it returns false −
SCALAR
ARRAY
HASH
CODE
GLOB
REF
Let's try the following example −
Live Demo

#!/usr/bin/perl

$var = 10;
$r = \$var;
print "Reference type in r : ", ref($r), "\n";

@var = (1, 2, 3);

$r = \@var;
print "Reference type in r : ", ref($r), "\n";

%var = ('key1' => 10, 'key2' => 20);

$r = \%var;
print "Reference type in r : ", ref($r), "\n";
When above program is executed, it produces the following result −
Reference type in r : SCALAR
Reference type in r : ARRAY
Reference type in r : HASH

Circular References
A circular reference occurs when two references contain a reference to each other. You have to be
careful while creating references otherwise a circular reference can lead to memory leaks.
Following is an example −
Live Demo

#!/usr/bin/perl

my $foo = 100;
$foo = \$foo;

print "Value of foo is : ", $$foo, "\n";

When above program is executed, it produces the following result −
Value of foo is : REF(0x9aae38)

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References to Functions
This might happen if you need to create a signal handler so you can produce a reference to a
function by preceding that function name with \& and to dereference that reference you simply need
to prefix reference variable using ampersand &. Following is an example −
Live Demo

#!/usr/bin/perl

# Function definition
sub PrintHash {
my (%hash) = @_;

foreach $item (%hash) {

print "Item : $item\n";
}
}
%hash = ('name' => 'Tom', 'age' => 19);

# Create a reference to above function.

$cref = \&PrintHash;

# Function call using reference.

&$cref(%hash);
When above program is executed, it produces the following result −
Item : name
Item : Tom
Item : age
Item : 19

Perl - Formats
Perl uses a writing template called a 'format' to output reports. To use the format feature of Perl,
you have to define a format first and then you can use that format to write formatted data.

Define a Format
Following is the syntax to define a Perl format −
format FormatName =
fieldline
value_one, value_two, value_three
fieldline
value_one, value_two
.
Here FormatName represents the name of the format. The fieldline is the specific way, the data
should be formatted. The values lines represent the values that will be entered into the field line.
You end the format with a single period.

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Next fieldline can contain any text or fieldholders. The fieldholders hold space for data that will be
placed there at a later date. A fieldholder has the format −
@<<<<
This fieldholder is left-justified, with a field space of 5. You must count the @ sign and the < signs
to know the number of spaces in the field. Other field holders include −
@>>>> right-justified
@|||| centered
@####.## numeric field holder
@* multiline field holder
An example format would be −
format EMPLOYEE =
===================================
@<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<< @<<
$name $age
@#####.##
$salary
===================================
.
In this example, $name would be written as left justify within 22 character spaces and after that age
will be written in two spaces.

Using the Format

In order to invoke this format declaration, we would use the write keyword −
write EMPLOYEE;
The problem is that the format name is usually the name of an open file handle, and the write
statement will send the output to this file handle. As we want the data sent to the STDOUT, we
must associate EMPLOYEE with the STDOUT filehandle. First, however, we must make sure that
that STDOUT is our selected file handle, using the select() function.
select(STDOUT);
We would then associate EMPLOYEE with STDOUT by setting the new format name with
STDOUT, using the special variable $~ or $FORMAT_NAME as follows −
$~ = "EMPLOYEE";
When we now do a write(), the data would be sent to STDOUT. Remember: if you are going to
write your report in any other file handle instead of STDOUT then you can use select() function to
select that file handle and rest of the logic will remain the same.
Let's take the following example. Here we have hard coded values just for showing the usage. In
actual usage you will read values from a file or database to generate actual reports and you may
need to write final report again into a file.
Live Demo

#!/usr/bin/perl

format EMPLOYEE =
===================================
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@<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<< @<<
$name $age
@#####.##
$salary
===================================
.

select(STDOUT);
$~ = EMPLOYEE;

@n = ("Ali", "Raza", "Jaffer");

@a = (20,30, 40);
@s = (2000.00, 2500.00, 4000.000);

$i = 0;
foreach (@n) {
$name = $_;
$age = $a[$i];
$salary = $s[$i++];
write;
}
When executed, this will produce the following result −
===================================
Ali 20
2000.00
===================================
===================================
Raza 30
2500.00
===================================
===================================
Jaffer 40
4000.00
===================================

Define a Report Header

Everything looks fine. But you would be interested in adding a header to your report. This header
will be printed on top of each page. It is very simple to do this. Apart from defining a template you
would have to define a header and assign it to $^ or $FORMAT_TOP_NAME variable −
Live Demo

#!/usr/bin/perl

format EMPLOYEE =
===================================
@<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<< @<<
$name $age
@#####.##
$salary
===================================
.
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format EMPLOYEE_TOP =
===================================
Name Age
===================================
.

select(STDOUT);
$~ = EMPLOYEE;
$^ = EMPLOYEE_TOP;

@n = ("Ali", "Raza", "Jaffer");

@a = (20,30, 40);
@s = (2000.00, 2500.00, 4000.000);

$i = 0;
foreach (@n) {
$name = $_;
$age = $a[$i];
$salary = $s[$i++];
write;
}
Now your report will look like −
===================================
Name Age
===================================
===================================
Ali 20
2000.00
===================================
===================================
Raza 30
2500.00
===================================
===================================
Jaffer 40
4000.00
===================================

Define a Pagination
What about if your report is taking more than one page? You have a solution for that, simply
use $% or $FORMAT_PAGE_NUMBER vairable along with header as follows −
format EMPLOYEE_TOP =
===================================
Name Age Page @<
$%
===================================
.
Now your output will look like as follows −
===================================
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Name Age Page 1

===================================
===================================
Ali 20
2000.00
===================================
===================================
Raza 30
2500.00
===================================
===================================
Jaffer 40
4000.00
===================================

Number of Lines on a Page

You can set the number of lines per page using special variable $= ( or
$FORMAT_LINES_PER_PAGE ), By default $= will be 60.

Define a Report Footer

While $^ or $FORMAT_TOP_NAME contains the name of the current header format, there is no
corresponding mechanism to automatically do the same thing for a footer. If you have a fixed-size
footer, you can get footers by checking variable $- or $FORMAT_LINES_LEFT before each write()
and print the footer yourself if necessary using another format defined as follows −
format EMPLOYEE_BOTTOM =
End of Page @<
$%
.
For a complete set of variables related to formating, please refer to the Perl Special
Variables section.

Perl - File I/O

The basics of handling files are simple: you associate a filehandle with an external entity (usually
a file) and then use a variety of operators and functions within Perl to read and update the data
stored within the data stream associated with the filehandle.
A filehandle is a named internal Perl structure that associates a physical file with a name. All
filehandles are capable of read/write access, so you can read from and update any file or device
associated with a filehandle. However, when you associate a filehandle, you can specify the mode
in which the filehandle is opened.
Three basic file handles are - STDIN, STDOUT, and STDERR, which represent standard input,
standard output and standard error devices respectively.

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Opening and Closing Files

There are following two functions with multiple forms, which can be used to open any new or
existing file in Perl.
open FILEHANDLE, EXPR
open FILEHANDLE

sysopen FILEHANDLE, FILENAME, MODE, PERMS

sysopen FILEHANDLE, FILENAME, MODE
Here FILEHANDLE is the file handle returned by the open function and EXPR is the expression
having file name and mode of opening the file.

Open Function
Following is the syntax to open file.txt in read-only mode. Here less than < sign indicates that file
has to be opend in read-only mode.
open(DATA, "<file.txt");
Here DATA is the file handle, which will be used to read the file. Here is the example, which will
open a file and will print its content over the screen.
#!/usr/bin/perl

open(DATA, "<file.txt") or die "Couldn't open file file.txt, $!";

while(<DATA>) {
print "$_";
}
Following is the syntax to open file.txt in writing mode. Here less than > sign indicates that file has
to be opend in the writing mode.
open(DATA, ">file.txt") or die "Couldn't open file file.txt, $!";
This example actually truncates (empties) the file before opening it for writing, which may not be
the desired effect. If you want to open a file for reading and writing, you can put a plus sign before
the > or < characters.
For example, to open a file for updating without truncating it −
open(DATA, "+<file.txt"); or die "Couldn't open file file.txt, $!";
To truncate the file first −
open DATA, "+>file.txt" or die "Couldn't open file file.txt, $!";
You can open a file in the append mode. In this mode, writing point will be set to the end of the file.
open(DATA,">>file.txt") || die "Couldn't open file file.txt, $!";
A double >> opens the file for appending, placing the file pointer at the end, so that you can
immediately start appending information. However, you can't read from it unless you also place a
plus sign in front of it −
open(DATA,"+>>file.txt") || die "Couldn't open file file.txt, $!";
Following is the table, which gives the possible values of different modes
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Sr.No. Entities & Definition

1
< or r
Read Only Access

2
> or w
Creates, Writes, and Truncates

3
>> or a
Writes, Appends, and Creates

4
+< or r+
Reads and Writes

5
+> or w+
Reads, Writes, Creates, and Truncates

6
+>> or a+
Reads, Writes, Appends, and Creates

Sysopen Function
The sysopen function is similar to the main open function, except that it uses the
system open() function, using the parameters supplied to it as the parameters for the system
function −
For example, to open a file for updating, emulating the +<filename format from open −
sysopen(DATA, "file.txt", O_RDWR);
Or to truncate the file before updating −
sysopen(DATA, "file.txt", O_RDWR|O_TRUNC );
You can use O_CREAT to create a new file and O_WRONLY- to open file in write only mode and
O_RDONLY - to open file in read only mode.
The PERMS argument specifies the file permissions for the file specified, if it has to be created. By
default it takes 0x666.
Following is the table, which gives the possible values of MODE.

Sr.No. Entities & Definition

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 Perl Tutorial for Beginners

1
O_RDWR
Read and Write

2
O_RDONLY
Read Only

3
O_WRONLY
Write Only

4
O_CREAT
Create the file

5
O_APPEND
Append the file

6
O_TRUNC
Truncate the file

7
O_EXCL
Stops if file already exists

8
O_NONBLOCK
Non-Blocking usability

Close Function
To close a filehandle, and therefore disassociate the filehandle from the corresponding file, you use
the close function. This flushes the filehandle's buffers and closes the system's file descriptor.
close FILEHANDLE
close
If no FILEHANDLE is specified, then it closes the currently selected filehandle. It returns true only
if it could successfully flush the buffers and close the file.
close(DATA) || die "Couldn't close file properly";

Reading and Writing Files

Once you have an open filehandle, you need to be able to read and write information. There are a
number of different ways of reading and writing data into the file.

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The <FILEHANDL> Operator

The main method of reading the information from an open filehandle is the <FILEHANDLE>
operator. In a scalar context, it returns a single line from the filehandle. For example −
#!/usr/bin/perl

print "What is your name?\n";

$name = <STDIN>;
print "Hello $name\n";
When you use the <FILEHANDLE> operator in a list context, it returns a list of lines from the
specified filehandle. For example, to import all the lines from a file into an array −
#!/usr/bin/perl

open(DATA,"<import.txt") or die "Can't open data";

@lines = <DATA>;
close(DATA);

getc Function
The getc function returns a single character from the specified FILEHANDLE, or STDIN if none is
specified −
getc FILEHANDLE
getc
If there was an error, or the filehandle is at end of file, then undef is returned instead.

read Function
The read function reads a block of information from the buffered filehandle: This function is used to
read binary data from the file.
read FILEHANDLE, SCALAR, LENGTH, OFFSET
read FILEHANDLE, SCALAR, LENGTH
The length of the data read is defined by LENGTH, and the data is placed at the start of SCALAR
if no OFFSET is specified. Otherwise data is placed after OFFSET bytes in SCALAR. The function
returns the number of bytes read on success, zero at end of file, or undef if there was an error.

print Function
For all the different methods used for reading information from filehandles, the main function for
writing information back is the print function.
print FILEHANDLE LIST
print LIST
print
The print function prints the evaluated value of LIST to FILEHANDLE, or to the current output
filehandle (STDOUT by default). For example −
print "Hello World!\n";

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Copying Files
Here is the example, which opens an existing file file1.txt and read it line by line and generate
another copy file file2.txt.
#!/usr/bin/perl

# Open file to read

open(DATA1, "<file1.txt");

# Open new file to write

open(DATA2, ">file2.txt");

# Copy data from one file to another.

while(<DATA1>) {
print DATA2 $_;
}
close( DATA1 );
close( DATA2 );

Renaming a file
Here is an example, which shows how we can rename a file file1.txt to file2.txt. Assuming file is
available in /usr/test directory.
#!/usr/bin/perl

rename ("/usr/test/file1.txt", "/usr/test/file2.txt" );

This function renames takes two arguments and it just renames the existing file.

Deleting an Existing File

Here is an example, which shows how to delete a file file1.txt using the unlink function.
#!/usr/bin/perl

unlink ("/usr/test/file1.txt");

Positioning inside a File

You can use to tell function to know the current position of a file and seek function to point a
particular position inside the file.

tell Function
The first requirement is to find your position within a file, which you do using the tell function −
tell FILEHANDLE
tell
This returns the position of the file pointer, in bytes, within FILEHANDLE if specified, or the current
default selected filehandle if none is specified.

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seek Function
The seek function positions the file pointer to the specified number of bytes within a file −
seek FILEHANDLE, POSITION, WHENCE
The function uses the fseek system function, and you have the same ability to position relative to
three different points: the start, the end, and the current position. You do this by specifying a value
for WHENCE.
Zero sets the positioning relative to the start of the file. For example, the line sets the file pointer to
the 256th byte in the file.
seek DATA, 256, 0;

File Information
You can test certain features very quickly within Perl using a series of test operators known
collectively as -X tests. For example, to perform a quick test of the various permissions on a file,
you might use a script like this −
#/usr/bin/perl

my $file = "/usr/test/file1.txt";
my (@description, $size);
if (-e $file) {
push @description, 'binary' if (-B _);
push @description, 'a socket' if (-S _);
push @description, 'a text file' if (-T _);
push @description, 'a block special file' if (-b _);
push @description, 'a character special file' if (-c _);
push @description, 'a directory' if (-d _);
push @description, 'executable' if (-x _);
push @description, (($size = -s _)) ? "$size bytes" : 'empty';
print "$file is ", join(', ',@description),"\n";
}
Here is the list of features, which you can check for a file or directory −

Sr.No. Operator & Definition

1
-A
Script start time minus file last access time, in days.

2
-B
Is it a binary file?

3
-C
Script start time minus file last inode change time, in days.

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3
-M
Script start time minus file modification time, in days.

4
-O
Is the file owned by the real user ID?

5
-R
Is the file readable by the real user ID or real group?

6
-S
Is the file a socket?

7
-T
Is it a text file?

8
-W
Is the file writable by the real user ID or real group?

9
-X
Is the file executable by the real user ID or real group?

10
-b
Is it a block special file?

11
-c
Is it a character special file?

12
-d
Is the file a directory?

13
-e
Does the file exist?

14
-f
Is it a plain file?

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15
-g
Does the file have the setgid bit set?

16
-k
Does the file have the sticky bit set?

17
-l
Is the file a symbolic link?

18
-o
Is the file owned by the effective user ID?

19
-p
Is the file a named pipe?

20
-r
Is the file readable by the effective user or group ID?

21
-s
Returns the size of the file, zero size = empty file.

22
-t
Is the filehandle opened by a TTY (terminal)?

23
-u
Does the file have the setuid bit set?

24
-w
Is the file writable by the effective user or group ID?

25
-x
Is the file executable by the effective user or group ID?

26
-z
Is the file size zero?

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Perl - Directories
Following are the standard functions used to play with directories.
opendir DIRHANDLE, EXPR # To open a directory
readdir DIRHANDLE # To read a directory
rewinddir DIRHANDLE # Positioning pointer to the begining
telldir DIRHANDLE # Returns current position of the dir
seekdir DIRHANDLE, POS # Pointing pointer to POS inside dir
closedir DIRHANDLE # Closing a directory.

Display all the Files

There are various ways to list down all the files available in a particular directory. First let's use the
simple way to get and list down all the files using the glob operator −
#!/usr/bin/perl

# Display all the files in /tmp directory.

$dir = "/tmp/*";
my @files = glob( $dir );

foreach (@files ) {
print $_ . "\n";
}

# Display all the C source files in /tmp directory.

$dir = "/tmp/*.c";
@files = glob( $dir );

foreach (@files ) {
print $_ . "\n";
}

# Display all the hidden files.

$dir = "/tmp/.*";
@files = glob( $dir );
foreach (@files ) {
print $_ . "\n";
}

# Display all the files from /tmp and /home directories.

$dir = "/tmp/* /home/*";
@files = glob( $dir );

foreach (@files ) {
print $_ . "\n";
}
Here is another example, which opens a directory and list out all the files available inside this
directory.
#!/usr/bin/perl

opendir (DIR, '.') or die "Couldn't open directory, $!";

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 Perl Tutorial for Beginners

while ($file = readdir DIR) {

print "$file\n";
}
closedir DIR;
One more example to print the list of C source files you might use is −
#!/usr/bin/perl

opendir(DIR, '.') or die "Couldn't open directory, $!";

foreach (sort grep(/^.*\.c$/,readdir(DIR))) {
print "$_\n";
}
closedir DIR;

Create new Directory

You can use mkdir function to create a new directory. You will need to have the required
permission to create a directory.
#!/usr/bin/perl

$dir = "/tmp/perl";

# This creates perl directory in /tmp directory.

mkdir( $dir ) or die "Couldn't create $dir directory, $!";
print "Directory created successfully\n";

Remove a directory
You can use rmdir function to remove a directory. You will need to have the required permission
to remove a directory. Additionally this directory should be empty before you try to remove it.
#!/usr/bin/perl

$dir = "/tmp/perl";

# This removes perl directory from /tmp directory.

rmdir( $dir ) or die "Couldn't remove $dir directory, $!";
print "Directory removed successfully\n";

Change a Directory
You can use chdir function to change a directory and go to a new location. You will need to have
the required permission to change a directory and go inside the new directory.
#!/usr/bin/perl

$dir = "/home";

# This changes perl directory and moves you inside /home directory.
chdir( $dir ) or die "Couldn't go inside $dir directory, $!";
print "Your new location is $dir\n";

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Perl - Error Handling

The execution and the errors always go together. If you are opening a file which does not exist.
then if you did not handle this situation properly then your program is considered to be of bad
quality.
The program stops if an error occurs. So a proper error handling is used to handle various type of
errors, which may occur during a program execution and take appropriate action instead of halting
program completely.
You can identify and trap an error in a number of different ways. Its very easy to trap errors in Perl
and then handling them properly. Here are few methods which can be used.

The if statement
The if statement is the obvious choice when you need to check the return value from a statement;
for example −
if(open(DATA, $file)) {
...
} else {
die "Error: Couldn't open the file - $!";
}
Here variable $! returns the actual error message. Alternatively, we can reduce the statement to
one line in situations where it makes sense to do so; for example −
open(DATA, $file) || die "Error: Couldn't open the file $!";

The unless Function

The unless function is the logical opposite to if: statements can completely bypass the success
status and only be executed if the expression returns false. For example −
unless(chdir("/etc")) {
die "Error: Can't change directory - $!";
}
The unless statement is best used when you want to raise an error or alternative only if the
expression fails. The statement also makes sense when used in a single-line statement −
die "Error: Can't change directory!: $!" unless(chdir("/etc"));
Here we die only if the chdir operation fails, and it reads nicely.

The ternary Operator

For very short tests, you can use the conditional operator ?:
print(exists($hash{value}) ? 'There' : 'Missing',"\n");
It's not quite so clear here what we are trying to achieve, but the effect is the same as using
an if or unless statement. The conditional operator is best used when you want to quickly return
one of the two values within an expression or statement.

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The warn Function

The warn function just raises a warning, a message is printed to STDERR, but no further action is
taken. So it is more useful if you just want to print a warning for the user and proceed with rest of
the operation −
chdir('/etc') or warn "Can't change directory";

The die Function

The die function works just like warn, except that it also calls exit. Within a normal script, this
function has the effect of immediately terminating execution. You should use this function in case
it is useless to proceed if there is an error in the program −
chdir('/etc') or die "Can't change directory";

Errors within Modules

There are two different situations we should be able to handle −
• Reporting an error in a module that quotes the module's filename and line number - this is useful when
debugging a module, or when you specifically want to raise a module-related, rather than script-related,
error.
• Reporting an error within a module that quotes the caller's information so that you can debug the line
within the script that caused the error. Errors raised in this fashion are useful to the end-user, because
they highlight the error in relation to the calling script's origination line.
The warn and die functions work slightly differently than you would expect when called from within
a module. For example, the simple module −
package T;

require Exporter;
@ISA = qw/Exporter/;
@EXPORT = qw/function/;
use Carp;

sub function {
warn "Error in module!";
}
1;
When called from a script like below −
use T;
function();
It will produce the following result −
Error in module! at T.pm line 9.
This is more or less what you might expected, but not necessarily what you want. From a module
programmer's perspective, the information is useful because it helps to point to a bug within the
module itself. For an end-user, the information provided is fairly useless, and for all but the
hardened programmer, it is completely pointless.

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The solution for such problems is the Carp module, which provides a simplified method for reporting
errors within modules that return information about the calling script. The Carp module provides
four functions: carp, cluck, croak, and confess. These functions are discussed below.

The carp Function

The carp function is the basic equivalent of warn and prints the message to STDERR without
actually exiting the script and printing the script name.
package T;

require Exporter;
@ISA = qw/Exporter/;
@EXPORT = qw/function/;
use Carp;

sub function {
carp "Error in module!";
}
1;
When called from a script like below −
use T;
function();
It will produce the following result −
Error in module! at test.pl line 4

The cluck Function

The cluck function is a sort of supercharged carp, it follows the same basic principle but also prints
a stack trace of all the modules that led to the function being called, including the information on
the original script.
package T;

require Exporter;
@ISA = qw/Exporter/;
@EXPORT = qw/function/;
use Carp qw(cluck);

sub function {
cluck "Error in module!";
}
1;
When called from a script like below −
use T;
function();
It will produce the following result −
Error in module! at T.pm line 9
T::function() called at test.pl line 4
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The croak Function

The croak function is equivalent to die, except that it reports the caller one level up. Like die, this
function also exits the script after reporting the error to STDERR −
package T;

require Exporter;
@ISA = qw/Exporter/;
@EXPORT = qw/function/;
use Carp;

sub function {
croak "Error in module!";
}
1;
When called from a script like below −
use T;
function();
It will produce the following result −
Error in module! at test.pl line 4
As with carp, the same basic rules apply regarding the including of line and file information
according to the warn and die functions.

The confess Function

The confess function is like cluck; it calls die and then prints a stack trace all the way up to the
origination script.
package T;

require Exporter;
@ISA = qw/Exporter/;
@EXPORT = qw/function/;
use Carp;

sub function {
confess "Error in module!";
}
1;
When called from a script like below −
use T;
function();
It will produce the following result −
Error in module! at T.pm line 9
T::function() called at test.pl line 4

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Perl - Special Variables

There are some variables which have a predefined and special meaning in Perl. They are the
variables that use punctuation characters after the usual variable indicator ($, @, or %), such as
$_ ( explained below ).
Most of the special variables have an english like long name, e.g., Operating System Error variable
$! can be written as $OS_ERROR. But if you are going to use english like names, then you would
have to put one line use English; at the top of your program file. This guides the interpreter to
pickup exact meaning of the variable.
The most commonly used special variable is $_, which contains the default input and pattern-
searching string. For example, in the following lines −
Live Demo

#!/usr/bin/perl

foreach ('hickory','dickory','doc') {
print $_;
print "\n";
}
When executed, this will produce the following result −
hickory
dickory
doc
Again, let's check the same example without using $_ variable explicitly −
Live Demo

#!/usr/bin/perl

foreach ('hickory','dickory','doc') {
print;
print "\n";
}
When executed, this will also produce the following result −
hickory
dickory
doc
The first time the loop is executed, "hickory" is printed. The second time around, "dickory" is printed,
and the third time, "doc" is printed. That's because in each iteration of the loop, the current string
is placed in $_, and is used by default by print. Here are the places where Perl will assume $_ even
if you don't specify it −
• Various unary functions, including functions like ord and int, as well as the all file tests (-f, -d) except for -
t, which defaults to STDIN.
• Various list functions like print and unlink.
• The pattern-matching operations m//, s///, and tr/// when used without an =~ operator.
• The default iterator variable in a foreach loop if no other variable is supplied.

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• The implicit iterator variable in the grep and map functions.

• The default place to put an input record when a line-input operation's result is tested by itself as the sole
criterion of a while test (i.e., ). Note that outside of a while test, this will not happen.

Special Variable Types

Based on the usage and nature of special variables, we can categorize them in the following
categories −

• Global Scalar Special Variables.

• Global Array Special Variables.
• Global Hash Special Variables.
• Global Special Filehandles.
• Global Special Constants.
• Regular Expression Special Variables.
• Filehandle Special Variables.

Global Scalar Special Variables

Here is the list of all the scalar special variables. We have listed corresponding english like names
along with the symbolic names.

$_
The default input and pattern-searching space.
$ARG

$.
The current input line number of the last filehandle
that was read. An explicit close on the filehandle
resets the line number.
$NR

$/
The input record separator; newline by default. If set
to the null string, it treats blank lines as delimiters.
$RS

$,
The output field separator for the print operator.
$OFS

$\ The output record separator for the print operator.

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$ORS

$"
Like "$," except that it applies to list values
interpolated into a double-quoted string (or similar
interpreted string). Default is a space.
$LIST_SEPARATOR

$;
The subscript separator for multidimensional array
emulation. Default is "\034".
$SUBSCRIPT_SEPARATOR

$^L
What a format outputs to perform a formfeed. Default
is "\f".
$FORMAT_FORMFEED

$:
The current set of characters after which a string
may be broken to fill continuation fields (starting with
^) in a format. Default is "\n"".
$FORMAT_LINE_BREAK_CHARACTERS

$^A
The current value of the write accumulator for format
lines.
$ACCUMULATOR

$#
Contains the output format for printed numbers
(deprecated).
$OFMT

$?
The status returned by the last pipe close, backtick
(``) command, or system operator.
$CHILD_ERROR

$! If used in a numeric context, yields the current value

of the errno variable, identifying the last system call
error. If used in a string context, yields the
$OS_ERROR or $ERRNO corresponding system error string.

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$@
The Perl syntax error message from the last eval
command.
$EVAL_ERROR

$$
The pid of the Perl process running this script.
$PROCESS_ID or $PID

$<
The real user ID (uid) of this process.
$REAL_USER_ID or $UID

$>
The effective user ID of this process.
$EFFECTIVE_USER_ID or $EUID

$(
The real group ID (gid) of this process.
$REAL_GROUP_ID or $GID

$)
The effective gid of this process.
$EFFECTIVE_GROUP_ID or $EGID

$0 Contains the name of the file containing the Perl

script being executed.

$PROGRAM_NAME

$[ The index of the first element in an array and of the

first character in a substring. Default is 0.

$] Returns the version plus patchlevel divided by 1000.

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$PERL_VERSION

$^D
The current value of the debugging flags.
$DEBUGGING

$^E
Extended error message on some platforms.
$EXTENDED_OS_ERROR

$^F
The maximum system file descriptor, ordinarily 2.
$SYSTEM_FD_MAX

$^H Contains internal compiler hints enabled by certain

pragmatic modules.

$^I
The current value of the inplace-edit extension. Use
undef to disable inplace editing.
$INPLACE_EDIT

$^M The contents of $M can be used as an emergency

memory pool in case Perl dies with an out-of-
memory error. Use of $M requires a special
compilation of Perl. See the INSTALL document for
more information.

$^O
Contains the name of the operating system that the
current Perl binary was compiled for.
$OSNAME

$^P
The internal flag that the debugger clears so that it
doesn't debug itself.
$PERLDB

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$^T
The time at which the script began running, in
seconds since the epoch.
$BASETIME

$^W
The current value of the warning switch, either true
or false.
$WARNING

$^X
The name that the Perl binary itself was executed as.
$EXECUTABLE_NAME

$ARGV Contains the name of the current file when reading

from <ARGV>.

Global Array Special Variables

@ARGV The array containing the command-line arguments intended for the
script.

@INC The array containing the list of places to look for Perl scripts to be
evaluated by the do, require, or use constructs.

@F The array into which the input lines are split when the -a command-
line switch is given.

Global Hash Special Variables

%INC The hash containing entries for the filename of each file that has
been included via do or require.

%ENV The hash containing your current environment.

%SIG The hash used to set signal handlers for various signals.

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Global Special Filehandles

ARGV The special filehandle that iterates over command line filenames in @ARGV.
Usually written as the null filehandle in <>.

STDERR The special filehandle for standard error in any package.

STDIN The special filehandle for standard input in any package.

STDOUT The special filehandle for standard output in any package.

DATA The special filehandle that refers to anything following the __END__ token in the
file containing the script. Or, the special filehandle for anything following the
__DATA__ token in a required file, as long as you're reading data in the same
package __DATA__ was found in.

_ The special filehandle used to cache the information from the last stat, lstat, or file
(underscore) test operator.

Global Special Constants

__END__ Indicates the logical end of your program. Any following text is
ignored, but may be read via the DATA filehandle.

__FILE__ Represents the filename at the point in your program where it's
used. Not interpolated into strings.

__LINE__ Represents the current line number. Not interpolated into strings.

__PACKAGE__ Represents the current package name at compile time, or undefined

if there is no current package. Not interpolated into strings.

Regular Expression Special Variables

$digit Contains the text matched by the corresponding set of parentheses
in the last pattern matched. For example, $1 matches whatever was

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contained in the first set of parentheses in the previous regular

expression.

$&
The string matched by the last successful pattern match.
$MATCH

$`
The string preceding whatever was matched by the last successful
pattern match.
$PREMATCH

$'
The string following whatever was matched by the last successful
pattern match.
$POSTMATCH

$+ The last bracket matched by the last search pattern. This is useful if
you don't know which of a set of alternative patterns was matched.
For example : /Version: (.*)|Revision: (.*)/ && ($rev = $+);
$LAST_PAREN_MATCH

Filehandle Special Variables

$|
If set to nonzero, forces an fflush(3) after every write or print on
the currently selected output channel.
$OUTPUT_AUTOFLUSH

$%
The current page number of the currently selected output
channel.
$FORMAT_PAGE_NUMBER

$=
The current page length (printable lines) of the currently
selected output channel. Default is 60.
$FORMAT_LINES_PER_PAGE

$-

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$FORMAT_LINES_LEFT The number of lines left on the page of the currently selected
output channel.

$~
The name of the current report format for the currently selected
output channel. Default is the name of the filehandle.
$FORMAT_NAME

$^ The name of the current top-of-page format for the currently

selected output channel. Default is the name of the filehandle
with _TOP appended.

Perl - Coding Standard

Each programmer will, of course, have his or her own preferences in regards to formatting, but
there are some general guidelines that will make your programs easier to read, understand, and
maintain.
The most important thing is to run your programs under the -w flag at all times. You may turn it off
explicitly for particular portions of code via the no warnings pragma or the $^W variable if you must.
You should also always run under use strict or know the reason why not. The use sigtrap and even
use diagnostics pragmas may also prove useful.
Regarding aesthetics of code lay out, about the only thing Larry cares strongly about is that the
closing curly bracket of a multi-line BLOCK should line up with the keyword that started the
construct. Beyond that, he has other preferences that aren't so strong −

• 4-column indent.
• Opening curly on same line as keyword, if possible, otherwise line up.
• Space before the opening curly of a multi-line BLOCK.
• One-line BLOCK may be put on one line, including curlies.
• No space before the semicolon.
• Semicolon omitted in "short" one-line BLOCK.
• Space around most operators.
• Space around a "complex" subscript (inside brackets).
• Blank lines between chunks that do different things.
• Uncuddled elses.
• No space between function name and its opening parenthesis.
• Space after each comma.
• Long lines broken after an operator (except and and or).
• Space after last parenthesis matching on current line.
• Line up corresponding items vertically.
• Omit redundant punctuation as long as clarity doesn't suffer.

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Here are some other more substantive style issues to think about: Just because you CAN do
something a particular way doesn't mean that you SHOULD do it that way. Perl is designed to give
you several ways to do anything, so consider picking the most readable one. For instance −
open(FOO,$foo) || die "Can't open $foo: $!";
Is better than −
die "Can't open $foo: $!" unless open(FOO,$foo);
Because the second way hides the main point of the statement in a modifier. On the other hand,
print "Starting analysis\n" if $verbose;
Is better than −
$verbose && print "Starting analysis\n";
Because the main point isn't whether the user typed -v or not.
Don't go through silly contortions to exit a loop at the top or the bottom, when Perl provides the last
operator so you can exit in the middle. Just "outdent" it a little to make it more visible −
LINE:
for (;;) {
statements;
last LINE if $foo;
next LINE if /^#/;
statements;
}
Let's see few more important points −
• Don't be afraid to use loop labels--they're there to enhance readability as well as to allow multilevel loop
breaks. See the previous example.
• Avoid using grep() (or map()) or `backticks` in a void context, that is, when you just throw away their return
values. Those functions all have return values, so use them. Otherwise use a foreach() loop or the
system() function instead.
• For portability, when using features that may not be implemented on every machine, test the construct in
an eval to see if it fails. If you know what version or patchlevel a particular feature was implemented, you
can test $] ($PERL_VERSION in English) to see if it will be there. The Config module will also let you
interrogate values determined by the Configure program when Perl was installed.
• Choose mnemonic identifiers. If you can't remember what mnemonic means, you've got a problem.
• While short identifiers like $gotit are probably ok, use underscores to separate words in longer identifiers.
It is generally easier to read $var_names_like_this than $VarNamesLikeThis, especially for non-native
speakers of English. It's also a simple rule that works consistently with VAR_NAMES_LIKE_THIS.
• Package names are sometimes an exception to this rule. Perl informally reserves lowercase module
names for "pragma" modules like integer and strict. Other modules should begin with a capital letter and
use mixed case, but probably without underscores due to limitations in primitive file systems'
representations of module names as files that must fit into a few sparse bytes.
• If you have a really hairy regular expression, use the /x modifier and put in some whitespace to make it
look a little less like line noise. Don't use slash as a delimiter when your regexp has slashes or
backslashes.
• Always check the return codes of system calls. Good error messages should go to STDERR, include
which program caused the problem, what the failed system call and arguments were, and (VERY
IMPORTANT) should contain the standard system error message for what went wrong. Here's a simple
but sufficient example −
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opendir(D, $dir) or die "can't opendir $dir: $!";

• Think about reusability. Why waste brainpower on a one-shot when you might want to do something like
it again? Consider generalizing your code. Consider writing a module or object class. Consider making
your code run cleanly with use strict and use warnings (or -w) in effect. Consider giving away your code.
Consider changing your whole world view. Consider... oh, never mind.
• Be consistent.
• Be nice.

Perl - Regular Expressions

A regular expression is a string of characters that defines the pattern or patterns you are viewing.
The syntax of regular expressions in Perl is very similar to what you will find within other regular
expression.supporting programs, such as sed, grep, and awk.
The basic method for applying a regular expression is to use the pattern binding operators =~
and !~. The first operator is a test and assignment operator.
There are three regular expression operators within Perl.

• Match Regular Expression - m//

• Substitute Regular Expression - s///
• Transliterate Regular Expression - tr///
The forward slashes in each case act as delimiters for the regular expression (regex) that you are
specifying. If you are comfortable with any other delimiter, then you can use in place of forward
slash.

The Match Operator

The match operator, m//, is used to match a string or statement to a regular expression. For
example, to match the character sequence "foo" against the scalar $bar, you might use a statement
like this −
Live Demo

#!/usr/bin/perl

$bar = "This is foo and again foo";

if ($bar =~ /foo/) {
print "First time is matching\n";
} else {
print "First time is not matching\n";
}

$bar = "foo";
if ($bar =~ /foo/) {
print "Second time is matching\n";
} else {
print "Second time is not matching\n";
}
When above program is executed, it produces the following result −
First time is matching
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Second time is matching

The m// actually works in the same fashion as the q// operator series.you can use any combination
of naturally matching characters to act as delimiters for the expression. For example, m{}, m(), and
m>< are all valid. So above example can be re-written as follows −
#!/usr/bin/perl

$bar = "This is foo and again foo";

if ($bar =~ m[foo]) {
print "First time is matching\n";
} else {
print "First time is not matching\n";
}

$bar = "foo";
if ($bar =~ m{foo}) {
print "Second time is matching\n";
} else {
print "Second time is not matching\n";
}
You can omit m from m// if the delimiters are forward slashes, but for all other delimiters you must
use the m prefix.
Note that the entire match expression, that is the expression on the left of =~ or !~ and the match
operator, returns true (in a scalar context) if the expression matches. Therefore the statement −
$true = ($foo =~ m/foo/);
will set $true to 1 if $foo matches the regex, or 0 if the match fails. In a list context, the match returns
the contents of any grouped expressions. For example, when extracting the hours, minutes, and
seconds from a time string, we can use −
my ($hours, $minutes, $seconds) = ($time =~ m/(\d+):(\d+):(\d+)/);

Match Operator Modifiers

The match operator supports its own set of modifiers. The /g modifier allows for global matching.
The /i modifier will make the match case insensitive. Here is the complete list of modifiers

Sr.No. Modifier & Description

1
i
Makes the match case insensitive.

2
m
Specifies that if the string has newline or carriage return characters, the ^ and $ operators
will now match against a newline boundary, instead of a string boundary.

3
o

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Evaluates the expression only once.

4
s
Allows use of . to match a newline character.

5
x
Allows you to use white space in the expression for clarity.

6
g
Globally finds all matches.

7
cg
Allows the search to continue even after a global match fails.

Matching Only Once

There is also a simpler version of the match operator - the ?PATTERN? operator. This is basically
identical to the m// operator except that it only matches once within the string you are searching
between each call to reset.
For example, you can use this to get the first and last elements within a list −
Live Demo

#!/usr/bin/perl

@list = qw/food foosball subeo footnote terfoot canic footbrdige/;

foreach (@list) {
$first = $1 if /(foo.*?)/;
$last = $1 if /(foo.*)/;
}
print "First: $first, Last: $last\n";
When above program is executed, it produces the following result −
First: foo, Last: footbrdige

Regular Expression Variables

Regular expression variables include $, which contains whatever the last grouping match
matched; $&, which contains the entire matched string; $`, which contains everything before the
matched string; and $', which contains everything after the matched string. Following code
demonstrates the result −
Live Demo

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#!/usr/bin/perl

$string = "The food is in the salad bar";

$string =~ m/foo/;
print "Before: $`\n";
print "Matched: $&\n";
print "After: $'\n";
When above program is executed, it produces the following result −
Before: The
Matched: foo
After: d is in the salad bar

The Substitution Operator

The substitution operator, s///, is really just an extension of the match operator that allows you to
replace the text matched with some new text. The basic form of the operator is −
s/PATTERN/REPLACEMENT/;
The PATTERN is the regular expression for the text that we are looking for. The REPLACEMENT
is a specification for the text or regular expression that we want to use to replace the found text
with. For example, we can replace all occurrences of dog with catusing the following regular
expression −
Live Demo

#/user/bin/perl

$string = "The cat sat on the mat";

$string =~ s/cat/dog/;

print "$string\n";
When above program is executed, it produces the following result −
The dog sat on the mat

Substitution Operator Modifiers

Here is the list of all the modifiers used with substitution operator.

Sr.No. Modifier & Description

1
i
Makes the match case insensitive.

2
m
Specifies that if the string has newline or carriage return characters, the ^ and $ operators
will now match against a newline boundary, instead of a string boundary.

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3
o
Evaluates the expression only once.

4
s
Allows use of . to match a newline character.

5
x
Allows you to use white space in the expression for clarity.

6
g
Replaces all occurrences of the found expression with the replacement text.

7
e
Evaluates the replacement as if it were a Perl statement, and uses its return value as the
replacement text.

The Translation Operator

Translation is similar, but not identical, to the principles of substitution, but unlike substitution,
translation (or transliteration) does not use regular expressions for its search on replacement
values. The translation operators are −
tr/SEARCHLIST/REPLACEMENTLIST/cds
y/SEARCHLIST/REPLACEMENTLIST/cds
The translation replaces all occurrences of the characters in SEARCHLIST with the corresponding
characters in REPLACEMENTLIST. For example, using the "The cat sat on the mat." string we
have been using in this chapter −
Live Demo

#/user/bin/perl

$string = 'The cat sat on the mat';

$string =~ tr/a/o/;

print "$string\n";
When above program is executed, it produces the following result −
The cot sot on the mot.
Standard Perl ranges can also be used, allowing you to specify ranges of characters either by letter
or numerical value. To change the case of the string, you might use the following syntax in place
of the uc function.
$string =~ tr/a-z/A-Z/;

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Translation Operator Modifiers

Following is the list of operators related to translation.

Sr.No. Modifier & Description

1
c
Complements SEARCHLIST.

2
d
Deletes found but unreplaced characters.

3
s
Squashes duplicate replaced characters.

The /d modifier deletes the characters matching SEARCHLIST that do not have a corresponding
entry in REPLACEMENTLIST. For example −
Live Demo

#!/usr/bin/perl

$string = 'the cat sat on the mat.';

$string =~ tr/a-z/b/d;

print "$string\n";
When above program is executed, it produces the following result −
b b b.
The last modifier, /s, removes the duplicate sequences of characters that were replaced, so −
Live Demo

#!/usr/bin/perl

$string = 'food';
$string = 'food';
$string =~ tr/a-z/a-z/s;

print "$string\n";
When above program is executed, it produces the following result −
fod

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More Complex Regular Expressions

You don't just have to match on fixed strings. In fact, you can match on just about anything you
could dream of by using more complex regular expressions. Here's a quick cheat sheet −
Following table lists the regular expression syntax that is available in Python.

Sr.No. Pattern & Description

1
^
Matches beginning of line.

2
$
Matches end of line.

3
.
Matches any single character except newline. Using m option allows it to match newline
as well.

4
[...]
Matches any single character in brackets.

5
[^...]
Matches any single character not in brackets.

6
*
Matches 0 or more occurrences of preceding expression.

7
+
Matches 1 or more occurrence of preceding expression.

8
?
Matches 0 or 1 occurrence of preceding expression.

9
{ n}
Matches exactly n number of occurrences of preceding expression.

10
{ n,}
Matches n or more occurrences of preceding expression.

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11
{ n, m}
Matches at least n and at most m occurrences of preceding expression.

12
a| b
Matches either a or b.

13
\w
Matches word characters.

14
\W
Matches nonword characters.

15
\s
Matches whitespace. Equivalent to [\t\n\r\f].

16
\S
Matches nonwhitespace.

17
\d
Matches digits. Equivalent to [0-9].

18
\D
Matches nondigits.

19
\A
Matches beginning of string.

20
\Z
Matches end of string. If a newline exists, it matches just before newline.

21
\z
Matches end of string.

22
\G
Matches point where last match finished.

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23
\b
Matches word boundaries when outside brackets. Matches backspace (0x08) when inside
brackets.

24
\B
Matches nonword boundaries.

25
\n, \t, etc.
Matches newlines, carriage returns, tabs, etc.

26
\1...\9
Matches nth grouped subexpression.

27
\10
Matches nth grouped subexpression if it matched already. Otherwise refers to the octal
representation of a character code.

28
[aeiou]
Matches a single character in the given set

29
[^aeiou]
Matches a single character outside the given set

The ^ metacharacter matches the beginning of the string and the $ metasymbol matches the end
of the string. Here are some brief examples.
# nothing in the string (start and end are adjacent)
/^$/

# a three digits, each followed by a whitespace

# character (eg "3 4 5 ")
/(\d\s) {3}/

# matches a string in which every

# odd-numbered letter is a (eg "abacadaf")
/(a.)+/

# string starts with one or more digits

/^\d+/

# string that ends with one or more digits

/\d+$/
Lets have a look at another example.

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Live Demo

#!/usr/bin/perl

$string = "Cats go Catatonic\nWhen given Catnip";

($start) = ($string =~ /\A(.*?) /);
@lines = $string =~ /^(.*?) /gm;
print "First word: $start\n","Line starts: @lines\n";
When above program is executed, it produces the following result −
First word: Cats
Line starts: Cats When

Matching Boundaries
The \b matches at any word boundary, as defined by the difference between the \w class and the
\W class. Because \w includes the characters for a word, and \W the opposite, this normally means
the termination of a word. The \B assertion matches any position that is not a word boundary. For
example −
/\bcat\b/ # Matches 'the cat sat' but not 'cat on the mat'
/\Bcat\B/ # Matches 'verification' but not 'the cat on the mat'
/\bcat\B/ # Matches 'catatonic' but not 'polecat'
/\Bcat\b/ # Matches 'polecat' but not 'catatonic'

Selecting Alternatives
The | character is just like the standard or bitwise OR within Perl. It specifies alternate matches
within a regular expression or group. For example, to match "cat" or "dog" in an expression, you
might use this −
if ($string =~ /cat|dog/)
You can group individual elements of an expression together in order to support complex matches.
Searching for two people’s names could be achieved with two separate tests, like this −
if (($string =~ /Martin Brown/) || ($string =~ /Sharon Brown/))

This could be written as follows

if ($string =~ /(Martin|Sharon) Brown/)

Grouping Matching
From a regular-expression point of view, there is no difference between except, perhaps, that the
former is slightly clearer.
$string =~ /(\S+)\s+(\S+)/;

and

$string =~ /\S+\s+\S+/;

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However, the benefit of grouping is that it allows us to extract a sequence from a regular expression.
Groupings are returned as a list in the order in which they appear in the original. For example, in
the following fragment we have pulled out the hours, minutes, and seconds from a string.
my ($hours, $minutes, $seconds) = ($time =~ m/(\d+):(\d+):(\d+)/);
As well as this direct method, matched groups are also available within the special $x variables,
where x is the number of the group within the regular expression. We could therefore rewrite the
preceding example as follows −
Live Demo

#!/usr/bin/perl

$time = "12:05:30";

$time =~ m/(\d+):(\d+):(\d+)/;
my ($hours, $minutes, $seconds) = ($1, $2, $3);

print "Hours : $hours, Minutes: $minutes, Second: $seconds\n";

When above program is executed, it produces the following result −
Hours : 12, Minutes: 05, Second: 30
When groups are used in substitution expressions, the $x syntax can be used in the replacement
text. Thus, we could reformat a date string using this −
Live Demo

#!/usr/bin/perl

$date = '03/26/1999';
$date =~ s#(\d+)/(\d+)/(\d+)#$3/$1/$2#;

print "$date\n";
When above program is executed, it produces the following result −
1999/03/26

The \G Assertion
The \G assertion allows you to continue searching from the point where the last match occurred.
For example, in the following code, we have used \G so that we can search to the correct position
and then extract some information, without having to create a more complex, single regular
expression −
Live Demo

#!/usr/bin/perl

$string = "The time is: 12:31:02 on 4/12/00";

$string =~ /:\s+/g;
($time) = ($string =~ /\G(\d+:\d+:\d+)/);
$string =~ /.+\s+/g;
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($date) = ($string =~ m{\G(\d+/\d+/\d+)});

print "Time: $time, Date: $date\n";

When above program is executed, it produces the following result −
Time: 12:31:02, Date: 4/12/00
The \G assertion is actually just the metasymbol equivalent of the pos function, so between regular
expression calls you can continue to use pos, and even modify the value of pos (and therefore \G)
by using pos as an lvalue subroutine.

Regular-expression Examples

Literal Characters

Sr.No. Example & Description

1
Perl
Match "Perl".

Character Classes

Sr.No. Example & Description

1
[Pp]ython
Matches "Python" or "python"

2
rub[ye]
Matches "ruby" or "rube"

3
[aeiou]
Matches any one lowercase vowel

4
[0-9]
Matches any digit; same as [0123456789]

5
[a-z]
Matches any lowercase ASCII letter

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6
[A-Z]
Matches any uppercase ASCII letter

7
[a-zA-Z0-9]
Matches any of the above

8
[^aeiou]
Matches anything other than a lowercase vowel

9
[^0-9]
Matches anything other than a digit

Special Character Classes

Sr.No. Example & Description

1
.
Matches any character except newline

2
\d
Matches a digit: [0-9]

3
\D
Matches a nondigit: [^0-9]

4
\s
Matches a whitespace character: [ \t\r\n\f]

5
\S
Matches nonwhitespace: [^ \t\r\n\f]

6
\w
Matches a single word character: [A-Za-z0-9_]

7
\W

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Matches a nonword character: [^A-Za-z0-9_]

Repetition Cases

Sr.No. Example & Description

1
ruby?
Matches "rub" or "ruby": the y is optional

2
ruby*
Matches "rub" plus 0 or more ys

3
ruby+
Matches "rub" plus 1 or more ys

4
\d{3}
Matches exactly 3 digits

5
\d{3,}
Matches 3 or more digits

6.
\d{3,5}
Matches 3, 4, or 5 digits

Nongreedy Repetition
This matches the smallest number of repetitions −

Sr.No. Example & Description

1
<.*>
Greedy repetition: matches "<python>perl>"

2
<.*?>
Nongreedy: matches "<python>" in "<python>perl>"

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Grouping with Parentheses

Sr.No. Example & Description

1
\D\d+
No group: + repeats \d

2
(\D\d)+
Grouped: + repeats \D\d pair

3
([Pp]ython(, )?)+
Match "Python", "Python, python, python", etc.

Backreferences
This matches a previously matched group again −

Sr.No. Example & Description

1
([Pp])ython&\1ails
Matches python&pails or Python&Pails

2
(['"])[^\1]*\1
Single or double-quoted string. \1 matches whatever the 1st group matched. \2 matches
whatever the 2nd group matched, etc.

Alternatives

Sr.No. Example & Description

1
python|perl
Matches "python" or "perl"

2
rub(y|le))
Matches "ruby" or "ruble"

3
Python(!+|\?)

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"Python" followed by one or more ! or one ?

Anchors
This need to specify match positions.

Sr.No. Example & Description

1
^Python
Matches "Python" at the start of a string or internal line

2
Python$
Matches "Python" at the end of a string or line

3
\APython
Matches "Python" at the start of a string

4
Python\Z
Matches "Python" at the end of a string

5
\bPython\b
Matches "Python" at a word boundary

6
\brub\B
\B is nonword boundary: match "rub" in "rube" and "ruby" but not alone

7
Python(?=!)
Matches "Python", if followed by an exclamation point

8
Python(?!!)
Matches "Python", if not followed by an exclamation point

Special Syntax with Parentheses

Sr.No. Example & Description

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1
R(?#comment)
Matches "R". All the rest is a comment

2
R(?i)uby
Case-insensitive while matching "uby"

3
R(?i:uby)
Same as above

4
rub(?:y|le))
Group only without creating \1 backreference

Perl - Sending Email

Using sendmail Utility

Sending a Plain Message

If you are working on Linux/Unix machine then you can simply use sendmail utility inside your Perl
program to send email. Here is a sample script that can send an email to a given email ID. Just
make sure the given path for sendmail utility is correct. This may be different for your Linux/Unix
machine.
#!/usr/bin/perl

$to = 'abcd@gmail.com';
$from = 'webmaster@yourdomain.com';
$subject = 'Test Email';
$message = 'This is test email sent by Perl Script';

open(MAIL, "|/usr/sbin/sendmail -t");

# Email Header
print MAIL "To: $to\n";
print MAIL "From: $from\n";
print MAIL "Subject: $subject\n\n";
# Email Body
print MAIL $message;

close(MAIL);
print "Email Sent Successfully\n";
Actually, the above script is a client email script, which will draft email and submit to the server
running locally on your Linux/Unix machine. This script will not be responsible for sending email to

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actual destination. So you have to make sure email server is properly configured and running on
your machine to send email to the given email ID.

Sending an HTML Message

If you want to send HTML formatted email using sendmail, then you simply need to add Content-
type: text/html\n in the header part of the email as follows −
#!/usr/bin/perl

$to = 'abcd@gmail.com';
$from = 'webmaster@yourdomain.com';
$subject = 'Test Email';
$message = '<h1>This is test email sent by Perl Script</h1>';

open(MAIL, "|/usr/sbin/sendmail -t");

# Email Header
print MAIL "To: $to\n";
print MAIL "From: $from\n";
print MAIL "Subject: $subject\n\n";
print MAIL "Content-type: text/html\n";
# Email Body
print MAIL $message;

close(MAIL);
print "Email Sent Successfully\n";

Using MIME::Lite Module

If you are working on windows machine, then you will not have access on sendmail utility. But you
have alternate to write your own email client using MIME:Lite perl module. You can download this
module from MIME-Lite-3.01.tar.gz and install it on your either machine Windows or Linux/Unix. To
install it follow the simple steps −
$tar xvfz MIME-Lite-3.01.tar.gz
$cd MIME-Lite-3.01
$perl Makefile.PL
$make
$make install
That's it and you will have MIME::Lite module installed on your machine. Now you are ready to
send your email with simple scripts explained below.

Sending a Plain Message

Now following is a script which will take care of sending email to the given email ID −
#!/usr/bin/perl
use MIME::Lite;

$to = 'abcd@gmail.com';
$cc = 'efgh@mail.com';
$from = 'webmaster@yourdomain.com';
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$subject = 'Test Email';

$message = 'This is test email sent by Perl Script';

$msg = MIME::Lite->new(
From => $from,
To => $to,
Cc => $cc,
Subject => $subject,
Data => $message
);

$msg->send;
print "Email Sent Successfully\n";

Sending an HTML Message

If you want to send HTML formatted email using sendmail, then you simply need to add Content-
type: text/html\n in the header part of the email. Following is the script, which will take care of
sending HTML formatted email −
#!/usr/bin/perl
use MIME::Lite;

$to = 'abcd@gmail.com';
$cc = 'efgh@mail.com';
$from = 'webmaster@yourdomain.com';
$subject = 'Test Email';
$message = '<h1>This is test email sent by Perl Script</h1>';

$msg = MIME::Lite->new(
From => $from,
To => $to,
Cc => $cc,
Subject => $subject,
Data => $message
);

$msg->attr("content-type" => "text/html");

$msg->send;
print "Email Sent Successfully\n";

Sending an Attachment
If you want to send an attachment, then following script serves the purpose −
#!/usr/bin/perl
use MIME::Lite;

$to = 'abcd@gmail.com';
$cc = 'efgh@mail.com';
$from = 'webmaster@yourdomain.com';
$subject = 'Test Email';
$message = 'This is test email sent by Perl Script';

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$msg = MIME::Lite-=>new(
From => $from,
To => $to,
Cc => $cc,
Subject => $subject,
Type => 'multipart/mixed'
);

# Add your text message.

$msg->attach(Type => 'text',
Data => $message
);

# Specify your file as attachement.

$msg->attach(Type => 'image/gif',
Path => '/tmp/logo.gif',
Filename => 'logo.gif',
Disposition => 'attachment'
);
$msg->send;
print "Email Sent Successfully\n";
You can attach as many files as you like in your email using attach() method.

Using SMTP Server

If your machine is not running an email server then you can use any other email server available
at the remote location. But to use any other email server you will need to have an id, its password,
URL, etc. Once you have all the required information, you simple need to provide that information
in send() method as follows −
$msg->send('smtp', "smtp.myisp.net", AuthUser=>"id", AuthPass=>"password"
);
You can contact your email server administrator to have the above used information and if a user
id and password is not already available then your administrator can create it in minutes.

Object Oriented Programming in PERL

We have already studied references in Perl and Perl anonymous arrays and hashes. Object
Oriented concept in Perl is very much based on references and anonymous array and hashes.
Let's start learning basic concepts of Object Oriented Perl.

Object Basics
There are three main terms, explained from the point of view of how Perl handles objects. The
terms are object, class, and method.
• An object within Perl is merely a reference to a data type that knows what class it belongs to. The object
is stored as a reference in a scalar variable. Because a scalar only contains a reference to the object, the
same scalar can hold different objects in different classes.
• A class within Perl is a package that contains the corresponding methods required to create and
manipulate objects.
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• A method within Perl is a subroutine, defined with the package. The first argument to the method is an
object reference or a package name, depending on whether the method affects the current object or the
class.
Perl provides a bless() function, which is used to return a reference which ultimately becomes an
object.

Defining a Class
It is very simple to define a class in Perl. A class is corresponding to a Perl Package in its simplest
form. To create a class in Perl, we first build a package.
A package is a self-contained unit of user-defined variables and subroutines, which can be re-used
over and over again.
Perl Packages provide a separate namespace within a Perl program which keeps subroutines and
variables independent from conflicting with those in other packages.
To declare a class named Person in Perl we do −
package Person;
The scope of the package definition extends to the end of the file, or until another package keyword
is encountered.

Creating and Using Objects

To create an instance of a class (an object) we need an object constructor. This constructor is a
method defined within the package. Most programmers choose to name this object constructor
method new, but in Perl you can use any name.
You can use any kind of Perl variable as an object in Perl. Most Perl programmers choose either
references to arrays or hashes.
Let's create our constructor for our Person class using a Perl hash reference. When creating an
object, you need to supply a constructor, which is a subroutine within a package that returns an
object reference. The object reference is created by blessing a reference to the package's class.
For example −
package Person;
sub new {
my $class = shift;
my $self = {
_firstName => shift,
_lastName => shift,
_ssn => shift,
};
# Print all the values just for clarification.
print "First Name is $self->{_firstName}\n";
print "Last Name is $self->{_lastName}\n";
print "SSN is $self->{_ssn}\n";
bless $self, $class;
return $self;
}
Now Let us see how to create an Object.

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$object = new Person( "Mohammad", "Saleem", 23234345);

You can use simple hash in your consturctor if you don't want to assign any value to any class
variable. For example −
package Person;
sub new {
my $class = shift;
my $self = {};
bless $self, $class;
return $self;
}

Defining Methods
Other object-oriented languages have the concept of security of data to prevent a programmer from
changing an object data directly and they provide accessor methods to modify object data. Perl
does not have private variables but we can still use the concept of helper methods to manipulate
object data.
Lets define a helper method to get person’s first name −
sub getFirstName {
return $self->{_firstName};
}
Another helper function to set person’s first name −
sub setFirstName {
my ( $self, $firstName ) = @_;
$self->{_firstName} = $firstName if defined($firstName);
return $self->{_firstName};
}
Now lets have a look into complete example: Keep Person package and helper functions into
Person.pm file.
#!/usr/bin/perl

package Person;

sub new {
my $class = shift;
my $self = {
_firstName => shift,
_lastName => shift,
_ssn => shift,
};
# Print all the values just for clarification.
print "First Name is $self->{_firstName}\n";
print "Last Name is $self->{_lastName}\n";
print "SSN is $self->{_ssn}\n";
bless $self, $class;
return $self;
}
sub setFirstName {
my ( $self, $firstName ) = @_;
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$self->{_firstName} = $firstName if defined($firstName);

return $self->{_firstName};
}

sub getFirstName {
my( $self ) = @_;
return $self->{_firstName};
}
1;
Now let's make use of Person object in employee.pl file as follows −
#!/usr/bin/perl

use Person;

$object = new Person( "Mohammad", "Saleem", 23234345);

# Get first name which is set using constructor.
$firstName = $object->getFirstName();

print "Before Setting First Name is : $firstName\n";

# Now Set first name using helper function.

$object->setFirstName( "Mohd." );

# Now get first name set by helper function.

$firstName = $object->getFirstName();
print "Before Setting First Name is : $firstName\n";
When we execute above program, it produces the following result −
First Name is Mohammad
Last Name is Saleem
SSN is 23234345
Before Setting First Name is : Mohammad
Before Setting First Name is : Mohd.

Inheritance
Object-oriented programming has very good and useful concept called inheritance. Inheritance
simply means that properties and methods of a parent class will be available to the child classes.
So you don't have to write the same code again and again, you can just inherit a parent class.
For example, we can have a class Employee, which inherits from Person. This is referred to as an
"isa" relationship because an employee is a person. Perl has a special variable, @ISA, to help with
this. @ISA governs (method) inheritance.
Following are the important points to be considered while using inheritance −
• Perl searches the class of the specified object for the given method or attribute, i.e., variable.
• Perl searches the classes defined in the object class's @ISA array.
• If no method is found in steps 1 or 2, then Perl uses an AUTOLOAD subroutine, if one is found in the
@ISA tree.
• If a matching method still cannot be found, then Perl searches for the method within the UNIVERSAL
class (package) that comes as part of the standard Perl library.

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• If the method still has not found, then Perl gives up and raises a runtime exception.
So to create a new Employee class that will inherit methods and attributes from our Person class,
we simply code as follows: Keep this code into Employee.pm.
#!/usr/bin/perl

package Employee;
use Person;
use strict;
our @ISA = qw(Person); # inherits from Person
Now Employee Class has all the methods and attributes inherited from Person class and you can
use them as follows: Use main.pl file to test it −
#!/usr/bin/perl

use Employee;

$object = new Employee( "Mohammad", "Saleem", 23234345);

# Get first name which is set using constructor.
$firstName = $object->getFirstName();

print "Before Setting First Name is : $firstName\n";

# Now Set first name using helper function.

$object->setFirstName( "Mohd." );

# Now get first name set by helper function.

$firstName = $object->getFirstName();
print "After Setting First Name is : $firstName\n";
When we execute above program, it produces the following result −
First Name is Mohammad
Last Name is Saleem
SSN is 23234345
Before Setting First Name is : Mohammad
Before Setting First Name is : Mohd.

Method Overriding
The child class Employee inherits all the methods from the parent class Person. But if you would
like to override those methods in your child class then you can do it by giving your own
implementation. You can add your additional functions in child class or you can add or modify the
functionality of an existing methods in its parent class. It can be done as follows: modify
Employee.pm file.
#!/usr/bin/perl

package Employee;
use Person;
use strict;
our @ISA = qw(Person); # inherits from Person

# Override constructor

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sub new {
my ($class) = @_;

# Call the constructor of the parent class, Person.

my $self = $class->SUPER::new( $_[1], $_[2], $_[3] );
# Add few more attributes
$self->{_id} = undef;
$self->{_title} = undef;
bless $self, $class;
return $self;
}

# Override helper function

sub getFirstName {
my( $self ) = @_;
# This is child class function.
print "This is child class helper function\n";
return $self->{_firstName};
}

# Add more methods

sub setLastName{
my ( $self, $lastName ) = @_;
$self->{_lastName} = $lastName if defined($lastName);
return $self->{_lastName};
}

sub getLastName {
my( $self ) = @_;
return $self->{_lastName};
}

1;
Now let's again try to use Employee object in our main.pl file and execute it.
#!/usr/bin/perl

use Employee;

$object = new Employee( "Mohammad", "Saleem", 23234345);

# Get first name which is set using constructor.
$firstName = $object->getFirstName();

print "Before Setting First Name is : $firstName\n";

# Now Set first name using helper function.

$object->setFirstName( "Mohd." );

# Now get first name set by helper function.

$firstName = $object->getFirstName();
print "After Setting First Name is : $firstName\n";
When we execute above program, it produces the following result −
First Name is Mohammad
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Last Name is Saleem

SSN is 23234345
This is child class helper function
Before Setting First Name is : Mohammad
This is child class helper function
After Setting First Name is : Mohd.

Default Autoloading
Perl offers a feature which you would not find in any other programming languages: a default
subroutine. Which means, if you define a function called AUTOLOAD(), then any calls to undefined
subroutines will call AUTOLOAD() function automatically. The name of the missing subroutine is
accessible within this subroutine as $AUTOLOAD.
Default autoloading functionality is very useful for error handling. Here is an example to implement
AUTOLOAD, you can implement this function in your own way.
sub AUTOLOAD {
my $self = shift;
my $type = ref ($self) || croak "$self is not an object";
my $field = $AUTOLOAD;
$field =~ s/.*://;
unless (exists $self->{$field}) {
croak "$field does not exist in object/class $type";
}
if (@_) {
return $self->($name) = shift;
} else {
return $self->($name);
}
}

Destructors and Garbage Collection

If you have programmed using object oriented programming before, then you will be aware of the
need to create a destructor to free the memory allocated to the object when you have finished
using it. Perl does this automatically for you as soon as the object goes out of scope.
In case you want to implement your destructor, which should take care of closing files or doing
some extra processing then you need to define a special method called DESTROY. This method
will be called on the object just before Perl frees the memory allocated to it. In all other respects,
the DESTROY method is just like any other method, and you can implement whatever logic you
want inside this method.
A destructor method is simply a member function (subroutine) named DESTROY, which will be
called automatically in following cases −

• When the object reference's variable goes out of scope.

• When the object reference's variable is undef-ed.
• When the script terminates
• When the perl interpreter terminates
For Example, you can simply put the following method DESTROY in your class −

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package MyClass;
...
sub DESTROY {
print "MyClass::DESTROY called\n";
}

Object Oriented Perl Example

Here is another nice example, which will help you to understand Object Oriented Concepts of Perl.
Put this source code into any perl file and execute it.
Live Demo

#!/usr/bin/perl

# Following is the implementation of simple Class.

package MyClass;

sub new {
print "MyClass::new called\n";
my $type = shift; # The package/type name
my $self = {}; # Reference to empty hash
return bless $self, $type;
}

sub DESTROY {
print "MyClass::DESTROY called\n";
}

sub MyMethod {
print "MyClass::MyMethod called!\n";
}

# Following is the implemnetation of Inheritance.

package MySubClass;

@ISA = qw( MyClass );

sub new {
print "MySubClass::new called\n";
my $type = shift; # The package/type name
my $self = MyClass->new; # Reference to empty hash
return bless $self, $type;
}

sub DESTROY {
print "MySubClass::DESTROY called\n";
}

sub MyMethod {
my $self = shift;
$self->SUPER::MyMethod();
print " MySubClass::MyMethod called!\n";
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# Here is the main program using above classes.

package main;

print "Invoke MyClass method\n";

$myObject = MyClass->new();
$myObject->MyMethod();

print "Invoke MySubClass method\n";

$myObject2 = MySubClass->new();
$myObject2->MyMethod();

print "Create a scoped object\n";

{
my $myObject2 = MyClass->new();
}
# Destructor is called automatically here

print "Create and undef an object\n";

$myObject3 = MyClass->new();
undef $myObject3;

print "Fall off the end of the script...\n";

# Remaining destructors are called automatically here
When we execute above program, it produces the following result −
Invoke MyClass method
MyClass::new called
MyClass::MyMethod called!
Invoke MySubClass method
MySubClass::new called
MyClass::new called
MyClass::MyMethod called!
MySubClass::MyMethod called!
Create a scoped object
MyClass::new called
MyClass::DESTROY called
Create and undef an object
MyClass::new called
MyClass::DESTROY called
Fall off the end of the script...
MyClass::DESTROY called
MySubClass::DESTROY called

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