1PERLREFTUT(1) Perl Programmers Reference Guide PERLREFTUT(1)
2
6 perlreftut - Mark's very short tutorial about references
7
9 One of the most important new features in Perl 5 was the capability to
10 manage complicated data structures like multidimensional arrays and
11 nested hashes. To enable these, Perl 5 introduced a feature called
12 references, and using references is the key to managing complicated,
13 structured data in Perl. Unfortunately, there's a lot of funny syntax
14 to learn, and the main manual page can be hard to follow. The manual
15 is quite complete, and sometimes people find that a problem, because it
16 can be hard to tell what is important and what isn't.
17 Fortunately, you only need to know 10% of what's in the main page to
19 get 90% of the benefit. This page will show you that 10%.
20
22 One problem that comes up all the time is needing a hash whose values
23 are lists. Perl has hashes, of course, but the values have to be
24 scalars; they can't be lists.
25 Why would you want a hash of lists? Let's take a simple example: You
27 have a file of city and country names, like this:
28 Chicago, USA
30 Frankfurt, Germany
31 Berlin, Germany
32 Washington, USA
33 Helsinki, Finland
34 New York, USA
35 and you want to produce an output like this, with each country
37 mentioned once, and then an alphabetical list of the cities in that
38 country:
39 Finland: Helsinki.
41 Germany: Berlin, Frankfurt.
42 USA: Chicago, New York, Washington.
43 The natural way to do this is to have a hash whose keys are country
45 names. Associated with each country name key is a list of the cities
46 in that country. Each time you read a line of input, split it into a
47 country and a city, look up the list of cities already known to be in
48 that country, and append the new city to the list. When you're done
49 reading the input, iterate over the hash as usual, sorting each list of
50 cities before you print it out.
51 If hash values couldn't be lists, you lose. You'd probably have to
53 combine all the cities into a single string somehow, and then when time
54 came to write the output, you'd have to break the string into a list,
55 sort the list, and turn it back into a string. This is messy and
56 error-prone. And it's frustrating, because Perl already has perfectly
57 good lists that would solve the problem if only you could use them.
58
60 By the time Perl 5 rolled around, we were already stuck with this
61 design: Hash values must be scalars. The solution to this is
62 references.
63 A reference is a scalar value that refers to an entire array or an
65 entire hash (or to just about anything else). Names are one kind of
66 reference that you're already familiar with. Each human being is a
67 messy, inconvenient collection of cells. But to refer to a particular
68 human, for instance the first computer programmer, it isn't necessary
69 to describe each of their cells; all you need is the easy, convenient
70 scalar string "Ada Lovelace".
71 References in Perl are like names for arrays and hashes. They're
73 Perl's private, internal names, so you can be sure they're unambiguous.
74 Unlike a human name, a reference only refers to one thing, and you
75 always know what it refers to. If you have a reference to an array,
76 you can recover the entire array from it. If you have a reference to a
77 hash, you can recover the entire hash. But the reference is still an
78 easy, compact scalar value.
79 You can't have a hash whose values are arrays; hash values can only be
81 scalars. We're stuck with that. But a single reference can refer to
82 an entire array, and references are scalars, so you can have a hash of
83 references to arrays, and it'll act a lot like a hash of arrays, and
84 it'll be just as useful as a hash of arrays.
85 We'll come back to this city-country problem later, after we've seen
87 some syntax for managing references.
88
90 There are just two ways to make a reference, and just two ways to use
91 it once you have it.
92 Making References
94 Make Rule 1
95 If you put a "\" in front of a variable, you get a reference to that
97 variable.
98 $aref = \@array; # $aref now holds a reference to @array
100 $href = \%hash; # $href now holds a reference to %hash
101 Once the reference is stored in a variable like $aref or $href, you can
103 copy it or store it just the same as any other scalar value:
104 $xy = $aref; # $xy now holds a reference to @array
106 $p[3] = $href; # $p[3] now holds a reference to %hash
107 $z = $p[3]; # $z now holds a reference to %hash
108 These examples show how to make references to variables with names.
110 Sometimes you want to make an array or a hash that doesn't have a name.
111 This is analogous to the way you like to be able to use the string "\n"
112 or the number 80 without having to store it in a named variable first.
113 Make Rule 2
115 "[ ITEMS ]" makes a new, anonymous array, and returns a reference to
117 that array. "{ ITEMS }" makes a new, anonymous hash, and returns a
118 reference to that hash.
119 $aref = [ 1, "foo", undef, 13 ];
121 # $aref now holds a reference to an array
122 $href = { APR => 4, AUG => 8 };
124 # $href now holds a reference to a hash
125 The references you get from rule 2 are the same kind of references that
127 you get from rule 1:
128 # This:
130 $aref = [ 1, 2, 3 ];
131 # Does the same as this:
133 @array = (1, 2, 3);
134 $aref = \@array;
135 The first line is an abbreviation for the following two lines, except
137 that it doesn't create the superfluous array variable @array.
138 If you write just "[]", you get a new, empty anonymous array. If you
140 write just "{}", you get a new, empty anonymous hash.
141 Using References
143 What can you do with a reference once you have it? It's a scalar
144 value, and we've seen that you can store it as a scalar and get it back
145 again just like any scalar. There are just two more ways to use it:
146 Use Rule 1
148 You can always use an array reference, in curly braces, in place of the
150 name of an array. For example, "@{$aref}" instead of @array.
151 Here are some examples of that:
153 Arrays:
155 @a @{$aref} An array
157 reverse @a reverse @{$aref} Reverse the array
158 $a[3] ${$aref}[3] An element of the array
159 $a[3] = 17; ${$aref}[3] = 17 Assigning an element
160 On each line are two expressions that do the same thing. The left-hand
162 versions operate on the array @a. The right-hand versions operate on
163 the array that is referred to by $aref. Once they find the array
164 they're operating on, both versions do the same things to the arrays.
165 Using a hash reference is exactly the same:
167 %h %{$href} A hash
169 keys %h keys %{$href} Get the keys from the hash
170 $h{'red'} ${$href}{'red'} An element of the hash
171 $h{'red'} = 17 ${$href}{'red'} = 17 Assigning an element
172 Whatever you want to do with a reference, Use Rule 1 tells you how to
174 do it. You just write the Perl code that you would have written for
175 doing the same thing to a regular array or hash, and then replace the
176 array or hash name with "{$reference}". "How do I loop over an array
177 when all I have is a reference?" Well, to loop over an array, you
178 would write
179 for my $element (@array) {
181 ...
182 }
183 so replace the array name, @array, with the reference:
185 for my $element (@{$aref}) {
187 ...
188 }
189 "How do I print out the contents of a hash when all I have is a
191 reference?" First write the code for printing out a hash:
192 for my $key (keys %hash) {
194 print "$key => $hash{$key}\n";
195 }
196 And then replace the hash name with the reference:
198 for my $key (keys %{$href}) {
200 print "$key => ${$href}{$key}\n";
201 }
202 Use Rule 2
204 Use Rule 1 is all you really need, because it tells you how to do
206 absolutely everything you ever need to do with references. But the
207 most common thing to do with an array or a hash is to extract a single
208 element, and the Use Rule 1 notation is cumbersome. So there is an
209 abbreviation.
210 "${$aref}[3]" is too hard to read, so you can write "$aref->[3]"
212 instead.
213 "${$href}{red}" is too hard to read, so you can write "$href->{red}"
215 instead.
216 If $aref holds a reference to an array, then "$aref->[3]" is the fourth
218 element of the array. Don't confuse this with $aref[3], which is the
219 fourth element of a totally different array, one deceptively named
220 @aref. $aref and @aref are unrelated the same way that $item and @item
221 are.
222 Similarly, "$href->{'red'}" is part of the hash referred to by the
224 scalar variable $href, perhaps even one with no name. $href{'red'} is
225 part of the deceptively named %href hash. It's easy to forget to leave
226 out the "->", and if you do, you'll get bizarre results when your
227 program gets array and hash elements out of totally unexpected hashes
228 and arrays that weren't the ones you wanted to use.
229 An Example
231 Let's see a quick example of how all this is useful.
232 First, remember that "[1, 2, 3]" makes an anonymous array containing
234 "(1, 2, 3)", and gives you a reference to that array.
235 Now think about
237 @a = ( [1, 2, 3],
239 [4, 5, 6],
240 [7, 8, 9]
241 );
242 @a is an array with three elements, and each one is a reference to
244 another array.
245 $a[1] is one of these references. It refers to an array, the array
247 containing "(4, 5, 6)", and because it is a reference to an array, Use
248 Rule 2 says that we can write "$a[1]->[2]" to get the third element
249 from that array. "$a[1]->[2]" is the 6. Similarly, "$a[0]->[1]" is
250 the 2. What we have here is like a two-dimensional array; you can
251 write "$a[ROW]->[COLUMN]" to get or set the element in any row and any
252 column of the array.
253 The notation still looks a little cumbersome, so there's one more
255 abbreviation:
256 Arrow Rule
258 In between two subscripts, the arrow is optional.
259 Instead of "$a[1]->[2]", we can write "$a[1][2]"; it means the same
261 thing. Instead of "$a[0]->[1] = 23", we can write "$a[0][1] = 23"; it
262 means the same thing.
263 Now it really looks like two-dimensional arrays!
265 You can see why the arrows are important. Without them, we would have
267 had to write "${$a[1]}[2]" instead of "$a[1][2]". For three-
268 dimensional arrays, they let us write "$x[2][3][5]" instead of the
269 unreadable "${${$x[2]}[3]}[5]".
270
272 Here's the answer to the problem I posed earlier, of reformatting a
273 file of city and country names.
274 1 my %table;
276 2 while (<>) {
278 3 chomp;
279 4 my ($city, $country) = split /, /;
280 5 $table{$country} = [] unless exists $table{$country};
281 6 push @{$table{$country}}, $city;
282 7 }
283 8 for my $country (sort keys %table) {
285 9 print "$country: ";
286 10 my @cities = @{$table{$country}};
287 11 print join ', ', sort @cities;
288 12 print ".\n";
289 13 }
290 The program has two pieces: Lines 2-7 read the input and build a data
292 structure, and lines 8-13 analyze the data and print out the report.
293 We're going to have a hash, %table, whose keys are country names, and
294 whose values are references to arrays of city names. The data
295 structure will look like this:
296 %table
298 +-------+---+
299 | | | +-----------+--------+
300 |Germany| *---->| Frankfurt | Berlin |
301 | | | +-----------+--------+
302 +-------+---+
303 | | | +----------+
304 |Finland| *---->| Helsinki |
305 | | | +----------+
306 +-------+---+
307 | | | +---------+------------+----------+
308 | USA | *---->| Chicago | Washington | New York |
309 | | | +---------+------------+----------+
310 +-------+---+
311 We'll look at output first. Supposing we already have this structure,
313 how do we print it out?
314 8 for my $country (sort keys %table) {
316 9 print "$country: ";
317 10 my @cities = @{$table{$country}};
318 11 print join ', ', sort @cities;
319 12 print ".\n";
320 13 }
321 %table is an ordinary hash, and we get a list of keys from it, sort the
323 keys, and loop over the keys as usual. The only use of references is
324 in line 10. $table{$country} looks up the key $country in the hash and
325 gets the value, which is a reference to an array of cities in that
326 country. Use Rule 1 says that we can recover the array by saying
327 "@{$table{$country}}". Line 10 is just like
328 @cities = @array;
330 except that the name "array" has been replaced by the reference
332 "{$table{$country}}". The "@" tells Perl to get the entire array.
333 Having gotten the list of cities, we sort it, join it, and print it out
334 as usual.
335 Lines 2-7 are responsible for building the structure in the first
337 place. Here they are again:
338 2 while (<>) {
340 3 chomp;
341 4 my ($city, $country) = split /, /;
342 5 $table{$country} = [] unless exists $table{$country};
343 6 push @{$table{$country}}, $city;
344 7 }
345 Lines 2-4 acquire a city and country name. Line 5 looks to see if the
347 country is already present as a key in the hash. If it's not, the
348 program uses the "[]" notation (Make Rule 2) to manufacture a new,
349 empty anonymous array of cities, and installs a reference to it into
350 the hash under the appropriate key.
351 Line 6 installs the city name into the appropriate array.
353 $table{$country} now holds a reference to the array of cities seen in
354 that country so far. Line 6 is exactly like
355 push @array, $city;
357 except that the name "array" has been replaced by the reference
359 "{$table{$country}}". The "push" adds a city name to the end of the
360 referred-to array.
361 There's one fine point I skipped. Line 5 is unnecessary, and we can
363 get rid of it.
364 2 while (<>) {
366 3 chomp;
367 4 my ($city, $country) = split /, /;
368 5 #### $table{$country} = [] unless exists $table{$country};
369 6 push @{$table{$country}}, $city;
370 7 }
371 If there's already an entry in %table for the current $country, then
373 nothing is different. Line 6 will locate the value in
374 $table{$country}, which is a reference to an array, and push $city into
375 the array. But what does it do when $country holds a key, say
376 "Greece", that is not yet in %table?
377 This is Perl, so it does the exact right thing. It sees that you want
379 to push "Athens" onto an array that doesn't exist, so it helpfully
380 makes a new, empty, anonymous array for you, installs it into %table,
381 and then pushes "Athens" onto it. This is called
382 autovivification--bringing things to life automatically. Perl saw that
383 the key wasn't in the hash, so it created a new hash entry
384 automatically. Perl saw that you wanted to use the hash value as an
385 array, so it created a new empty array and installed a reference to it
386 in the hash automatically. And as usual, Perl made the array one
387 element longer to hold the new city name.
388
390 I promised to give you 90% of the benefit with 10% of the details, and
391 that means I left out 90% of the details. Now that you have an
392 overview of the important parts, it should be easier to read the
393 perlref manual page, which discusses 100% of the details.
394 Some of the highlights of perlref:
396 • You can make references to anything, including scalars, functions,
398 and other references.
399 • In Use Rule 1, you can omit the curly brackets whenever the thing
401 inside them is an atomic scalar variable like $aref. For example,
402 @$aref is the same as "@{$aref}", and $$aref[1] is the same as
403 "${$aref}[1]". If you're just starting out, you may want to adopt
404 the habit of always including the curly brackets.
405 • This doesn't copy the underlying array:
407 $aref2 = $aref1;
409 You get two references to the same array. If you modify
411 "$aref1->[23]" and then look at "$aref2->[23]" you'll see the
412 change.
413 To copy the array, use
415 $aref2 = [@{$aref1}];
417 This uses "[...]" notation to create a new anonymous array, and
419 $aref2 is assigned a reference to the new array. The new array is
420 initialized with the contents of the array referred to by $aref1.
421 Similarly, to copy an anonymous hash, you can use
423 $href2 = {%{$href1}};
425 • To see if a variable contains a reference, use the "ref" function.
427 It returns true if its argument is a reference. Actually it's a
428 little better than that: It returns "HASH" for hash references and
429 "ARRAY" for array references.
430 • If you try to use a reference like a string, you get strings like
432 ARRAY(0x80f5dec) or HASH(0x826afc0)
434 If you ever see a string that looks like this, you'll know you
436 printed out a reference by mistake.
437 A side effect of this representation is that you can use "eq" to
439 see if two references refer to the same thing. (But you should
440 usually use "==" instead because it's much faster.)
441 • You can use a string as if it were a reference. If you use the
443 string "foo" as an array reference, it's taken to be a reference to
444 the array @foo. This is called a symbolic reference. The
445 declaration "use strict 'refs'" disables this feature, which can
446 cause all sorts of trouble if you use it by accident.
447 You might prefer to go on to perllol instead of perlref; it discusses
449 lists of lists and multidimensional arrays in detail. After that, you
450 should move on to perldsc; it's a Data Structure Cookbook that shows
451 recipes for using and printing out arrays of hashes, hashes of arrays,
452 and other kinds of data.
453
455 Everyone needs compound data structures, and in Perl the way you get
456 them is with references. There are four important rules for managing
457 references: Two for making references and two for using them. Once you
458 know these rules you can do most of the important things you need to do
459 with references.
460
462 Author: Mark Jason Dominus, Plover Systems ("mjd-perl-ref+@plover.com")
463 This article originally appeared in The Perl Journal (
465 <http://www.tpj.com/> ) volume 3, #2. Reprinted with permission.
466 The original title was Understand References Today.
468 Distribution Conditions
470 Copyright 1998 The Perl Journal.
471 This documentation is free; you can redistribute it and/or modify it
473 under the same terms as Perl itself.
474 Irrespective of its distribution, all code examples in these files are
476 hereby placed into the public domain. You are permitted and encouraged
477 to use this code in your own programs for fun or for profit as you see
478 fit. A simple comment in the code giving credit would be courteous but
479 is not required.
480perl v5.38.2 2023-11-30 PERLREFTUT(1)