perlcheat - Perl 5 Cheat Sheet This 'cheat sheet' is a handy reference, meant for beginning Perl programmers. Not everything is mentioned, but 194 features may already be overwhelming.

The sheet
CONTEXTS SIGILS ARRAYS HASHES void $scalar whole: @array %hash scalar @array slice: @array[0, 2] @hash{'a', 'b'} list %hash element: $array[0] $hash{'a'} &sub *glob SCALAR VALUES number, string, reference, glob, undef REFERENCES \ references $$foo[1] aka $foo->[1] $@%&* dereference $$foo{bar} aka $foo->{bar} [] anon. arrayref ${$$foo[1]}[2] aka $foo->[1]->[2] {} anon. hashref ${$$foo[1]}[2] aka $foo->[1][2] \() list of refs NUMBERS vs STRINGS LINKS OPERATOR PRECEDENCE = = perl.plover.com -> + . search.cpan.org ++ -- == != eq ne cpan.org ** < > <= >= lt gt le ge pm.org ! ~ \ u+ u- <=> cmp tpj.com =~ !~ perldoc.com * / % x SYNTAX + - . for (LIST) { }, for (a;b;c) { } << >> while ( ) { }, until ( ) { } named uops if ( ) { } elsif ( ) { } else { } < > <= >= lt gt le ge unless ( ) { } elsif ( ) { } else { } == != <=> eq ne cmp for equals foreach (ALWAYS) & | ^ REGEX METACHARS REGEX MODIFIERS && ^ string begin /i case insens. || $ str. end (before \n) /m line based ^$ .. ... + one or more /s . includes \n ?: * zero or more /x ign. wh.space = += -= *= etc. ? zero or one /g global , => {3,7} repeat in range list ops () capture REGEX CHARCLASSES not (?:) no capture . == [^\n] and [] character class \s == [\x20\f\t\r\n] or xor | alternation \w == [A-Za-z0-9_] \b word boundary \d == [0-9] \z string end \S, \W and \D negate DO use strict; DON'T LINKS use warnings; "$foo" perl.com my $var; $$variable_name perlmonks.org open() or die $!; `$userinput` use.perl.org use Modules; /$userinput/ perl.apache.org parrotcode.org FUNCTION RETURN LISTS stat localtime caller SPECIAL VARIABLES 0 dev 0 second 0 package $_ default variable 1 ino 1 minute 1 filename $0 program name 2 mode 2 hour 2 line $/ input separator 3 nlink 3 day 3 subroutine $\ output separator 4 uid 4 month-1 4 hasargs $| autoflush 5 gid 5 year-1900 5 wantarray $! sys/libcall error 6 rdev 6 weekday 6 evaltext $@ eval error 7 size 7 yearday 7 is_require $$ process ID 8 atime 8 is_dst 8 hints $. line number 9 mtime 9 bitmask @ARGV command line args 10 ctime just use @INC include paths 11 blksz POSIX:: 3..9 only @_ subroutine args 12 blcks strftime! with EXPR %ENV environment The first version of this document appeared on Perl Monks, where several people had useful suggestions. Thank you, Perl Monks. A special thanks to Damian Conway, who didn't only suggest important changes, but also took the time to count the number of listed features and make a Perl 6 version to show that Perl will stay Perl. Juerd Waalboer <juerd@cpan.org>, with the help of many Perl Monks. http://perlmonks.org/?node_id=216602 the original PM post http://perlmonks.org/?node_id=238031 Damian Conway's Perl 6 version http://juerd.nl/site.plp/perlcheat home of the Perl Cheat Sheet