The Perl Purity Test

... rewritten a Unix command in perl?

... rewritten a DOS command in perl?

... emulated a kernel feature inside a program in perl?

... written a compressor/decompressor using pack?

... written scripts that generate other scripts?

... used undocumented features?

... used reserved keywords as variable names?

... used $x, @x, and %x in a script?

... used $x, @x, %x, and *x in a script?

... not gotten confused when you used $x, @x, %x, and *x all in that script?

... written a script with no alphabetic characters in it?

... no alphanumeric characters in it?

... used variables with control-characters other than ones already defined?

... created variables at runtime?

... used lists of lists?

... used associative array operators on the main symbol table?

... created functions at runtime?

... written a function that returns different types? (e.g., scalar, list, etc.)

... called a subroutine with the & operator and no arguments so that the

child function inherited what remains of the caller’s argument stack, @_?

... changed function definitions on the fly?

... used wantarray?

... returned a "0 but true" scalar?

... used do BLOCK inside an EXPR?

... used loop controls (e.g., last, next, etc.) from inside a signal handler?

... created a loop label at runtime?

... used the scalar ".." operator?

... used it with things other than line numbers, array indices, or regexps?

... used syscall?

... used the /e switch?

... used the /ee switch?

... used a /eee or higher number of e’s in a switch?

... used arrays of file handles?

... used indirect file handles?

... used doubly indirect file handles?

... used a directory handle as a file handle?

... and gotten away with it?

... used a file handle as a directory handle?

... and gotten away with it?

... used all nine sets of parentheses in a regexp?

... used more than nine sets of parentheses in a regexp?

... used nested parentheses in a regexp?

... wished for an equivalent to LISP’s meta-close character "]", which closes all currently open parentheses?

... used grep on non-arrays?

... nested grep within another grep (for a total of two greps)?

... nested up to five greps within one statement?

... nested more thann five greps within one statement?

... written self-modifying evals?

... used eval to test for features your brain-damaged version of Unix doesn’t have?

... used eval/die to emulate setjmp/longjmp?

... nested an eval inside another eval (for a total of two nested evals)?

... used up to five nested evals?

... used more than five nested evals?

... used references?

... used lists of references?

... used associative arrays of references?

... lost your referents and didn’t care?

... used stream sockets?

... used datagram sockets?

... used RPC?

... used the -D flag?

... used the -D1024 flag?

... figured out what all that debugging info meant?

... used the perl debugger?

... modified the perl debugger?

... written your own package?

... used packages to emulate structures?

... referenced a package’s symbol table via %_packagename?

... gotten frustrated with the documentation of how to link in user subroutines?

... written a subroutine to be linked in with uperl.o so that your routine can be called from a perl script?

... replaced your version of perl with a version that has your subroutine(s)?

... abused dynamic scoping by fudging @ARGV?

... abused dynamic scoping and changed the names of functions?

... debugged the result of h2ph?

... hacked on h2ph?

... debugged the result of c2ph?

... hacked on c2ph?

... ported gcc so you can use c2ph?

... used autoloading functions?

... sent mail to Larry asking for help?

... sent mail to Larry reporting a bug in perl?

... sent mail to Larry requesting a feature?

... gotten a reply from Larry (as opposed to his autoreplier)?

... gotten more than ten autoreplies from Larry?

... sent mail to Randal asking for help?

... sent mail to Randal reporting a bug in perl?

... sent mail to Randal with an idea for a JAPH script?

... sent mail to Tom asking for help?

... sent mail to Tom reporting a bug in perl?

... sent mail to Tom pointing out an error in his slides?

... had a requested feature be included in a subsequent set of patches?

... had up to five requested features included?

... had more than five requested features included?

... written a "Just another Perl hacker" script?

... written five or less JAPH scripts?

... written more than five JAPH scripts?

... written any perl poems?

... run these perl poems?

... used unquoted strings?

... used them unintentionally?

... seeked on __DATA__ to reread your script?

... tried to use a bi-directional pipe?

... realized why this is a waste of time?

... used co-routines in a perl script?

... written a script that used command-line switches?

... used up to five command-line switches?

... more than five command-line switches?

... written a script with its own man page embedded in it?

... counted how many perl functions are overloaded?

... referred to the Perl book?

... bought the Perl book?

... bought multiple copies because you wore out the previous copies?

... owned more than one edition of the Perl book?

... owned more than one copy of every edition of the Perl book?

... wondered why Larry and Randall chose a camel for the cover?

... found out why Larry and Randall chose a camel?

... read comp.lang.perl?

... posted to comp.lang.perl?

... applied a kill file to comp.lang.perl?