Perl 5.12 new features

Perl 5.12.1 is out, which is the sign that it’s time for normal users to pay attention to it: that first point release should have sanded down all the rough edges. As usual, the complete list of major changes is in the perldelta5.12.0 documentation, we’ll cover some more of the interesting features in The Effective Perler in the coming weeks. Our initial list of user-interesting features include:

• use 5.012 turns on strict by default
• each on arrays
• when as a statement modifier
• locally delete hash keys or array values
• 32-bit limit on substr removed
• The new deprecation warnings
• Use the \N regex character class to get “not a newline”
• length of an undefined value returns undef
• The yadda yadda operator placeholder

If there are some other Perl 5.12 features that you’d like us to cover, leave a comment telling us what it is and why you’re curious about it.