Re: RFC 127 (v1) Sane resolution to large function returns

[Larry Wall]

Chaim Frenkel writes:
: LW> P.S. I think we *could* let @foo and %bar return an object ref in scalar
: LW> context, as long as the object returned overloads itself to behave as
: LW> arrays and hashes currently do in scalar context.
: 
: Isn't this an internals issue?

Not completely.  The scalar value would visably be a built-in object:

    @bar = (0,1,2);
    $foo = @bar;        # now means \@bar, not (\@bar)->num
    print ref $foo, $foo->num, $foo->str, ($foo->bool ? "true" : "false");
    ^D
    ARRAY3(0,1,2)true

One implication of this approach is that we'd break the rule that says
references are always true.  Not clear if that's a problem.  It's basically
already broken with bool overloading, and defined still works.

Larry