As you might know you can run perl code on the command line without even creating a script using the -e flag:

$ perl -e "print 42"

The same way you can also run the a code that consists of the number 1 only, that of course won't do anything:

$ perl -e 1

Except that we could include the -d flag and that would run that code in the debugger

$ perl -d -e 1

Because we can combine some of the command line flags, we can also write this:

$ perl -de1

We can print a number using ther perl function print. We can assign a value to a scalar variable. (There is no need to declare the variables using my.) We can then print the content of the variable using the print function of Perl.

If we are lazy, and we should be lazy, we can use the p command of the debugger which just does the same as the print function of perl.

 DB<1> print 42
42

 DB<2> $x = 42

 DB<3> print $x
42

 DB<4> p $x
42

We can also assign values to an array such as @names. If we print it out using print, or for that matter using the p command of the debugger, the values will be smashed together and we won't see the separate values. Not very useful.

We can put the array in double quotes "@names" which will get the print function to include spaces between the values, but we still won't know if the array had 3 values, or one value with 2 spaces in it. A much better way to display an array is the x operator of the debugger which is quite similar to Data::Dumper. It also expects a reference to an array, hence we added the backslash in-front of the array.

 DB<5> @names = qw(Foo Bar Baz)

 DB<6> print @names
FooBarBaz

 DB<7> print "@names"
Foo Bar Baz

 DB<8> x \@names
0 ARRAY(0x1a41c68)
  0  'Foo'
  1  'Bar'
  2  'Baz'

We can also create a hash, and we can use the x operator on the reference to that hash, to print it out:

 DB<9>  %h = (fname => 'Foo', lname => 'Bar')

 DB<10> x \%h
0 HASH(0x1a41d70)
  'fname'  => 'Foo'
  'lname'  => 'Bar'

We can also execute any Perl statement. For example we can use the push function on the array appending a new element to it and then we can check the content of the array again:

 DB<11> push @names, 'Moose'

 DB<12> x \@names
0 ARRAY(0x1a41c68)
  0  'Foo'
  1  'Bar'
  2  'Baz'
  3  'Moose'

We can also load modules with use and the we can call the functions imported by the module.

 DB<13> use Cwd

 DB<14> cwd

 DB<15> p cwd
/home/gabor

We can also load the File::Basename module.

 DB<16> use File::Basename

 DB<17> p basename(cwd)
gabor

Using the b command of the debugger, we can set a breakpoint at the entrance of any function which is already in memory. Even if it is in a Perl module written by someone else. After setting the breakpoint if we run the function again, it will stop just when we enter the function.

 DB<18> b File::Basename::basename

 DB<19> p basename(cwd)
File::Basename::basename(/usr/share/perl/5.10/File/Basename.pm:215):
215:      my($path) = shift;

Then we can look around. For example we can use the l command to list the next few lines of the source code

 DB<<20>> l
215==>b  my($path) = shift;
216
217   # From BSD basename(1)
218   # The basename utility deletes any prefix ending with the last slash '/'
219   # character present in string (after first stripping trailing slashes)
220:  _strip_trailing_sep($path);
221
222:  my($basename, $dirname, $suffix) = fileparse( $path, map("\Q$_\E",@_) );
223
224   # From BSD basename(1)

We can also list any section of the code by supplying the line numbers:

 DB<<20>> l 200-220
213
214    sub basename {
215==>b  my($path) = shift;
216
217      # From BSD basename(1)
218      # The basename utility deletes any prefix ending with the last slash '/'
219      # character present in string (after first stripping trailing slashes)
220:     _strip_trailing_sep($path);

Finally, for this screencasts, we can quite the debugger using q:

 DB<<21>> q

$

The debugger commands

• p - print scalar
• x - print data structure
• b subname - set breakpoint
• l - list the next few lines of the source code
• l from-to - list source code between given lines
• q - quit the debugger