#!/usr/bin/perl -w
use strict;

use Benchmark;

use vars qw/$str/;

$str = "123456789asgdjlaskjglkajblnlbnlaqjteoijqotijwojgl;akjglkj";

timethese(shift || 1000000, {
    'unpack' => sub { my $char = getn_unpack($str, 1) },
    'substr' => sub { my $char = getn_substr($str, 1) },
    'split'  => sub { my $char = getn_split($str, 1) }
});

sub getn_unpack {
    return unpack "x" . ($_[1]-1) . "a", $_[0];
}

sub getn_substr {
    return substr $_[0], $_[1]-1, 1;
}

sub getn_split {
    return +(split //, $_[0],2)[$_[1]-1];
}