# A long string containing code is assigned to $raven. Colons # are actually spaces, as you will see later: my$raven=' # I admit, I had to cheat here; I actually had to print these # out to find out what they are. But then again, its pack # and unpack, its near impossible to solve them by hand... # Btw, a hint on the unpack one: it is actually quoted with # a q||, its not a bareword. the unpack one is in unicode, # which is translated to ascii; the pack is in hex (the * # means "apply to all characters"), and it returns a list # (which is ok, since print accepts a list!) # oh, and btw, these print the title. print:unpack("u",q|=5&AE(%)A=F5N(&)Y($5D9V%R($%L;&5N(%!O90H`|); print:pack("H*","51756f74682074686520726176656e203a0a"); # open $0 (the name of the file this is in) and assign it to # the filehandle LENORE. The < means the handle is for reading # only. open(LENORE,"<$0")||die$!; # $bird = 'nevermore'; $bird=q|nevermore|; # @saying = ('n', 'e', 'v', 'e', 'r', 'm', 'o', 'r', 'e'); @saying=split(//,$bird); # get rid of the shebang by using the filehandle in void context; # since the source code of the file is in because of # the open, using it in void context is kind of like shift(ing) it. ; # same context to get rid of blank line ; # loop through the rest of LENORE for() { # replac all non space characters with a colon # \x3a is a colon btw :) (its in hex; 3a = 58 in # decimal; the \x "chr(s)" it; print chr(58) if # you don't believe me :) s|\S|\x3a|g; # globally replace all spaces (\x20 is a space; also, the # shape of ascii art is a silhoutte of a raven; the # silhoutte is what is being modified) with # '$saying[int$t++%9]', the e modifier makes it eval it, # below is an explanation of the inside: # first of all, the reason for the non-strict and # non-warnings is because $t is never declared. It # starts off at 0, and gets ++(ed) every pass through # the loop. Next, it gets modulus(ed) by 9, which # happens to be the size of @saying ($#saying). # Finally, this value is int(ed) so the value is an # integer. In this way, the phrase 'nevermore' is # "looped" through. s|\x20|$saying[int$t++%9]|ge; # $_ (current value of ) is printed. print; # loop ends } # filehandle closed like a good boy ;) close(LENORE); # raven is end-quoted. '; # $_ is set to $raven $_=$raven; # all spaces are removed. $_=~s/\s//gx; # colons are changed to spaces; $_=~s/\x3a/\x20/g;eval # the whole bloody think is evalled (meaning all # of the code in $raven is evalled since $_ was # set to $raven. # ick sloppy! I need to show you guys a few tricks # to avoid things like this in shaping ;) ;;;;