note philipbailey <p>This is one of those times when there is a difference between a list and an array in Perl. It seems hard to produce a concise definition of the difference, but to a first approximation an array is a list with a name (such as @a in your examples). So qw(a b c d e) is a list which you have assigned to @a.</p> <p>What you have exposed is that in scalar context, a array and list (both containing the same data) have different values. The value, in scalar context, of an array, is the number of elements. The value, in scalar context, of a list, is the last item in that list.</p> Update. See <a href="http://perldoc.perl.org/perlfaq4.html#What-is-the-difference-between-a-list-and-an-array?">perlfaq4</a> 866291 866291