The way context is propagated to the return statement (resp. the last statement) of a sub is indeed a problem.

( its too surprising how return 1..3 behaves and suddenly transforms into a flip flop)

That's why subs were remodeled in Perl 6 and I'd really appreciate a similar feature or pragma switch in Perl 5.

Regarding your list() routine, I think it solves the wrong problem . The behavior of comma separated lists comes from the "scalar comma operator" and is rarely useful.

The IMHO "most normal behavior" is to return a count, like arrays do. This fits perfectly into boolean context! That's why I occasionally wrap my values into a @{[...]} construct.

But that's too short to justify an own built-in function.

Maybe something like arr() could at least add some more readability.

YMMV! :)

update

To complete the picture, I was also in situations where I would have preferred $a=call() to act like:

• ($a)=call() (great for iterators) or
• $a=[call()] (gimme the reference)
• simply die (never meant to return scalar)

Tastes differ, IMHO its rather a question of clear notation.

update

And wantarray is not only a misnomer, but too difficult handle in 3 contexts. Damien published a module handling this which should better be XSed and Core.