13:08 >perl -MData::Dump -wE "@a = @a || (1 .. 3); dd \@a;" [1, 2, 3] 13:08 >perl -MData::Dump -wE "@a ||= (1 .. 3); dd \@a;" Can't modify array dereference in logical or assignment (||=) at -e line 1, near ");" Execution of -e aborted due to compilation errors. 13:09 >perl -v This is perl 5, version 18, subversion 0 (v5.18.0) built for MSWin32-x86-multi-thread-64int