Perhaps this little sample script will demonstrate the definition.
$ perl -e '
my $string = "Lorem ipsum";
my @array = qw(The quick brown fox jumps over the lazy dog);
for my $offset (0..length($string)) {
printf "Offset $offset: %s\n", substr($string, $offset);
}
for my $offset (0..$#array) {
printf "Offset $offset: %s\n", $array[$offset];
}
'
Offset 0: Lorem ipsum
Offset 1: orem ipsum
Offset 2: rem ipsum
Offset 3: em ipsum
Offset 4: m ipsum
Offset 5: ipsum
Offset 6: ipsum
Offset 7: psum
Offset 8: sum
Offset 9: um
Offset 10: m
Offset 11:
Offset 0: The
Offset 1: quick
Offset 2: brown
Offset 3: fox
Offset 4: jumps
Offset 5: over
Offset 6: the
Offset 7: lazy
Offset 8: dog
$