the answer to an 'uninitialized value, now how do I implement it?

[Bismark]

In the snippet below I have the dreaded "uninitialized value" I see the cause. $searchresult is initialized with three values, then when I try to use it in the print statement I try to give it seven values, 3 - 7 are the uninitialized culprits. I eventually want to have more than seven fields, so how do I initialize them in the beginning?

my $searchresult = search( part     => $part,
               rev      => $rev,
               filename => './file.db'           );

print $searchresult
  ? "Located Part Number: @{$searchresult}[0 .. 7]\n"

[pfaut]

my $searchresult = search( ... );
if ($searchresult) {
    my $count = $#$searchresult;
    $count = 7 if $count > 7;
    print "Located Part Numer: @{$searchresult}[0..$count]\n";
}

---
print map { my ($m)=1<<hex($_)&11?' ':'';
$m.=substr('AHJPacehklnorstu',hex($_),1) }
split //,'2fde0abe76c36c914586c';

[runrig]

While declaring the array in the function, or before returning the result from the function, you can initialize the values if you want to:

# Before doing stuff with array
my @array = ('') x 8;
# do stuff with array

# or before returning from function
for (@array) { $_ = '' unless defined }
#or
#for (@array[0..7]) { $_ = '' unless defined }

return @array;

[graff]

Try this:

my $resultsize = @$searchresult;
print "Located Part Number: @$searchresult[0..$resultsize]\n"
    if ( $resultsize );

(I was puzzled at what appeared to be an incomplete ternary operator in your code -- there was an expression, a question mark, another expression, then nothing else, when there should have been a colon and a third expression.)

[Bismark]

There is a colon and third expression, I left it out here since it is not involved with the error. I tried your suggestion and still get the uninitialized value error. After the error message it does print all the fields. So it is closer than I have gotten so far.

[Coruscate]

psst... just for the record, you are printing out an array slice of 8 items, not 7. :) Always remember that arrays begin with the number 0. So when you say @{$var}[0 .. 7], you are retrieving data from the array "slots" 0, 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6 and 7, making a total of 8 items.

You know... just for the record :)