Question

Let’s say I have a hash like this

my %profile = (
    building            => $p->{account}->{building},
    email               => $p->{account}->{email},
    phone               => $p->{account}->{phone},
    );

The variables in $p can have all sorts of values when they have not been defined. I have atleast seen undef ~ ''.

How do I assign a value of -1 to e.g. $profile{building} if $p->{account}->{building} have one of these strange default values?

Are there any clever Perl way to do that?

Update: Any of the values can take on any of the strange default values undef ~ ''.

Answer 1

I would add a function:

my %profile = (
    building            => scrub($p->{account}->{building}),
    email               => scrub($p->{account}->{email}),
    phone               => scrub($p->{account}->{phone}),
    );

and implement the default-filtering logic in the function.

Or, better yet, pre-apply the logic to $p so that you know that $p has reasonable values.