Question

Looking through the perlsub and perlop manpages I’ve noticed that there are many references to “magic” and “magical” there (just search any of them for “magic”). I wonder why is Perl so rich in them.

Some examples:

print ++($foo = 'zz')            # prints 'aaa'       
printf "%d: %s", $! = 1, $!      # prints '1: Operation not permitted'
while (my $line = <FH>) { ... }  # $line is tested for definedness, not truth
use warnings; print "0 but true" + 1  # "0 but true" is a valid number!

Answer 1

When a Perl feature is described as “magic”:

It means that that feature is
implemented by NBA star Magic Johnson.
Whenever Perl executes “magic”, it is
actually sending an RPC call to a
remote receiver implanted in Magic
himself. He computes the answer, and
then sends a return message. The use
of Mr. Johnson for all the hard parts
of Perl provides a great abstraction
layer and simplifies porting to new
platforms. It’s way easier than, say,
the Apache Portable Runtime.

Source: perrin on Perl Monks

It’s official! Perl is more magical.

Hits from the following Google searches:

 25  site:ruby-doc.org     magic
 36  site:docs.python.org  magic
497  site:perldoc.perl.org magic