What is prototypes in Perl?

In Perl, prototypes are a mechanism that allows you to specify the expected argument types for subroutines. This helps Perl to enforce certain constraints on the arguments passed to a subroutine and can also provide additional contextual information to the compiler.

When you define a subroutine with a prototype, Perl checks the number and types of arguments when the subroutine is called. Prototypes can be useful for creating domain-specific languages or for ensuring that subroutines are called with the correct data types.

Here is a simple example of using prototypes in Perl:

sub greet ($) { my ($name) = @_; return "Hello, $name!"; } print greet("World"); # Outputs: Hello, World!

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