[inseparable changes from patch from perl5.003_11 to perl5.003_12]

 CORE LANGUAGE CHANGES

Subject: Support C<delete @hash{@keys}>
From: Chip Salzenberg <chip@atlantic.net>
Files: op.c op.h opcode.pl pod/perldiag.pod pod/perlfunc.pod pp.c t/op/delete.t

Subject: Autovivify scalars
From: Chip Salzenberg <chip@atlantic.net>
Files: dump.c op.c op.h pp.c pp_hot.c

 DOCUMENTATION

Subject: Update pods: perldelta -> perlnews, perli18n -> perllocale
From: Tom Christiansen <tchrist@perl.com>
Files: MANIFEST pod/perl.pod pod/perldelta.pod pod/perli18n.pod pod/perlnews.pod

Subject: perltoot.pod
Date: Mon, 09 Dec 1996 07:44:10 -0700
From: Tom Christiansen <tchrist@mox.perl.com>
Files: MANIFEST pod/perltoot.pod
Msg-ID: <199612091444.HAA09947@toy.perl.com>

    (applied based on p5p patch as commit 32e22efaa9ec59b73a208b6c532a0b435e2c6462)

Subject: Perlguts, version 25
Date: Fri, 6 Dec 96 11:40:27 PST
From: Jeff Okamoto <okamoto@hpcc123.corp.hp.com>
Files: pod/perlguts.pod

    private-msgid: <199612061940.AA055461228@hpcc123.corp.hp.com>

Subject: pod patches for English errors
Date: Mon, 09 Dec 1996 13:33:11 -0800
From: Steve Kelem <steve.kelem@xilinx.com>
Files: pod/*.pod
Msg-ID: <24616.850167191@castor>

    (applied based on p5p patch as commit 0135f10892ed8a21c4dbd1fca21fbcc365df99dd)

Subject: Misc doc updates
Date: Sat, 14 Dec 1996 18:56:33 -0700
From: Tom Christiansen <tchrist@mox.perl.com>
Files: pod/*

    Subject: Re: perldelta.pod 
    
    Here are some diffs to the _11 pods.  I forgot to add perldelta to
    perl.pod though.
    
    And *PLEASE* fix the Artistic License so it no longer has the bogus
    "whomever" misdeclined in the nominative case:
    
        under the copyright of this Package, but belong to whomever generated
        them, and may be sold commercially, and may be aggregated with this
    
    It should obviously be "whoever".
    
    p5p-msgid: <199612150156.SAA12506@mox.perl.com>

 OTHER CORE CHANGES

Subject: Allow assignment to empty array values during foreach()
From: Chip Salzenberg <chip@atlantic.net>
Files: cop.h global.sym mg.c op.c perl.h pp_hot.c proto.h sv.c

Subject: Fix nested closures
From: Chip Salzenberg <chip@atlantic.net>
Files: op.c opcode.pl pp.c pp_ctl.c pp_hot.c

Subject: Fix core dump on auto-vivification
From: Chip Salzenberg <chip@atlantic.net>
Files: pp_hot.c

Subject: Fix core dump on C<open $undef_var, "X">
From: Chip Salzenberg <chip@atlantic.net>
Files: pp_sys.c

Subject: Fix -T/-B on globs and globrefs
From: Chip Salzenberg <chip@atlantic.net>
Files: pp_sys.c

Subject: Fix memory management of $`, $&, and $'
From: Chip Salzenberg <chip@atlantic.net>
Files: pp_hot.c regexec.c

Subject: Fix paren matching during backtracking
From: Chip Salzenberg <chip@atlantic.net>
Files: regexec.c

Subject: Fix memory leak and std{in,out,err} death in perl_{con,de}str
From: Chip Salzenberg <chip@atlantic.net>
Files: miniperlmain.c perl.c perl.h sv.c

Subject: Discard garbage bytes at end of prototype()
From: Chip Salzenberg <chip@atlantic.net>
Files: pp.c

Subject: Fix local($pack::{foo})
From: Chip Salzenberg <chip@atlantic.net>
Files: global.sym pp.c pp_hot.c proto.h scope.c

Subject: Disable warn, die, and parse hooks _before_ global destruction
From: Chip Salzenberg <chip@atlantic.net>
Files: perl.c

Subject: Re: Bug in formline 
Date: Sun, 08 Dec 1996 14:58:32 -0500
From: Gurusamy Sarathy <gsar@engin.umich.edu>
Files: pp_ctl.c
Msg-ID: <199612081958.OAA26025@aatma.engin.umich.edu>

    (applied based on p5p patch as commit b386bda18108ba86d0b76ebe2d8745eafa80f39e)

Subject: Fix C<@a = ($a,$b,$c,$d) = (1,2)>
From: Chip Salzenberg <chip@atlantic.net>
Files: pp_hot.c

Subject: Properly support and document newRV{,_inc,_noinc}
From: Chip Salzenberg <chip@atlantic.net>
Files: global.sym pod/perlguts.pod sv.c sv.h

Subject: Allow lvalue pos inside recursive function
From: Chip Salzenberg <chip@atlantic.net>
Files: op.c pp.c pp_ctl.c pp_hot.c

 PORTABILITY

Subject: Make $privlib contents compatible with 5.003
From: Chip Salzenberg <chip@atlantic.net>
Files: INSTALL ext/Opcode/Safe.pm installperl lib/FileHandle.pm lib/Test/Harness.pm

Subject: Support $bincompat3 config variable; update metaconfig units
From: Chip Salzenberg <chip@atlantic.net>
Files: Configure MANIFEST compat3.sym config_h.SH embed.pl global.sym old_embed.pl old_global.sym old_perl_exp.SH perl_exp.SH

Subject: Look for gettimeofday() in Configure
Date: Wed, 11 Dec 1996 15:49:57 +0100
From: John Hughes <john@AtlanTech.COM>
Files: Configure config_H config_h.SH pp.c

    Subject: perl5.003_11, Should base use of gettimeofday on HAS_GETTIMEOFDAY, not I_SYS_TIME
    
    I've been installing perl5.003_11 on a SCO system that has the TCP/IP runtime
    installed but not the TCP/IP development system.
    
    Unfortunately the <sys/time.h> include file is included in the TCP/IP runtime
    while libsocket.a is in the development system.
    
    This means that pp.c decides to use "gettimeofday" because <sys/time.h> is
    present but I can't link the perl that gets compiled.
    
    So, here's a patch to base the use of "gettimeofday" on "HAS_GETTIMEOFDAY"
    instead of "I_SYS_TIME".  I also took the liberty of removing the special
    case for plan9 (I assume plan9 has <sys/time.h> but no gettimeofday.  Am I
    right?).
    
    p5p-msgid: <01BBE77A.F6F37F80@malvinas.AtlanTech.COM>

Subject: Make $startperl a relative path if people want portable scrip
From: Chip Salzenberg <chip@atlantic.net>
Files: Configure

Subject: Homogenize use of "eval exec" hack
From: Chip Salzenberg <chip@atlantic.net>
Files: Porting/Glossary eg/README eg/nih eg/sysvipc/ipcmsg eg/sysvipc/ipcsem eg/sysvipc/ipcshm lib/diagnostics.pm makeaperl.SH pod/checkpods.PL pod/perlrun.pod pod/pod2html.PL pod/pod2latex.PL pod/pod2man.PL pod/pod2text.PL utils/c2ph.PL utils/h2ph.PL utils/h2xs.PL utils/perlbug.PL utils/perldoc.PL utils/pl2pm.PL x2p/a2py.c x2p/find2perl.PL x2p/s2p.PL

Subject: LynxOS support
Date: Thu, 12 Dec 1996 09:25:00 PST
From: Greg Seibert <seibert@Lynx.COM>
Files: Configure MANIFEST hints/lynxos.sh t/op/stat.t
Msg-ID: <m0vYEsY-0000IZC@kzinti.lynx.com>

    (applied based on p5p patch as commit 6693373533b15e559fd8f0f1877e5e6ec15483cc)

Subject: Re: db-recno.t failures with _11 on Freebsd 2.1-stable
Date: 11 Dec 1996 18:58:56 -0500
From: Roderick Schertler <roderick@gate.net>
Files: INSTALL hints/freebsd.sh
Msg-ID: <pzohg0r5tr.fsf@eeyore.ibcinc.com>

    (applied based on p5p patch as commit 10e40321ee752c58e3407b204c74c8049894cb51)

Subject: VMS patches to 5.003_11
Date: Mon, 09 Dec 1996 23:16:10 -0500 (EST)
From: Charles Bailey <bailey@HMIVAX.HUMGEN.UPENN.EDU>
Files: MANIFEST regexec.c t/lib/filehand.t util.c vms/*

    private-msgid: <01ICTR32LCZG001A1D@hmivax.humgen.upenn.edu>

 TESTING

Subject: recurse recurse recurse ...
Date: Mon, 9 Dec 1996 23:44:27 +0200 (EET)
From: Jarkko Hietaniemi <jhi@cc.hut.fi>
Files: MANIFEST t/op/recurse.t

    private-msgid: <199612092144.XAA29025@alpha.hut.fi>

 UTILITIES, LIBRARY, AND EXTENSIONS

Subject: Add CPAN and Net::FTP
From: Chip Salzenberg <chip@atlantic.net>
Files: MANIFEST lib/CPAN.pm lib/CPAN/FirstTime.pm lib/CPAN/Nox.pm lib/Net/FTP.pm lib/Net/Netrc.pm lib/Net/Socket.pm pod/perlmod.pod

Subject: Add File::Compare
Date: Mon, 16 Dec 1996 18:44:59 GMT
From: Nick Ing-Simmons <nik@tiuk.ti.com>
Files: MANIFEST lib/File/Compare.pm pod/perlmod.pod
Msg-ID: <199612161844.SAA02152@pluto>

    (applied based on p5p patch as commit ec971c5c328aca84fb827f69f2cc1dc3be81f830)

Subject: Add Tie::RefHash
Date: Sun, 15 Dec 1996 18:58:08 -0500
From: Gurusamy Sarathy <gsar@engin.umich.edu>
Files: MANIFEST lib/Tie/RefHash.pm pod/perlmod.pod
Msg-ID: <199612152358.SAA28665@aatma.engin.umich.edu>

    (applied based on p5p patch as commit 9a079709134ebbf4c935cc8752fdb564e5c82b94)

Subject: Put "splain" in utils.
From: Chip Salzenberg <chip@atlantic.net>
Files: Makefile.SH installperl utils/Makefile utils/splain.PL

Subject: Some h2ph fixes
Date: Fri, 13 Dec 1996 11:34:12 -0800
From: Jeff Okamoto <okamoto@hpcc123.corp.hp.com>
Files: utils/h2ph.PL

    Here is a message regarding changes to h2ph that should probably be folded
    into the 5.004 release.
    
    p5p-msgid: <199612131934.AA289845652@hpcc123.corp.hp.com>

1 files changed, 39 insertions, 17 deletions

diff --git a/pod/perldata.pod b/pod/perldata.pod
index c1144715d8..407a25204f 100644
--- a/pod/perldata.pod
+++ b/pod/perldata.pod
@@ -19,7 +19,7 @@ I<identifier>, that is, a string beginning with a letter or underscore,
 and containing letters, underscores, and digits.  In some cases, it
 may be a chain of identifiers, separated by C<::> (or by C<'>, but
 that's deprecated); all but the last are interpreted as names of
-packages, in order to locate the namespace in which to look
+packages, to locate the namespace in which to look
 up the final identifier (see L<perlmod/Packages> for details).
 It's possible to substitute for a simple identifier an expression
 which produces a reference to the value at runtime; this is
@@ -65,14 +65,14 @@ This means that $foo and @foo are two different variables.  It also
 means that C<$foo[1]> is a part of @foo, not a part of $foo.  This may
 seem a bit weird, but that's okay, because it is weird.
 
-Since variable and array references always start with '$', '@', or '%',
+Because variable and array references always start with '$', '@', or '%',
 the "reserved" words aren't in fact reserved with respect to variable
 names.  (They ARE reserved with respect to labels and filehandles,
 however, which don't have an initial special character.  You can't have
 a filehandle named "log", for instance.  Hint: you could say
 C<open(LOG,'logfile')> rather than C<open(log,'logfile')>.  Using uppercase
 filehandles also improves readability and protects you from conflict
-with future reserved words.)  Case I<IS> significant--"FOO", "Foo" and
+with future reserved words.)  Case I<IS> significant--"FOO", "Foo", and
 "foo" are all different names.  Names that start with a letter or
 underscore may also contain digits and underscores.
 
@@ -80,9 +80,9 @@ It is possible to replace such an alphanumeric name with an expression
 that returns a reference to an object of that type.  For a description
 of this, see L<perlref>.
 
-Names that start with a digit may only contain more digits.  Names
+Names that start with a digit may contain only more digits.  Names
 which do not start with a letter, underscore,  or digit are limited to
-one character, e.g.  C<$%> or C<$$>.  (Most of these one character names
+one character, e.g.,  C<$%> or C<$$>.  (Most of these one character names
 have a predefined significance to Perl.  For instance, C<$$> is the
 current process id.)
 
@@ -135,7 +135,7 @@ Scalar variables may contain various kinds of singular data, such as
 numbers, strings, and references.  In general, conversion from one form to
 another is transparent.  (A scalar may not contain multiple values, but
 may contain a reference to an array or hash containing multiple values.)
-Because of the automatic conversion of scalars, operations and functions
+Because of the automatic conversion of scalars, operations, and functions
 that return scalars don't need to care (and, in fact, can't care) whether
 the context is looking for a string or a number.
 
@@ -183,7 +183,7 @@ for details on regular expressions.
 
 The length of an array is a scalar value.  You may find the length of
 array @days by evaluating C<$#days>, as in B<csh>.  (Actually, it's not
-the length of the array, it's the subscript of the last element, since
+the length of the array, it's the subscript of the last element, because
 there is (ordinarily) a 0th element.)  Assigning to C<$#days> changes the
 length of the array.  Shortening an array by this method destroys
 intervening values.  Lengthening an array that was previously shortened
@@ -207,7 +207,7 @@ last value, like the C comma operator.)  The following is always true:
 Version 5 of Perl changed the semantics of C<$[>: files that don't set
 the value of C<$[> no longer need to worry about whether another
 file changed its value.  (In other words, use of C<$[> is deprecated.)
-So in general you can just assume that
+So in general you can assume that
 
     scalar(@whatever) == $#whatever + 1;
 
@@ -220,7 +220,7 @@ If you evaluate a hash in a scalar context, it returns a value which is
 true if and only if the hash contains any key/value pairs.  (If there
 are any key/value pairs, the value returned is a string consisting of
 the number of used buckets and the number of allocated buckets, separated
-by a slash.  This is pretty much only useful to find out whether Perl's
+by a slash.  This is pretty much useful only to find out whether Perl's
 (compiled in) hashing algorithm is performing poorly on your data set.
 For example, you stick 10,000 things in a hash, but evaluating %HASH in
 scalar context reveals "1/16", which means only one out of sixteen buckets
@@ -247,7 +247,7 @@ The usual Unix backslash rules apply for making characters such as
 newline, tab, etc., as well as some more exotic forms.  See
 L<perlop/Quote and Quotelike Operators> for a list.
 
-You can also embed newlines directly in your strings, i.e. they can end
+You can also embed newlines directly in your strings, i.e., they can end
 on a different line than they begin.  This is nice, but if you forget
 your trailing quote, the error will not be reported until Perl finds
 another line containing the quote character, which may be much further
@@ -276,16 +276,16 @@ in the subscript will be interpreted as an expression.
 
 Note that a
 single-quoted string must be separated from a preceding word by a
-space, since single quote is a valid (though deprecated) character in
+space, because single quote is a valid (though deprecated) character in
 a variable name (see L<perlmod/Packages>).
 
 Two special literals are __LINE__ and __FILE__, which represent the
 current line number and filename at that point in your program.  They
-may only be used as separate tokens; they will not be interpolated into
+may be used only as separate tokens; they will not be interpolated into
 strings.  In addition, the token __END__ may be used to indicate the
 logical end of the script before the actual end of file.  Any following
 text is ignored, but may be read via the DATA filehandle.  (The DATA
-filehandle may read data only from the main script, but not from any
+filehandle may read data from only the main script, but not from any
 required file or evaluated string.)  The two control characters ^D and
 ^Z are synonyms for __END__ (or __DATA__ in a module; see L<SelfLoader> for 
 details on __DATA__).
@@ -432,7 +432,7 @@ put the list in parentheses to avoid ambiguity.  Examples:
     $time = (stat($file))[8];
 
     # SYNTAX ERROR HERE.
-    $time = stat($file)[8];  # OOPS, FORGOT PARENS
+    $time = stat($file)[8];  # OOPS, FORGOT PARENTHESES
 
     # Find a hex digit.
     $hexdigit = ('a','b','c','d','e','f')[$digit-10];
@@ -454,7 +454,7 @@ produced by the expression on the right side of the assignment:
     $x = (($foo,$bar) = f());	        # set $x to f()'s return count
 
 This is very handy when you want to do a list assignment in a Boolean
-context, since most list functions return a null list when finished,
+context, because most list functions return a null list when finished,
 which when assigned produces a 0, which is interpreted as FALSE.
 
 The final element may be an array or a hash:
@@ -513,7 +513,7 @@ Note that just because a hash is initialized in that order doesn't
 mean that it comes out in that order.  See L<perlfunc/sort> for examples
 of how to arrange for an output ordering.
 
-=head2 Typeglobs
+=head2 Typeglobs and Filehandles
 
 Perl uses an internal type called a I<typeglob> to hold an entire
 symbol table entry.  The type prefix of a typeglob is a C<*>, because
@@ -522,7 +522,29 @@ pass arrays and hashes by reference into a function, but now that
 we have real references, this is seldom needed.  It also used to be the
 preferred way to pass filehandles into a function, but now
 that we have the *foo{THING} notation it isn't often needed for that,
-either.
+either.  It is still needed to pass new filehandles into functions
+(*HANDLE{IO} only works if HANDLE has already been used).
+
+If you need to use a typeglob to save away a filehandle, do it this way:
+
+    $fh = *STDOUT;
+
+or perhaps as a real reference, like this:
+
+    $fh = \*STDOUT;
+
+This is also a way to create a local filehandle.  For example:
+
+    sub newopen {
+	my $path = shift;
+	local *FH;  # not my!
+	open (FH, $path) || return undef;
+	return \*FH;
+    }
+    $fh = newopen('/etc/passwd');
+
+Another way to create local filehandles is with IO::Handle and its ilk,
+see the bottom of L<perlfunc/open()>.
 
 See L<perlref>, L<perlsub>, and L<perlmod/"Symbol Tables"> for more
 discussion on typeglobs.