[csdvrx]

> `$array` - What do you think this does?

I think it will throw an error if you declared my @array

> Why can't we just `@array[1]`?

Because that could return an array or a hash if you are dealing with structures likes arrays-of-arrays (AoA) or arrays-of-hashes (AoH).

To my naive take, it makes much more sense to only identify high level objects to put them under one category (arrays, AoA, AoH -> @) then consider everything else as "uncertain" and default to $.

Otherwise, you would have to declare AoA and AoH differently (ex: my @@AoA; my @%AoH;) and then the interpreter could see @AoA[1] and %AoH[1] as valid but %AoA[1] and @AoH[1] as invalid.

I could see that as potentially having value to know at a glance what you are dealing with, but it might break many things, and casting to a new object with my %aoh_1 = %{ $AoH[1] } makes more sense.

[jwilk]

> Because that could return an array or a hash

@array[1] returns a single-element list-like thing. It mostly works, but you get a warning:

https://perldoc.perl.org/perldiag#Scalar-value-@%25s%5B%25s%...