CGI::State looks interesting. However, the time that it takes to go through all of the forms and update the field names might just negate the benefits. I can always get the form data in a hash like so:

use CGI qw/:standard/;
my %formdata = map { $_ => [ param( $_ ) ] } param;
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That's easy. However, I really dislike doing that as it makes it much easier to miss untainting/validating a particular variable (IMHO). Also, I explicitly like to see the checkbox groups represented as arrays and individual elements represented as scalars. It's more obvious to me how to handle them. Hmm... am I just being foolish? I guess I really can't see the difference between populating a bunch of scalars and populating a hash with all of the data aside from the fact that single value form elements are now represented as a one element array reference, removing the clear visual distinction between arrays and scalars:

# The following is clearer for me:

my $first_name = $in_name;
foreach ( @in_colors ) {
    # do something
}

# This is less clear:

my $first_name = $formdata{ 'in_name' }[0];
foreach ( @$formdata{ 'in_colors' } ) {
    # do something
}
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Is that a matter of style over substance, or is this something that could actually be an issue (particularly with maintenance?).

I'm beginning to think this should have been in meditations instead.

Cheers,
Ovid

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