hash reference question

targetsmart has asked for the wisdom of the Perl Monks concerning the following question:

here is one code

perl -e "%package = ( 'zips' => {1,2,3,4} ); print %package->{zips};"
[download]

other code

perl -e "%package = ( 'zips' => {1,2,3,4} ); print $package{zips};"
[download]

both the one liners print

HASH(0x23bbe4)
[download]

but when I enable warning(-w) the former produces

Using a hash as a reference is deprecated at -e line 1.

I thought only the later should work, the former should fail, but it is also working but outputs along with a warning. can anyone tell me what happens if I do like %package->{key} considering the above example.

Vivek
-- 'I' am not the body, 'I' am the 'soul', which has no beginning or no end, no attachment or no aversion, nothing to attain or lose.

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