http://qs321.pair.com?node_id=919622


in reply to need a clearer understanding

I suspect that your failure to put the code in your question in a code block is the reason people are finding you hard to answer.
if($tmp[0] eq ">") { my $nm = substr($line,1); $nm = $nm . $tot; $tot++; $line = <$IFH>; #IS THIS THE LINE YOU MEANT ? chomp $line; $ret{$nm} = $line; }
If my guess is correct it means exactly the same as the same code in the while ($line = <$IFH>){ line that surrounds the read.

It reads the next line into the $line variable (If not end of file) within a block which is only run if the previous line began with a ">" character.

print "Good ",qw(night morning afternoon evening)[(localtime)[2]/6]," fellow monks."