Yes, split isn't exactly consistent there. There is a third parameter - LIMIT - which limits the number of time the string is splitted. Eg: split '_', 'a_b_c_d', 2 will actually return the list ('a', 'b_c_d') because it has been splitted in two.

The thing is if LIMIT is 0 or omitted, all empty fields at the end are removed. So split '_', 'a_b___', 0; will return the list ('a', 'b'). Which is why you get an undefined value in your second case.

Now, the tricky bit is, for optimization, when perl knows how many values you are trying to write to, it will actually set LIMIT to the number of element +1 (split to each element, and ignore the reminder). So

my ($key, @array[0,1], undef, $value) = split " ", $string;
[download]

is actually interpreted as

my ($key, @array[0,1], undef, $value) = split " ", $string, 6; # Split
+ five times, ignore the sixth value
[download]

In that case, LIMIT is not 0 so the empty fields at the end are not removed.

You could write ($key, $value) = split(" ", $string, 8)[0,6]; (there are seven values from 0 to 6, so the reminder is the 8th), but the 8 seems to come out of nowhere, and this just calls for a mistake. Luckily, if LIMIT is negative, it will be treated as an infinite value, ie split will continue splitting until the end of the input, and won't remove empty fields at the end:

my ($key, $value) = (split(" ", $string, -1))[0,6];
[download]

Do note that split " " is a special case of split which is the same as split /\s+/ except empty fields at the start are removed.

Edit: for what it's worth, hippo's solution doesn't have that problem.

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