How do I determine the number of elements in an array reference?

Question

Here is the situation I am facing...

$perl_scalar = decode_json( encode (\'utf8\',$line));

decode_json returns a reference. I am sure this is a

Answer 1

$num_of_hashes = @{$perl_scalar};

Since you're assigning to a scalar, the dereferenced array is evaluated in a scalar context to the number of elements.

If you need to force scalar context then do as KARASZI says and use the scalar function.