Scalar...Numeric(3pm)

💖 Scalar...Numeric 💖

okay bestie, welcome to Scalar::Util::Numeric(3pm) ✨ — it's a User Contributed Perl Documentation page and it is, no cap, the vibe check your scalars have been begging for 🫶

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🌸 NAME 🌸

Scalar::Util::Numeric — numeric tests for perl scalars 🔢💅

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✨ SYNOPSIS ✨

use Scalar::Util::Numeric qw(isnum isint isfloat);

foo($bar / 2) if (isnum $bar);

if (isint $baz) {
    # ...
} elsif (isfloat $baz) {
    # ...
}

like... four lines and you're already the main character 🎀

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🦋 DESCRIPTION 🦋

So here's the tea ☕: this module exports a bunch of lil wrappers around perl's builtin grok_number function. And what does grok_number do? It returns the numeric type of whatever you throw at it — or 0 if your argument isn't numeric at all 😭. Not numeric = zero, periodt.

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🎀 TAGS 🎀

Every single function in Scalar::Util::Numeric can be pulled in at once with the :all tag, iconic behaviour honestly 👑

use Scalar::Util::Numeric qw(:all);

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💜 EXPORTS 💜

⭐ isnum ⭐

isnum ($val)

Returns a nonzero value (which is your hint at the numeric type) if $val is a number. Not a bool, not a vibe — it's the type, encoded 🔥

And that numeric type? It's a conjunction of these flags right here:

0x01  IS_NUMBER_IN_UV               (number within UV range - not necessarily an integer)
0x02  IS_NUMBER_GREATER_THAN_UV_MAX (number is greater than UV_MAX)
0x04  IS_NUMBER_NOT_INT             (saw . or E notation)
0x08  IS_NUMBER_NEG                 (leading minus sign)
0x10  IS_NUMBER_INFINITY            (Infinity)
0x20  IS_NUMBER_NAN                 (NaN - not a number)

🌈 isint / isuv / isbig / isfloat / isneg / isinf / isnan 🌈

These are the lil flavours of isnum (each one matching a flag up there 👆) and they're all available too:

isint
isuv
isbig
isfloat
isneg
isinf
isnan

isint is the dramatic one: it returns -1 if its operand is a negative integer, 1 if it's 0 or a positive integer, and 0 otherwise. Three moods, one function 💀

The others? They're chill. They always return 1 or 0. no in-between, no chaos 🧚

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👑 SEE ALSO 👑

Go read these too, bestie, they're all part of the extended universe 🫶

• "type" in autobox
• Data::Types
• Params::Classify
• Params::Util
• Scalar::Util
• String::Numeric

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🍓 VERSION 🍓

0.40 — yes, that's the one you want ✨

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💖 AUTHORS 💖

• chocolateboy <chocolate@cpan.org>
• Michael G. Schwern <schwern@pobox.com>

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🌸 COPYRIGHT 🌸

Copyright (c) 2005-2014, chocolateboy.

This module is free software. It may be used, redistributed and/or modified under the same terms as Perl itself. 🫶

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and that's the whole page, bestie 💅 go forth and grok those numbers. iykyk.

okay love u bye — this was perl v5.42.3, dated 2026-08-19, and the page you just read was Scalar...Numeric(3pm) 🎀💖✨