Arrays

Array variables can host more than one value. The values can be of the same type, or can be of different types. Arrays are often used to keep lists of data items.

Arrays in Perl 6 are prefixed with the @ sigil. To access the elements of an array, the postfix pair of square brackets is used. For example, the second element of the @a array is @a[1]. Note that indexing starts from zero.

Let's take a look at how to create an array of integer numbers:

my @odd_numbers = 1, 3, 5, 7, 9, 11;

my @array2 = (1, 3, 5, 7, 9, 11);
my @array3 = <1 3 5 7 9 11>;

When printing it using the say built-in function, Perl 6 prints the content of the array in square brackets, as you can see here:

say @odd_numbers; [1 3 5 7 9 11]

my @array = 1, 'two', 3E-2;

All the elements here are of different types (integer, string, and floating-point value), but they can easily be accessed via their index:

say @array[0]; # 1
say @array[1]; # two
say @array[2]; # 0.03

Let's take a further look at the possibilities that arrays offer in Perl 6.