I't been so song since I've made that decision
I don't remember why. Sorry. It has gone
from a reasoned decision to cargo cult
programming.
I just flipped pages until I saw an open
example and it included an 'or dir' construct.
I won't claim all of them do.
You MUST have Programming Perl (CAMEL). There
is no choice. Nobody wanders perldoc and
hits on things serendipitiously. But you
can do that in flipping around in the book
in the bathroom. Just commit to carrying
the book for a month, and you become amazed
what the language can do.
Also, yes on the Cookbook. I still pull
it out occasionally. I love it.