Bug #101931 for Sereal-Encoder: bitwise behaviour not preserved

$ perl -MSereal::Encoder=encode_sereal -MSereal::Decoder=decode_sereal -MTest::More=no_plan -MDevel::Peek -lwe 'sub roundtrip_ok { ok +(decode_sereal(encode_sereal($_[0])) ^ "1") eq ($_[0] ^ "1"); } roundtrip_ok 1; roundtrip_ok "1"; my $a = "1"; my $b = $a+0; my $c = $a+0.5; roundtrip_ok $a' ok 1 ok 2 not ok 3 # Failed test at -e line 1. 1..3 # Looks like you failed 1 test of 3. This is testing whether scalars are treated as numbers or as strings for the purposes of bitwise ops. This is a visible feature of a scalar, which Sereal should probably preserve. Internally the test is actually SvNIOK(). Sereal preserves this status for most scalars, but a scalar that is simultaneously IOK, NOK, and POK comes out POK-only, thus changing its SvNIOK() status. Obviously, this interacts with whatever is done for [rt.cpan.org #101876]. Simple fixes for that cause the bitwise-roundtrip test to fail in more cases. Preserving bitwise status while also preserving string value would require essentially passing at least one NIOK bit alongside a string value, which would require a protocol addition. If the protocol is going to be changed in this area, it might be wise to extend it to full dualvar handling at the same time. If you'd rather not have Sereal preserve bitwise status, this limitation should be documented. -zefram