Each element of %! has a true value only if $! is set to that value. For example, $!{ENOENT} is true if and only if the current value of $! is ENOENT; that is, if the most recent error was "No such file or directory" (or its moral equivalent: not all operating systems give that exact error, and certainly not all languages). To check if a particular key is meaningful on your system, use exists $!{the_key}; for a list of legal keys, use keys %!. See Errno for more information, and also see above for the validity of $!.