The zip meta-operator prefix, Z, combines the corresponding elements of its list operands like the zipper does. The record
@a Z+ @b
is equivalent to this (in Perl 6, the last element of an array is indexed as *-1, not just -1; see the details in Appendix):
((@a[0] + @b[0]), (@a[1] + @b[1]), . . . (@a[*-1] + @b[*-1]))
Notice that the zip meta-operator differs from the Z infix operator. Compare the output of the following test programme:
my @a = 1, 2, 3; my @b = 10, 20, 30; say @a Z+ @b; # (11 22 33) say @a Z @b; # ((1 10) (2 20) (3 30))
Here is another example with the => operator, which creates pairs:
my @a = ^5; my @b = 'a' .. 'e'; say @a Z=> @b;
As you can see, the => operator is used indeed:
(0 => a 1 => b 2 => c 3 => d 4 => e)
The default operator for Z is comma ,. Thus, @a Z @ b and @a Z, @b produce the same result.
my @a = ^5; my @b = 'a' .. 'e'; say @a Z, @b;
The output is the same as in the example in the section about list operators earlier in this chapter.
((0 a) (1 b) (2 c) (3 d) (4 e))