Test2::Tools::Ref(3pm) Perl Programmers Reference Guide Test2::Tools::Ref(3pm)

# [NAME](#NAME)

Test2::Tools::Ref - Tools for validating references.

# [DESCRIPTION](#DESCRIPTION)

This module contains tools that allow you to verify that something is a ref. It also has tools to check if two refs are the same exact ref, or different. None of the functions in this module do deep comparisons.

# [SYNOPSIS](#SYNOPSIS)

```
    use Test2::Tools::Ref;
    # Ensure something is a ref.
    ref_ok($ref);
    # Check that $ref is a HASH reference
    ref_ok($ref, 'HASH', 'Must be a hash')
    ref_is($refa, $refb, "Same exact reference");
    ref_is_not($refa, $refb, "Not the same exact reference");
```

# [EXPORTS](#EXPORTS)

All subs are exported by default.

[ref\_ok($thing)](#ref_ok%28$thing%29)

[ref\_ok($thing, $type)](#ref_ok%28$thing,)

[ref\_ok($thing, $type, $name)](#ref_ok%28$thing,~2)

This checks that $thing is a reference. If $type is specified then it will check that $thing is that type of reference.

[ref\_is($ref1, $ref2, $name)](#ref_is%28$ref1,)

Verify that two references are the exact same reference.

[ref\_is\_not($ref1, $ref2, $name)](#ref_is_not%28$ref1,)

Verify that two references are not the exact same reference.

# [SOURCE](#SOURCE)

The source code repository for Test2-Suite can be found at *https://github.com/Test-More/test-more/*.

# [MAINTAINERS](#MAINTAINERS)

[Chad Granum <exodist@cpan.org>](#Chad)

# [AUTHORS](#AUTHORS)

[Chad Granum <exodist@cpan.org>](#Chad~2)

# [COPYRIGHT](#COPYRIGHT)

Copyright Chad Granum <exodist@cpan.org>.

This program is free software; you can redistribute it and/or modify it under the same terms as Perl itself.

See *http://dev.perl.org/licenses/*

2026-10-26 perl v5.44.0

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Document: Test2::Tools::Ref(3pm) from perl 5.44.0-r3 (Chainguard OS)
Source: https://github.com/Perl/perl5.git