bytes - Perl pragma to force byte semantics rather than character semantics
use bytes;
no bytes;WARNING: The implementation of Unicode support in Perl is incomplete. See perlunicode for the exact details.
The use bytes pragma disables character semantics for the rest of the lexical scope in which it appears. no bytes can be used to reverse the effect of use bytes within the current lexical scope.
Perl normally assumes character semantics in the presence of character data (i.e. data that has come from a source that has been marked as being of a particular character encoding).
To understand the implications and differences between character semantics and byte semantics, see perlunicode.