I do find <> helpful. Perhaps if it were more descriptive? <ARGVorSTDIN> or similar?
If you're already aware that ARGV exists, you'll guess that ARGF might be used in relation to it, and so when writing a CLI program that uses ARGV, you might wonder if ARGF could simplify your code and look up what it is/does.
These ultra terse shorthands make some sense in the shell because it's meant for interactive, write-only commands but a scripting language should be a little more verbose and consistent IMO.
while (buf = <>)
did. So I didn't want to invent a new syntax, there is way too much of that going on, I like C, I like perl, pull the useful stuff from each and move on.
I freely admit it's not how everyone would do it.
I think <> as a fancy readline and _ as a default/throwaway variable does really improve readability and lowers the mental load of understanding programs.