The rc file used to be a bunch of variables, each one requiring to be
declared before being used. While this was nice and all, it was a
little cumbersome to add a new flag or option.
If you disregard the "catch typos" aspect of having to predeclare
variables, it's a lot more useful to have all of rc be in a hash and use
any hash keys you want.
There could be other uses; for instance it could hold arbitrary data
that you would currently put in %ENV, without having to pollute %ENV if
you don't need child tasks to inherit it.
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NOTE: I also ran perltidy, which I don't always remember to :)