Does Perl execute code that appears after the return; function?

Question

I have an ugly Perl subroutine that has a nested if statement that returns different values depending on the conditions. It's ugly because I don't like nested if statements. They're hard to follow so I want to break it up into separate if statements but I'm not sure if it'll change the way the subroutine performs. The original subroutine follows:

 sub TacacsInstalled(){

    my $Installed;
    my $InstalledVersion;
    my $InstalledRelease;
    my $NewVersion;
    my $NewRelease;

    $Installed = `rpm -qa | grep tac_plus | wc -l`;
    chomp $Installed;

    # Check to see if Tacacs is installed.
    if ($Installed == 0){ # Tacacs is not installed. Fresh install.
        return "False";
    } else { # Tacacs is installed.  Is it an old version?
        $InstalledVersion = `rpm -q tac_plus --queryformat \"%{VERSION}\""`;
        chomp $InstalledVersion;
        $NewVersion = `rpm -qp ./tac_plus*.x86_64.rpm --queryformat \"%{VERSION}\""`;
        chomp $NewVersion;

        if ($InstalledVersion < $NewVersion) { # Current installed version is too old, must update.
            return "False";
        } else { # Maybe the release is newer.
            $InstalledRelease = `rpm -q tac_plus --queryformat \"%{RELEASE}\""`;
            chomp $InstalledRelease;
            $NewRelease = `rpm -qp ./tac_plus*.x86_64.rpm --queryformat \"%{RELEASE}\""`;
            chomp $NewRelease;

            if ($InstalledRelease < $NewRelease) { # Current installed release is too old, must update.
                return "False";

            } else { # Installed release is newer than or equal to what we're trying to install. Do nothing.
                return "True";
            }
        }
    }
}

Could I improve this code by using the following instead?

sub TacacsInstalled(){

    my $Installed;
    my $InstalledVersion;
    my $InstalledRelease;
    my $NewVersion;
    my $NewRelease;

    $Installed = `rpm -qa | grep tac_plus | wc -l`;
    chomp $Installed;

    # Check to see if Tacacs is installed.
    if ($Installed == 0){ return "False" }; # Tacacs is not installed perform a fresh install.

    # If we got this far then Tacacs must be installed.  Is it an old version?
    $InstalledVersion = `rpm -q tac_plus --queryformat \"%{VERSION}\""`;
    chomp $InstalledVersion;
    $NewVersion = `rpm -qp ./tac_plus*.x86_64.rpm --queryformat \"%{VERSION}\""`;
    chomp $NewVersion;      

    if ($InstalledVersion < $NewVersion) { return "False" }; # Current installed version is too old, must update.

    # The Version is the same so then is the release is newer?
    $InstalledRelease = `rpm -q tac_plus --queryformat \"%{RELEASE}\""`;
    chomp $InstalledRelease;
    $NewRelease = `rpm -qp ./tac_plus*.x86_64.rpm --queryformat \"%{RELEASE}\""`;
    chomp $NewRelease;

    if ($InstalledRelease < $NewRelease) { return "False" }; # Current installed release is too old, must update.

    # Installed release is newer than or equal to what we're trying to install. Do nothing.
    return "True";

}

Answer 1

No, Perl does not execute code after a return. That's the whole point of return!