Comments on: perl is dead, long live…perl?

By: sticking with what you know | Equivalence

sticking with what you know | Equivalence — Thu, 27 Aug 2009 00:03:24 +0000

[...] First, we cover the forced abandonment. This is when you are pushed kicking and screaming into pastures new, whether you like it or not, i.e. the new job. Here, not only is the new language curve ball thrown (viciously), but you also get whole new set of business rules into the bargain. So what do you do? You program the new language like the old one, only translating the syntax in your head. This is not the best way to learn a language though. Why? Well consider those C programmers trying to program imperatively in Java, Java programmers in JavaScript, C++ programmers in Ruby, and so on. When there is a change in paradigm this mapping strategy just doesn’t work – a similar situation exists with languages that contain a more powerful expression set. It also encourages the behaviour where people learning enough to get the job done, without understanding what is really happening, or that there may have been a better way using “unmappable” language’s features. A better approach would be to write something small, and new, that allows you to explore the language’s features. I’m sure most people can think of something they could write. Furthermore, if you can make it useful to other people, or even your new employer, then everyone’s a winner! This is something I touched on before. [...]

By: Donal

Donal — Tue, 23 Dec 2008 04:59:34 +0000

For such tasks, I generally write a Unix shell script (preferrably bash), but that’s probably only because I don’t know any better.

By: Equivalence » Blog Archive » bad software engineering - made easy

Equivalence » Blog Archive » bad software engineering - made easy — Wed, 26 Nov 2008 11:58:22 +0000

[...] perl is dead, long live…perl? [...]

By: masukomi

masukomi — Tue, 25 Nov 2008 16:21:15 +0000

> Ruby again I just don’t know well enough, but would probably only consider this an option for a web app like PHP.

The fact that ruby became popular because it serves as the basis for Rails should not be taken to mean that it’s original purpose wasn’t to be used in all the places that Perl is used. In fact, while I love Perl, if I have to interact with other command line apps and read their output it’s generally much easier to do so with Ruby. So, for quicky command line scripts I’ll generally use Ruby. But for more complex scripting lang apps, I’ll still use Perl because I like it better and because it’s better known at my co.

By: admin

admin — Tue, 25 Nov 2008 15:41:01 +0000

Thanks for the input folks. It has certainly got me thinking. As I said I’m always keen to learn something new, and contrary to a certain comments on reddit, the reason I posted this was that I’m looking to find an alternative to Perl.

At the moment in my job I’m doing a fair amount of Java so Groovy, it appears, may be a good option to go for.

I notice that Ruby does seem to be getting a thumbs up as well and a few years back I made a big point of learning Ruby but have since forgotten most of it – to be honest I think I forgot it deliberately as I experienced some really bad hosting problems with a website that was developed and this damaged the allure of Ruby for me, despite it not being the fault of Ruby. I don’t know, maybe I should dust off my Ruby cap…

By: Rui Vieira

Rui Vieira — Tue, 25 Nov 2008 15:08:55 +0000

Groovy is simply excellent for scripts and applications.

It is always compiled (as Groovy itself runs on the JVM).

You can however use it transparently as “groovy myscript.groovy” and the process will be automatic.
It includes an interactive shell out of the box.

By: markus

markus — Tue, 25 Nov 2008 14:04:58 +0000

I think your general line of thought is correct. Now the question is only which language do people choose.

I am a heavy Ruby user myself and I give the python users a general thumbs up for several reason, but I talked to a perl developer who did not care about perl 6(!) and instead said he was only interested in perl 5. Which surprised me, because I thought people dont really care about perl < 6 these days.

It kinda opened my eyes, because this means that EVERY language that has gained a big follower base will continue to keep a language alive and actually evolve it. Now personally I have no illusion how much perl 5 can evolve (for me I have given up on perl 6 years ago, and on php 3-4 years ago already) but it seems that different people continue to have different opinions.

Programming languages are immortal. At least as long as old farts continue to use them

By: admin

admin — Tue, 25 Nov 2008 13:16:42 +0000

Mmmm Groovy might just be worth a look then.

That said I have a funny feeling that I will just convert everything in my head into Perl – for example, when I have to do a regular expression in say Java, I normally first create it either literally or metaphorically in Perl then import it into Java. Though it does beg the question if I can achieve all my small script needs in Perl then why change – I suppose though it’s the old programmers adage, “something new is something interesting”?

By: Michael Campbell

Michael Campbell — Tue, 25 Nov 2008 13:08:59 +0000

Groovy’s pretty neat. It’s interpreted, or you can compile it to .class files.

JRuby is another one to consider, if you want to stay with the jvm. Ruby syntax, java runtime.

Personally, I use (j)ruby for quickie scripts these days. I’m an old perl-head and still “think” in perl a lot (perl 4 and 5, anyway; that v6 stuff is just beyond the pale, but I’ll look in another 5 years when it’s finally released).

By: admin

admin — Tue, 25 Nov 2008 12:42:44 +0000

So I know nothing about Groovy. Is it complied or interpreted? I need it to be interpreted for it to meet my criteria for usage