3 ms·

or decipher data structures in perl that use pointers due to a syntax that is still unintuitive after a decade of use Hint: Perl doesn't have pointer

by phaylon 16y ago

or decipher data structures in perl that use pointers due to a syntax that is still unintuitive after a decade of use Hint: Perl doesn't have pointers, it has references. It's odd that you haven't gotten used to it after 10 years. Perl code that creates classes and objects is quite hard. Not with Moose. Simply declarative OO that contains an MOP and is very extensible. Coding in Perl can be a challenge and Perl is so large that all of us are expert at different things which means that almost every single piece of new perl code I see is like having to learn a new language. This always surprises me. I code Perl for a living, and I never have this problem. I never run into code I don't understand. Sometimes the formatting and I need half a second to locate the curly brackets because the original author was a C/C++ guy, but that's about it.

bugsy 16y ago
Speaking from the perspective of someone who routinely writes his own compilers, and who has extensive experience designing VLSI microprocessors, etc various fancy complicated stuff. It's also odd that many people after 10 year with Perl have not realized that it has pointers which it calls references. Pointers and references are not so different that they need separate names. There's too much branching of terminology. Pointers are pointers. Even those & things in C++ are pointers as well, they are just a syntactic simplification of pointers for ease in typing. If C++ didn't have references, what it calls references could be implemented in the preprocessor as an alternate syntax for pointers. Oh, references can't be nil in C++? No, they can be if you try hard enough on every compiler I've ever seen. Lots of people agree as well. Perl has pointers. Call them references if you like. They are pointers. http://ist.marshall.edu/ist334/perl_pointers.html http://ist.marshall.edu/ist334/perl_pointers.html This whole sidebar is pretty off topic for this thread though so if you'd like to continue please create a new thread. The post was about finding Perl programmers in LA. Part of the problem is fewer people are embracing Perl nowadays. Part of the reason is that Perl is difficult. I like Perl. I use Perl all the time. I also recognize that, like C++, Perl can be a pain in the ass for people, and there are much easier languages to read and write in which work just as well for things like basic web programming. So as a result people learn those other things more nowadays and not so many adopt Perl. That's not hating on Perl, that's just explaining why the dude can't as easily find his Perl programmers (for whatever lowball salary he is offering, which is not stated) in LA anymore.
- chromatic 16y ago
  Pointers and references are not so different that they need separate names. Please perform pointer arithmetic or demonstrate the pointer/array equivalence with references or write a garbage collection system which uses pointer counting. When you've finished, demonstrate effective and type-safe autovivification with pointers. Finally, use references (sorry, pointers) to stack-allocated variables in C and create an object system based on closures.

by phaylon 16y ago

bugsy 16y ago

Speaking from the perspective of someone who routinely writes his own compilers, and who has extensive experience designing VLSI microprocessors, etc various fancy complicated stuff. It's also odd that many people after 10 year with Perl have not realized that it has pointers which it calls references. Pointers and references are not so different that they need separate names. There's too much branching of terminology. Pointers are pointers. Even those & things in C++ are pointers as well, they are just a syntactic simplification of pointers for ease in typing. If C++ didn't have references, what it calls references could be implemented in the preprocessor as an alternate syntax for pointers. Oh, references can't be nil in C++? No, they can be if you try hard enough on every compiler I've ever seen. Lots of people agree as well. Perl has pointers. Call them references if you like. They are pointers. http://ist.marshall.edu/ist334/perl_pointers.html http://ist.marshall.edu/ist334/perl_pointers.html This whole sidebar is pretty off topic for this thread though so if you'd like to continue please create a new thread. The post was about finding Perl programmers in LA. Part of the problem is fewer people are embracing Perl nowadays. Part of the reason is that Perl is difficult. I like Perl. I use Perl all the time. I also recognize that, like C++, Perl can be a pain in the ass for people, and there are much easier languages to read and write in which work just as well for things like basic web programming. So as a result people learn those other things more nowadays and not so many adopt Perl. That's not hating on Perl, that's just explaining why the dude can't as easily find his Perl programmers (for whatever lowball salary he is offering, which is not stated) in LA anymore.

chromatic 16y ago
Pointers and references are not so different that they need separate names. Please perform pointer arithmetic or demonstrate the pointer/array equivalence with references or write a garbage collection system which uses pointer counting. When you've finished, demonstrate effective and type-safe autovivification with pointers. Finally, use references (sorry, pointers) to stack-allocated variables in C and create an object system based on closures.