7 ms·

> Imho they should just fork Perl 6 and continue developing Perl 5. [insert "what if I told you" meme here] I meant rename Perl 6 into something else and deve

> Imho they should just fork Perl 6 and continue developing Perl 5. [insert "what if I told you" meme here] I meant rename Perl 6 into something else and develop Perl 5.xxxx into Perl 6....

aseipp 8y ago
That ship already sailed way over a decade ago (or longer) and changing it now would just massively add to the confusion between what Perl 5 and 6 are. You can't retroactively rewrite every webpage and reference in history, and it's not a particularly hard to explain that they're essentially separate languages. Perl 5 will continue to be maintained and evolve in a compatible way, and Perl 6 is a much different language altogether. They quite literally "forked perl 6, and continued developing perl 5". Forking an existing, newer language just so you can do what amounts to a meaningless, useless major version bump of an existing, established language, is pretty much the exact definition of a breaking change for frivolous reasons.
- platinium 8y ago
  Agreed on everything. However, nobody new (read: young) will want to learn a language that is not able to receive a major version bump. (notable exception I guess, Python). A language that can't receive major version bump will be (is?) perceived as a dead language. Perception does matter. Ads, marketing, etc etc, the world is run by perception.
  - kbenson 8y ago
    I don't really think most people think like that (or even necessarily initially have the information to be able to). To me, it seems like most language adoption is driven by fads, what people are hiring for, and random interesting projects. Have you ever actually been interested in a language and looked to see whether it was able to have a major version number bump or not prior to deciding whether or not to pursue it?
  - aseipp 8y ago
    "Mega language popularity"[1] is largely driven by boom-and-bust fads, my friend, as well as cultural artifacts like word-of-mouth -- and the number of people who generally make any language decisions about them based on minute details like you're implying is a vanishingly small one, in my experience. I'd even go further and say that, in my experience, your mind is likely already decided, as well as the minds of many others, when it comes to choices like this. Whether or not they renamed Perl 5 to Perl 7 or whatever is not really going to make a difference in the long run and no perceptible marketing changes will change that to you... People on places like this website already like to talk about other examples such as how "Ruby and Rails are dead" despite them still being immensely popular and widely used today still... Their mind is decided well before any actual facts of the matter come up, even if Rails has more open bug-reports than they have users. No amount of new marketing will change it meaningfully, because much of the decision is driven by cultural aesthetics, and aesthetically, it's just not cool anymore. We're all prone to it, and unfortunately, it is not always a fully rational or predictable path, either. Some amount of marketing matters for software projects, a lot of it in fact. But at some point you have to call a spade a spade, and decide when you're just chasing meaningless fads for something that won't happen, based on technical marketing alone. [1] Which is almost exclusively what everyone 'means' when they talk about this sort of branding/marketing stuff, if you asked me as a FOSS developer. Nobody can ever conceptualize "successful, accomplished, and with a healthy life", because by every measure Perl is a wild success in all these metrics, beyond what most software could ever dream of -- they can only conceptualize "total failure" AKA "dead language" and "wildly successful beyond all measure in all circumstances, forever".
  - collyw 8y ago
    > A language that can't receive major version bump will be (is?) perceived as a dead language. It still seems to be a major effort to get people over to Python 3.
- hzhou321 8y ago
  > That ship already sailed ... That doesn't prevent launching a new ship. > and changing it now would just massively add to the confusion ... There are two types folks who care about Perl - both are in dwindling numbers. The old-timers -- they never have and will never be confused and clearly understand that there is urgency for that "ship", now more than ever. The new-comers and those have deserted the ship and looking for an opportunity to come back -- they are massively confused as hell right here right now. There is only one real reason for not launching that ship -- Larry Wall has taken that sailed ship long ago and will not come back (admit his mistake).
  - kbenson 8y ago
    > There is only one real reason for not launching that ship -- Larry Wall has taken that sailed ship long ago and will not come back (admit his mistake). To my understanding, he's admitted his mistake. That doesn't mean that after this much time, going back is the best solution. There are major positives and negatives to all options, so at this point people are just letting it stay as it is rather than force it into something that could be even worse. People have had well over a decades to come to terms with the naming, and coming out with Perl 7 (or taking the name Perl 6 back) aren't really going to help with anyone that's already confused. Perl 5 and Perl 6 are still both advancing on their own paths, it's not like either one was actually stopped because of this.
  - psergeant 8y ago
    > That doesn't prevent launching a new ship. Amen. I’d love to see a rebrand to Rakudo and Pumpkin, where the latter is Perl5 plus some long-overdue backwards incompatible changes, but also 99% compatible.
    - labster 8y ago
      I'm not really sure what you want in terms of backcompat breaking changes. I feel like if you do enough to make Perl 5 modern, you end up with Perl 6, but different. Once you add real Unicode support and a MOP and concurrency, you've reinvented more than half of Rakudo. It should be called Perl 7, so we can have yet another version.
rurban 8y ago
That't what I am doing with cperl. perl5 is unfortunately not developed anymore, just "maintained", with more and more destruction being added every year.

> Imho they should just fork Perl 6 and continue developing Perl 5. [insert "what if I told you" meme here] I meant rename Perl 6 into something else and develop Perl 5.xxxx into Perl 6....

aseipp 8y ago

That ship already sailed way over a decade ago (or longer) and changing it now would just massively add to the confusion between what Perl 5 and 6 are. You can't retroactively rewrite every webpage and reference in history, and it's not a particularly hard to explain that they're essentially separate languages. Perl 5 will continue to be maintained and evolve in a compatible way, and Perl 6 is a much different language altogether. They quite literally "forked perl 6, and continued developing perl 5". Forking an existing, newer language just so you can do what amounts to a meaningless, useless major version bump of an existing, established language, is pretty much the exact definition of a breaking change for frivolous reasons.

platinium 8y ago
Agreed on everything. However, nobody new (read: young) will want to learn a language that is not able to receive a major version bump. (notable exception I guess, Python). A language that can't receive major version bump will be (is?) perceived as a dead language. Perception does matter. Ads, marketing, etc etc, the world is run by perception.
- kbenson 8y ago
  I don't really think most people think like that (or even necessarily initially have the information to be able to). To me, it seems like most language adoption is driven by fads, what people are hiring for, and random interesting projects. Have you ever actually been interested in a language and looked to see whether it was able to have a major version number bump or not prior to deciding whether or not to pursue it?
- aseipp 8y ago
  "Mega language popularity"[1] is largely driven by boom-and-bust fads, my friend, as well as cultural artifacts like word-of-mouth -- and the number of people who generally make any language decisions about them based on minute details like you're implying is a vanishingly small one, in my experience. I'd even go further and say that, in my experience, your mind is likely already decided, as well as the minds of many others, when it comes to choices like this. Whether or not they renamed Perl 5 to Perl 7 or whatever is not really going to make a difference in the long run and no perceptible marketing changes will change that to you... People on places like this website already like to talk about other examples such as how "Ruby and Rails are dead" despite them still being immensely popular and widely used today still... Their mind is decided well before any actual facts of the matter come up, even if Rails has more open bug-reports than they have users. No amount of new marketing will change it meaningfully, because much of the decision is driven by cultural aesthetics, and aesthetically, it's just not cool anymore. We're all prone to it, and unfortunately, it is not always a fully rational or predictable path, either. Some amount of marketing matters for software projects, a lot of it in fact. But at some point you have to call a spade a spade, and decide when you're just chasing meaningless fads for something that won't happen, based on technical marketing alone. [1] Which is almost exclusively what everyone 'means' when they talk about this sort of branding/marketing stuff, if you asked me as a FOSS developer. Nobody can ever conceptualize "successful, accomplished, and with a healthy life", because by every measure Perl is a wild success in all these metrics, beyond what most software could ever dream of -- they can only conceptualize "total failure" AKA "dead language" and "wildly successful beyond all measure in all circumstances, forever".
- collyw 8y ago
  > A language that can't receive major version bump will be (is?) perceived as a dead language. It still seems to be a major effort to get people over to Python 3.
hzhou321 8y ago
> That ship already sailed ... That doesn't prevent launching a new ship. > and changing it now would just massively add to the confusion ... There are two types folks who care about Perl - both are in dwindling numbers. The old-timers -- they never have and will never be confused and clearly understand that there is urgency for that "ship", now more than ever. The new-comers and those have deserted the ship and looking for an opportunity to come back -- they are massively confused as hell right here right now. There is only one real reason for not launching that ship -- Larry Wall has taken that sailed ship long ago and will not come back (admit his mistake).
- kbenson 8y ago
  > There is only one real reason for not launching that ship -- Larry Wall has taken that sailed ship long ago and will not come back (admit his mistake). To my understanding, he's admitted his mistake. That doesn't mean that after this much time, going back is the best solution. There are major positives and negatives to all options, so at this point people are just letting it stay as it is rather than force it into something that could be even worse. People have had well over a decades to come to terms with the naming, and coming out with Perl 7 (or taking the name Perl 6 back) aren't really going to help with anyone that's already confused. Perl 5 and Perl 6 are still both advancing on their own paths, it's not like either one was actually stopped because of this.
- psergeant 8y ago
  > That doesn't prevent launching a new ship. Amen. I’d love to see a rebrand to Rakudo and Pumpkin, where the latter is Perl5 plus some long-overdue backwards incompatible changes, but also 99% compatible.
  - labster 8y ago
    I'm not really sure what you want in terms of backcompat breaking changes. I feel like if you do enough to make Perl 5 modern, you end up with Perl 6, but different. Once you add real Unicode support and a MOP and concurrency, you've reinvented more than half of Rakudo. It should be called Perl 7, so we can have yet another version.

rurban 8y ago

That't what I am doing with cperl. perl5 is unfortunately not developed anymore, just "maintained", with more and more destruction being added every year.