4 ms·

> What I do appreciate that's missing from many other languages and systems is the extreme committment to backwards compatibility. The knowledge that the next m

> What I do appreciate that's missing from many other languages and systems is the extreme committment to backwards compatibility. The knowledge that the next minor release won't break existing scripts is underrated, IMO. I don't write much Perl these days and haven't for some time, but it's still what I might reach for if I were tasked with writing something suitable for a scripting language that had to run with ~0 operational or upgrade/maintenance budget for a decade or more in environments I wouldn't necessarily be able to control or influence, or else [bad thing will happen].

latchkey 4y ago
Perl needs backwards compatibility given the `write once, read never` nature of the syntax. Imagine trying to upgrade this to some new syntax... https://github.com/schwern/AAAAAAA https://github.com/schwern/AAAAAAA
- TimTheTinker 4y ago
  That looks more like write-only naming... but the syntax itself isn't bad at all. Here's the main module: https://github.com/schwern/AAAAAAA/blob/aaaaaa/aaa/AAAAAAAAA.pm https://github.com/schwern/AAAAAAA/blob/aaaaaa/aaa/AAAAAAAAA...
  - liveoneggs 4y ago
    gross. Look at all of those non-'A's
- usefulcat 4y ago
  The fact that it's possible to craft deliberately obfuscated code in a language doesn't actually tell you much about the language.
  - paulryanrogers 4y ago
    My guess is that for many people it's hard to write non-obfuscated Perl code. It has so many operators and ways of doing things that walking into someone else's code may feel like having to learn everything from scratch. (Higher Order Perl and such not withstanding.)
    - kamaal 4y ago
      In all honesty I have read more unreadable code in Python, than Perl. And I have written nearly equal of both over my career. You can write bad code in any language. Bad variable names(sometimes single alphabet names), functions running pages long, duplicate code, algorithmically inefficient code, no error handling, master try/catch statements, OO abuse, functions with unpredictable side effects etc etc. Early internet saw a flood of newbie programmers, and therefore a flood of badly written code too. For that matter you also see badly written C/C++ code from those days. How do you think C++ got its reputation for being too bloated beyond practical use?
- gerikson 4y ago
  See also Acme::Bleach: <https://metacpan.org/pod/Acme::Bleach https://metacpan.org/pod/Acme::Bleach>

latchkey 4y ago

Perl needs backwards compatibility given the `write once, read never` nature of the syntax. Imagine trying to upgrade this to some new syntax... https://github.com/schwern/AAAAAAA https://github.com/schwern/AAAAAAA

TimTheTinker 4y ago
That looks more like write-only naming... but the syntax itself isn't bad at all. Here's the main module: https://github.com/schwern/AAAAAAA/blob/aaaaaa/aaa/AAAAAAAAA.pm https://github.com/schwern/AAAAAAA/blob/aaaaaa/aaa/AAAAAAAAA...
- liveoneggs 4y ago
  gross. Look at all of those non-'A's
usefulcat 4y ago
The fact that it's possible to craft deliberately obfuscated code in a language doesn't actually tell you much about the language.
- paulryanrogers 4y ago
  My guess is that for many people it's hard to write non-obfuscated Perl code. It has so many operators and ways of doing things that walking into someone else's code may feel like having to learn everything from scratch. (Higher Order Perl and such not withstanding.)
  - kamaal 4y ago
    In all honesty I have read more unreadable code in Python, than Perl. And I have written nearly equal of both over my career. You can write bad code in any language. Bad variable names(sometimes single alphabet names), functions running pages long, duplicate code, algorithmically inefficient code, no error handling, master try/catch statements, OO abuse, functions with unpredictable side effects etc etc. Early internet saw a flood of newbie programmers, and therefore a flood of badly written code too. For that matter you also see badly written C/C++ code from those days. How do you think C++ got its reputation for being too bloated beyond practical use?
gerikson 4y ago
See also Acme::Bleach: <https://metacpan.org/pod/Acme::Bleach https://metacpan.org/pod/Acme::Bleach>