5 ms·

Perl is maybe the most enjoyable language I've ever coded in up until I'm forced to read someone else's code which is always hellish.

thwd 2y ago
It's a write-only language.
- knowitnone 2y ago
  Write Once Read Never(WORN)
speed_spread 2y ago
Programming is an individual activity; developing software is a social activity. Current tools and teaching are still biased in favor of the former, resulting in most of our troubles in the latter.
- forgetfreeman 2y ago
  The legend of the 10x programmer certainly didn't do our industry any favors either.
shagie 2y ago
As a perl programmer from decades past (I transitioned to Java during the perl 6 winter), I've been finding that groovy and even more recently scala are really nice tools for what I'd have traditionally done in perl. When doing this year's advent of code, some of the terseness of symbols reminded me of perl. Perl lost me and I transitioned too far away from its ecosystem professionally to return for more than a dalliance or occasional debugging ( https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=16219876 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=16219876 ).
- gregw2 2y ago
  One of my impressions as a Scala newbie coming from a perl background years ago was that Scala practitioners' culture in a corporate setting tended to end up with code bases that reminded me of corporate perl code bases - suffering from "theres more than one way to do it" disease. A bit too easy to be obscure for me to use/recommend it since then despite the nice typing, actors, lazy evaluation, etc. Not sure if this TMTOWTDI Scala resonates with others knowing both or not...
  - shagie 2y ago
    https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=6959326 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=6959326 > Scala feels like the Perl of the modern era: there is more than one way to do it. There is value in that mode of thinking, and Perl is a better language than people give it credit for. https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=2603425 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=2603425 > This actually is one of my frustrations with Scala, too many right ways to do the same thing. Makes it easier to write but harder to read especially when people have drastically differing styles. One of the advantages of Java is how easy it is to read and use someone else's code since the base language is so limited. --- The question of company dialects for various languages comes up occasionally. You can see it with people talking about having to learn a new LISP (or Scheme) each time they switch to a different company. I suspect that flexibility is similar to what is seen in perl, ruby, scala, and groovy. The TMTOWTDI Scala exists... but I want to say that it is more a reflection of the power of the language (drawing from their LISP heritage). It becomes then a question of how much does the company impose a consistent way of doing it within the company (compare the different company dialects).
    - kazinator 2y ago
      > people talking about having to learn a new LISP (or Scheme) each time they switch to a different company. Which people, where? Do you have a URL to a discussion? I've not seen heard or read such talk almost 25 years of being involved in open source Lisp. Needless to say, I've often seen such narrative repeated by programmers not working in Lisp, who heard it from such others. Someone talking about any industry work in Lisp whatsoever, even just one job, from any angle, is extremely rare.
saalweachter 2y ago
My impression of Perl, as someone who wrote two scripts in it twenty years ago and has been on the Internet since the middle-old days, is that it is a language suited to being clever.
- forgetfreeman 2y ago
  This observation is spot on and 100% of the reason why dealing with other people's code is insufferable. After 20 years of coding I can confidently say I'd rather clean out crawlspaces for a living than deal with another "clever" codebase.
cafard 2y ago
Most of the someone else's I have read has been in stuff from CPAN, and I recall it as pretty good. I have written some pretty bad Perl, and wish that I had encountered the O'Reilly Perl Best Practices long before I did.
- creer 2y ago
  Perl's "layering" is one of its most brilliant features. You start learning Perl in layers; achieve some fluency and effectiveness and understanding of the general principles - and will still have many layers and sets of features that you can dig into as you progress. The set of O'Reilly books was amazing for this. Still is. But the documentation itself was amazing also. Still is. That's one problem with Raku: Can raku ever get to this level? This is important as a powerful tool for a powerful programmer. I always contrast this to C++ - where you are dangerous, too dangerous, until you have learned a huge amount "of the language" (and good luck understanding it). Or BASIC, where... there isn't much.
miohtama 2y ago
That's why it is called write-only language. Single job scripts, yes. Team work, no.
cruffle_duffle 2y ago
> I'm forced to read someone else's code Which is 85% of the time my own code!

thwd 2y ago

It's a write-only language.

knowitnone 2y ago
Write Once Read Never(WORN)

speed_spread 2y ago

Programming is an individual activity; developing software is a social activity. Current tools and teaching are still biased in favor of the former, resulting in most of our troubles in the latter.

forgetfreeman 2y ago
The legend of the 10x programmer certainly didn't do our industry any favors either.

shagie 2y ago

As a perl programmer from decades past (I transitioned to Java during the perl 6 winter), I've been finding that groovy and even more recently scala are really nice tools for what I'd have traditionally done in perl. When doing this year's advent of code, some of the terseness of symbols reminded me of perl. Perl lost me and I transitioned too far away from its ecosystem professionally to return for more than a dalliance or occasional debugging ( https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=16219876 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=16219876 ).

gregw2 2y ago
One of my impressions as a Scala newbie coming from a perl background years ago was that Scala practitioners' culture in a corporate setting tended to end up with code bases that reminded me of corporate perl code bases - suffering from "theres more than one way to do it" disease. A bit too easy to be obscure for me to use/recommend it since then despite the nice typing, actors, lazy evaluation, etc. Not sure if this TMTOWTDI Scala resonates with others knowing both or not...
- shagie 2y ago
  https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=6959326 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=6959326 > Scala feels like the Perl of the modern era: there is more than one way to do it. There is value in that mode of thinking, and Perl is a better language than people give it credit for. https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=2603425 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=2603425 > This actually is one of my frustrations with Scala, too many right ways to do the same thing. Makes it easier to write but harder to read especially when people have drastically differing styles. One of the advantages of Java is how easy it is to read and use someone else's code since the base language is so limited. --- The question of company dialects for various languages comes up occasionally. You can see it with people talking about having to learn a new LISP (or Scheme) each time they switch to a different company. I suspect that flexibility is similar to what is seen in perl, ruby, scala, and groovy. The TMTOWTDI Scala exists... but I want to say that it is more a reflection of the power of the language (drawing from their LISP heritage). It becomes then a question of how much does the company impose a consistent way of doing it within the company (compare the different company dialects).
  - kazinator 2y ago
    > people talking about having to learn a new LISP (or Scheme) each time they switch to a different company. Which people, where? Do you have a URL to a discussion? I've not seen heard or read such talk almost 25 years of being involved in open source Lisp. Needless to say, I've often seen such narrative repeated by programmers not working in Lisp, who heard it from such others. Someone talking about any industry work in Lisp whatsoever, even just one job, from any angle, is extremely rare.

saalweachter 2y ago

My impression of Perl, as someone who wrote two scripts in it twenty years ago and has been on the Internet since the middle-old days, is that it is a language suited to being clever.

forgetfreeman 2y ago
This observation is spot on and 100% of the reason why dealing with other people's code is insufferable. After 20 years of coding I can confidently say I'd rather clean out crawlspaces for a living than deal with another "clever" codebase.

cafard 2y ago

Most of the someone else's I have read has been in stuff from CPAN, and I recall it as pretty good. I have written some pretty bad Perl, and wish that I had encountered the O'Reilly Perl Best Practices long before I did.

creer 2y ago
Perl's "layering" is one of its most brilliant features. You start learning Perl in layers; achieve some fluency and effectiveness and understanding of the general principles - and will still have many layers and sets of features that you can dig into as you progress. The set of O'Reilly books was amazing for this. Still is. But the documentation itself was amazing also. Still is. That's one problem with Raku: Can raku ever get to this level? This is important as a powerful tool for a powerful programmer. I always contrast this to C++ - where you are dangerous, too dangerous, until you have learned a huge amount "of the language" (and good luck understanding it). Or BASIC, where... there isn't much.

miohtama 2y ago

That's why it is called write-only language. Single job scripts, yes. Team work, no.

cruffle_duffle 2y ago

> I'm forced to read someone else's code Which is 85% of the time my own code!