* Chris Andrews ([EMAIL PROTECTED]) wrote: > > The learning curve to writing *bad* PHP is really flat. The learning curve > to writing good, secure, scalable PHP I would suggest is much steeper and > longer, because the language itself, and also the user community (and so > the support and resources available) is so geared to writing quick-hack > code. >
Which was the state of Perl *plucks figure out of the air* 4 years ago. However during this time we've seen great advances in the way people develop in Perl. Off the top of my head I'd suggest the major forces in this advancement are (and this is imho), * Testing Testing has become easier and more fun in Perl, thanks to all the modules, articles, talks on the subject. (At this point I'd like to suggest to anyone who hasn't looked at Test::MockObject to look at it today) * Template Toolkit Like TT or not, the emergence of a dominant templating system has stopped people in a lot of cases rolling their own, or hacking their own extensions onto H::T. * YAPC YAPC conferences have meant there are a low cost alternative to TPC, meaning that people can still meet with their peers and learn from talks/tutorials even if they can't afford TPC. * Perl 6 Perl 6 is acting as a stimulus for the way people think about Perl and the Perl community (and its relationship to Python, Java, et al.) Also I'm hoping we will see some aspects of Perl 6 make their way into 5.10 but there are already lots of modules on CPAN emulating Perl 6 RFC suggestions. Of all the driving forces this is perhaps the one which we haven't seen the most impact from so far, but I believe we will see more and more impact from it, in the next 6~12 months. I've probably forgotten some of the improvements in the world of Perl during this time, but the point remains Perl has matured in ``software engineering'' terms, whatever that means and PHP still has to do so. Anyway, thats just me tuppence ha'penny worth, Greg -- Greg McCarroll http://www.mccarroll.org.uk/~gem/ jabber:[EMAIL PROTECTED]