Tony Bowden wrote:
My current situation is somewhat unusual because Perl is not the language that the people I am coding with were hired to write. They are mostly Java programmers, and I'm just doing some useful admin and database scripts in Perl because it's so much quicker than doing them in Java. Someone else will eventually have to maintain them, so I write in a way that a novice with a copy of Learning Perl has a hope of understanding.... but I think that there should be a certain level of ability that should be assumed when coding commercially ...
When I work in an environment that is more Perl-centric, I expand the vocabulary of my code more.
Perl is a large language, and not all of it needs to be used all the time. I wouldn't call $_ advanced, but I know I hate reading code where people use it more than they have to. Hash slices and map are uncommon enough that I had been writing fairly challenging OO Perl for quite a while before I ever saw one. I don't use them when something more basic will do just as well.things like map, hash slices, and even $_ aren't what I could class as advanced Perl ideas.
Correct Perl style is probably not something that any two people will ever agree on. This used to bother me more before I realized that all languages have this problem, even though they try to deny it. I've seen some hideous Java code at this place that really takes the wind out of the "Java is more maintainable" argument.
- Perrin
