On Wed, 11 Dec 2002, Nathan Torkington wrote:
> Actually, we do cover mod_perl--we published the Eagle book, "Writing
> Apache Modules ..." way back in 1999.
Yes, I have had my now dog-eared copy since then :)
> There's no way that 20 recipes in the Perl Cookbook will compete with
> the what, 250? in the mod_perl Developer's Cookbook. Especially when
> the introduction and each recipe points the reader to the mpDC. The
> Perl Cookbook has over a hundred thousand readers. I want to push as
> many as I can onto the mpDC. If that's competing, then I can only say
> that you have a strange sense of competition :-)
Ahem, well, without wanting to get into a fruitless argument about this
part, I might say that you have a strange idea of how to push people onto
their book. At close to $50 a pop, I know I'd think twice about purchasing
the mpDC if I'd shelled out for the Perl Cookbook and it had a section on
mod_perl. I venture to say Geoff et al will see less overall sales, rather
than more, if the PCB has a mod_perl section. This notwithstanding the
fact that _some_ people _will_ no doubt have their appetite whetted and
move on to the definitive mpDC. (Of course there's nothing definitive
about Perl, that's the whole point about TMTOWTDI, right?)
> > Trying now to cover highly complex topics like "Authenticating in
> > mod_perl" in a recipe in a chapter of the Perl cookbook is
> > futile. It will only serve to oversimplify and lead novices into a
> > false sense of competence.
This was really my point.
> The Perl Cookbook has never pretended to be the definitive guide to
> anything it covers (have you seen the Perl Cookbook? I recommend
> it :-). Each recipe includes references to definitive sources of
> information (manpages, web sites, and other books).
I have also owned the Perl Cookbook since it came out. It's very useful as
exactly what it says: a cookbook. You can turn to it for a recipe to
accomplish a small, simple task which you guess others may have tackled
before you. You can also use it as a tutorial, if you choose to, by
studying each chapter as a whole. I do not believe that mod_perl lends
itself to the former, and I think that the mpDC more approaches the
latter. One can go look up a recipe, true, but it is useless without a
pretty thorough prior understanding of mod_perl. So, I stand by my
prediction that just putting a few mod_perl recipes in the PCB will lead
more than a few people into more problems than solutions.
While I've been writing this reply a few people have responded to your
request for content suggestions. Stacked handlers, among other things
... I think it just goes to show that there can be no successful trivial
coverage of mod_perl. (That's why the Eagle book, and the mpDC, are so
good.)
- nick
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
Nick Tonkin {|8^)>
