On Fri, Feb 16, 2001 at 06:52:22PM -0800, Peter Scott wrote:
> S'not about saving keystrokes, as many times as I do type the same things
> in every file; it's about giving newbies the right introduction to the
> language and providing appropriate feedback at the appropriate level of
> individual development.
You're making it sound like -w is a personal tutor!
> strict/warnings are not that picky; the odds that the code is more wrong
> than right are very good if they complain. "But it produces the right
> answer" is not a defence. You know that; why else would you develop with
> them? Anyone who resents the feedback is in the wrong business.
No, they're not in the wrong business, they're just learning. "But it
produces the right answer" may not be a valid defense, but it is a
common one and you and I aren't going to be around to tell them it
isn't. Forcing extra stricness on a new programmer only works if
there's a mentor around to help them through the process and explain
things.
> >You also have to take into account the legions of sysadmins who use
> >Perl as more powerful shell scripting. Do not equate not using strict
> >and warnings with "newbie".
>
> Okay, but these people are not going to be put out by sticking -q on the #!
> line.
We're talking about the folks who call things 'ls' instead of 'dir'
because its one less character to type, right?
> Eh? I still don't get it. You're saying that instead of typing 'foo',
> these people are typing 'perl -w foo' every time, to save themselves from
> putting -w on the #! line? That's insane.
Perhaps, but its common.
> >Code style is a very, very emotional and personal issue. Adding any
> >default enforcement is going to piss off lots and lots of people.
>
> Just like the lack of it has already pissed off lots of people :-)
Yes, but like it or not, they have over 10 years of precedent behind
them. We're used to this situation, the screaming has already been
done, the scabs are healed over. Let's not pick at them.
