Thanks for all the responses so far! :) It's helping met get a better
picture of what to go for. I have no programming experience and I've
just been starting to play around with bash since it looked fun to
learn. So I'm still learning my way around bash scripting. Well that
sounds like a good idea to learn both and see which I like better, I
will still have to pick one to go for first. Cause to me it seems it
would be confusing to learn two languages at the same time when starting
to learn a first language, or am I seeing that wrong?
I did buy two books, one on python and one on perl. Learning Perl(By
Tom Phoenix Brian D Foy Randal L. Schwartz) and Python for
Informatics(by Charles Serverance)
On 2016-12-30 10:14, prmari...@gmail.com wrote:
By the way. If you would like I can happily send you a brief reading
list if you want to get started with Perl 5. I just need to know if
you already know any other languages so I can send you the right list.
For example if you are already a C++ programmer you only need to read
1 very short book and a couple of pages on the Perl web site to update
what's changed since it was published. If you don't have programing
experience then the list gets longer
Original Message
From: prmari...@gmail.com
Sent: Friday, December 30, 2016 04:04
To: Maarten; SCIENTIFIC-LINUX-USERS@fnal.gov
Subject: Re: Perl 6 just hit
Ok well I will try to be unbiased but full disclosure I am a real hard
core Perl programmer and I admittedly am not a huge Python fan.
Both have their good and bad points.
The python philosophy is to enforce good programing practices by
enforcing indentation.
The Perl philosophy it there are many ways to do it.
A little bit of a primer one of the biggest motivation of the
original writer of Python was he hated how sloppy Perl programmers
were and wanted to create a language that enforced what he thought
were good coding practices. By the way any one who disagrees a quick
google search for linux journal articles circa 2001 can back me up
with his own words.
The truth is I've seen good and bad code in both languages. An
enforcing indentation doesn't help especially when the the interpreter
can't tell the difference between a tab and the equivalent number of
spaces on that platform.
Perl got an image Problem thanks to a 2002 April fools joke by Larry
Wall the writer of the language which oddly back fired on him. He
announced Perl 6 was the new Perl engine which would also be able to
run code in a VM in any other language. He also created a code repo
for it. A couple of days later he was shocked to find working code in
the repo. So he rolled with it and started to put together extremely
ambitious specs for Perl 6. Now Perl should have gone through several
major releases since then but because of the lofty goals of Perl 6 it
didn't. That's not to say the language has been static. No Perl 5
program I've written in the last 10 years will not run on a version of
Perl 5 from 2002 or even in most cases a version from 2005. To People
who know the language well what we are calling Perl 6 should probably
be called Perl 9.
As for Python it's become popular and definitely Red Hat's favorite
scripting language. It's got a great following and is used for many
things.
As for modules Perl 5 still has more but many of the are dated, Python
is catching up and it has the benefit of youth and popularity.
For example Amazon AWS has a Python API, but not a Perl API. I've been
debating about writing one my self and in the Perl tradition there are
2 ways I can do it build on LWP (lib WWW Perl) to create a native Perl
module, or take the lazy route by create an "XS" module which wraps
the C API. The advantage of the XS method is I can run a script and
have a clumsy but working module in seconds, then spend a couple of
hours to make it easy to use.
What you will here is Perl is dead, but the truth is most people use
it on a daily basis and don't know it. Perl is still the swiss army
chainsaw of scripting languages.
Honestly for support on learning Python is easier.
With Perl if you can get to the point where you really understand the
power of anonymous references, it's still a very fast and flexible
language.
In conclusion
Either one is good. Learn them both at least superficially. Tinker and
play with them and see which one is right for you.
Original Message
From: Maarten
Sent: Friday, December 30, 2016 03:00
To: SCIENTIFIC-LINUX-USERS@fnal.gov
Subject: Re: Perl 6 just hit
Hello,
Saw this discussion and found it interesting, got a somewhat half on
topic question. I've been trying to decide on a language to learn,
python and perl both stood out. There seems to be various discussions
of
why one is better than the other, and the pro's and con's of both. From
what I've seen perl has been around longer than python and there are
plenty of places to ask for help and lots of perl modules to use in
your
code. Python on the other hand seems newer, also has modules(probably
less than perl), and has quite bit of community around too. However
lately I've been seeing that there are more python projects than perl,
making me think python might be the better one to go for. So I am more
wondering what peoples opinions on this mailing list are when it comes
to python or perl, that way I can consider the opinion of people who
have been programming for a while before I make a decision to what I am
going to do ;)
On 2016-12-30 02:03, prmari...@gmail.com wrote:
I couldn't agree more, usually when I go to an open source event if
the crowd is a good one they wind up going some where else after the
event is over and chat for hours.
Thanks for the links, I'll look into them even though I'm on too many
mailing lists already :).
Original Message
From: ToddAndMargo
Sent: Thursday, December 29, 2016 18:24
To: Paul Robert Marino
Cc: scientific-linux-users@fnal.gov
Subject: Re: Perl 6 just hit
On 12/28/2016 01:09 PM, Paul Robert Marino wrote:
there is one for active Perl 6
projects but they don't want any one who doesn't already have an
active Perl 6 project to attend. I asked them very politely for a
clarification on their policy and didn't not get a response. I didn't
get a reply but I know other Perl 5 programmers who showed up looking
to get porting tips, and were asked to leave because they weren't
currently Perl 6 programmers, which is a very poor approach to take
if
you really want to rebuild the Perl community.
I have found in all my years in this biz that when so called "experts"
get
arrogant and condescending, it is usually because they don't
know what they are doing. The real experts love to talk and talk
about what they have learned. Sort of like letting the air out
of a compressed air container.
There is a Perl 6 mailing list with a bunch of great guys
over at
http://lists.perl.org/list/perl6-users.html
