Re: Perl 6 just hit
On 31/12/16 17:12, Nico Kadel-Garcia wrote: > I'd suggest learning bash first. Many complex perl, python, php, etc. > tools are actually wrappers for a few lines of shell. Yeah, I was going to suggest this too. Your biggest thing will be shell scripts - they hold everything together. There's not much that you can't do in bash - but there are a lot more things that are much more complex / dedicated that you'd be better off in a language like perl. The big thing is learning how to think in logical steps. When to use if, for, while etc etc. Once you've got a grip on the basics, the only real difference between languages is what specific formatting you give to the options to keep its compiler happy. bash is something you'll use every day - so its probably easy to deal with from the start. -- Steven Haigh Email: net...@crc.id.au Web: https://www.crc.id.au Phone: (03) 9001 6090 - 0412 935 897 signature.asc Description: OpenPGP digital signature
Re: Perl 6 just hit
Hi Maarten, On Fri, Dec 30, 2016 at 10:48:58AM +0100, Maarten wrote: > Thanks for taking the time to response :) Yes it did help a bit, > although it didn't make my choice any easier ;) Since even here people > have different opinions about python and perl as in preference. I > decided to take Steven Haigh's advice and learn both, that way I can > find out for myself which I like better. Is it true of what I've heard, > that once you know one language it's easier to learn a second? So say I > first learn python, then it would be easier for me to learn perl > afterwards or the other way around? Learning a second language is certainly much easier than a first one, although I would say you should start to learn programming and not a specific language, but that's a more philosophical discussion. Starting with Python is certainly better than starting with Perl from an educational point of view. Unless you have a specific need to learn both and/or to use Perl, I do not see a good reason to take the effort to learn Perl at this moment as a second language, as they are in the same league. If you want to extend your programming skills beyond Python, I would suggest to start learning C, and maybe even Javascript. The latter not because it is a nice language, it is not (although it inherits many things from Python and Perl), but because it has quite some practical value in the current era of web and even mobile app development. But again, all opinions are just mine and YMMV ;-). -- --Jos Vos--X/OS Experts in Open Systems BV | Office: +31 20 6938364 --Amsterdam, The Netherlands| Mobile: +31 6 26216181
Re: Perl 6 just hit
On 30/12/16 08:59, Maarten wrote: > 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 ;) I've worked with both Perl and Python professionally. I will not say that I was very good with Perl, but I could make it work reasonably well. But my experience with Python was that I got up-to-speed way faster than with Perl. Another thing I like about Python is that it is possible to write hard core performance needing components in C, which is loaded as Python modules. Something similar might be be possible with Perl too, but I have no experience with it. With that said, I would write a program depending heavily on processing text and regex, then I would most likely consider Perl for that project if I would have time to refresh my Perl skills. Otherwise I would choose Python, as it is to me quite easy to get started quickly there. So to me, Perl vs Python is depending just as much of the needs of a new project. Both have merits, but since everything isn't a nail, neither of them are the uniform hammer which works perfect for all occasions. With all that said, for most of my use cases, Python have been a reasonably good alternative. -- kind regards, David Sommerseth
Re: Perl 6 just hit
Hello Jos, Thanks for taking the time to response :) Yes it did help a bit, although it didn't make my choice any easier ;) Since even here people have different opinions about python and perl as in preference. I decided to take Steven Haigh's advice and learn both, that way I can find out for myself which I like better. Is it true of what I've heard, that once you know one language it's easier to learn a second? So say I first learn python, then it would be easier for me to learn perl afterwards or the other way around? On 2016-12-30 09:58, Jos Vos wrote: Hi Maarten, On Fri, Dec 30, 2016 at 08:59:36AM +0100, Maarten wrote: 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 ;) This is an absolute no-brainer: go for Python. There are IMHO many reasons for that, some are subjective, some are objective. My personal prediction is that the use of Perl will decrease during the time and that Perl 6 will never gain a significant "market share" in programming land. I think even part of the Perl community "fears" the same. See also the TIOBE index (http://www.tiobe.com/tiobe-index/) although do not consider this table to be a reflection of good taste ;-). And go for Python 3. Although Python 2 and 3 are almost compatible (which Perl 5 and 6 are definitely not, which is part of the problem), when starting to learn better stay with Python 3 from the beginning. Because you asked: I've been programming for 30+ years (and using UNIX for the same amount of time) and have used a large number of languages (of course including Perl). Python has become my favorite language, although for some things I have to switch to C or even JS. Hope this helps a bit.
Re: Perl 6 just hit
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
Re: Perl 6 just hit
By the way I know for a fact that on their big deployment contracts Cisco does not use their own products to manage their switches. They actually use Perl scripts. Original Message From: Steven Haigh Sent: Friday, December 30, 2016 04:11 To: scientific-linux-users@fnal.gov Subject: Re: Perl 6 just hit On 30/12/16 20:04, prmari...@gmail.com wrote: > 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. If you do an online transaction - somewhere between you and your bank, you hit a perl script. It's been said that the next financial crisis will be triggered by a perl bug. Even more seriously, stuff that absolutely must work, all the time, every time and for more than a year at a time is written in perl. Billion of dollars a month get moved around with perl scripts - and that won't change anytime soon... -- Steven Haigh Email: net...@crc.id.au Web: https://www.crc.id.au Phone: (03) 9001 6090 - 0412 935 897
Re: Perl 6 just hit
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
Re: Perl 6 just hit
On 30/12/16 20:04, prmari...@gmail.com wrote: > 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. If you do an online transaction - somewhere between you and your bank, you hit a perl script. It's been said that the next financial crisis will be triggered by a perl bug. Even more seriously, stuff that absolutely must work, all the time, every time and for more than a year at a time is written in perl. Billion of dollars a month get moved around with perl scripts - and that won't change anytime soon... -- Steven Haigh Email: net...@crc.id.au Web: https://www.crc.id.au Phone: (03) 9001 6090 - 0412 935 897 signature.asc Description: OpenPGP digital signature
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
Re: Perl 6 just hit
Hi Maarten, On Fri, Dec 30, 2016 at 08:59:36AM +0100, Maarten wrote: > 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 ;) This is an absolute no-brainer: go for Python. There are IMHO many reasons for that, some are subjective, some are objective. My personal prediction is that the use of Perl will decrease during the time and that Perl 6 will never gain a significant "market share" in programming land. I think even part of the Perl community "fears" the same. See also the TIOBE index (http://www.tiobe.com/tiobe-index/) although do not consider this table to be a reflection of good taste ;-). And go for Python 3. Although Python 2 and 3 are almost compatible (which Perl 5 and 6 are definitely not, which is part of the problem), when starting to learn better stay with Python 3 from the beginning. Because you asked: I've been programming for 30+ years (and using UNIX for the same amount of time) and have used a large number of languages (of course including Perl). Python has become my favorite language, although for some things I have to switch to C or even JS. Hope this helps a bit. -- --Jos Vos--X/OS Experts in Open Systems BV | Office: +31 20 6938364 --Amsterdam, The Netherlands| Mobile: +31 6 26216181
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