Talk:Perl

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  • Archive 1 - Leaking; Book Reviews, Xah Lee, would-be perl critic?; Perl programming language?; Regular Expressions with Perl Examples; Logo suggestion; Merits and demerits of Perl as a programming language; Propagandistic errors; Web hosting advertisements; Obfuscation example; History; Copyedits; TOCleft and indented paragraphs; Perl 6; Section ordering; Pathologically Eclectic Rubbish Lister.
  • Archive 2 - A sample Perl program; [Pp]erl; Perl - Practical Extraction and Report Language; Explanation of for/foreach Syntax; Sample code formatting; Merits and demerits of Perl as a programming language; Data types and Variables; Time to split the page?; Language Design Philosophy; Intro paragraph; Perl is not (really) an interpreted language; Pro vs. Con; Use of $a, $b in examples; Context-free; Hello world; Perlscript; The lead; Perl is interpreted; Semicolons used inconsistently in one line scripts; Regex examples; Page reorganization; Listed as a .Net Language?; processor-bound tasks???.
  • Archive 3 (the -Barry- collection) - Popular alternatives to Perl; TCPI?; Benchmark comparison; Future of Perl 5; brian d foy's style guide; Call for "See also" links for Pro section; Linking more than first instance if a term; References section; Popularity, again; Opinion section links; More bias by Scarpia; Article removed from Wikipedia:Good articles; Where's the index on the talk page?; Mediation; Perl's OO model influenced by Python; brian d foy on percentages and the TIOBE data; mediation with a stick; m// match operator; The Overview section; TIOBE data and IRC chat; Naming conventions; Let's ditch the Opinion section completely.
  • Archive 4 - The Perl Wiki in Wikia; Comparative Performance; # This is a comment; The Perl Wiki in Wikia, plea 2; A GPL Perl application; Critique

Contents

[edit] Criticism

This article seems to be remarkably short on criticism of perl. —Ashley Y 00:38, 30 September 2006 (UTC)

Oh goodness me, be careful with that box if you're going to open it. (Why? Have a read through /Archive03 to see the approach you shouldn't take.) -- Earle Martin [t/c] 00:47, 30 September 2006 (UTC)

I recommend citations of criticism from reputable sources. Did Dijkstra say anything about it, for instance? —Ashley Y 19:48, 12 October 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Agonising, eye-glazingly long syntax section

This isn't a tutorial. It shouldn't read like one. The syntax section does not need examples. This needs heavily whittled down, it's a whole article in itself. Chris Cunningham 16:26, 12 October 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Lead with Overview, not History

I think we should move the history section back down to the end of the article. It may be logical to begin any subject by reciting its history, that's not usually the first thing that people consulting an encyclopedia want to see. People reading the Perl article in WikiPedia want a basic overview and introduction, and that's what the Overview section is for. Swmcd 15:51, 13 October 2006 (UTC)

A quick glance at the linked languages in the infobox shows that every single one of them opens with the history section. In Perl's case there's an even stronger case what with the "overview" being well over a page long on a 1280x1024 display. Chris Cunningham 16:17, 13 October 2006 (UTC)
While I agree with your points, I think Swmcd's assumptions need close examination as well. An encyclopedia entry is not a reference manual, and it must be aimed at the broadest possible audience. For this article to be encyclopedic it needs to deal with the fact that, while some readers will understand the technical details of the langauge, most will want to place it in a non-technical context to understand its relation to other langauges in an abstract, historical sense. Leading with the history section accomplishes that. In fact, that was one of the first changes proposed when I put Perl 6 up for Good Article review. -Harmil 17:22, 13 October 2006 (UTC)
The problem is that the History section does not place the language in a non-technical context. The History section recounts the sequence of technical developments to the langauge. By the end of the Perl article, a non-technical reader will have some context for this, but at the very beginning, they don't. The new paragraph in the lead gives the reader some orientation, but I think it would simpler and clearer to move the History section back to the end of the article and rely on the Overview section to orient the user. Swmcd 21:36, 14 October 2006 (UTC)
Review of History section for technical ramp-up:
  • "Wall began work..." Only the mention of "regular expressions" and "binary data" are technical at all, and both are too fundamental to do much more work on explaining.
  • "Until 1991..." The mention of the documentation is a bit abrupt, and could use more context, but isn't technical at all.
  • "Perl 4 went through..." About version numbering. Not technical other than in the use of fairly typical version numbering schemes.
  • "Development of Perl 5..." Totally non-technical. Again, all about versions and communication channels.
  • "Perl 5 was released..." Here, we mention a laundry-list of features. Some might need some context. Some don't. This paragraph could use work.
  • "On October 26, 1995..." Nothing really technical, but more context about CPAN would not hurt. As I recall, CPAN's mission changed rapidly, and perhaps some mention of the early history would help.
  • "As of 2006, Perl 5..." Some context here would be good. Nothing major, just some reduction in the jargon in favor of descriptive text. "Unicode" for example should be "international text processing features using the Unicode character set," which gives the reader who doesn't know Unicode, but doesn't want to follow the link more of a leg to stand on.
That's it. for the most part, I think it's in good shape as the first sub-section. There are certainly some stubby paragraphs, but when compared to many other language articles, I think it's good. -Harmil 00:50, 15 October 2006 (UTC)

[edit] A sentance that is hard to understand

From the article:"All variables are marked by a leading sigil, which identifies the data type being accessed (not the type of the variable itself)"

I don't think the differnece between the data type being accessed and the type of the variable itself is clear.ori 18:28, 29 November 2006 (UTC)

I agree actually I think that the Data Types section needs work. Lists are NOT arrays are NOT lists. And there are more than four fundamental types and I think if we are going to discuss filehandles (IO) as one of them I think we should include subroutines (CODE) as one of them. Particularly as perl is a functional language with first class closures available. Demerphq 22:51, 6 December 2006 (UTC)
I added subroutines to the data type and removed references to "lists" when discussing variables. Lists are an abstract concept in perl and not a variable type. Demerphq 23:00, 6 December 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Two "current" versions on ActiveState

Generally, there is one main version of a software program. It is the one with the highest version number, the "latest and greatest". Any version below that is not being actively maintained. Perl is differnt, in that, if someone looks at the ActiveState website, they will see both a 5.8 version and a 5.6 version. Perhaps we should add a paragraph or two describing how and why there are two versions of perl5 being maintained and updated. TakingUpSpace 01:59, 7 December 2006 (UTC)

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