Slashdot Mirror
On Perl 5.6
bryan schwab writes "Perl 5.6 is in development, here is a list of
all the new features" The article is an interview with the "Patch Pumpkin" - one of the
guys from ActiveState in charge of putting together the development release. Seems there is a lot
planned for the next release.
I was struggling at the time I wrote that to understand regexp, and I haven't felt the need to fix working code, as it has other bottlenecks way more serious than bad pattern-matching.
On an aside: if the Slashdot maintainers read this, could you please add support for HTML entities (the ones with those funky &'s in them: preview will sort let you but it is broken....
... and today's pet project has
Somehow I doubt our friend Larry's ever heard of the "pumping lemma".
If he's going to do this, why not just support context free grammars?
Okay, I retract that. I did point out that I didn't know anything about this :-)
Linux is only the kernel. There's nothing strange about saying that Redhat's using Linux 2.2.3 or whatnot.
To be reading an article on programming languages I'd thought you would have picked up on the symantics of the quote. The quote was "similar to RedHat's Linux where you have 2.2.3" implying that RedHat owns a product called Linux and it is referred to with a version number of 2.2.3. RedHat does have a product named "Offical RedHat Linux" Note the lack of the posessive 's in the product name. It's not "RedHat's Linux" So, he didn't say that "Redhat's using Linux 2.2.3 or whatnot" (which while not incorrect is misleading because your use of 's is not in the possessive sense as it is in the quote from the article).
In effect, he was tying the version number, which was the only reason to mention either Linux or Redhat to RedHat's product called Linux and not the Linux kernel. This is particularly disturbing because RedHat does not "own" Linux and does not set the version numbers for new versions of Linux.
This reflects a serious mis-understanding of the Linux movement by the person who made the statement. The fact that:
1) He is one of the primary developers of perl.
2) He works for ActiveState.
3) The goals of the direction of perl seem, IMHO, mis-directed (PPM sucks - what the hell is wrong with compiling modules when it's a programming tool for crying out loud?)
I don't personally mind ORL's involvement in perl or the "OpenSource" movement in general. I don't particularly trust ActiveState and don't have a great appreciation for their work with perl on Windows (it doesn't compare to perl on Unix as you can't generally download any perl module source code and compile it into your perl installation). Their work with perl on the Windows platform is a classic example of "embrace and extend" if I ever saw one. Not only do they make proprietary system interfaces in the language encouraging the creation of non-portable programs but now they are talking about putting an event loop in the friggin language. How are they going to do that? Is it going to be specific to Windows?
I'd much rather see an effort to getting the "official" perl back on track and compiling under cygwin for the Windows platform. That it may not have all the Windows proprietary system interfaces but the ActiveState port does not mean much to me, as I try to circumvent the Windows system every chance I get when forced to work on that platform.
It just doesn't seem right to have to rely on someone else to compile a friggin package for me because I didn't happen to pay Microsoft an outrageous sum of money for their compilers...
That's what I see from my perspective also. When we start seeing normal modules not being able to be compiled and having to wait for Microsoft^H^H^H^H^H^H^H^H^HActivState to release a binary PPM for our platform of choice then we know it's time to fork the tree and split the language into MS^H^Hperl and "normal" perl...
I'm quite sure Larry's heard of the "pumping lemma." Regular expressions as implemented in various programming languages and utilities haven't been true regular expressions in the mathematical sense for quite some time. See Friedl's book for the gory details.
A regular expression in Perl is a syntax and set of parsing rules, not a mathematical statement about its expressiveness. With embedded Perl code, it's probably equivalent to a Turing machine at this point, which means it already handles more than context-free grammars.
Hmm... The guys at Scriptics added full
unicode support to TCL 8.1 (?? right version).
It wiped out performance big time. People
are very unhappy. We're staying with TCL 8.0.
So I hope the Perl people are taking performance
into account before slamming in the Unicode stuff.
-- cary
Wouldn't that be a more fitting symbol for Caml than for Perl?
Our wretched species is so made that those who walk on the well-trodden path always throw stones at those who are showing a new road.
Bye bye Perl! Nice knowing you.
The beginning of the end has started. This guy holding the patch pumpkin is clueless about computer languages.
The stuff he is talking about has already been done by several languages; OK maybe not in the middle of a regexp, but that is a minor point.
"In this case, we're talking about Windows NT..." ie we will "proprietize the protocol" like the Halloween docs say by implementing it on NT in a non-portable fashion. Sure there will be a way to do it under Unix, but it will take longer to finish or will be slower.
"greater control over warning messages" give me a freaking break! As if the way Perl handles it currently is stopping people from using it? 'Chuck, sorry, but we have to use this other programming language because we can't get the control over warning messages we need.' typical MSFT-style fiddling over details.
[in perl regexp section]..."something that is not there in any other language" gee, ever heard of LISP? Why do you think people wrote customized readers in LISP, doofus!
Even some ancient Lisp Machines could look at TCP packets as they came over the wire and despatch them according to certain rules! this is like 10 years ago or more!
Perl code being executed based on whether something is matched in a regexp is a new feature of 5.6?! Umm, I don't think so.
Threading model::don't you think it might be modified in ways that benefit Win32 platforms but are creaky under Unix? Or am I just paranoid?
Cordially
Patrick Giagnocavo
a222@redrose.net
The point was,.. he was talking about the KERNEL VERSION NUMBER.. redhat does not own the kernel,..
Man, I'm seeing the writing on the wall. This
Gurusamy Sarathy dude is releasing the next
version of perl. He also works for ActiveState
who just took big bucks from MS to make sure
Perl works well on Windows. Next thing you know
it will me MSPerl. WTF? Now will we have MS
lining the pockets of the Apache developers?
Calling me ParaNoid?? Don't think so, just look back on the 'head-fakes' that were put on OS/2 and Lotus.
Be smart. Don't be a fool.
Jim
Thats all....sorry...
The change will allow us to represent version numbers as a sequence of three numbers instead of as a single floating point number. This is similar to Red Hat's Linux where you have 2.2.3.
---
Put Hemos through English 101!
Linux MAPI Server!
http://www.openone.com/software/MailOne/
(Exchange Migration HOWTO coming soon)
Stallman gonna love it ;)
------------
Got GNU?
<^>_<(ô ô)>_<^>
Is it me or does the new perl.com look like the love child of Slashdot & O'Reilly? As if one swallowed the other and you end up with a baby blue version of Slashdot or something? It's not bad -- Slashdot's great, O'Reilly's great, I shouldn't have any complaints -- there are poorer online role models out there, but... ...it feels derivative to me. I think perl.com should set a better example than this, something more innovative & bold.
Maybe that's just me though.
DO NOT LEAVE IT IS NOT REAL
The article says it will be released "soon after the O'Reilly Perl and Open Source Conference". When is the conference?
Perl runs both under UNIX and NT.... not like I like NT or anything... :)
This guy is the patch pumpkin? Does that mean he gets passed around from developer to developer? Don't they mean, he's the patch pumpking ?
Also, the guy worries me. He works for ActiveState. Blech. Nothing concrete, I'm not on the perl mailing lists, so I'm probably wrong, but that seems a bit .. scary.
I think you'll find that either the Parse::RecDescent module or the Parse:Yapp module will do what you want. They're really very neat, although I've only ever spent much time reading up on the first of them.
Once you get more experience in the industry, you'll realize that these "fakes" and "frauds" are a fact of life and they will always be around. Nonetheless you've still got a job to do -- and chances are good that if you're managing a team, you'll have a few morons to manage. Driving them out of town won't bring your project in on time, but helping them out and giving them a chance will.
Can you say,.. bullshit? :) :)
:P
Java and Perl are actually VERY much like C/C++
When I started in perl it only took a few mins to understand the differances between it and C and I was off writing code. The only problem I have with perl currently... I REALLY dont like its use of OOP... I prefer how C++ or Java handles OOP...
hehe... I kinda like being able to actually declare things as public or private,.. things like that. But what can I do
ohh yah.. and C++- is not a language
3) The goals of the direction of perl seem, IMHO, mis-directed (PPM sucks - what the hell is wrong with compiling modules when it's a programming tool for crying out loud?)
That's great on unices. I don't want to get into VC++, prefering to work in Perl. Even those who put linux advocacy ahead of Perl should be able to relate to that.
Your "embrace and extend" paranoia is misplaced. Perl will at some point be included in the Windows distributions. The open source nature of Perl will open that OS. More important, having a modern and efficient language on Win will improve it immensely.
So don't worry about what Micros~1 is going to do to Perl. But glad at what Perl is going to do for the majority, those who use the Win OS.
Just another perl hacker in Bangkok
I can now pretend to be intelligent and search and discard seperate matched tags? Lots and lots of cool implications for HTML, CGI, and XML developers there.
Yes yes yes!
and mundane things like find the missing quote the misplaced braces will be much easier.
doing replaces for programming Code will be much easier and we may be able to get started on a regex classification engine.
Just another perl hacker in Bangkok
I'm afraid that I must agree with some of the others here--Perl is a cornerstone of free software, and this is a direct attempt by Microsoft to "take it over". We should all be prepared to execute a code fork. I'll bet Larry Wall will lead the charge, if it comes to that--no fool nor Microsoft lover he.
Driving them out of town won't bring your project in on time, but helping them out and giving them a chance will.
I completely disagree. Whatever they do, harm is greater than whatever useful they might produce, and the damage, caused by hidden bugs and unmanageable code can haunt projects for years. Most of those people are impossible to "fix" -- they are in the industry for money only and will never miss a chance to get enough credit for others' work to remain getting their money while producing nothing. If there will be a way to weed them out efficiently, companies that will be able to do that will benefit from it even if all those people will end up paid by those companies for the rest of their lives -- because in that case those people won't be able to screw up things like they do now.
Contrary to the popular belief, there indeed is no God.
PPM sucks - what the hell is wrong with compiling modules when it's a programming tool for crying out loud?
Dude, PPM RULES! I can download and install a Perl module in SECONDS. If I had to compile it on my NT server machine I would:
a) have to get a C compiler
b) take the time to learn to use the C compiler
c) get the code and makefiles and complile it.
Not all Perl programmer are C programmer, too. Many of us are web designers, forced to use NT/IIS instead of Linux/Apache, and Perl saves us our sanity.
I don't particularly trust ActiveState and don't have a great appreciation for their work with perl on Windows (it doesn't compare to perl on Unix as you can't generally download any perl module source code and compile it into your perl installation).
That's why PPM rules! Sheesh!
-geekd
If you were on p5p, I'm quite certain you wouldn't be joining the other Illuminati wannabes with these unsubstantiated delusions of evil conspiracies and take-overs. Please try to simmer down, and do a little research. You'll see that all is well. Or talk to one of us directly if you'd prefer.
> Once you get more experience in the industry
Could you possibly more annoying?
I'm a contract software developer contractor
on Wall Street. I deal with these phony
software developers every day. They claim to
be experts in everything from Corba to Java
to whatever-is-hot-at-this-moment -- yet
they know nothing.
Frankly, I think they all should be fired.
No discussion. They claim to know something
they don't, but are billing their clients
as if they are experts in the field.
They lengthen deadlines, triple projects budgets
and deliver half-assed solutions -- they
give software developers a bad name in general.
No free ride from me. I'm tired of this crap.
> Driving them out of town won't bring your project in on time
I beg to differ. Where's your proof?
I've observed in my 15 years of programming
that a single lousy programmer can slow down
_several_ team members through their buggy
code and general stupidity.
And yes, firing them can indeed help you make a
deadline.
I used to think as you do.
Maybe once you get more experience in the
industry, you'll come to the same realization.
There was a "Perl Town Hall" at the end of last years Perl Conference. During the question and answer session, perl users griped about being at the mercy of evil sysadmins who refused to install new versions of Perl solely based on the version of the product. Their sysadmins would reason, "The version number has increased by only one-thousandth of a point. Such an insignificant upgrade is not worthy of my precious sysadmin time!" (My sysadmins also subscribe to this foolish belief. But thanks to linux, I now have my own box where I can do what I please. But that's another story.)
Anyway, the panel (which consisted of Larry Wall, Chip S, brian d foy, Tim Bunce, Dick Hardt, Gurusamy Sarathy, Tim O'Reilly, and other people whom I can't remember right now) agreed that new versions of Perl should indeed have bigger version numbers -- something which more accurately represents the significance of the release. During this "town hall", they promised to do something about it. It looks like they finally have. It's good to see the change.
Where I work, I have an additional problem. I'm surrounded by people who HAVE been exposed to Perl. They, however, have dismissed Perl as a non-viable solution. Why? Well, their last exposure to Perl was back in the pre-4.0 days. Even though Perl has grown considerbly since then, they've never come back to take a second look and see the improvements. They've dismissed it forever. (Well, perhaps not forever, but it would take quite a bit to get them to give Perl another chance.)
So what would get these people to come back for another look? A new (much needed) edition of "Programming Perl"? A new primary version number -- Perl 6.0? Or maybe a new name altogether? I'm optimistic about Topaz. Even if Topaz has the same functionality as Perl, I believe the new name will attract some much-deserved attention. But that's just my very humble opinion.
Extending Perl till its bloated beyond all belief, heh, thats what CPAN is for.
Um, right, a downloadable set of _modules_ that are available seperate from the main PERL package is bloat. I guess C must be the most bloated language of all considering how many libraries have been written with it...
0) Tsk tsk on those of you who believe everything Microsoft say. When they said they were paying Activestate to make Perl work better on NT, you forgot to translate that back into honest English: they're paying Activestate to implement fork() on NT so that NT can become more like Unix (a slower buggier more crashprone Unix). Yes, Microsoft for "bring up to baseline of minimum acceptable functionality" is "make it work better". Another way of saying this is "make NT suck less for Perl users". Perl is all about making your OS suck less.
1) Perl's version numbering is changing because major changes in functionality (e.g., the introduction of threads and a compiler) were hidden in the thousands decimal point of the version number. Hopefully this new numbering system will make it more obvious that things have changed. It's a small cosmetic change, not technical, but it's something people wanted.
2) Lexical warnings. Perl's philosophy is "there's more than one way to do it". With warnings as they were, there were only two ways to do it: all warnings enabled, no warnings enabled. Now you can say "I know it looks to the compiler as though I only use this variable once, but don't issue a warning". If you don't see yourself wanting to use it, don't panic--unless you explicitly use the new warning doodads, your programs will emit as few or as many warnings as before.
3) Sarathy is a smart smart guy. He's not an NT flack. He's a smart Unix guy who happens to be employed at Activestate because that's about the only place a guy can be hired to work on the Perl internals. He does far more work on the Perl core to benefit everyone than he does Windoze-specific work. If you're going to be at the Perl+Apache+Linux+... uberconference that O'Reilly are organizing, I urge you to seek him out (he won't be hard to find) and have a talk about your concerns. He'll be the first to agree that NT sucks hard.
4) Unicode reading (via UTF8) is implemented as an add-on module, so that only the part of your program that needs to know about Unicode takes any speed hit. It's also simple to turn programs that used to read ASCII text into programs that read Unicode text: just add "use utf8" at the top. We don't anticipate slowdowns anything like those that one Slashdot reader reported in Tcl.
5) The Unicode support only extends to reading and processing text, not to Perl's interaction with the system (filenames, error messages, etc.) I believe that Windows deals with UTF in the same way that many Unices deal with long files: a separate set of OS functions are provided. The Unicodification of Perl is being extended to use these parallel functions, if present. Generalizing this is hard because, like Unix and long files, everyone does it different. That doesn't mean that Sarathy's work precludes this happening for any other operating systems that provide Unicode support like this. In fact, having the first work done will make support for other operating systems easier. And the best bit is that Microsoft are paying for it.
I don't know about you, but I'm all for fleecing Uncle Bill.
Nat
Perhaps they are. But consider that Perl has always been utterly Unix-specific in the past -- most Perlscripts call out to Unix commands to do basic things.
I prefer Unix to Windows, but that doesn't make me think that being unix-specific is more holy than being windows-specific.
Perhaps after the Windows people slam Perl around a while, and the Unix people grab it back and slam it around, they'll all come to their senses and simply write non-platform-specific code.
Or just use Python, which has been platform independant since day one. Not to mention looking MUCH more sexy, and doing everything aside from text parsing more tersely.
-Billy
Perl's expressions are far from regular. They are NP-Complete.
--
Man is most nearly himself when he achieves the seriousness of a child at play.
****Gfx Scrollbar Special case hit!!*****
What are you talking about ? Slashdot is red, white and blue on a black background. Slash also has FAR more usability than most web-sites.
Now I won't have any reason at all to write C code. I'll hate to see that skill that saw me through so many years of trial and tribulation finally fade away. But in truth, handling balanced tags (quotes as well as HTML tags) was all I've used it for in the recent past.
Information is not Knowledge
Myeahh, myeahh... I got sand in my diaper.
You sure complained quick when your post got moderated in a way you didn't like, but no comment when the moderation changed? It's a dynamic system, and by the time you've bitched, it may have changed. Your complaints are getting old.
I for one might have moderated your post down because your message was indeed a "direct quote from the article". That's nice. I understand you wanted to make emphasis. But try making a comment.
There are more than 26 letters out there, dude. Do you know any other languages? Did you try to work with them? Ever got pissed encountering 23 ways to encode/screw up text you try to read?
Oh, piss off.
Did he say, "Screw them thar other furriner tongues, speak American or dah!" No. He said "It wiped out performance big time. People
are very unhappy."
So are you saying it's a typically arrogant American attitude to want software to run with great performance? New features are great, even better more human language support, but why accept a performance hit?
Why, might I ask, would the folks working on perl want to start numbering their releases the same way kernels (and lots of other software product releases are numbered?
/., open source, FSF, etc... don't encompass. Who wants to be like everybody else? Not me!
That's standardization, something which I think the spirit of Linux,
Insert mind here.
Please... perl was accumulated, not designed. I'll keep on writing emminantly maintainable and extensible apps in much more extendable and pleasing environ (Python) and enjoy watching perl choke on its own tangled mess.
... There are more than 26 letters out there, dude. Do you know any other languages? Did you try to work with them? Ever got pissed encountering 23 ways to encode/screw up text you try to read?
<^>_<(ô ô)>_<^>
the win32 api isn't even completely documented. how did you learn it all?
He's probably one of Microsoft's finest programmers...
From reading the press releases, the Gates Foundation doesn't fund any libraries or any other charitable organizations. It provides gives of Microsoft products, services, and hardware to run them. It sounds a lot more like making damn sure that these organizations are locked into Microsoft-only IT solutions and increasing long term sales.
the good ground has been paved over by suicidal maniacs
Wow, the _complete_ Win32 API!? Seriously, if you can master C++ and the Win32 API, Perl is a piece of cake. Go out and buy O'Reilly's "Programming Perl" 2nd Edition and you'll have it down in a week. Perl is "hellacool" like that.
I make no apologies, however, for being suspicious of Microsoft's motivations. I do believe, having now read Mr. Christiansen's assurance, that this is not an attack by Microsoft, at least not yet. There will be an attack, but apparently this isn't it. So sorry for having gotten your dander up.
In future, however, it might behoove you to know a bit more about those you insult. Just in general, as it were.
I don't believe any regex featurs are going to help you. If you use s///, you're just way to naive. You should step away from programming - go play quake or something like that.
Abigail
Java is not that close to C++, semantically. Among other aspects,
* C and C++ allow pointers, including function pointers. This allows, say, saner GUI development where you don't need classes willy-nilly all over the place. I'll write XForms applications far, far faster than an equivalent Java GUI, partly because I can reuse the same callback with different arguments, w/o messing with a class hierarchy. You can also simulate some higher-order functions this way, although it's not terribly pleasant.
* Java *forces* a class hierarchy. It does allow interfaces, though, which are a tad saner than frequent usage of C++-style multiple inheritance.
* Java's type system is stronger than C/C++, where if I feel like it, I can cast a pointer to an object as a (char *), and that to a pointer of a completely unrelated structure. And so forth.
Only the dead have seen the end of war.
The size of the standard APIs included with Java is large, but that doesn't mean anything. It's akin to saying C is a big slow language because of all the libraries, many of which may not be optimized for speed.
And the fact that a subset of standard Java fits into PalmPilots should be a clue that the language itself isn't as big and bloated as you think.
Just doing my part to put an end to language bigot FUD.
Ita erat quando hic adveni.
the win32 api isn't even completely documented. how did you learn it all?
Up till 5.005, for instance, perl regexes couldn't match a balanced parenthesis string. However, the language consisting of balanced parenthesis strings, is recognized by a PDA. And it doesn't take super linear time to do the parsing.
Am I making any sense?
Abigail
Strong typing is for weak minds.
Weak typing is for strong minds.
Dude, PPM RULES! I can download and install a Perl module in SECONDS. If I had to compile it on my NT server machine I would:
a) have to get a C compiler
b) take the time to learn to use the C compiler
c) get the code and makefiles and complile it.
Really? I run a variety of Unix, and never had to learn how to use the C compiler:
$ perl Makefile.PL
$ make && make test && make install
Of course I'm old fashioned, and doing it the hard(!) way. Lotsa folks just do:
$ perl -MCPAN -e shell
$ install distribution_file
> I don't believe any regex featurs are going to help you. If you use s///, you're just way to
> naive. You should step away from programming - go play quake or something like that.
What an unbelievably arrogant statement! I'm really happy for you that you were *born* with an ingrained knowledge of regular expression syntax, but some people might actually have to *learn* how to use them.
Perhaps instead of casually dismissing any would-be Perl-er from learning the language since they can't grok s/// yet, how about explaining *why* using it for HTML tags is (in your opinion) a bad idea.
By the way, for some circumstances where you know you'll be parsing a web page in a certain format, s/// can work just fine thank you very much (my success with it proves that).
Sheesh.
You shouldn't have to "get into VC++. You should be able to install cygwin (a Free product) and do a
:-), but I would have a problem if the main maintainers of the language started to leave the Unix ports behind and changed it into a mainly Windows product with Unix ports instead of a mainly Unix product with a Windows port. (See how that works, a Unix product with one Windows port or a Windows product with multiple Unix ports?)
perl -MCPAN -e shell
install module
like all other sane people.
I have no problem if perl is put in the Windows "distributions" (that was funny
If you trust Microsoft and their intentions then you're worse off that I thought...
Exactly. That's what pisses me off. The fact that I now have to either
A) purchase Visual C from Microsoft to compile any module I want
or
B) Beg ActiveState to port a module for me.
They seem to indicate that they are perfectly willing to port any modules and provide a PPM but it appears that they would not be so willing if there are any problems (compile fails, etc)...
You write: "I would have a problem if the main maintainers of the language started to leave the Unix ports behind and changed it into a mainly Windows product".
That's not happening. There's no indication that that's happening. There's a great deal of indication that is shall NOT happen. Please take your medicine and stop spreading FUD. This kind of paranoia can be treated.
Slashdot has had the same bulbous, seasick green look forever. How about a peppy new makeover with some usability improvements? We especially need a larger "Comment" box.
You mean ActiveState?
Well, since they are funded by Microsoft to provide porting of perl to windows, I don't know what you would expect.
SNIP
the change will allow us to represent version numbers as a sequence of three numbers instead of as a single floating point number. This is similar to Red Hat's Linux where you have 2.2.3.
END SNIP
I assume he's talkign about the kernel number (i've never seen redhat 2.2.3). That said, when did it become redhat's kernel? Horrible use of words IMHO
As far as casual programmers like myself go, I really appreciate a numbering system that's more "industry standard." I mean, sticking a couple of decimal places out in front of a major revision number is pretty confusing for those of us who can't keep up. Until I read this piece, I'd though 5.005 was only marginally different from 5.004. (Raster, Mandrake: if you're reading this -- why is E still at .16? Are you planning 83 more releases between now and the one where it's finally ready?)
Now, if they'd add support for *irregular* expressions, that's something I could really go for; programmin' Yoda-style!
"Oh, I hope he doesn't give us halyatchkies," said Heinrich.
Where previously I had to settle for using something like s/<.*?>//g; to discard all tags, I can now pretend to be intelligent and search and discard seperate matched tags? Lots and lots of cool implications for HTML, CGI, and XML developers there.
Good thinking guys!
... and today's pet project has
What green look? You mean you let other people override your colors? Ick. I set as many "give me the simple stuff only" flags, but still prefer reading it with lynx. But then again, I'd rather still be using trn.
But its a simpler scheme. 5.6.1 is far easier on the eye than 5.006_1 or whatever the hell their arse about face scheme currently uses. I think its a damn fine idea.
Well, I've always wondered at the version numbering in perl, the new numberig is more in tune with the rest of the world, not that that should matter really.
multi threading though? Why? The only thing I can think of is GUI interfaces and server processes on Win32 (because of the sucking memory and process handling on Windows). Seems like a waste of time to me.
What's so bloated about Java? People have decent subsets of Java running in well under 1 meg of memory. Or are you talking about Sun's JDK?
:-)
*shrug* Once I get my copy of the Python reference book from Amazon UK, I'll probably ditch Perl for any development anyway...
Certainly there exists a class of problems that lends itself to more than one PC (program counter; it means program counter damn it) executing simultaneously in the same text and data. Personally, I prefer everything unshared unless I say otherwise, not the other way around.
But it's pretty scary stuff for all but the most rigorous of seasoned programmers. To my mind, handing a script kiddie multithreading is like handing a six year old a loaded Uzi. That's not to say that in the hands of a trained professional, these aren't useful. But in the wrong hands, they're more like a sneaky murder-suicide device.
It's getting a bit dated, and certainly carries its own agenda, but several years ago, John Ousterhout gave a talk on Why Threads Are A Bad Idea (for most purposes) that you might like to check out.
If you're curious about threading in Perl, the best place to start is probably the perlthrtut manpage. Some low-level documentation is also available.
I'll be giving a half-day talk on multitasking (both forking processes and spawning threads) in August at the Perl Conference in Monterey. I've got about 100 slides for 3 hours of talk, which should be, um, brisk. :-)
Java is big and slow and painful. Especially painful. It's not for regular people. It's only for professional programmers with a high pain threshhold.
... will probably show how much faster perl ist on NT... using that threading stuff that is optimized for NT only, but no other person would have very much use for..
i think what we see here is the beginning of "embrace & extend".
greetings from vienna.
mond.
WHat are you smoking? Open Source implementing *open standards* is one of the mantras of the whole movement.
You can be as rebel, rebel as you like, but you still have to use HTTP if you want to make a web browser.
I think you have the logo confused with chemical dependence.
Yes but there is one important fact that you seem to overlook.
/etc/passwd file or something.
Unix "specific" programs and interfaces are available for Windows. You can get cygwin and compile just about any Unix "specific" program that is called from within a perl program.
Windows "specific" features that are being put in perl are truely "specific." You can't, nor would anyone want to, port Windows "specific" API's to Unix.
Perl programs which contain Unix "specific" APIs can therefore be relatively easily ported to the Windows platform. The only exceptions would be when you are writing a program to do a truely Unix "specific" task, such as working with the
Perl programs which contain Windows "specific" APIs generally CAN'T be ported to Unix. This is usually the case even when the task at hand is not overly Windows "specific."
Fortunately, you're wrong. There are no "Windows specific APIs" being stuck "into Perl".
If it offends you that there exist Win32::XXX modules that the Windows users can use, than you have a big problem.
The three-part version number scheme is easier to understand, since the significant of the changes can be expressed in which part you decide to increment. Besides, the Mac and Windows versioning schemes have done this for a while.
tell doesn't return the correct file offset for unix files (no CRs) if binmode isn't set. There's no good reason for it either. Screws up look.pl big time.
:-)
I wrote my own version of look.pl that works in windoz, binmode or not. It's faster but sadly not up to perl standards. Not nearly obfuscated enough.
...then it ain't a "regular expression" anymore. But anyway...
BTW, did your example get mangled by the HTML parser or what? ".*?" is redundant...
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Put Hemos through English 101!
Linux MAPI Server!
http://www.openone.com/software/MailOne/
(Exchange Migration HOWTO coming soon)
As long as they can do all this neat stuff without turning Perl into a bloated beast like java, I'm all for it. I don't want "hello world" to require 64 MB and a pentium 3 to run.
...the needs of Windows-specific programming are slowly taking over the development of perl. Not good in my book.
Contrary to the popular belief, there indeed is no God.
Funding to port Perl to Windows? AFAIK, all MS did was to provided information and help to make the existing Win32 port of Perl work better on Windows. The port had existed for a couple of years or so by then.
Chris
mtnbkr@mindspring.com
I don't even know how to use Perl 1.0 :/
I see on these web sites using databases and CGIs and XML and Java and JavaScript and DHTML and HTML, shockwave, flash, ActiveX, and VBScript.... And all I know is the complete Win32 API and C++- but nobody gives a shit.
...for the same reason it has a competitor to Jini called Millenium: they've got a million hedge projects. It costs them next to nothing, and it gives them an in if they decide they need it. That leaves the possibility of 'embracing and extending' perl, but doesn't guarantee it at all.
Personally, I doubt they'll bother trying to colonize Perl, since Perl is competitive only with Visual Basic, which isn't threatened at all, given its penetration via Microsoft Office. There's no perceived threat from Perl the way there was with Java, and while they're ponying up some helpful development cash, they get some positive PR from supporting it.
In other words, this is part of M$'s diversified portfolio of technologies that they keep around, of which maybe 1-5% actually pop on Billy's radar and get the full behemoth treatment. Fear at this point is more than unreasonable, it's self-deluding.
Anyone who loves or hates any language, platform, or manufacturer, doesn't know what they're talking about.
How is this "offtopic"? I took a quote from the linked interview.
I'd tend to agree with you. In fact, I was so flipped out by that quote when I read the article yesterday that I sent in a comment to perl.com and let them know that RedHat doesn't "own" Linux (as implied) and that they never had a version of their product called 2.2.3.
I'm semi up to speed in Perl, but haven't yet done any serious parsing work with it. Are there any modules/extensions that give you yacc/lex functionality in a true-to-perl terse style? I don't wanna go back to yacc if I can do it in perl!
That's a step backwards IMHO...people are getting terribly carried away with version numbers. I like the idea of a simple floating point number - this X.Y.Zfoobar2-pl1-yadda.yadda.yadda stuff is getting out of hand.
Barry
It doesn't sound strange to hear "Suse's Linux is 2.2, but Redhat's got 2.3".
I think you guys are too sensitive.
You may be able to use trn in the near future. I've had a news server for Slash out there for a while now. Rob knows about it and plans to use it, but that page has said "soon" for a while now.
The Perl Symbol makes me won't to smoke some cigs.