[23926] in Perl-Users-Digest
Perl-Users Digest, Issue: 6127 Volume: 10
daemon@ATHENA.MIT.EDU (Perl-Users Digest)
Fri Feb 13 03:05:44 2004
Date: Fri, 13 Feb 2004 00:05:07 -0800 (PST)
From: Perl-Users Digest <Perl-Users-Request@ruby.OCE.ORST.EDU>
To: Perl-Users@ruby.OCE.ORST.EDU (Perl-Users Digest)
Perl-Users Digest Fri, 13 Feb 2004 Volume: 10 Number: 6127
Today's topics:
Re: Changing Mcdonald to McDonald <pinyaj@rpi.edu>
Re: compile Perl as a STATIC library <tmohr@s.netic.de>
Re: compile Perl as a STATIC library <usenet@morrow.me.uk>
configure, WIN32 <tmohr@s.netic.de>
Re: formating pipe delimited file <webstuff@fluidic.com>
Re: formating pipe delimited file <krahnj@acm.org>
Re: GDBM and Perl 5.6.1 <Joe.Smith@inwap.com>
hidden perl <NOJUNK@EMAILPLEASE.COM>
Re: hidden perl <jurgenex@hotmail.com>
Re: hidden perl <invalid-email@rochester.rr.com>
Re: hidden perl <noreply@gunnar.cc>
Re: hidden perl <NOJUNK@EMAILPLEASE.COM>
Re: hidden perl <NOJUNK@EMAILPLEASE.COM>
Re: hidden perl <uri@stemsystems.com>
Re: One more running Perl as a service question <usenet@morrow.me.uk>
Re: One more running Perl as a service question (Cosmic Cruizer)
Re: One more running Perl as a service question <news@LearnQuick.com>
Re: perl and db-module (Dan Bent)
Re: Perl usage these days? <bmb@ginger.libs.uga.edu>
Re: Problem opening sed pipe <xx087@freenet.carleton.ca>
Re: Test message, please ignore. <jurgenex@hotmail.com>
Re: Why is Perl losing ground? <cwilbur@mithril.chromatico.net>
Re: Why is Perl losing ground? <cwilbur@mithril.chromatico.net>
Re: Why is Perl losing ground? <cwilbur@mithril.chromatico.net>
Digest Administrivia (Last modified: 6 Apr 01) (Perl-Users-Digest Admin)
----------------------------------------------------------------------
Date: Fri, 13 Feb 2004 01:06:59 -0500
From: Jeff 'japhy' Pinyan <pinyaj@rpi.edu>
To: porter970 <porter970@lycos.com>
Subject: Re: Changing Mcdonald to McDonald
Message-Id: <Pine.SGI.3.96.1040213010531.105784A-100000@vcmr-64.server.rpi.edu>
[posted & mailed]
On Thu, 12 Feb 2004, porter970 wrote:
>(which I copied from somewhere and don't fully understand.)
Then you should read up on 'tr///' and regexes. Read 'perlop' and
'perlre'.
> if ($name =~ /^Mc[a-z]/i) {
> $name =~ s/^Mc([a-z])?/Mc\U$1/;
> }
Why are you testing to see if the pattern exists, and THEN doing a
substitution based on that same pattern? That's wasted effort.
$name =~ s/^Mc([a-z])/Mc\U$1/;
is fine.
--
Jeff Pinyan RPI Acacia Brother #734 2003 Rush Chairman
"And I vos head of Gestapo for ten | Michael Palin (as Heinrich Bimmler)
years. Ah! Five years! Nein! No! | in: The North Minehead Bye-Election
Oh. Was NOT head of Gestapo AT ALL!" | (Monty Python's Flying Circus)
------------------------------
Date: Fri, 13 Feb 2004 02:01:08 +0100
From: Torsten Mohr <tmohr@s.netic.de>
Subject: Re: compile Perl as a STATIC library
Message-Id: <c0h7kk$63h$1@schleim.qwe.de>
Hi,
> If the 'programs' you are talking about are Perl programs, then you
> want PAR. If they are C programs that use embedded Perl interpreters,
> then you will want to build perl statically by passing -Uusedl to
> Configure, and then you must make sure you create an perlxsi.c with
> ExtUtils::Embed::xs_init and link it into your executable.
this sounds very interesting, thanks for that hint.
I'd like to do this on WIN32, so i can't really pass anything
to "configure", on Windows there's a Makefile for nmake.
I will look into it and undef "USEDL", but i think there
are more changes necessary.
Thanks,
Torsten.
------------------------------
Date: Fri, 13 Feb 2004 02:52:59 +0000 (UTC)
From: Ben Morrow <usenet@morrow.me.uk>
Subject: Re: compile Perl as a STATIC library
Message-Id: <c0he6b$76m$1@wisteria.csv.warwick.ac.uk>
Torsten Mohr <tmohr@s.netic.de> wrote:
> Hi,
>
> > If the 'programs' you are talking about are Perl programs, then you
> > want PAR. If they are C programs that use embedded Perl interpreters,
> > then you will want to build perl statically by passing -Uusedl to
> > Configure, and then you must make sure you create an perlxsi.c with
> > ExtUtils::Embed::xs_init and link it into your executable.
>
> this sounds very interesting, thanks for that hint.
> I'd like to do this on WIN32, so i can't really pass anything
> to "configure", on Windows there's a Makefile for nmake.
> I will look into it and undef "USEDL", but i think there
> are more changes necessary.
Get MinGW (http://www.mingw.org) and build it properly with Configure
and make: it's a supported configuration on win32. (NB this is not the
same as cygwin: the final perl.exe doesn't depend on any special dlls
or POSIX emulation layers, only on MSVCRT.dll as ever.)
Ben
--
don't get my sympathy hanging out the 15th floor. you've changed the locks 3
times, he still comes reeling though the door, and soon he'll get to you, teach
you how to get to purest hell. you do it to yourself and that's what really
hurts is you do it to yourself just you, you and noone else * ben@morrow.me.uk
------------------------------
Date: Fri, 13 Feb 2004 02:06:34 +0100
From: Torsten Mohr <tmohr@s.netic.de>
Subject: configure, WIN32
Message-Id: <c0h7uq$63j$1@schleim.qwe.de>
Hi,
i'd like to compile Perl on WIN32, i already did that by
using the supplied Makefile for "nmake" and it went fine.
But i'd like to pass some additional parameters to the
compile process.
Is there a way to pass some more parameters to "configure"
on WIN32?
Do i need to use MinGW then?
Thanks for hints,
Torsten.
------------------------------
Date: Fri, 13 Feb 2004 03:17:40 GMT
From: J <webstuff@fluidic.com>
Subject: Re: formating pipe delimited file
Message-Id: <0001HW.BC51AC06002D70CFF03865B0@news-server.tampabay.rr.com>
On Thu, 12 Feb 2004 1:22:28 -0500, John W. Krahn wrote
(in message <402B1B47.F6589E1E@acm.org>):
> J wrote:
>
> Something like this should work:
>
> #!/usr/bin/perl
> use warnings;
> use strict;
>
> ( $^I, @ARGV ) = ( '.bak', 'yourfile.txt' );
>
> my @lens = map length, split /\|/, <>, -1;
> while ( <> ) {
> chomp;
> my $i = -1;
> $lens[ ++$i ] < $_ and $lens[ $i ] = $_ for map length, split /\|/, $_,
> -1;
> }
> @ARGV = $ARGV;
> while ( <> ) {
> chomp;
> my $i;
> print join( '|', map sprintf( '%-*s', $lens[ $i++ ], $_ ), split /\|/,
> $_, -1 ), "\n";
> }
>
> __END__
I'm having a hard time understand this line of code
$lens[ ++$i ] < $_ and $lens[ $i ] = $_ for map length, split /\|/, $_,-1
Could some one explain this line of code.
John
------------------------------
Date: Fri, 13 Feb 2004 05:11:50 GMT
From: "John W. Krahn" <krahnj@acm.org>
Subject: Re: formating pipe delimited file
Message-Id: <402C5C82.9F586710@acm.org>
J wrote:
>
> On Thu, 12 Feb 2004 1:22:28 -0500, John W. Krahn wrote
> (in message <402B1B47.F6589E1E@acm.org>):
>
> > J wrote:
> >
> > Something like this should work:
> >
> > #!/usr/bin/perl
> > use warnings;
> > use strict;
> >
> > ( $^I, @ARGV ) = ( '.bak', 'yourfile.txt' );
> >
> > my @lens = map length, split /\|/, <>, -1;
> > while ( <> ) {
> > chomp;
> > my $i = -1;
> > $lens[ ++$i ] < $_ and $lens[ $i ] = $_ for map length, split /\|/, $_,
> > -1;
> > }
> > @ARGV = $ARGV;
> > while ( <> ) {
> > chomp;
> > my $i;
> > print join( '|', map sprintf( '%-*s', $lens[ $i++ ], $_ ), split /\|/,
> > $_, -1 ), "\n";
> > }
> >
> > __END__
>
> I'm having a hard time understand this line of code
> $lens[ ++$i ] < $_ and $lens[ $i ] = $_ for map length, split /\|/, $_,-1
>
> Could some one explain this line of code.
Sure, to put it more verbosely:
# set $index to -1 because we pre-increment it in the loop
my $index = -1;
# split the line in $_ using the pipe '|' character
# third argument is -1 to get trailing empty fields
for my $field ( split /\|/, $_, -1 ) {
my $length = length $field;
++$index;
if ( $lens[ $index ] < $length ) {
# store $length in the array @lens if it is
# greater than the previous value in @lens
$lens[ $index ] = $length;
}
}
John
--
use Perl;
program
fulfillment
------------------------------
Date: Fri, 13 Feb 2004 06:09:27 GMT
From: Joe Smith <Joe.Smith@inwap.com>
Subject: Re: GDBM and Perl 5.6.1
Message-Id: <rSZWb.168060$U%5.782057@attbi_s03>
JAG wrote:
> Solaris 9 comes with Perl and I suspect that rebuilding Perl would be a really
> bad idea. Is this suspicion correct?
Incorrect.
It is a bad idea to overwrite or replace /usr/perl5/*, but perfectly
reasonable to "rm /usr/bin/perl; ln -s /usr/local/bin/perl /usr/bin".
The vendor supplied scripts all use /usr/perl5/bin/perl, which means
it is OK to install a newer one from www.sunfreeware.com.
solaris9% /usr/perl5/bin/perl -v
This is perl, v5.6.1 built for sun4-solaris-64int
solaris9% perl -v
This is perl, v5.8.3 built for sun4-solaris
The latter was compiled with gcc instead of Sun's C compiler.
-Joe
------------------------------
Date: Thu, 12 Feb 2004 22:34:48 -0500
From: "daniel caplan" <NOJUNK@EMAILPLEASE.COM>
Subject: hidden perl
Message-Id: <1076643382.189913@nntp.acecape.com>
sorry if this is in the wrong newsgroup. am not a perl programmer, so am
not sure under what heading to put this under. simply put:
my company has a software (written in perl) that it runs on our internal
servers (linux). we would
like to be able to have 3rd party companies run it, not off of our servers,
but on their own internals network. but obviously we don't want them to
be able to see our source code.
can i ask what solutions there are?
are there compilers? reliable ones? am sure we are not the first to
encounter this scenario, so am sure there is a solution.
many thanks ahead, as always.
sergio
------------------------------
Date: Fri, 13 Feb 2004 03:52:00 GMT
From: "Jürgen Exner" <jurgenex@hotmail.com>
Subject: Re: hidden perl
Message-Id: <ARXWb.14212$1S1.4077@nwrddc01.gnilink.net>
daniel caplan wrote:
[question snipped]
You won't believe this coincidence, but _two_ namesakes of yours posted
exactly the same question to alt.perl and comp.lang.perl just a few minutes
ago.
You may want to check there for answers.
jue
------------------------------
Date: Fri, 13 Feb 2004 04:12:59 GMT
From: Bob Walton <invalid-email@rochester.rr.com>
Subject: Re: hidden perl
Message-Id: <402C4EA6.4050308@rochester.rr.com>
daniel caplan wrote:
> sorry if this is in the wrong newsgroup. am not a perl programmer, so am
> not sure under what heading to put this under. simply put:
>
> my company has a software (written in perl) that it runs on our internal
> servers (linux). we would
> like to be able to have 3rd party companies run it, not off of our servers,
> but on their own internals network. but obviously we don't want them to
> be able to see our source code.
>
> can i ask what solutions there are?
>
> are there compilers? reliable ones? am sure we are not the first to
> encounter this scenario, so am sure there is a solution.
...
> sergio
This is a FAQ:
perldoc -q hide
You can also refer to other recent threads in this newsgroup on this
same general topic.
--
Bob Walton
Email: http://bwalton.com/cgi-bin/emailbob.pl
------------------------------
Date: Fri, 13 Feb 2004 05:14:57 +0100
From: Gunnar Hjalmarsson <noreply@gunnar.cc>
Subject: Re: hidden perl
Message-Id: <c0hj9a$17c9df$1@ID-184292.news.uni-berlin.de>
daniel caplan wrote:
> my company has a software (written in perl) that it runs on our
> internal servers (linux). we would like to be able to have 3rd
> party companies run it, not off of our servers, but on their own
> internals network. but obviously we don't want them to be able to
> see our source code.
Obviously? That's not obvious to me at all, since you don't mention
the circumstances that make you want to hide the code.
Would those 3rd parties sell the code, making you loose income
opportunities?
Or is the code so unique so that they might derive other programs from
it, sell those programs, and thus make you loose income opportunities?
Or is there any other good reason?
--
Gunnar Hjalmarsson
Email: http://www.gunnar.cc/cgi-bin/contact.pl
------------------------------
Date: Thu, 12 Feb 2004 23:26:27 -0500
From: "daniel caplan" <NOJUNK@EMAILPLEASE.COM>
Subject: Re: hidden perl
Message-Id: <1076646519.459368@nntp.acecape.com>
"Gunnar Hjalmarsson" <noreply@gunnar.cc> wrote in message
news:c0hj9a$17c9df$1@ID-184292.news.uni-berlin.de...
> daniel caplan wrote:
> > my company has a software (written in perl) that it runs on our
> > internal servers (linux). we would like to be able to have 3rd
> > party companies run it, not off of our servers, but on their own
> > internals network. but obviously we don't want them to be able to
> > see our source code.
>
> Obviously? That's not obvious to me at all, since you don't mention
> the circumstances that make you want to hide the code.
>
> Would those 3rd parties sell the code, making you loose income
> opportunities?
>
> Or is the code so unique so that they might derive other programs from
> it, sell those programs, and thus make you loose income opportunities?
>
> Or is there any other good reason?
>
> --
> Gunnar Hjalmarsson
> Email: http://www.gunnar.cc/cgi-bin/contact.pl
>
------------------------------
Date: Thu, 12 Feb 2004 23:34:38 -0500
From: "daniel caplan" <NOJUNK@EMAILPLEASE.COM>
Subject: Re: hidden perl
Message-Id: <1076646974.141197@nntp.acecape.com>
well yes, it is our code, and we want to keep it private......
------------------------------
Date: Fri, 13 Feb 2004 05:25:33 GMT
From: Uri Guttman <uri@stemsystems.com>
Subject: Re: hidden perl
Message-Id: <x7r7wzy2ia.fsf@mail.sysarch.com>
>>>>> "dc" == daniel caplan <NOJUNK@EMAILPLEASE.COM> writes:
dc> well yes, it is our code, and we want to keep it private......
so what? why would anyone want to copy it? if they sell it you can sue
their asses off. copyright is stronger than any encryption. your mindset
is way off base. now this is a subject that comes up regularly here and
so we don't want to get into it again. google for this and read up. any
encryption you want can be broken. any hiding style can be worked
around. trusting your customers is more productive then mistrusting
them. they will respect you, refer you to new customers, remain loyal
and pay support fees. the bottom line is that you are going about this
the wrong way.
over and out.
uri
--
Uri Guttman ------ uri@stemsystems.com -------- http://www.stemsystems.com
--Perl Consulting, Stem Development, Systems Architecture, Design and Coding-
Search or Offer Perl Jobs ---------------------------- http://jobs.perl.org
------------------------------
Date: Fri, 13 Feb 2004 02:56:21 +0000 (UTC)
From: Ben Morrow <usenet@morrow.me.uk>
Subject: Re: One more running Perl as a service question
Message-Id: <c0hecl$76m$2@wisteria.csv.warwick.ac.uk>
XXjbhuntxx@white-star.com (Cosmic Cruizer) wrote:
> I would think this question is more suitable for a Microsoft forum, but
> since I have not received any replies to the questions I posted there, I'm
> back here again.
>
> Now that I am finally successful in turning my Perl scripts into services,
> is it possible to have the service display a console window when the account
> is used to logon? If yes, what changes do I need to make to my service?
>
> This is an application that used to run as a console window, but since it
> also needs to run without an account being logged on, I turned it into a
> service. Since the application is a real-time automated monitoring tool,
> there are times when it is necessary to observe what is scrolling by on the
> screen.
>
> If this isn't the best place to post this question, which group might be
> better suited to answer my question? (I tried the microsoft.public.win2000
> groups.)
I would have said you want two programs: one that sits in the
background doing its stuff, and then another that connects to it and
asks for current monitoring info. Or the daemon (sorry, service) could
log all it's info to a file or to whatever windows' equivalent of
syslog is, and you could view it later at lesiure.
Ben
--
"The Earth is degenerating these days. Bribery and corruption abound.
Children no longer mind their parents, every man wants to write a book,
and it is evident that the end of the world is fast approaching."
-Assyrian stone tablet, c.2800 BC ben@morrow.me.uk
------------------------------
Date: Fri, 13 Feb 2004 05:30:23 GMT
From: XXjbhuntxx@white-star.com (Cosmic Cruizer)
Subject: Re: One more running Perl as a service question
Message-Id: <Xns948DDABF9E9D8ccruizermydejacom@64.164.98.49>
Ben Morrow <usenet@morrow.me.uk> wrote in
<c0hecl$76m$2@wisteria.csv.warwick.ac.uk>:
>
>I would have said you want two programs: one that sits in the
>background doing its stuff, and then another that connects to it and
>asks for current monitoring info. Or the daemon (sorry, service) could
>log all it's info to a file or to whatever windows' equivalent of
>syslog is, and you could view it later at lesiure.
>
>Ben
>
The case of reading the info from a log file was already determined to be
impractical, but I never consider having a secondary application that could
connect to the service. I like this idea. I'm not yet quite sure on what I
need to do, but it sounds like an interesting and challenging little
exercise.
Thanks Ben.
------------------------------
Date: Fri, 13 Feb 2004 06:29:43 GMT
From: "Herb Martin" <news@LearnQuick.com>
Subject: Re: One more running Perl as a service question
Message-Id: <r9_Wb.7776$te.4386@fe1.texas.rr.com>
I think Ben is still correct that you might prefer a two program solutions
with the
service acting as server to the other program but....
On a Windows service there is a setting "interact with desktop"; without
this the
service may not display anything directly to the user. Check that
(literally and
figuratively) and you can probably display a command window depending on
when and where you want it to appear.
--
Herb Martin
"Cosmic Cruizer" <XXjbhuntxx@white-star.com> wrote in message
news:Xns948DDABF9E9D8ccruizermydejacom@64.164.98.49...
> Ben Morrow <usenet@morrow.me.uk> wrote in
> <c0hecl$76m$2@wisteria.csv.warwick.ac.uk>:
>
> >
> >I would have said you want two programs: one that sits in the
> >background doing its stuff, and then another that connects to it and
> >asks for current monitoring info. Or the daemon (sorry, service) could
> >log all it's info to a file or to whatever windows' equivalent of
> >syslog is, and you could view it later at lesiure.
> >
> >Ben
> >
>
> The case of reading the info from a log file was already determined to be
> impractical, but I never consider having a secondary application that
could
> connect to the service. I like this idea. I'm not yet quite sure on what I
> need to do, but it sounds like an interesting and challenging little
> exercise.
>
> Thanks Ben.
------------------------------
Date: 12 Feb 2004 20:32:24 -0800
From: dbent@benefit-systems.com (Dan Bent)
Subject: Re: perl and db-module
Message-Id: <410b6b6e.0402122032.5e6fdeb@posting.google.com>
non existent <none@nowhere.non> wrote in message news:<pan.2004.02.03.18.51.42.348789@nowhere.non>...
> On Sat, 31 Jan 2004 03:15:08 -0800, Sebastian Diedrich wrote:
>
> > i have some problems with perl and the berkeley-db-module. when i start
> > a perl-prog such as cyradm (cyrus-imap) or some other that uses the
> > berkeley-db; perl throws this error:
> >
> > <---------------------------
> > Can't load
> > '/usr/lib/perl5/site_perl/5.6.1/i586-linux/auto/Cyrus/IMAP/IMAP.so' for
> > module Cyrus::IMAP:
>
> I hardly know how to spell perl but in regards to a complied from source
> cyrus-imapd that was installed in the default /usr/local location I was
> able to: 'export
> PERL5LIB=/usr/local/lib/perl5/site_perl/5.8.1/i386-linux-thread-multi'
> thereby adding this path to perl's @INC and working around the problem. If
> your cyrus_imapd is installed in /usr/local, and not /usr adjust the
> example for your paths.
>
> Chris
I am also perl impaired. I'm having the same problem on FreeBSD
5.1-RELEASE, and perl 5.8.3. I tried the solution above (at least I
think I did - I exported the environment variable, adjusted to match
my system, and ran cyradm. I didn't compile anything with the
environment variable set), but got the same result. There's a comment
near line 229 in DynaLoader.pm:
# Many dynamic extension loading problems will appear to come from
# this section of code: XYZ failed at line 123 of DynaLoader.pm.
# Often these errors are actually occurring in the initialisation
# C code of the extension XS file. Perl reports the error as being
# in this perl code simply because this was the last perl code
# it executed.
Sorry I'm no help, but I'd like to learn the solution, myself.
------------------------------
Date: Thu, 12 Feb 2004 21:05:21 -0500
From: Brad Baxter <bmb@ginger.libs.uga.edu>
Subject: Re: Perl usage these days?
Message-Id: <Pine.A41.4.58.0402122057380.17592@ginger.libs.uga.edu>
On Wed, 11 Feb 2004, Brian wrote:
> Sites listing the popularity of Perl and other languages:
>
> http://www.faqs.org/docs/artu/ch14s05.html
> http://www.tiobe.com/tpci.htm
> http://www.thebobo.com/language_popularity.php
>
IANAS, but http://www.tiobe.com/tiobe_index/images/tpci_trends.gif, for
example, doesn't strike me as an indication that Perl is particularly
losing ground.
Thanks, for the links. Obviously, I could search these out myself, too.
I personally don't, however, particularly see a point in it. :-)
Regards,
Brad
------------------------------
Date: 13 Feb 2004 02:17:06 GMT
From: Glenn Jackman <xx087@freenet.carleton.ca>
Subject: Re: Problem opening sed pipe
Message-Id: <slrnc2oct2.hhs.xx087@smeagol.ncf.ca>
freewilly3d <bill.standke@medica.com> wrote:
> I'm trying to open the following pipe in perl open(SASPS,"ps -
> ef|sed 's/^\(.\{32\}\) /\1/; s/^ *$/*/'|grep sas| sort +0 -1 -d +7 -
> 8 -d +4 -5 -d +6 -7 -d |") and get a sed error returned. The command
> works fine at the command line. The error has something to do with
> th *$/ part of the code. This is the message I get back
> adwprod:/prod/rptg/bstandke >pssas
> sed: 0602-404 Function s/^(.{32}) //; s/^ * cannot be parsed.
> any suggestions?
Escape the dollar sign, or put the whole command in q{} instead of
double quotes.
--
Glenn Jackman
NCF Sysadmin
glennj@ncf.ca
------------------------------
Date: Fri, 13 Feb 2004 03:10:39 GMT
From: "Jürgen Exner" <jurgenex@hotmail.com>
Subject: Re: Test message, please ignore.
Message-Id: <PeXWb.14167$1S1.10285@nwrddc01.gnilink.net>
zak zebrowski wrote:
> This is a simple test message, please ignore.
Your wish is my command
**PLONK**
jue
------------------------------
Date: Fri, 13 Feb 2004 06:44:43 GMT
From: Charlton Wilbur <cwilbur@mithril.chromatico.net>
Subject: Re: Why is Perl losing ground?
Message-Id: <8765ebwks3.fsf@mithril.chromatico.net>
>>>>> "S" == Sara <genericax@hotmail.com> writes:
S> Incidentally, programmers, particularly those early in their
S> careers, this is exactly why you can't learn "a language or
S> two" and expect them to serve your needs for a whole
S> career. You always have to be looking at "what's next". Wise
S> Perl programmers would be looking and maybe even starting to
S> use Python and Ruby now. I've been an industry developer now
S> for over 20 years, and if a language serves my employer's needs
S> for 5 years thats a long life!
Do your employer's needs change that often? For the problem domain
that gave rise to C, C is still among the top three languages in
existence. The same can be said for FORTRAN, Perl, Forth, and LISP.
Of course, if you're looking for a magic-bullet solution, or your
employer reads and believes buzzword-compliant glossy magazines -- but
then, you're talking trendiness and marketing, not technical solutions
to specific problems.
Charlton
--
cwilbur at chromatico dot net
cwilbur at mac dot com
------------------------------
Date: Fri, 13 Feb 2004 06:44:44 GMT
From: Charlton Wilbur <cwilbur@mithril.chromatico.net>
Subject: Re: Why is Perl losing ground?
Message-Id: <871xozwko8.fsf@mithril.chromatico.net>
>>>>> "twit" == fishfry <BLOCKSPAMfishfry@your-mailbox.com> writes:
twit> Perl was originally a simple scripting and programming
twit> language. In the past several years these factors have
twit> contributed to its impending decline:
Do you have hard evidence of a decline, or are you simply fearmongering?
Charlton
--
cwilbur at chromatico dot net
cwilbur at mac dot com
------------------------------
Date: Fri, 13 Feb 2004 06:59:44 GMT
From: Charlton Wilbur <cwilbur@mithril.chromatico.net>
Subject: Re: Why is Perl losing ground?
Message-Id: <87wu6rv5cm.fsf@mithril.chromatico.net>
>>>>> "RLS" == Randal L Schwartz <merlyn@stonehenge.com> writes:
RLS> Now that we have Apache::Template (and EmbPerl before that),
RLS> there's really no reason to learn PHP, except when that's the
RLS> only choice you have for other defining reasons.
No *good* reason. But I can think of a couple reasons that PHP is
still around.
* mod_perl is configuration-intensive. I'm convinced that this is why
most cut-rate web hosts don't offer it: the cost of supporting the
few morons who can't figure out how to configure it (and who expect
to get hours of free support for their $9.95 a month) would devour
their profits rapidly. With PHP, you can say "We support PHP
version foo with these standard modules," and that's that.
* Apache::Template, HTML::Template, EmbPerl, ePerl - all require
building software or installing modules. Users are too ignorant to
do this; sysadmins don't like it when it happens. PHP lets you
avoid that.
So for someone who's developing a tiny web site to be hosted on a
cut-rate shared-hosting service -- sure, PHP is a sensible choice, and
going with anything else will cause you an uphill battle, which you'll
lose because the risk that you'll need help with the mod_perl
configuration is great enough that the hosting company will drop you
as a customer rather than lose money keeping you as a customer. But
for a site that's large enough to be hosted on a colocated server, or
for a site that's developed in-house, there's just no advantage to
using PHP over Perl, and several disadvantages.
I had a long email exchange with my web hosting company before I
signed on with them, because I wanted to use HTML::Mason, mod_perl,
and Postgres. They said they'd be happy to do that, provided I got
one of the higher-end hosting accounts that had shell access; I could
build whatever flavor of apache I wanted, whatever database I wanted,
and they'd bless it by making my virtual host a proxy for that web
server. This seemed like a reasonable situation (especially as I
didn't need a separate colocated server, and I especially didn't need
to pay what one would have cost, back when I initially worked out this
arrangement.)
Charlton
--
cwilbur at chromatico dot net
cwilbur at mac dot com
------------------------------
Date: 6 Apr 2001 21:33:47 GMT (Last modified)
From: Perl-Users-Request@ruby.oce.orst.edu (Perl-Users-Digest Admin)
Subject: Digest Administrivia (Last modified: 6 Apr 01)
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End of Perl-Users Digest V10 Issue 6127
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