Pearls

I was told Perl was some complicated masterful thing that was hard to learn and puts python to shame

easier then basic to learn and exact same functionality... am i missing something

Objection!

>>1
Learn Ruby instead.

So, summer in /prog/ is Ruby, Perl, Python, Java, Lisp-haters, C and /g/?

Oh well, see you after summer.

>>1
You were misinformed.  Python is much better for most scripting tasks than Perl.

On the other hand, Ruby is DWIM-er than either Python or Ruby, but not nearly as readable.

In short, there is no task for which Perl is a better choice than both Ruby and Python, so it's not really worth your time.

>>1
Perl, Ruby and Python are different way to say the same thing.

Perl is already dead. Hope Ruby and Python will join him soon. All these lowly nigger-languages deserve only death.

>>7
Of course I've no hope seeing PHP dead. Together with C/C++ and JAVA, PHP is a fucking COBOL of 21c.

I hope Perl doesn't die.  I love unless and being able to tack on if as a predicate.  It makes my man pussy wet.

>>4
What's wrong with Perl and C?

>>10
What's wrong with Perl
Perl vs $anything threads.
and C?
C.

>>11
very funny. go fuck a goat.

>>10
What's wrong with Perl
Sigils.

>>9
Haha, what? You can use if as a predicate for if?

In Lisp, this sets the variable a to a list:

(setq a '(1 2 3 4))

Here we create list b where the first element is another list:

(setq b '((0.8 0.9 1) 2 3 4))

Here's the first list in Perl:

@a=(1,2,3,4);

and here's the second:

@b=((0.8,0.9,1),2,3,4);

(The @s before the variable names tells Perl that these are array variables.) That wasn't so bad, was it? Well, let's try to use this.

To pick out the first element of the first list in Lisp, you just write

(first a)

and Lisp gives you

1

To get the first element of the second list you write

(first b)

and Lisp gives you

(0.8 0.9 1)

Let's try this in Perl.

$a[0]

gives us

1

The $ before the variable name tells Perl that we want a single value (scalar in Perl lingo), not an array. The [0] tells Perl that we want the first value of the array. Perl, like many other languages and APIs counts from 0.

Then we do

$b[0]

and Perl happily gives us

0.8

That's right, Perl has broken into the list inside the b list and retrieved the first value of it. Or, rather, it flattened b into one list when we created it, so it's now really one consecutive list with 6 elements.

>>15
To do this right we should have written

@b=([(0.8,0.9,1)],2,3,4);

when we created the list. The []s enter a reference to the inner list as the first element of the outer list instead of flattening the inner list into the outer one.

OK. So we try again:

$b[0]

gives us

ARRAY(0xb75eb0)

So obviously we manage to find the array, but something still goes wrong along the way. The problem is that we use $b, which makes Perl think that we want a scalar and so it gives us a reference to the array instead of the array itself (which is not a scalar).

Aha! Of course! We must use

@b[0]

because @ tells Perl we want an array value. Not so. We get

ARRAY(0xb75eb0)

once again. I've never managed to understand why this is so and at this point I gave up on the entire thing.

Some weeks later I saw a helpful posting on no.perl: one should request a reference to the array, like this

@{$b[0]}

which actually gives us

(0.8 0.9 1)

So now I can write code with arrays inside arrays and hashes inside hashes.

Now, ask yourself: do you really think you should have to go through all this in order to put one list inside another?

>>16
You can only have references in arrays, not other arrays. It's pretty elementary stuff. Now go fuck a goat.

>>17
goat
a new o'reilly book?

>>18
http://www.google.com/search?tbm=isch&q=ruby+in+a+nutshell

>>19
So >>17-san was saying ``go learn Ruby''?

puts is a really fucking stupid word. I will never touch Ruby so long as I'd have to use that disgusting piece of shit.

>>21
``puts'' is a jewish word for a ``penis''

>>22
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_English_words_of_Yiddish_origin
putz: (vulgar) an idiot, a jerk; a penis (from Yiddish פּאָץ pots)

>>22
>>23
Matz confirmed for Jewish scumbag. That's what he gets for being a Mormon.

>>24
Matz being a Mormon.
Yep. That's a little unusual for a Japanese.

>>21

Ruby has puts and print. Take your pick, they both do effectively the same thing.

Also...


var = "Imma let you finish but Ruby Interpolation of strings is fucking badass"
print "But seriously you can #{var} do awesome shit with ruby\n"

Lisp

World:'Earth  say "Hello, $World!"

Ruby

var = "Imma let you finish but Ruby Interpolation of strings is fucking badass"
print "But seriously you can #{var} do awesome shit with ruby\n"

>>27

There are no parenthesis in that, it is not lisp.

c and perl?

TANAMI BROWNE'D

>>26
p, puts, and print do different shit.
they're not exactly the same.

$var = "Imma let you finish but PHP Interpolation of strings is fucking badass";
print "But seriously you can {$var} do awesome shit with PHP\n";

>>28
code-as-data = Lisp

>>32
code-as-data = Lisp
Tcl is clearly a Lisp, Io is clearly a Lisp. NO THEY ARE NOT YOU FUCKING RETARD

Congrats, retards. You just realized that all of your fancy scripting languages are just copies of each other with slight differences in syntax.

>>34
Congratulations, you've just restated what >>6 said, without saging, without giving an actual contribution to the discussion, being a cock-loving faggot.

>>33
But TCL doesnt have macros!

Congrats, retards. You just realized that all of your fancy scripting languages are just copies of each other with slight differences in syntax.

it deeply upsets me how hardly anyone can see this

Lisp and Java are one and the same.

>>36
Macros do not imply homoiconicity.

>>39
Without code as lists, you cant have macros.