=head1 NAME
-perlfaq1 - General Questions About Perl ($Revision: 1.12 $, $Date: 2003/07/09 15:47:28 $)
+perlfaq1 - General Questions About Perl
=head1 DESCRIPTION
and http://archive.develooper.com/perl5-porters@perl.org/
or the news gateway nntp://nntp.perl.org/perl.perl5.porters or
its web interface at http://nntp.perl.org/group/perl.perl5.porters ,
-or read the faq at http://simon-cozens.org/writings/p5p-faq ,
+or read the faq at http://dev.perl.org/perl5/docs/p5p-faq.html ,
or you can subscribe to the mailing list by sending
perl5-porters-request@perl.org a subscription request
(an empty message with no subject is fine).
=head2 Which version of Perl should I use?
-You should definitely use version 5. Version 4 is old, limited, and
-no longer maintained; its last patch (4.036) was in 1992, long ago and
-far away. Sure, it's stable, but so is anything that's dead; in fact,
-perl4 had been called a dead, flea-bitten camel carcass. The most
-recent production release is 5.8.1 (although 5.005_03 and 5.6.1 are
-still supported). The most cutting-edge development release is 5.9.
-Further references to the Perl language in this document refer to the
-production release unless otherwise specified. There may be one or
-more official bug fixes by the time you read this, and also perhaps
-some experimental versions on the way to the next release.
-All releases prior to 5.004 were subject to buffer overruns, a grave
-security issue.
-
-=head2 What are perl4 and perl5?
-
-Perl4 and perl5 are informal names for different versions of the Perl
-programming language. It's easier to say "perl5" than it is to say
-"the 5(.004) release of Perl", but some people have interpreted this
-to mean there's a language called "perl5", which isn't the case.
-Perl5 is merely the popular name for the fifth major release (October 1994),
-while perl4 was the fourth major release (March 1991). There was also a
-perl1 (in January 1988), a perl2 (June 1988), and a perl3 (October 1989).
-
-The 5.0 release is, essentially, a ground-up rewrite of the original
-perl source code from releases 1 through 4. It has been modularized,
-object-oriented, tweaked, trimmed, and optimized until it almost doesn't
-look like the old code. However, the interface is mostly the same, and
-compatibility with previous releases is very high.
-See L<perltrap/"Perl4 to Perl5 Traps">.
-
-To avoid the "what language is perl5?" confusion, some people prefer to
-simply use "perl" to refer to the latest version of perl and avoid using
-"perl5" altogether. It's not really that big a deal, though.
+(contributed by brian d foy)
+
+There is often a matter of opinion and taste, and there isn't any one
+answer that fits everyone. In general, you want to use either the current
+stable release, or the stable release immediately prior to that one.
+Currently, those are perl5.10.x and perl5.8.x, respectively.
+
+Beyond that, you have to consider several things and decide which is best
+for you.
+
+=over 4
+
+=item *
+
+If things aren't broken, upgrading perl may break them (or at least issue
+new warnings).
+
+=item *
+
+The latest versions of perl have more bug fixes.
+
+=item *
+
+The Perl community is geared toward supporting the most recent releases,
+so you'll have an easier time finding help for those.
+
+=item *
+
+Versions prior to perl5.004 had serious security problems with buffer
+overflows, and in some cases have CERT advisories (for instance,
+http://www.cert.org/advisories/CA-1997-17.html ).
+
+=item *
+
+The latest versions are probably the least deployed and widely tested, so
+you may want to wait a few months after their release and see what
+problems others have if you are risk averse.
+
+=item *
+
+The immediate, previous releases (i.e. perl5.8.x ) are usually maintained
+for a while, although not at the same level as the current releases.
+
+=item *
+
+No one is actively supporting Perl 4. Five years ago it was a dead
+camel carcass (according to this document). Now it's barely a skeleton
+as its whitewashed bones have fractured or eroded.
+
+=item *
+
+There is no Perl 6 release scheduled, but it will be available when
+it's ready. Stay tuned, but don't worry that you'll have to change
+major versions of Perl; no one is going to take Perl 5 away from you.
+
+=item *
+
+There are really two tracks of perl development: a maintenance version
+and an experimental version. The maintenance versions are stable, and
+have an even number as the minor release (i.e. perl5.10.x, where 10 is the
+minor release). The experimental versions may include features that
+don't make it into the stable versions, and have an odd number as the
+minor release (i.e. perl5.9.x, where 9 is the minor release).
+
+=back
+
+
+=head2 What are Perl 4, Perl 5, or Perl 6?
+
+(contributed by brian d foy)
+
+In short, Perl 4 is the past, Perl 5 is the present, and Perl 6 is the
+future.
+
+The number after perl (i.e. the 5 after Perl 5) is the major release
+of the perl interpreter as well as the version of the language. Each
+major version has significant differences that earlier versions cannot
+support.
+
+The current major release of Perl is Perl 5, and was released in 1994.
+It can run scripts from the previous major release, Perl 4 (March 1991),
+but has significant differences. It introduced the concept of references,
+complex data structures, and modules. The Perl 5 interpreter was a
+complete re-write of the previous perl sources.
+
+Perl 6 is the next major version of Perl, but it's still in development
+in both its syntax and design. The work started in 2002 and is still
+ongoing. Many of the most interesting features have shown up in the
+latest versions of Perl 5, and some Perl 5 modules allow you to use some
+Perl 6 syntax in your programs. You can learn more about Perl 6 at
+http://dev.perl.org/perl6/ .
See L<perlhist> for a history of Perl revisions.
-=head2 What is Ponie?
+=head2 What was Ponie?
-At The O'Reilly Open Source Software Convention in 2003, Artur
-Bergman, Fotango, and The Perl Foundation announced a project to
-run perl5 on the Parrot virtual machine named Ponie. Ponie stands for
-Perl On New Internal Engine. The Perl 5.10 language implementation
-will be used for Ponie, and there will be no language level
-differences between perl5 and ponie. Ponie is not a complete rewrite
-of perl5.
+(contributed by brian d foy)
-=head2 What is perl6?
+Ponie stands for "Perl On the New Internal Engine", started by Arthur
+Bergman from Fotango in 2003, and subsequently run as a project of The
+Perl Foundation. It was abandoned in 2006
+( http://www.nntp.perl.org/group/perl.ponie.dev/487 ).
+
+Instead of using the current Perl internals, Ponie aimed to create a
+new one that would provide a translation path from Perl 5 to Perl 6
+(or anything else that targets Parrot, actually). You would have been
+able to just keep using Perl 5 with Parrot, the virtual machine which
+will compile and run Perl 6 bytecode.
+
+=head2 What is Perl 6?
At The Second O'Reilly Open Source Software Convention, Larry Wall
-announced Perl6 development would begin in earnest. Perl6 was an oft
+announced Perl 6 development would begin in earnest. Perl 6 was an oft
used term for Chip Salzenberg's project to rewrite Perl in C++ named
Topaz. However, Topaz provided valuable insights to the next version
of Perl and its implementation, but was ultimately abandoned.
-If you want to learn more about Perl6, or have a desire to help in
-the crusade to make Perl a better place then peruse the Perl6 developers
+If you want to learn more about Perl 6, or have a desire to help in
+the crusade to make Perl a better place then peruse the Perl 6 developers
page at http://dev.perl.org/perl6/ and get involved.
-Perl6 is not scheduled for release yet, and Perl5 will still be supported
-for quite awhile after its release. Do not wait for Perl6 to do whatever
+Perl 6 is not scheduled for release yet, and Perl 5 will still be supported
+for quite awhile after its release. Do not wait for Perl 6 to do whatever
you need to do.
"We're really serious about reinventing everything that needs reinventing."
Larry and the Perl development team occasionally make changes to the
internal core of the language, but all possible efforts are made toward
-backward compatibility. While not quite all perl4 scripts run flawlessly
-under perl5, an update to perl should nearly never invalidate a program
+backward compatibility. While not quite all Perl 4 scripts run flawlessly
+under Perl 5, an update to perl should nearly never invalidate a program
written for an earlier version of perl (barring accidental bug fixes
and the rare new keyword).
of programming experience, an understanding of regular expressions, and
the ability to understand other people's code. If there's something you
need to do, then it's probably already been done, and a working example is
-usually available for free. Don't forget the new perl modules, either.
+usually available for free. Don't forget Perl modules, either.
They're discussed in Part 3 of this FAQ, along with CPAN, which is
discussed in Part 2.
set of tasks. These languages have their own newsgroups in which you
can learn about (but hopefully not argue about) them.
-Some comparison documents can be found at http://language.perl.com/versus/
+Some comparison documents can be found at http://www.perl.com/doc/FMTEYEWTK/versus/
if you really can't stop yourself.
=head2 Can I do [task] in Perl?
shared-memory applications, or extremely large applications. You'll
notice that perl is not itself written in Perl.
-The new, native-code compiler for Perl may eventually reduce the
-limitations given in the previous statement to some degree, but understand
-that Perl remains fundamentally a dynamically typed language, not
+Perl remains fundamentally a dynamically typed language, not
a statically typed one. You certainly won't be chastised if you don't
trust nuclear-plant or brain-surgery monitoring code to it. And Larry
will sleep easier, too--Wall Street programs not withstanding. :-)
=head2 What's the difference between "perl" and "Perl"?
One bit. Oh, you weren't talking ASCII? :-) Larry now uses "Perl" to
-signify the language proper and "perl" the implementation of it,
-i.e. the current interpreter. Hence Tom's quip that "Nothing but perl
-can parse Perl." You may or may not choose to follow this usage. For
-example, parallelism means "awk and perl" and "Python and Perl" look
-OK, while "awk and Perl" and "Python and perl" do not. But never
-write "PERL", because perl is not an acronym, apocryphal
-folklore and post-facto expansions notwithstanding.
+signify the language proper and "perl" the implementation of it, i.e.
+the current interpreter. Hence Tom's quip that "Nothing but perl can
+parse Perl."
+
+Before the first edition of I<Programming perl>, people commonly
+referred to the language as "perl", and its name appeared that way in
+the title because it referred to the interpreter. In the book, Randal
+Schwartz capitalised the language's name to make it stand out better
+when typeset. This convention was adopted by the community, and the
+second edition became I<Programming Perl>, using the capitalized
+version of the name to refer to the language.
+
+You may or may not choose to follow this usage. For example,
+parallelism means "awk and perl" and "Python and Perl" look good, while
+"awk and Perl" and "Python and perl" do not. But never write "PERL",
+because perl is not an acronym, apocryphal folklore and post-facto
+expansions notwithstanding.
=head2 Is it a Perl program or a Perl script?
once and can then be run multiple times, whereas a I<script> must be
translated by a program each time it's used.
-Perl programs are (usually) neither strictly compiled nor strictly
-interpreted. They can be compiled to a byte-code form (something of a
-Perl virtual machine) or to completely different languages, like C or
-assembly language. You can't tell just by looking at it whether the
-source is destined for a pure interpreter, a parse-tree interpreter,
-a byte-code interpreter, or a native-code compiler, so it's hard to give
-a definitive answer here.
-
Now that "script" and "scripting" are terms that have been seized by
unscrupulous or unknowing marketeers for their own nefarious purposes,
they have begun to take on strange and often pejorative meanings,
=head2 What is a JAPH?
-These are the "just another perl hacker" signatures that some people
-sign their postings with. Randal Schwartz made these famous. About
-100 of the earlier ones are available from
-http://www.cpan.org/misc/japh .
+(contributed by brian d foy)
+
+JAPH stands for "Just another Perl hacker,", which Randal Schwartz used
+to sign email and usenet messages starting in the late 1980s. He
+previously used the phrase with many subjects ("Just another x hacker,"),
+so to distinguish his JAPH, he started to write them as Perl programs:
+
+ print "Just another Perl hacker,";
+
+Other people picked up on this and started to write clever or obfuscated
+programs to produce the same output, spinning things quickly out of
+control while still providing hours of amusement for their creators and
+readers.
+
+CPAN has several JAPH programs at http://www.cpan.org/misc/japh .
=head2 Where can I get a list of Larry Wall witticisms?
-Over a hundred quips by Larry, from postings of his or source code,
-can be found at http://www.cpan.org/misc/lwall-quotes.txt.gz .
-
-=head2 How can I convince my sysadmin/supervisor/employees to use version 5/5.6.1/Perl instead of some other language?
-
-If your manager or employees are wary of unsupported software, or
-software which doesn't officially ship with your operating system, you
-might try to appeal to their self-interest. If programmers can be
-more productive using and utilizing Perl constructs, functionality,
-simplicity, and power, then the typical manager/supervisor/employee
-may be persuaded. Regarding using Perl in general, it's also
-sometimes helpful to point out that delivery times may be reduced
-using Perl compared to other languages.
-
-If you have a project which has a bottleneck, especially in terms of
-translation or testing, Perl almost certainly will provide a viable,
-quick solution. In conjunction with any persuasion effort, you
-should not fail to point out that Perl is used, quite extensively, and
-with extremely reliable and valuable results, at many large computer
-software and hardware companies throughout the world. In fact,
-many Unix vendors now ship Perl by default. Support is usually
-just a news-posting away, if you can't find the answer in the
-I<comprehensive> documentation, including this FAQ.
-
-See http://www.perl.org/advocacy/ for more information.
-
-If you face reluctance to upgrading from an older version of perl,
-then point out that version 4 is utterly unmaintained and unsupported
-by the Perl Development Team. Another big sell for Perl5 is the large
-number of modules and extensions which greatly reduce development time
-for any given task. Also mention that the difference between version
-4 and version 5 of Perl is like the difference between awk and C++.
-(Well, OK, maybe it's not quite that distinct, but you get the idea.)
-If you want support and a reasonable guarantee that what you're
-developing will continue to work in the future, then you have to run
-the supported version. As of October 2003 that means running either
-5.8.1 (released in September 2003), or one of the older releases like
-5.6.1 (released in April 2001) or 5.005_03 (released in March 1999),
-although 5.004_05 isn't that bad if you B<absolutely> need such an old
-version (released in April 1999) for stability reasons.
-Anything older than 5.004_05 shouldn't be used.
-
-Of particular note is the massive bug hunt for buffer overflow
-problems that went into the 5.004 release. All releases prior to
-that, including perl4, are considered insecure and should be upgraded
-as soon as possible.
-
-In August 2000 in all Linux distributions a new security problem was
-found in the optional 'suidperl' (not built or installed by default)
-in all the Perl branches 5.6, 5.005, and 5.004, see
-http://www.cpan.org/src/5.0/sperl-2000-08-05/
-Perl maintenance releases 5.6.1 and 5.8.0 have this security hole closed.
-Most, if not all, Linux distribution have patches for this
-vulnerability available, see http://www.linuxsecurity.com/advisories/ ,
-but the most recommendable way is to upgrade to at least Perl 5.6.1.
+(contributed by brian d foy)
+
+Google "larry wall quotes"! You might even try the "I feel lucky" button.
+:)
+
+Wikiquote has the witticisms from Larry along with their source,
+including his usenet postings and source code comments.
+
+If you want a plain text file, try
+http://www.cpan.org/misc/lwall-quotes.txt.gz .
+
+=head2 How can I convince others to use Perl?
+
+(contributed by brian d foy)
+
+Appeal to their self interest! If Perl is new (and thus scary) to them,
+find something that Perl can do to solve one of their problems. That
+might mean that Perl either saves them something (time, headaches, money)
+or gives them something (flexibility, power, testability).
+
+In general, the benefit of a language is closely related to the skill of
+the people using that language. If you or your team can be more faster,
+better, and stronger through Perl, you'll deliver more value. Remember,
+people often respond better to what they get out of it. If you run
+into resistance, figure out what those people get out of the other
+choice and how Perl might satisfy that requirement.
+
+You don't have to worry about finding or paying for Perl; it's freely
+available and several popular operating systems come with Perl. Community
+support in places such as Perlmonks ( http://www.perlmonks.com )
+and the various Perl mailing lists ( http://lists.perl.org ) means that
+you can usually get quick answers to your problems.
+
+Finally, keep in mind that Perl might not be the right tool for every
+job. You're a much better advocate if your claims are reasonable and
+grounded in reality. Dogmatically advocating anything tends to make
+people discount your message. Be honest about possible disadvantages
+to your choice of Perl since any choice has trade-offs.
+
+You might find these links useful:
+
+=over 4
+
+=item * http://perltraining.com.au/whyperl.html
+
+=item * http://www.perl.org/advocacy/whyperl.html
+
+=back
=head1 AUTHOR AND COPYRIGHT
-Copyright (c) 1997, 1998, 1999, 2000, 2001 Tom Christiansen and Nathan
-Torkington. All rights reserved.
+Copyright (c) 1997-2010 Tom Christiansen, Nathan Torkington, and
+other authors as noted. All rights reserved.
This documentation is free; you can redistribute it and/or modify it
under the same terms as Perl itself.
https://perl5.git.perl.org / perl5.git / blobdiff