> "don't use perl, it promotes brain rot"
> and no, i wont revisit my thinking.
Really?
> it's easy (easier than many languages) to slip into
> writing bad Perl
Why is this a bad idea? Do you also object to Perl Critic? Or say having a policy of using Perl Critic?
It took some time before the trolls woke up in this thread.
(I'd love to get access to the HN logs and check IPs, to see if the trolls where sloppy with using alternative access and can be identified.)
like another commenter said it's a discussion i've had before and haven't heard compelling arguments in favor of perl, so no i'm not interested in revisiting it.
that said it IS context dependent. i wont fire you for writing perl one-offs to maintain some systems or process some files. but i would argue against you for wanting to ship perl for the reasons i stated, with my main thesis being that your decision would jeopardize the project's future (assuming it had some future). i've heard the arguments before, like "you can write clean and maintainable perl" (which has analogues with "high performance java" and "long-term maintainable PHP"). the counterpoint is "sure, one can. but people rarely do. other tools promote those features more readily. pick one of them."
first, that some languages promote decent coding practices, while some actively encourage bad ones, either through crappy idioms, bad docs and a lousy community, or a lack of immediate penalties.
second, that where you spend much of your time coding has a significant effect on how you think about problem solving, consequences, etc. the practice of programming builds behaviors, modes of thinking, and values.
finally, if it isn't clear, i consider perl's features to be substandard to long term coding. the values it places on hacked up gimmicks (under the guise of "more than one way to do things" and "see! it's a one liner!") is a large part of this.
therefore "brain rot" in this case isn't equivalent to years of meth use, but rather a failure to appreciate crap designs, a failure to perform sound engineering when you write code, and a failure to think about the future of your code. i've seen the products of people who write code professionally, with them having learned through years of coding perl, and it is not pretty. lots of them.
keep calling me closed minded on the topic, i wont disagree. but the end result is that when someone tells me that perl is their language of choice and i'm hiring for a person to write code, it's a deep hole they have to get out of right away or i won't hire them, nor will many of the people i work with.