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in reply to Re: Re: Apparent Inconsistencies in Perl Function Naming
in thread Apparent Inconsistencies in Perl Function Naming
Programming is the practice of converting human thought to computer syntax. Programming has seen an evolution from punched cards, to machine language, to assembler language, to C and to Perl. In each case, the language has moved further from "speaking to the CPU" to "here's what I want to do."
An acid test of such evolution is the ability of the commoner to codify his thoughts in working programs. While Window-based menu systems go a long way towards providing such functionality, to date they are not as configurable as a scripted program and hence the need for a language allowing for expressiveness by everyone, not just the person trained to convert human thought to computer syntax.
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Re: The Secretary wants to Make LWP Requests too...
by swiftone (Curate) on Nov 28, 2000 at 21:40 UTC
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Programming is the practice of converting human thought to computer syntax. Programming has seen an evolution from punched cards, to machine language, to
assembler language, to C and to Perl. In each case, the language has moved further from "speaking to the CPU" to "here's what I want to do."
I'm going to weigh in with heavy support for this statement. One of the great things about Perl is that Larry questioned some of the assumptions other languages made, and thus moved the line between DWIM and DWIS closer to DWIM. There has to be a limit somewhere though, which is why I also disagree with the initial post.
As has been mentioned, there's always been a faction that dislikes the can-be-misleading name of length(). This is the first time I've ever heard a complaint about array slices, and I can't say I agree with that complaint.
The approach to take is not "This is wrong" but "how can I make this right in all cases". Length,as has been mentioned, shouldn't be too hard to change with no real loss. If you can come up with new examples where a "commoner" would think something, and a fix that doesn't break the flow of a long-term programmer, detail it. Submit a proposal to the Perl maintainers, write a patch, or whatever.
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The Tao of Perl
by tedv (Pilgrim) on Nov 29, 2000 at 22:20 UTC
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On one level you're right. Languages are designed to fit
with our personal understanding and methods of thought.
The early programming languages took none of this into account,
which made software design difficult at best. Most languages
take the approach of, "The reason software design is difficult
is that you're not using enough (functions|variables|comments|linguistic_names|classes|libraries).
In truth, the reason programming is so difficult is that
thinking is so difficult.
Most people have a prefered method of thinking and do not want
to change that. Programming opens you up to new ways of
thinking, and Perl opens you up the most because it encourages
so many different ways of attacking a problem.
So in some sense, princepawn, you're also wrong. That's
because if the language doesn't make sense to you, the
programmer, the problem is with the programmer for being
unwilling to adopt the language's mindset. And this is as
true of Cobol as it is of Perl, although Perl definitly
encouages more ways of thinking about a problem.
Princepawn, I feel like your view of the perl mindset is,
"Whatever makes sense to my mind should be easy to describe
in perl." You're claiming that you are the "enlightened" one
and that it's perl's job to enlighten itself. In reality,
each time you say, "This doesn't make sense to me-- someone
else must have done this wrong," you move further away from
understanding the true purpose of perl.
The true purpose of perl is to serve others, but it can
only do this if you humble your mind. But much like
enlightenment, I suppose that needs to be experienced, not
explained.
-Ted | [reply] |
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Princepawn, I feel like your view of the perl mindset is,
"Whatever makes sense to my mind should be easy to describe
in perl."
The operative word in your statement is feel and certainly it must be, because the very first part of the attack I launched on the discrepancy between concept and naming in Perl syntax was to discuss my boss and his problems with the language. So, I wasn't saying it should only make sense to my mind.
The true purpose of perl is to serve others, but it can
only do this if you humble your mind.
Hmm, well the over 200 submitted RFCs and the fact that Larry Wall is planning a complete rewrite of the language from the ground up should tell you something: even Larry Wall thinks that the current Perl has problems serious enough that they cannot be reconciled within the framework of evolution that occurred from @perl = (1..5);
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