in reply to Perl - Is it an OO Language

I have read and used perl as an OO language, and can understand the functionality over reusability arguments. Whilst I find it a problem on some levels that I have not yet found a internal implementation of 'public' and 'private' methods, this does not detract from the fact as stated in many of the messages previous that Perl 'can' be programmed in an OO fashion, which is to say that the language meets the criteria irrespective of whether you use it as a functional, procedural or 'glue' language.

I suppose if you wanted to get truely detailed you could claim that OO isn't a true paradigm as many books on the different programming paradigms have claimed that it was simply a highbrid more ordered procedural language. But I believe it is a paradigm in itself and although perl fits into this paradigm it is important to note that it can also fit in other paradigms too.

Surely the reusability issue is more to do with less than accurate documentation and not following proper 'Object Oriented Design' methodologies when designing the framework, which should ideally be done as an abstract to the language, making the reusability an issue of better OOD rather than the more subjective language (Perl for example) selected for the task.

Just my thoughts.
(Oh and shoot GURU_02 or atleast s/GURU_02/Unfounded_Opinions_Guy;)

--pray.

Replies are listed 'Best First'.
Re: Re: Perl - Is it an OO Language
by huxley (Novice) on Aug 28, 2002 at 01:32 UTC
    I agree. I don't think the fact that methods are procedures or functions in any way invalidates OO as a "true paradigm". In my experience, OO is about organization and higher-level relationships between pieces of information in a program. How the lower-level operations are done is not part of the "OO paradigm".

    That said, once OO in Perl6 gets sorted out, I'd like to hear more about support for contracts, which are just as important in writing tight, well-organized code. :-)
Re: Re: Perl - Is it an OO Language
by Anonymous Monk on Aug 28, 2002 at 17:15 UTC
    GURU_02 was the one who didn't have an opinion on Perl's OO.