Why do we have to apologise to those that don't take the time to see beyond the terse but immensely powerful notation that makes up the language 'perl 5 regex'?

My Dad would never have managed to wrap his brain around [(x-h)^2]/a^2 + [(y-k)^2]/b^2 = 1., although that didn't stop him from accurately (within obvious tolorances) cutting an oval from a piece of 1/2 inch ply using nothing but a piece of string, two nails and a piece of chalk.

To him, the whole concept of algebraic notation was an anathema, but it's doubtful if there are many people reading this for whom that formula isn't eminently readable. The difference? Education. My father left school aged 12 and started his 10 years apprenticship as a carpenter aged 14. He never had the opportunity to learn algebra.

The following short extract from here

When ²³⁵U captures a neutron, the resulting ²³⁶U nucleus emits g-rays as it deexcites to the ground state about 15% of the time, and undergoes fission about 85%. The fission process is somewhat analogous to the oscillations of a liquid drop. Using the liquid drop model Bohr and Wheeler calculated the critical energy E_c needed by the ²³⁶U nucleus to undergo fission. For this nucleus, the critical energy is 5.3 MeV, which is less than the 6.4 MeV of excitation energy produced when ²³⁵U captures a neutron. The capture of a neutron by ²³⁵U therefore produces an excited state of ²³⁶U that has more than enough energy to break apart. On the other hand, the critical energy for fission of the ²³⁹U nucleus is 5.9 MeV. The capture of a neutron by a ²³⁸U nucleus produces an excitation energy of only 5.2 MeV. Therefore, when a neutron is captured by ²³⁸U to form ²³⁹U, the excitation energy is not great enough for fission to occur. In this case, the excited ²³⁹U> nucleus deexcites by g-emission, and then decays to Np239 by b-decay, and then again to ²³⁹Pu by b-decay.

A fissioning nucleus can break into 2 medium-mass fragments in many different ways. Depending on the particular reaction, 1, 2 or 3 neutrons may be emitted. The average number of neutrons emitted in the fission of ²³⁵Uis about 2.5.

describes (roughly) the same thing as n + ²³⁵U --> ¹⁴¹Ba + ⁹²Kr + 3n

Now they both mean precious little to me, but to those that live and work in the field of nuclear physics, I'm pretty sure that the latter concise form is an infinitely less unweildy and more practical to work with in correspondance, notes, reports and papers as well as in aggregate works in which this formula is only a part.

In the same way, regexes are simply a short-hand notation that allow the capturing of complex aggregate programming concepts in a concise, weildy fashion.

For people to dismiss regexes, much less the whole of perl(*), as "line noise" because they haven't bothered to take the time to understand them, and the power they represent, requires no apology from us, but from them.

(*) As one who did exactly this, professionally, twice, I hereby apologise to the perl community at large, and Mr. Wall in particular for this heinous crime!