A compiled C program is very different from a running perl program.

To try to help clarify your 2nd question a bit more: It is my understanding that, in general, C programs are "compiled" into an executable, whereas Perl scripts are "interpreted" at runtime--each time the script is run (this would not include the executable Perl programs swiftone mentions, I'm assuming). Hence the differing terms, C program and Perl script. Although this adds to the runtime overhead, it makes debugging nicer in Perl since you don't have to re-compile the whole program after every little change. (Please correct me if I'm wrong, though, as I'm still learning Perl and would welcome any chance to improve my understanding)

In reply to RE(2): portability! by bnanaboy
in thread portability! by vnpandey

Title:
Use:  <p> text here (a paragraph) </p>
and:  <code> code here </code>
to format your post, it's "PerlMonks-approved HTML":


  • Posts are HTML formatted. Put <p> </p> tags around your paragraphs. Put <code> </code> tags around your code and data!
  • Titles consisting of a single word are discouraged, and in most cases are disallowed outright.
  • Read Where should I post X? if you're not absolutely sure you're posting in the right place.
  • Please read these before you post! —
  • Posts may use any of the Perl Monks Approved HTML tags:
    a, abbr, b, big, blockquote, br, caption, center, col, colgroup, dd, del, details, div, dl, dt, em, font, h1, h2, h3, h4, h5, h6, hr, i, ins, li, ol, p, pre, readmore, small, span, spoiler, strike, strong, sub, summary, sup, table, tbody, td, tfoot, th, thead, tr, tt, u, ul, wbr
  • You may need to use entities for some characters, as follows. (Exception: Within code tags, you can put the characters literally.)
            For:     Use:
    & &amp;
    < &lt;
    > &gt;
    [ &#91;
    ] &#93;
  • Link using PerlMonks shortcuts! What shortcuts can I use for linking?
  • See Writeup Formatting Tips and other pages linked from there for more info.