Yet, if I want to install Perl 6, I am directed to "Rakudo Star," a "compiler" based on "Parrot," a virtual machine. Whoa! What happened here?

I've heard about a programming language called 'C'. It's supposed to be very fast. Yet, if I want to install C, I'm directed the "Gnu Compiler Collection". Or to "clang", based on LLVM, a low-level virtual machine. Or icc, tcc, ... . Whoa! What happened here?

What happened is that programming languages can have multiple interpreters and compilers. Thus naming one of them just like the language would lead to even more confusion.

While Rakudo currently is the most usable Perl 6 compiler for most applications, there are others.

Was there a, lets-see-how-confusing-we-can-get contest?

So you don't know any reasons, yet assume the worst in others. How very encouraging.

Will this be resolved when the "next major version of Perl" arrives? I can't imagine trying to explain to folks that Perl 6 is a "reference specification" and not a language (compiler, virtual machine... whatever).

Perl 6 is a language. Just not a compiler.

And why ever not? What's wrong with C, C++, Java, Python, Pascal, Haskell and all the other languages that have a specification, and multiple compilers?

Perl 6 - second systems done right

In reply to Re: What is Perl6? -- a language. by moritz
in thread What is Perl6? by punkish

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