Re: Some Perl history for beginners (by a beginner)

In my opinion, that article was probably not very influential. I remember reading it at the time and thinking "What on earth is he talking about?" At most, it might demonstrate some things that were going on in one particular corner of the perl community. At the time, the Perl 5 Porters list and the comp.lang.perl.misc newsgroup were both fairly contentious. This probably had more to do with a few key individuals than anything else. If you look at the list back then, you'll see some pretty serious wars going on.

People who are very involved in p5p sometimes forget how small it is. The vast majority of perl programmers don't even read it, let alone ask beginner questions there. And in 2001, newsgroups were already mostly dead for newbies. I can't speak to the influence on PerlMonks, since I wasn't here then, but I can tell you that I asked dumb (although not FAQ or un-researched) questions in various places and never got yelled at for it, and this was well before Casey's article.

Comment on Re: Some Perl history for beginners (by a beginner)

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Re: Re: Some Perl history for beginners (by a beginner) by tilly (Archbishop) on May 02, 2004 at 21:43 UTC
Friendliness is partly in the eye of the beholder. You never were the kind of beginner that Casey's article was meant to improve the treatment of. You may have asked dumb questions, but you had years of technical experience before Perl and so would not take issue with terse answers that would be issues for many beginners. You may not have known the Perl answers, but you knew geek culture. There were certain common issues that you simply were not going to run into. Friendliness, like beauty, is partly in the eye of the beholder. Certainly as a beholder, Casey is on the sensitive side. Which I thing is a good thing in someone pointing out potential problems. For instance while we were one of the friendlier communities out there then, there were issues that grated on him. I'd also estimate more influence for that article than you would. Particularly when you add in the follow-up discussions here and elsewhere. An incidental point. Casey was not just talking about p5p when he cited problems. As discussion at PerlMonks as Ambassadors and elsewhere makes clear, he was primarily concerned about issues with other online communities, including PerlMonks. That p5p does not help beginners is not an issue because it is not supposed to. That sites which are supposed to help beginners don't is a different issue.	[reply]
Re: Re: Some Perl history for beginners (by a beginner) by McMahon (Chaplain) on May 03, 2004 at 01:16 UTC
I think it was hugely influential. The beginners' list is still thriving today. QED. I bet I'm not the only one who uses Perl (instead of Python or Ruby, for instance) because things like beginners@perl.org, learn.perl.org, PM, etc. exist. In 2001, usenet was (and still is) a quagmire. (Endless September, etc.) If I were starting out and the only place to ask for help was p5p or comp.lang.perl., I would have found some other language. Or some other career. =) Beginners shake things up as much as they drag things down. Good beginners ask things that make you think twice about stuff. West took an explicit stand, and concrete steps, to both welcome and to make room for* beginners in the Perl community. I've benefited from that, and lots of other people too, and so (I think) has Perl. Even NodeReaper is more polite than he used to be. =) (I work in software QA-- I would have enjoyed reading that reaped node from 2001. Heck, I might even repost it now, 3 years later-- except I'd be one of the first ones with a comment!) I had fun finding the article and reading the historical reaction to it on PM. I'm glad other folks liked it too.	[reply]