Re^2: To Perl or not to PERL.

"I object. Names contribute to identity, and are important to most humans"

I agree. But misspelling (for example the aforementioned pearl) is of a different quality than case.

"But then other people come to the site, and see that it's spelled PERL... nobody objects - it must be right"

On the Monastery Gates page perl is mentioned correctly 73 times at the moment. The impression anyone gets seeing this is that whatever 'PERL' is, it is not used, except by an obvious newbie. Even if he should conclude that PERL is technically not wrong (if he thinks about it at all) there is nearly zero chance he will use that.

and writing stuff typically makes you remember things better than if you just read it

Yes, but what is the ratio of reading to writing even a newbie does on a site like this. If he reads 10 times as much 'Perl' and 'perl' as he writes PERL he is still learning the right version.

Comment on Re^2: To Perl or not to PERL.

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Re^3: To Perl or not to PERL. by chromatic (Archbishop) on Jul 14, 2010 at 20:57 UTC
But misspelling (for example the aforementioned pearl) is of a different quality than case. Perhaps not in your native language. Remember also that the difference between `use strict;` and `use Strict;` is dramatic. Proper capitalization in programming is vital to correct behavior.	[reply] [d/l] [select]
Re^4: To Perl or not to PERL. by jethro (Monsignor) on Jul 14, 2010 at 23:37 UTC
Perhaps not in your native language. Note that I share the same native language with moritz who made the initial point. Since he shares your view, native language doesn't seem to be the dividing line "Proper capitalization in programming is vital..." Sure, and proper capitalization in sign language is absolutely non-vital. If you want to offer programming languages as analogy I might ask where the for loop is in the english language ;-) Don't get me wrong, I've got nothing against keeping perl in lowercase. But whatever importance you or I might attach to it, the question is what impression newcomers take away when they get corrected for that. Look at young programmers used to twitter and the World-of-Warcraft chat and guess what they think about the importance of case	[reply]
Re^5: To Perl or not to PERL. by chromatic (Archbishop) on Jul 15, 2010 at 00:25 UTC
But whatever importance you or I might attach to it, the question is what impression newcomers take away when they get corrected for that. Sure; there's no excuse to use extra knowledge that other people don't have yet as an excuse to be rude to novices. Details are worth getting right, but never as a weapon with which to berate people.	[reply]