The community is wrong; and that's the point. Furthermore, the community is not united on this point. Even the manual pages note that "You may or may not choose to follow this usage" with regards to the "Perl" versus "perl" misfeature.

It's simply *BAD ENGLISH* to change the meaning of a word based upon capitalization; and when we destroy the English language, we lose our ability to communicate.

As a form of disambiguation, the method chosen by the community is terrible. What if the word "perl" starts a sentence? It *MUST* be capitalized; and the distinction between the two meanings is instantly lost.

It's excessively confusing, it's noncomformant to English language capitalization standards, and it's simply unacceptable. PERL *is* a correct spelling of the acronym "Practical Extraction and Reporting Language"; anything else is *NOT*. Larry is trying to back away from the acronym he used to promote the language for years, but to this date, "man perl" give me:

perl - Practical Extraction and Report Language

That's about as offical as you can get!

Ruining the English language is simply *NOT* acceptable in exchange for a piece of whimsical jargon whose utility is minimal at best. Changing the meaning of an acronym (even a retrofitted one) years afterwards, and then claiming it's now an "incorrect usage" is equally unworthy of consideration. The community is wrong; Larry is wrong; and some people refuse, quite rightly, to follow conventions that are outright wrong.

In reply to Re: People who write perl, Perl and PERL by Anonymous Monk
in thread People who write perl, Perl and PERL by cog

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