perlmeditation pbeckingham <p> I see many questions being asked on this site, many by relative new-comers to the language. Sometimes the questions require involved answers that make use of non-standard modules. This is good - complex problems are being solved by readily available, tested code. </p> <p>But...</p> <p> There are many other occasions, today being one, where the answers could take many, many forms, and given that TIMTOWTDI - no, wait - TIMTOWTDI in Perl, but algorithmically we have geometrically more ways. <i>Ahem</i>. Given that there are many, many ways to do it, sometimes we do not favor an answer that may be just as good, but does not require our new-comer to jump right in and start installing modules - a known difficulty for many at first. </p> <p> I'd like to suggest that we provide answers using standard modules, when those solutions are adequate. New-comers just don't like installing modules to solve something that can be done with the standard distribution itself. Sometimes, the portability or the encoding just doesn't matter to the OP. </p> <p> <b>Update:</b> Wow. It looks like people read that as "use core modules over CPAN", which I most definitely did not say. I do not advocate using core over CPAN, unless the result is just as good. </p> <p> Are people really denying the quantity of module-installation issues that are reported here by new-comers? </p>