Beefy Boxes and Bandwidth Generously Provided by pair Networks
Keep It Simple, Stupid
 
PerlMonks  

Re^2: Why so much hate?

by Carfax (Acolyte)
on Aug 06, 2013 at 18:41 UTC ( [id://1048160]=note: print w/replies, xml ) Need Help??


in reply to Re: Why so much hate?
in thread Why so much hate?

It's a gentler introduction to programming, which I like quite a bit for people in your situation, even if it doesn't cover the same subjects Modern Perl covers the way I wanted to cover them.

Thanks for the reply sir/lady. I understand being an author yourself, may cause you to select your words carefully, but what i really need here, is not pampering. I really don't need to plunge my head into flames, just because there might be relief nearby. What i actually need is honesty. What i'm asking for is a point in the right direction. Like i said earlier, i don't mind picking up good books at all, what i'd hate is too go in too deep for me to be able to unlearn some habits.

And hence the quote

Learn all you can from the mistakes of others. You won't have time to make them all yourself. -Alfred Sheinwold

Replies are listed 'Best First'.
Re^3: Why so much hate?
by chromatic (Archbishop) on Aug 06, 2013 at 18:52 UTC

    Modern Perl assumes you're already decent at programming, so it elides some basic stuff in favor of explaining how Perl works from philosophy to programming in the large. Learning Perl assumes you've never programmed before, so it spends more time on the basics, covers less of the language, and doesn't explore the philosophy of Perl in as much detail.

      Thank you very much

        Let me add that as you progress through Learning Perl (and then Intermediate Perl), what is taught will start to converge with Modern Perl principles reasonably well.

        As chromatic said, Learning Perl is designed to teach programming as well as Perl, so it focuses on one thing at a time and ignores some good practices early on to avoid confusion.

        I recommend the latest edition of Intermediate Perl after Learning Perl and then Effective Perl Programming and/or Modern Perl after that.

        Stay away from Higher Order Perl until you consider yourself a "pretty good" programmer — or if you really enjoy the theoretical aspects of programming. It's a great book, but probably more confusing than helpful in the early years.

        I'm not a fan of Mastering Perl or Advanced Perl Programming. They have some useful bits, but nothing critical. Possibly the rewrite of Mastering Perl (not yet published) will improve it.

        I loved the Perl Cookbook years ago, but it's rather out of date now. It might be useful for recipes to get things done, but I wouldn't look to it as a guide for good ways to do things. You'll probably get better answers asking here.

        Avoid Object Oriented Perl. Horribly outdated.

        Perl Best Practices is good but needs to be taken with many grains of salt. There are good things there, but there are very opinionated/bad things there. I think there are discussions somewhere on this site about it. Save it for later when you start to have your own opinions about good ways to do things for context and don't use it as gospel.

        Hope that helps guide you.

        (N.B: I was a technical reviewer for Intermediate Perl)

        -xdg

        Code written by xdg and posted on PerlMonks is public domain. It is provided as is with no warranties, express or implied, of any kind. Posted code may not have been tested. Use of posted code is at your own risk.
Re^3: Why so much hate?
by 5mi11er (Deacon) on Aug 07, 2013 at 01:19 UTC
    I'm noticing that your question about being on the right path isn't directly being addressed.

    Yes, you're on the right track. First, you'll need to actively ignore the detractors. Nearly all of them are misinformed and just passing on misinformation. Then, you'll need to stick out learning the easy stuff, and gradually picking up the more advanced stuff.

    Becoming a good or perhaps great perl coder is a journey. Nearly 20 years ago, I started on that journey, part of what has kept me coming back here has been because I am still learning things. This isn't meant to be a deterrent, or warning that it's that hard to learn, it's not, it's just that deep a subject.

    So, if you're looking to be able to help yourself do something while on "the job", Perl is very likely to become more useful to you with less work than most other languages out there. Why perl now has such a bad reputation is beyond me.

    -Scott

Log In?
Username:
Password:

What's my password?
Create A New User
Domain Nodelet?
Node Status?
node history
Node Type: note [id://1048160]
help
Chatterbox?
and the web crawler heard nothing...

How do I use this?Last hourOther CB clients
Other Users?
Others chilling in the Monastery: (5)
As of 2024-03-28 08:30 GMT
Sections?
Information?
Find Nodes?
Leftovers?
    Voting Booth?

    No recent polls found