Re: Don't blindly recommend code

[alfie]

Well, I didn't recommend any special script from there. Quite obviously the one you picked seems to be one of the worst that are there. According to the index there are 51 guestbooks there, you said you just downloaded one of those.

Although I personally like depending on modules is a valueable thing in such a repository I think that scripts that don't need any other modules installed is a good thing. People that are searching for such scripts usually don't want to write ones themself and therefore depend on solutions that are easy to install. Without depending on modules makes the script even more useful to those guys. And the wish that it should not depend on an SQL database or flat file lets me think that the requester falls into this category. YMMV.

Finally I still think that there should be reasonably licenced stuff also in this list, I simply doubt that you belief every thing in the world should be GPLed (or better could). I also often dream of a brave new world ;-)
--
Alfie

[Ovid]

alfie wrote:

I simply doubt that you belief every thing in the world should be GPLed (or better could).

I agree that not everything should be released under the GPL. My objection, in this case, is that the restrictive license ensures that I cannot fix any bugs or security holes. I doubt anyone would ever have heard of Perl or Linux if either had such a license, even for free.

In fact, I would probably go so far as to say that I don't want to work with any software product where I cannot be reasonably expected to fix it or have a serious bug fix quickly issued by the manufacturer. That being said, I seem to be stuck in the Windows world, so that puts the lie to my argument :)

Cheers,
Ovid

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[tilly]

Based on past experience, I would guess that what Ovid saw is pretty much par for the course.

Also based on past experience, I would say that bad code which doesn't need modules does nobody a favour in the end.

As an exercise, why don't you go to the repository that you suggested and try to find a script from it that you would happily recommend? Would you care to bet on whether it would pass basic sanity checks when looked at by some of the knowledgable people here?

[bbfu]

Well, in some cases I could understand not wanting to rely on modules so that the program is easier to install. Such as Date::Calc and the like who have compile-necessary parts, as well as a few others that simply have huge (or hugely complicated) installations. For the other (more common), less complicated modules, you could just bundle the modules you require with yours and have your install script install the needed modules as well (if they're not already there). They might not get the most recent version but it's sure to work.

I simply cannot agree, however, that one should avoid dependance upon modules bundled with the core distrubution of Perl (CGI, etc). There are few (if any) Perl installs that will be lacking these most basic of modules and there are many very useful modules bundled with Perl.

Anyway, I just had to say that as I'm always leery when I see people arguing, "Well, I figured it would be easier to install if I didn't rely on modules... So I wrote my own CGI parsing code."

Just my $0.02 -- Oh! I'm sorry, do you have change for a nickel?

bbfu
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