I personally believe that the negative overall reputation of this very old node of mine clearly shows that by general consensus it actually was too harsh. In some sense, I apologize for that, and I believe my manners got better since. I still consider the actual question to be both overly stupid and overly stupidly asked, proof which can be the even more negative reputation. Incidentally I did give some actual advice in my reply as well. This, and the person who posted the question, later turned out to be an especially bad member of this community: while it is true that (as the sig of one of our fellow monks claims) one should "examine what is said, not who speaks," knowing who the OP was sheds some light on the annoying carelessness of his question.
If it is of any comfort to you, clpmisc is generally considered to be an even more ill mannered place than PM. Yet I've learnt Perl more there than from any other resource. The subject matter could be discussed ad nauseam, and it often is: to be blindly gentle, no matter what, or to occasionally slap in the face the arrogant newbie, as an educational aid? Who knows...
BTW: I can't understand what you mean with "extraneous punctuation," what is it supposed to be?
