Re: Looking for examples of well-written modules

[johnnywang]

I couldn't help adding some authors of non-English master pieces. Well, may be not.

Just want to add/second some thoughts:

• I aslo found the similarity between coding and other forms of writing. When someone says "I can only write, not read", we know it's a joke. But I've seen so many, actually maybe a majority of software engineers, who never ever read someone else's code. I always wondered how they can grow. The greatest thing of the internet and open source for software engineering is that it provides a free school that is better than that ever existed. Yet many of us fail to take advantage of it. So I appreciate the desire to read good code.
• Like reading, I believe the capability to appreciate a good style grows with time. For coding, one just needs to make enough mistakes, and even write enough bad code to be able to write good ones. It helps a lot if there is someone looking over your shoulders.
• PM is probably one of the best places to get a glimps of what some good codes look like. Like books, most examples are short, but one can get the essense.

[Your Mother]

PM is probably one of the best places to get a glimps of what some good codes look like. Like books, most examples are short, but one can get the essense.

This is doubly true b/c all the code that gets posted is defacto peer reviewed. So if something is awkward, overly inefficient, or just plain wrong, it tends to get exposed as such immediately. Sometimes when something is posted that looks great at first blush but is new to me I wait to see what one of the big cats like tilly, dragonchild, merlyn, et cetera have to say about it before I put it in the Bat-belt.

I also think short examples encourage modular thinking and coding. I probably learn more and pick up better style from reading other hackers' subs than their full applications.

I picked up quite a bit from reading the Class::DBI modules. Like using Class::Accessor and some DBI tricks I didn't know. IIRC TheDamian recommends reading anything from Gurusamy Sarathy.

You could also just tip-toe through http://cpanratings.perl.org/ and read the code for anything with 4.5+ cumulative stars. Code that users like is worth checking out even when the man behind the curtain doesn't always measure up face to face.