Re: How do you master Perl?

[naChoZ]

It's not surprised you're thinking about this. I remember your post Re: Indicators of your Perl skill. :)

By that measure, I'd say I'm advanced, or pretty close to it. I definitely don't muddle as much as I once did, but master is still a far cry for me.

As for how I got to my current skill level, reinvention has been a big thing for me. I have trouble learning things that I can't visualize or somehow create a mnemonic that is personally meaningful.

Sometimes I have to try doing something my own way in order to see why someone might do it another way. Sometimes, I blindly try to do it the way that they're doing it, without understanding what am doing. After I've tinkered with it enough, broken it enough, fixed it enough, it will finally start to gel and penetrate my often thick skull.

Like OO, for instance. I still don't have a *totally* solid understanding of it, but what helped me make progress (aside from merlyn's fine alpaca book) was RT. I had to monkey with it a lot for work. At first it was quite mysterious how all those modules interacted with each other, which modules inherited from each other, with methods were available in which place. After a while it finally started to make sense and I could finally see how an OO model could work together, be organized, intelligent, maintainable, and useful.

I know your question is "How do you master Perl?" but in this context, can you define master? Is a master someone who can use Perl as productively and efficiently as possible? Or is it Erudil and his ingenious posts. Or is a Perl master someone who can successfully earn a living based upon Perl. Or is it... Or is it...

Perhaps it's not really "mastery" that we seek?

[brian_d_foy]

I've never really thought about how I would define "master": I'd probably get into the same argument I do with Perl certification. ;)

I certainly don't think there is one level of mastery. We might separate Perl programmers (or any programmers) into three rough cuts of beginner, intermediate, and advanced, but then we could go into each of those groups and cut each into three more groups.

I think the heart of the matter, however, if that a Perl master bends Perl to his will, rather than being limited by it. Damian, king of source filters and Perl magic, makes Perl does what he wants instead of the other way around, for instance.

Maybe the definition is just a subjective comparison, and everyone puts different labels on people. I think most people would agree that Autrijus, Randal, Damian, and Larry are masters. People can also probably pick out the beginners pretty well too. After that, fists start to fly :)

[naChoZ]

After that, fists start to fly :)

True. And your old post directly addresses that also. Number 2, Intermediate: You think you know a lot of Perl....

;)