[geeks] Misuse of Java

[David Cantrell]

On Wed, Nov 06, 2002 at 04:00:15PM -0500, Greg A. Woods wrote:
> [ On Wednesday, November 6, 2002 at 20:10:41 (+0000), David Cantrell wrote: ]
> >                                                      but none of those
> > who rubbish perl have ever explained to me why perl sucks worse than any
> > of the others.
> Basically it boils down to the fact that Perl includes the grab bag of
> all the "bad" language features that ever were, and it literally
> directly encourages very bad programming practices.

Rubbish.  Whilst perl *permits* bad programming practices (want to write
BASIC in perl? you can) it doesn't encourage them*.  I think that that
misconception springs from the fact that it's really easy for a newbie
to get started with perl - far easier than any other language I've tried,
except the BASIC that came in ROM on old 8-bit home machines - and that
newbies write bad code.  Therefore there is lots of bad perl.

* - but then, you can write BASIC in Java too.

> Perl's proponents are even worse at encouraging all these bad things
> than the language itself is, though of course they're only a product of
> the environment they choose.

More rubbish.  If anything, the perl community does what it can to
encourage good habits.  Now sure, there's the odd bit of fun too, like
the obfuscated perl contest (inspired by the IOCCC**, so I guess C proponents
also encourage bad programming) and perl golf, but those are mostly unknown
outside the community.

** - which seems to be more an IOCPPCC :-(

> Jave, despite all its flaws, is almost infinitely better a computer
> programming language than perl.

More rubbish.  Java is a better language *for some jobs* and is terrible
for others.  A good engineer chooses the right tool for the job.

> As Dave said there are already many huge and even some deeply complex
> books detailing all these concepts about programming languages and
> good/bad programming practices.

Many of which I have read, and none of them lead me to think that perl
sucks any more than other languages.

-- 
Grand Inquisitor Reverend David Cantrell | http://www.cantrell.org.uk/david

If you're doing business with a religious son of a bitch, get it in writing.
His word isn't worth shit, not with the Good Lord telling him how to fuck you
on the deal   -- W.S.Burroughs, "Words of Advice for Young People"