[SunRescue] Anyone else here hate Perl?

[Dave McGuire]

On April 4, Steve Pacenka wrote:
> > > an outstanding example of code reuse.  I find Perl to be extremely efficient 
> > > in lines of code terms, taking many fewer lines for the kinds of programs I 
> > > write in it (file processing, number crunching) than any other language I 
> > 
> >   Fewer lines, sure...but how about machine cycles?  Bytes of memory?
> 
> What about programmer time, versus the cost of CPU clock and memory?  
> Obviously it depends on the application.  And the economics are shifting, when 
> you can get hundreds of megahertz and hundreds of megabytes of RAM for a 
> couple of thousand dollars (all via overnight mail) but you can't find enough 
> qualified programmers at the salaries your organization will pay (I'm in 
> higher ed, and we underpay computer people severely).

  Ahh, but I'm a programming purist. :)  And there's a lot more to
performance than megahertz, but we shouldn't go there.

> Code destined to run a zillion times or to crunch gigabytes will merit the 
> extra programmer time to write in C or assembler, or having the programmer 
> invest in learning an application-specific language like SQL.

  Hmm, run a zillion times or crunch gigabytes...like the average
Perl CGI program!  B-)

> I do have one current application that will outgrow Perl - it has to process 
> about 30,000 non-text files each 100k, wrong-endian for the architecture.  
> Perl was excellent for prototyping but we will process this set enough times 
> that a version in C will probably be done.

  Wow, that's a biggie...

   -Dave McGuire