Re: Perl

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From: Piers Cawley
Subject: Re: Perl
Date: 18:30 on 28 Feb 2004
peter@xxxxxxx.xxx (Peter da Silva) writes:

>>    "A good language allows people to say "pshaw" and "ain't" and
>>    "Barbara Streisand", no matter how unpleasant the words may sound.
>
> Alas, Perl only allows you to say "pshaw" and "ain't" and "Barbara
> Streisand" because they've been designed into the language... and
> it doesn't let you say "strooth" or "cobber" or "gruntbugly" because
> the Academie Perlais hasn't thought of those. The teachers and users
> of the language have little or no hand in its evolution because it's
> guided from afar like French, rather than being allowed to grow like
> English.
>
> It reminds me of Terry Pratchet's Guild of Joculators, with its hundred
> approved puns, "see, what a flexible language, Perl 6 allows you to
> say 'marry, nuncle' as well as 'forsooth'"...

Hmmm... the design of Perl 6 seems to imply that it's going to be
rather more flexible than that; the macro stuff seems to imply that if
you can write parser rules for it, it can go in. In theory you can
completely replace the Perl 6 parser for a module or two in favour of
whatever you prefer (but it's probably easier to target Parrot directly
in those cases).
There's stuff above here

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