use Perl

• You are an idiot (Score:1)

  by Aristotle (5147)

  Just look at it:

  msg = ' spacey string ';
  msg.replace(r'^\s+', '');
  msg.replace(r'\s+$', '');

  That’s clearly orders of magnitude easier to read than the Perl version.
  • Re: (Score:1)

    by Aristotle (5147)

    Oh wait, it has to be this:

    msg = ' spacey string ';
    msg = msg.replace(r'^\s+', '');
    msg = msg.replace(r'\s+$', '');

    Or possibly chain the methods.

    msg = ' spacey string ';
    msg = msg.replace(r'^\s+', '').replace(r'\s+$', '');

    Perl can’t hold a candle to any of that.
    • Re: (Score:2)

      by pudge (1)

      Wow ... I've seen many complaints about lack of readability, but this has to be the dumbest one (not yours, of course, the original). Just wow.
      
      
      • Re: (Score:2)

        by pudge (1)

        BTW, the "blogger" is apparently only 15, acc. to his profile. After reading the rest of his post I figured he was a dumb kid. So he is.
        
        Sometimes I worry that the chorus of "Perl, in a Nutshell" will damage Perl's reputation ("it's so easy to write, but it's not always easy to read"). Then I think, if only I could be so lucky!
        
        
        • Re: (Score:1)

          by mr.bambers (8132)

          As a new Perl programmer, and (I will disclaim now) having never written any PHP, I'd like to point out that no computer language has intrinsic "readability". Do you remember your first time ploughing through "Learning Perl"'s 'A Stroll Through Perl'?
          
          No programming language is readable until someone invents a programming language that reads like a native language. Think Pseudo-code, and THAT is readable (or at least you'll get the idea...) However, no-one has made a REAL language like that. Yet.
          
          I've been to
          • Re:You are an idiot (Score:1)

            by chromatic (983) on 2007.09.05 23:56 (#57514) Homepage Journal

            No programming language is readable until someone invents a programming language that reads like a native language.

            I'm not sure that's even possible, at least for any interesting problems. It's not that interesting to discuss the abstract relative readability of programming languages; syntax is just one particular expression of the semantics of the solution to a problem. You have to understand the problem and the semantics of a problem as well, and once you start talking along those lines, you have to bring in the principle of the conservation of complexity.

            Suddenly syntax isn't as abstract, or important. As Paul Hummer says, You simply cannot become an expert in Scheme by becoming an expert in its syntax. That's not where the power is. [theironlion.net]

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