[sf-perl] Real perl

Paul Makepeace Paul.Makepeace at realprogrammers.com
Wed Apr 11 11:39:40 PDT 2012


On Wed, Apr 11, 2012 at 03:33, Dodger <el.dodgero at gmail.com> wrote:
> I might also actually like knowing intrinsically how what I have made works.

Writing software is a discipline where there's a level of abstraction
where everything just goes black (box). It might be at "CPAN modules"
it might be at "Perl source code" it might be at "libc implementation"
it might be at "kernel scheduler" it might be at "filesystem device
driver" it might be at "L2 cache microcode" and so on down to particle
physics. At some point you stop caring and just trust it works.

IMO generally the higher level that is the more you can get done, and
those times when trust breaks down (i.e. an abstraction isn't
fulfilling its published contract) are the relatively fewer times you
ever have to care what's beneath the black.

That said, nothing wrong with liking knowing, it's just probably not
going to get as much made in the long run :)

Paul


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