[za-pm] is Perl on the decline?
Spike
spike at mweb.co.za
Fri Apr 9 00:38:24 PDT 2010
I have had this data-cleaning experience often. "we don't have budget
for the software","we are looking at blah product". I have usualy
accomplished the task with a few carefully crafted Regex.
Hey thanks for the heads up on Lingua::EN::NameParse I will definitely
haver a look at that!
Francois Marais wrote:
> Note: Beware! Default reply-to is to the list.
>
> ------------------------------------------------------------------------
>
> Another example: At a major SA financal institution we are working a
> M$ developer was given the task to clean name and address lists on a
> DB2 database. You know the thing: Address line1, line2,... with
> potentially everything in each line. The task was to sort that as far
> as possible into title, forenames, surname,...
>
> Anyway, a month later he came back proudly wielding a 12page SQL
> script. When asked how it worked he refused to explain, with a proud
> smile, saying the logic was too impenetrable.
>
> I heard about this, had a look around on CPAN, downloaded
> Lingua::EN::NameParse, and after fiddling with the config file to
> introduce local titles like Mnr/Mev/..., I was cleaning the DB2 data
> no problem. And I only had to write 10 lines of code, and importantly
> no parsing. And it took me one hour. And the parsing criteria are in a
> config file for all to see, easy to change.
>
> From every possible angle, except the original programmers twisted
> sense of pride, the Perl solution was better.
>
> On Thu, Apr 8, 2010 at 2:20 PM, Spike <spike at mweb.co.za
> <mailto:spike at mweb.co.za>> wrote:
>
> Note: Beware! Default reply-to is to the list.
>
> perl will never die for the simple reason it works. And works
> fast. Ask a java programmer to do the equivalent of perl -p -i -e
> on a hundred 500Mb files and see which app is ready first and
> which runs the quickest.
>
> We have complex systems built on .net. they work, not brilliantly
> but they do work. But simple things are often very time
> consuming. A quick example springs to mind - we need to FTP a
> 600Mb text files from a remote site and total all the numbers in
> the 4th, 9th and 17th columns depending on the value of the text
> in the first column. It took about 15 mintis to write and hour to
> polish in perl. The .net guys are still trying to get the FTP to work.
>
> So what I'm saying is that no matter how advanced and expensive
> your lazer concrete cutter is, a drill will always be faster and
> more reliable if you want to make hole.
>
> Winston Haybittle (by way of Anne Wainwright
> <anotheranne at fables.co.za> <mailto:anotheranne at fables.co.za>) wrote:
>> Note: Beware! Default reply-to is to the list.
>> Hi Ann & Group
>> We need clear roadmap for PERL 6, maybe a standards cross platform compiler.
>> This is definitely not technical issue, maybe management/marketing
>> optimizations needed. And then there is training and support? I mean PERL
>> kills PHP hands down?! Modern day architecture with open standards means
>> that Programming Language/OS lock in is less relevant. People should be
>> packaging virtual appliances with Perl in the core? As is the norm with the
>> very best VM appliances.
>> Winston...
>>
>> -----Original Message-----
>> From: za-pm-bounces+winstonh=mweb.co.za at pm.org <mailto:za-pm-bounces+winstonh=mweb.co.za at pm.org>
>> [mailto:za-pm-bounces+winstonh=mweb.co.za at pm.org] On Behalf Of Anne
>> Wainwright
>> Sent: 06 April 2010 11:04 PM
>> To: za perlmongers
>> Subject: [za-pm] is Perl on the decline?
>>
>> Note: Default reply-to is to the poster.
>> Hi,
>>
>> Well, is it?
>>
>> I was surprised (perhaps I wasn't) when I logged onto the za-pm
>> list-server to find that of course it is the ubiquitous Mailman which
>> is written in Python, and although it is a very capable package I
>> thought we might be supporting home industries ;) There are a number of
>> mailing list managers written in perl (sympa, dadamail). Can't comment
>> on whether we have the best one, but I'm happy with it anyway.
>>
>> Looking on the ubuntu software centre app, entering 'perl' brings up 19
>> apps which is reduced to 13 if we omit editors, ide's, and perl-specific
>> tools.
>>
>> entering 'python' brings up 99 apps reduced to 72 on the same basis.
>>
>> OK, figures up or down one or two, but that's a big difference. There
>> are an awful lot more general applications written in Python than perl
>> available for a linux box.
>>
>> Conversely, under IT & computer the local new book site loot.co.za <http://loot.co.za>
>> lists 338 books under 'perl' and 207 under 'python', but of course Perl
>> has been around a _lot_longer and many of the perl titles are of
>> long-standing.
>>
>> I am (very slowly) developing an app in perl/Catalyst. Needing
>> something up and running faster than I was going I found a RAD front -
>> Kexi - to do the CRUD dirtywork. No suprise, buttons & stuff can have
>> actions coded in Python or Ruby, but not perl! That's the KDE offering,
>> the Gnome offering - Glom - also allows coding in Python but not in perl
>> (or Ruby for that matter).
>>
>> This result could of course be skewed by the sort of programming that
>> each language is typically used for. Perl is probably way ahead in the
>> administration stakes, but why has it lagged behind in general useage?
>> Is this a technical issue?
>>
>> Do we have a new generation of programmers brought up on Python and not
>> perl? At the local university Python has been the starter package for
>> IT for some years. They are very M$ oriented and students are not
>> much exposed to linux and hence perl.
>>
>> I could go on, but wondered what the views on this from the
>> professional world are.
>>
>> bestest
>> Anne
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