Perl history
Paul Fenwick
pjf at perltraining.com.au
Tue Sep 9 02:09:58 CDT 2003
G'day Tim/Melb.PM,
On Mon, Sep 08, 2003 at 11:26:46PM +1000, Timothy S. Nelson wrote:
> > respelling of PEARL, arbitrarily chosen for its positive connotations".
>
> Does anyone know if this is correct? I'd always assumed that the
> Practical Extraction and Reporting name was designed at the same time.
The name then became "Pearl", which mutated into our present-day
"Perl", partly because Larry saw a reference to another
language called PEARL, but mostly becausehe's too lazy
to type five letters all the time. And, of course, so that
Perl could be used as a four-letter word. (You'll note,
however, the vestiges of the former spelling in the acronym's
gloss: "Practical Extraction /And/ Report Language".)
-- Camel Book, 3rd Ed, page 646.
My understanding of the "positive connotations" is that all good
Unix commands are four-letters long. ;)
Cheers,
Paul
--
Paul Fenwick <pjf at perltraining.com.au> | http://perltraining.com.au/
Director of Training | Ph: +61 3 9354 6001
Perl Training Australia | Fax: +61 3 9354 2681
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