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IWETHEY Home / IWETHEY Board / Theory and Practice of Programming Forum / May be it's a hindsight thing
Post #178,489
by Arkadiy
Picture of Arkadiy
10/8/04 3:47:36 PM
Reply
New May be it's a hindsight thing
but it seems to me that it took me less time and less effort to understand C, C++ and STL that it takes me to understand Perl. My "*shudder*" was not based on Todd's code, but rather on your code. As you say yourself, in Perl you have to be aware of the context at all times, and it's hard to stay aware because most of the time it "just works". In C++ I don't have such problem. May be because it became a second nature to me so long ago. Then again, in Smalltalk, I don't have such problem either. Probably because those languages don't try to magically do what I mean in most cases.
--

... a reference to Presidente Arbusto.
-- [link|http://itre.cis.upenn.edu/~myl/languagelog/archives/001417.html|Geoffrey K. Pullum]
Post #178,520
by ben_tilly
10/8/04 6:13:45 PM
Reply
New It could be many things
I know that when I learned to program in Perl, the course seemed much smoother than when I set out to learn other languages later. But then I realized that there were several factors:
  1. I misremember how long I took to learn Perl. It feels like I picked up the book and was writing it fluently a few weeks later. But I know that there were important parts of the language that I learned a lot later.

  2. When I was a baby in Perl, I tried to do baby-like things with it and succeeded. Now when I look at new languages, I over-reach. I immediately try to do things that I know how to do in Perl, and don't know enough to do them.

  3. When I learned Perl there was a constant feeling of accomplishment because I didn't know any way to easily do what I just learned. In other languages that sense is gone because whatever I just learned, I already knew how to do.

As for context, I think that it is important to know about context, but ideally it sinks into being a reflex. It's handled by the same part of your brain that handles grammar and knows when, for instance, you have to switch from past to present to future tense. Certainly I am not conciously aware of thinking about context, though I can tell you what is going on with it at any given moment.

Cheers,
Ben
I have come to believe that idealism without discipline is a quick road to disaster, while discipline without idealism is pointless. -- Aaron Ward (my brother)
     Perl frustrations - (tuberculosis) - (45) - Oct. 7, 2004, 03:55:53 PM EDT
         Simple solution - (ben_tilly) - (10) - Oct. 7, 2004, 05:31:13 PM EDT
             Bleh. - (admin) - (3) - Oct. 7, 2004, 04:42:49 PM EDT
                 That's because you approached it wrong - (ben_tilly) - (2) - Oct. 7, 2004, 05:22:57 PM EDT
                     I'm gradually warming up to it - (deSitter) - Oct. 7, 2004, 09:08:18 PM EDT
                     That should be in the man page. - (static) - Oct. 8, 2004, 02:17:42 AM EDT
             Is this a sort of typecasting? - (tuberculosis) - (2) - Oct. 7, 2004, 05:36:33 PM EDT
                 It's a reference -NT - (Simon_Jester) - Oct. 7, 2004, 06:00:50 PM EDT
                 Sort of - (ben_tilly) - Oct. 7, 2004, 06:10:14 PM EDT
             Interesting.... - (Simon_Jester) - (2) - Oct. 7, 2004, 05:58:41 PM EDT
                 The solution would have its own problems - (ben_tilly) - (1) - Oct. 7, 2004, 06:27:50 PM EDT
                     <bow> thank you. -NT - (Simon_Jester) - Oct. 7, 2004, 11:14:47 PM EDT
         THank you for stepping on this rake - (Arkadiy) - (33) - Oct. 7, 2004, 05:20:48 PM EDT
             He was overcomplicating it - (ben_tilly) - (32) - Oct. 7, 2004, 05:30:04 PM EDT
                 Well, maybe - (tuberculosis) - (17) - Oct. 7, 2004, 05:43:24 PM EDT
                     Agreed - (ben_tilly) - (16) - Oct. 7, 2004, 06:12:17 PM EDT
                         Agree its a mistake - (tuberculosis) - (15) - Oct. 7, 2004, 06:36:09 PM EDT
                             Same here. - (admin) - Oct. 7, 2004, 06:45:32 PM EDT
                             Right - (ben_tilly) - Oct. 7, 2004, 06:56:48 PM EDT
                             Shame about the inertia. Python's design is "least surprise" - (FuManChu) - (12) - Oct. 7, 2004, 10:02:43 PM EDT
                                 When I started with Perl... - (ben_tilly) - (11) - Oct. 7, 2004, 10:53:12 PM EDT
                                     On Perl 6 - (pwhysall) - (3) - Oct. 8, 2004, 01:53:55 AM EDT
                                         Re: On Perl 6 - (Yendor) - Oct. 8, 2004, 08:37:56 AM EDT
                                         I had a nice response to this typed up - (ben_tilly) - (1) - Oct. 8, 2004, 12:54:37 PM EDT
                                             Many thanks for that - (pwhysall) - Oct. 9, 2004, 02:53:04 AM EDT
                                     We're having a little brown bag on Ruby - (tuberculosis) - (4) - Oct. 8, 2004, 12:46:50 PM EDT
                                         Re: We're having a little brown bag on Ruby - (JimWeirich) - (3) - Oct. 11, 2004, 06:55:34 AM EDT
                                             Shhh! Anonymous Todd works at some other... - (CRConrad) - Oct. 11, 2004, 07:36:30 AM EDT
                                             I might have been there - (tuberculosis) - (1) - Oct. 11, 2004, 12:55:46 PM EDT
                                                 Re: I might have been there - (JimWeirich) - Oct. 11, 2004, 01:14:57 PM EDT
                                     Re: strict -- have you seen pychecker? - (FuManChu) - (1) - Oct. 8, 2004, 01:02:20 PM EDT
                                         No I hadn't, thanks - (ben_tilly) - Oct. 8, 2004, 01:08:02 PM EDT
                 BTW Arkadiy, I'm still waiting for a response - (ben_tilly) - (13) - Oct. 8, 2004, 12:57:52 PM EDT
                     I am not saying it's shorter in C... - (Arkadiy) - (10) - Oct. 8, 2004, 03:22:09 PM EDT
                         And now for my real comment - (ben_tilly) - (2) - Oct. 8, 2004, 03:34:09 PM EDT
                             May be it's a hindsight thing - (Arkadiy) - (1) - Oct. 8, 2004, 03:47:36 PM EDT
                                 It could be many things - (ben_tilly) - Oct. 8, 2004, 06:13:45 PM EDT
                         I don't know - multimap - (Simon_Jester) - (6) - Oct. 9, 2004, 12:22:32 AM EDT
                             Re: I don't know - multimap - (Arkadiy) - (5) - Oct. 9, 2004, 12:17:47 PM EDT
                                 Why the worry about efficiency? - (ben_tilly) - (4) - Oct. 9, 2004, 12:25:52 PM EDT
                                     I worry about efficiency - (Arkadiy) - (1) - Oct. 9, 2004, 12:30:44 PM EDT
                                         Ah - (ben_tilly) - Oct. 9, 2004, 12:59:07 PM EDT
                                     C vs Perl - efficiency - untrue for me - (broomberg) - (1) - Oct. 9, 2004, 12:41:13 PM EDT
                                         Point - but you may want to rebenchmark - (ben_tilly) - Oct. 9, 2004, 01:11:47 PM EDT
                     Here's a smalltalk version - (tuberculosis) - (1) - Oct. 8, 2004, 06:16:21 PM EDT
                         Yes, think of a reference as a pointer - (ben_tilly) - Oct. 8, 2004, 06:43:04 PM EDT

Specifically, they will not save the ship and crew, they will not win a stack of quatloos, and they will especially not get to sleep
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