From: johnpc@xs4all.nl (Jan-Pieter Cornet)
Newsgroups: comp.lang.misc,comp.lang.perl.misc,comp.lang.tcl,comp.lang.c,comp.lang.java,alt.lang.intercal,alt.test
Subject: Re: Readable Perl (was: Re: Relative Speed of Perl vs. Tcl vs. C)
Date: 27 Feb 1996 02:44:19 GMT
Organization: XS4ALL Internet
Message-ID: <4gtr64$s7h@news.xs4all.nl>
Summary: hit "n" now! quick!

In article <4ge7bk$4vq@news.ox.ac.uk>,
David Hopwood <lady0065@sable.ox.ac.uk> wrote:
>In article <4gb3kp$lu7@gaia.ns.utk.edu>,
>Matthew B. Kennel <kennel@msr.epm.ornl.gov> wrote:
>>Randal L. Schwartz (merlyn@stonehenge.com) wrote:
>>: >>>>> "John" == John Viega <jtv2j@mamba.cs.virginia.edu> writes:
>>
>>: John> People bitch about the readability of Perl non-stop.  In fact, I have
>>: John> heard the joke, "Perl, the only language you can uuencode, and not
>>: John> notice" twice this week around the department.
>>
>>: OK, now which do you find most readable...
>
>This (Haskell):
>
>cancount n = "I can count to "++(show n)++"\n"
>concat (map cancount [1..10])

No, you got it all totally wrong. I think this is the best readable
(in Tri-INTERCAL):

[Program moved to .3i file.]

Now, I think the advantages of this are pretty clear. First, this is
clearly a write-only language. There are only few people insane enough
to actually understand the above drivel, and they wouldn't bother
touching your petty code, as they are too busy filling bathtubs with
brightly colored machine tools.

Anyone else will simply be too scared to touch this code. So you can be
pretty sure nobody changes it behind your back.

In fact, you can be pretty sure you won't change it either after you
wrote it, because you will probably have forgotten how the program
works 5 minutes after you wrote it. So any luser nagging for extra
features afterwards, is SOL.

The other major advantage is... the above code took me about 3 hours
to write. Compare this to the 10 to 30 seconds it takes to write a
similar program in perl, BASIC, Haskell or what have you. But... that
means that when you programmed it in that other language, you'd have to
spend 2 hours 59 minutes and somewhere between 30 and 50 seconds
answering the phone talking to clueless lusers, changing backup tapes,
or doing other boring stuff. While you could have been programming
Intercal instead! Just think about that!

And last, but certainly not least, is: the above code is likely to
impress your boss. Bosses are wont to be impressed by incomprehensible
things. They won't be impressed by a three line perl program that anyone
not wearing a diaper can understand.

So that pretty much proves it.

PS: this article contains some strange usage of the words "best readable"
that you probably weren't previously aware of :)

-- 
Jan-Pieter Cornet  					<johnpc@xs4all.net>
Actual quote: "Linux was made by foreign terrorists to steal money from true
               AMERICAN companies like Microsoft who invented computing as we
	       know it, and are being punished for their success..."
Linux -- "It's computing, Jim, but not as we know it"