At Least One Point Handicapped.

[elfs]

Earlier this week Omaha had some Democrat thingy to attend. It was being held at Shari's, a Denny's clone the kids like because the coloring pads "are better," according to both. The girls immediately started doing the various word puzzles on the page labeled "Brainy Circus". And one of the problems on the page was "Can you make ten different words out of the phrase 'Brainy Circus'?" Well, while the girls worked on it, I did too, in the notebook I habitually carry with me. I got up to somewhere in the low-80s on my own before considering turning it over to a computer, but I realized that there were probably a few words I knew that I wouldn't have clued the girls into, like anus or urinary.

Curious, I wrote a quickie Python program (Python being "Perl for grownups") and compared the phrase against my spelling dictionary to discover 339 hits; I then ran the results file against my definitions dictionary and that pared it down to 168. I'm pleased to admit that I got "incubus," but somehow missed "binary" as a respelling of "brainy".

I'm such a geek...

Comments

Funny...

[livemerlyn.livejournal.com]

Since they keep wanting to train kids with Python, I think of Python as "perl for kids".

Re: Funny...

[elfs.livejournal.com]

I think python is a great language for kids: it's not as abstract as ruby or lisp. Everything is concrete and has a reason-- there is One Right Way to do anything with a minimum of fuss.

I also think python is a great language for mature adults: few perl programs, even those written with intent, are readable even by the fellow who writes one six months after putting it down.

Re: Funny...

[livemerlyn.livejournal.com]

"few perl programs, even those written with intent, are readable even by the fellow who writes one six months after putting it down"

I keep hearing this repeated time and time again. Have you ever worked in a shop with professional Perl programmers? Ones that do it for a job, and not just incidentally as part of some other task? Because I have, and most of *those* programs are perfectly readable six months later. They have to be. On the other hand, I've seen Excel macros and VB programs and, yes, Python programs that were not.

I'm tired of people bashing Perl. If you're gonna bash Perl, you should at least say the context in which these supposed "Perl" programmers worked, and how much experience they had, and whether they've read the standard literature. And by that, I mean books that don't call it "PERL" in all caps, and so on.

Re: Funny...

[elfs.livejournal.com]

Randall, I've worked with you.

And yes, I've worked in several professional Perl shops. Perl put food on my family's table for seven years. I still find that the syntax and symobol usage of the language lends itself to sloppiness as readily as it does laziness. It is easier to teach newbies how to approch the triune of impatience, hubris, and laziness in languages with cleaner syntax these days. While I'm all for acknowledging the contribution Larry made to the state of the art, it was the state of the art a decade ago. Matz and Guido are doing a better job today of advancing that art than Perl.

Re: Funny...

[livemerlyn.livejournal.com]

"Randall, I've worked with you.".

I don't think so. If you had worked with me, you wouldn't be spelling my name wrong now. And I do recall your face, but I don't recall working closely with you on anything.

Re: Funny...

[elfs.livejournal.com]

Ha! I should double-check who I'm responding to. Good morning, Mr. Schwartz.