Perl Foundation Awards Perl Development Grant to Larry Wall 137
Krellis writes: "The Perl Foundation today announced that they have awarded a Perl Development Grant to Larry Wall, the creator of Perl and designer of Perl 6, joining Dan Sugalski and Dr. Damian Conway, the other 2002 grant recipients. The Perl Development Grants are funded by donations; over USD 80,000 has been donated so far, a total of USD 240,000 is needed for the three grants. See http://donate.perl-foundation.org/ for more information on how you can pitch in - every dollar counts! See also the use.perl.org story for more information."
Re:Perl is extremely useful (Score:1, Offtopic)
One tool to replace two. Hey, seemed straightforward to me!
Re:Perl is extremely useful (Score:1)
check out www.ruby-lang.org [ruby-lang.org]
Well, duh! (Score:4, Insightful)
:Peter
Re:Well, duh! (Score:4, Informative)
With the establishment of this new Perl Foundation, maybe the idea is to formalize these kinds of patronages for key developers. Damien Conway was first because he's such a great teacher & advocate, and Dan Sugalski was second because he needed more time to work on the Parrot engine for Perl6. Now that Larry is joining this, hopefully he'll have more time to work on the high level language specification...
Re:Well, duh! (Score:3, Informative)
Re:Well, duh! (Score:2, Interesting)
Re:Well, duh! (Score:3, Informative)
Re:Well, duh! (Score:1)
But if Larry is no longer being patronized by ORA, it does impact my willingness to buy their books (especially the Perl-specific ones). In spite of the non-free nature of the Perl books I've bought from ORA, I always considered them (in part) a donation towards further development of Perl.
Here's a better question: will the next versions of the Camel (for Perl 6) be licensed under the same terms as Perl itself? Or is the Perl community being asked to donate to fund development of a language which they will then have to buy proprietary books from O'Reilly to learn more about?
I know I'm being a zealous stickler, but here's a better essay on the topic than I could write: http://www.gnu.org/philosophy/free-doc.html. And FWIW, I'm willing to pay *more* for a printed version of a Free book than I would be willing to pay for a non-Free version of same. Freedom is worth something.
Re:Well, duh! (Score:1)
With regard to O'Reilly and Perl, don't forget that ORA still donates to YAS [yetanother.org], hosts Perl.com [perl.com], purchasing and publishing articles and news, and employs or partially funds people involved with Perl -- Nat Torkington, Jon Orwant, Simon Cozens (editing Perl.com). They're also paying royalties to Larry, Tom Christiansen, Tim Bunce, Randal Schwartz, Doug McEachern, Lincoln Stein, Jarkko Hietaniemi, et al.
Finally, I might point out that Perl's fine documentation is both voluminous and very close to the Camel in many spots. Some of the same people who work on Perl books (writing and editing) work on the FAQ and the included POD.
It may not be as direct a donation to Perl development as when Larry was a direct patron, but I think the company is still doing Good things. There will always be free resources for people to use, but I have no problem supporting good publishers like O'Reilly and Manning. If someone can set up a trust to produce free-as-in-speech documentation, I'll support that project too.
Re:Well, duh! (Score:1)
Second, I would imagine it's because Larry has been employed by O'Reilly for the last couple of years, making it less of a 'need' for Larry's work to continue on via a grant.
-Bill
Cart Before the Horse (Score:5, Insightful)
The could have delayed the announcement, made fewer awards or made smaller awards.
Now, instead of focusing their efforts on raising money for future activities, they instead have to focus on digging out of a $160K hole.
Re:Cart Before the Horse (Score:1, Insightful)
The Polaris Foundation Awards (Score:1)
The obligatory song (Score:1)
A better headline choice... (Score:2, Interesting)
Scott.
Re:A better headline choice... (Score:1)
Great! But why is Larry no.3? (Score:1, Redundant)
It seems a bit like a Linux foundation (is there one?) giving money to Alan Cox & Marcelo Tosatti and then as an afterthought letting Linus Torvalds in on the party
Re:Great! But why is Larry no.3? (Score:1)
Re:Great! But why is Larry no.3? (Score:2)
Larry on the other hand has other sources of income and didn't really need the grant as much. Now it seems that the Perl Foundation would like Larry to travel more to promote Perl. Since travel is pretty costly the Perl Foundation wanted to help Larry defer some of those costs.
Re:Great! But why is Larry no.3? (Score:2, Informative)
Re:Great! But why is Larry no.3? (Score:5, Informative)
Laying off Larry Wall? (Score:1)
Re:Great! But why is Larry no.3? (Score:3, Insightful)
--Nathan Torkington
Best way to use money? (Score:5, Insightful)
If the Perl Foundation is a non-profit (which I assume they are), wouldn't it make more sense to take these guys on the pay-roll so that the money wasn't taxed except for the consideribly smaller amount that would be paid for general living expenses?
The 20K travel budget is what suprised me... Since that's a grant, it's not 20K for travel because Larry would still have to pay taxes on that no?
I'm not terribly proficent in tax laws but something just seems a bit fishy to me... I wonder if it has to do with whether one can claim that writing perl is charity...
If it isn't, then there definitely needs to be a movement to make OSS a charitable act because it certainly is. I know there was a
Re:Best way to use money? (Score:2, Interesting)
So, they gave him a grant for a vacation?
Re:Best way to use money? (Score:3, Insightful)
Re:Best way to use money? (Score:5, Informative)
Damian has set the bar very high in this regard--see the start of his 2002 schedule [yetanother.org], and read his 2001 diary [yetanother.org] to see how much he gets around. While I doubt Larry and Dan will be travelling internationally as much as Damian, we do want them to visit user groups outside their home town.
In an ideal world, a conference would pay Larry to be Larry. Unfortunately, you might have noticed that this world isn't ideal. Larry has to pay his own way to conferences, just like everyone else.
--Nathan Torkington
Re:Best way to use money? (Score:1)
The issue isn't whether 20K is a reasonable travel buy but rather whether is makes sense to just award him 20K as a travel budget when we will be forced to pay taxes on it reducing it to like 13K when assuming Perl Foundation is a non-profit, they could take him on the payroll and avoid the 7K in taxes.
That's what my concern is... I personally don't think 20K is an unusually large amount for travel expenses. Perl has a ton of developers, but having someone to represent perl is terribly important for the growth of the language.
Isn't it bad policy? (Score:2, Insightful)
Re:Isn't it bad policy? (Score:2, Informative)
As for freeness being an issue, we're actually surprised at how readily people will donate. It's just a matter of having someone on the ground to make the presentation and explain the benefits. Dan's going to be handling that part-time for the duration of his grant, and we expect great things as a result.
So yes, it is bad policy to grant money you don't have. Fortunately for us, we're not doing that :-)
Nathan Torkington
In other news... (Score:5, Funny)
"We're pleased to be able to let Bill focus on golf without distraction," said Craig Mundie, lead moron of the Microsoft Foundation. "Through these grants, the support of the monopolization -- including sizeable amounts from victims, can be put to use for the good of everyone!"
Yes, I'm just kidding, you can mod me down now. *close his eyes*
Re:In other news... (Score:2)
Kind of like freedom of religion is acceptable in america, as long as that religion is Christianity.
(Note the allegory requires you to accept the fact that the judging party is a small, but visible, minority.)
Re:In other news... (Score:1)
Kind of like freedom of religion is acceptable in america, as long as that religion is Christianity.
Heh, I can't agree more! XD
Take it easy man.
Re:Of Course -- he's on the board (Score:3, Insightful)
Maybe it is just an honorary thing... (Score:2, Informative)
The article said they did not have a enough money for all of the grants and Damian Conway had to have the cash to take the break from the university down under. They are shy of about $160,000 which may take a little while to dig up..:)
Sound good to me.
BWP
Re:Maybe it is just an honorary thing... (Score:3, Informative)
--Nat
At the risk of being curmudgeonly... (Score:4, Interesting)
Re:At the risk of being curmudgeonly... (Score:5, Informative)
Re:At the risk of being curmudgeonly... (Score:2, Interesting)
Wow!
How could the countless idoitic stories posted by Timothy and Michael be on the homepage, but *NOT* this?!
Hoping Larry Finds A Job Real Quick,
-Bill
Re:At the risk of being curmudgeonly... (Score:1)
--Nat
Re:At the risk of being curmudgeonly... (Score:1, Funny)
Re:At the risk of being curmudgeonly... (Score:2)
But the spine I can read from here only says "Conway!"
Larry Wall's Fence (Score:3, Interesting)
Anyway, apparently my co-worker's fence to the rear of his house had deteriorated to a severe state so he decided to repair it.
Being the polite guy (and probably wanting a little help with the funding of such a project) he is, my co-worker decided to contact the neighbors, all of whom he indicated he didn't know at all.
So he set off around the opposite side of the block to knock on the neighbors door directly behind his house. A gentleman comes to the door and my co-worker introduces himself and the gentleman introduces himself as Larry Wall.
My co-worker doesn't recognize the name since he really doesn't program to any extreme degree, more of a planning/management type guy.
But since the company is a software development house he knows several people who use Perl and they describe what they do with it on an almost daily basis. Thus he is aware of Perl.
So apparently the chit-chat continues on and the topic eventually comes to what each person does for a living.
My co-worker describes his job and then Larry says that he is currently writing a book for O'Reilly.
My co-worker is definitely intrigued by this answer and asks what sort of book and Larry describes that it's a book detailing the (is his a more appropriate adjective here) latest version of Perl.
When my co-worker hears the word Perl he gets all excited. His reaction was basically that it's pretty cool to have a neighbor who has contributed so much to the programming community.
Anyway to make an already long story shorter my understanding is that Larry was really cool about the fence, basically letting my co-worker take care of the details (the way my co-worker wanted them) and I believe he helped with the cost as well.
So if you contribute to the Perl Development Grant be aware that you are helping support some really nice folks! And that is to be commended!
I hope I got the details correct, at least that's how I remember them....
I expected some sort of punchine there... (Score:3, Funny)
to correct a few earlier posts... (Score:2, Informative)
warning: this is just the situation as I see it and have heard.. no official quotes or insider info here
Larry Wall is the founder of Perl, yes.. however, usually he does less active development on the language itself, usually stepping into settle a dispute or submitting the occasional patch.. Since the Perl 6 initiative was launched, he has been busier than in recent years, because of the RFC approval process and being the lead architect for Perl 6.
Damian Conway, in the past year, has contributed (IMHO) enormously to the popularity, usefulness and general knowledge of Perl.. he's toured giving talks and lectures, written more modules per week than even an ordinarily active Perl programmer would write in an year (Ok, some of them, I don't get, and others leave me just scratching my head..) As I understand it, he was given the grant so he could take a sabbatical from his university and concentrate on Perl full time for one year..
so, its irrelevant as to who gets it and in which order.. certainly, I think Larry Wall should get a grant, but to point fingers and question why he wasn't the first to get it, is simply to make a superficial assessment without knowing the facts behind the grants..
One final note: last year, the powers that be committed to funding Damian Conway, and it worked out well, even though they promised money that they hadn't collected (at that point). If you use Perl in any way, please consider making a donation..
I'm personally rooting for Dan Sugalski to work some more on Perl threads :o) hope he finds time for it in the course of the year...
Encouraging contributions (Score:2)
Why not generate a cool gif that people can display on their web sites to signify that they contribute to the Perl Foundation. Might encourage contributions.
huh? (Score:1, Redundant)
Re:huh? (Score:3, Insightful)
With the small difference that Microsoft is a company that makes money, and Bill Gates is presumably an employee who already receives salary or benefits or whatever someone at that level gets. The Perl community does not, of itself, make money, and Larry is not employed by the community -- well, until now.
A better comparison might be if the Linux community paid Linus Torvalds. As it is, he works for Transmeta; if he didn't, he probably wouldn't be making any money. Similar with Larry.
Re:Too bad... (Score:1)
- private variables - everything is an object - you need less code than with python - no indentation necessary which will be confusing when developers are using diffenrent editors
I think python is fine and it also will have a brigth future but more and more people will switch to Ruby
Re:Too bad... (Score:1)
Kudos, but not yet... (Score:3)
Re:YAS/Perl Foundation have lost it! (Score:2, Insightful)
"The Science of Perl" is a great topic which hasn't been explored already. Granted, there will be Perl 6 talks (hey, it looks like Larry will be there!), but it is nice to make a change.
Larry deserves an award however..... (Score:1)
IMHO he is far to focused on himself. He has a fine set of tools to sell himself and does so extremely well. Take a look at any interview with him. He is always ranting about how busy he is and how much work he is doing.
I knew Damian from college. Even though he was my supervisor it was impossible to spend any quality time with him. He was always off touring foreign countries for conferences (at this time his obsession was with the then trendy C++), or working on a paper so that he could go overseas again to present it. Otherwise he was at the gym.
I did not learn much from Damian. He did make one thing _very_ obvious though - always look after number one. Also to a lesser extent - the squeaky wheel gets the grease. If you do a good enough job of telling everyone how good you are, eventually it will stick.
Damian is good at determining who to rub shoulders with and whose palms require oil.
I supported him getting the first award because he evangelizes my favorite language so well (and as a side effect himself). I object like that he may be getting another. He is a player. It sickens me that he has managed to big note himself into further support from our community - one that places product above politics.
Larry would be better off working on the design of Perl 6 without him. Larry is a wonderful man - to me he embodies up the language that I love. He is a quiet achiever who does not need to sell himself - his work does that for him. Do we really need to pay someone to churn out another Exegesis?
I say allow showy Damian be an instructor on his own time (and dollar) - or better still a politician. Then he can jet around the globe all he likes. That is what he does best. It would also mean he would have to spend his _own_ time working on those damn Latin modules.....
Re:Larry deserves an award however..... (Score:1)
As for his contribution to Perl and Perl 6, make no mistake that it's critical. 2001 Damian was a cheerleader who showed people that Perl is still a vibrant fun language. Latin, Klingon, Quantum::Superpositions, and SelfGOL are all part of that.
In 2002, Damian's two main tasks are to back up Larry in the development of Perl 6 (and make no bones that we would not have the Apocalypses we have today without Damian's hard and unsung work behind the scenes) and to produce Parse::FastDescent (which will make thousands of Perl programmers' lives easier and less prematurely-bald :-).
I can't emphasize enough the "unsung" part. Damian is famous within the Perl community for his crazy modules and Vulcan nerve-pinch grasp of the language. But very few people know what he does to support Larry and perl6 development, because he has deliberately chosen to not publicise that work. Every Exegesis is priceless--in the development of the Exegesis Damian invariably finds omissions or contradictions in the Apocalypse, he gets clarifications on real world issues we didn't realize existed in the Apocalypse, and he helps translate the oft-heady Apocalypse into the real world pragmatic code that Perl programmers need.
Damian's an integral part of perl 6. I couldn't stand back and let only one side of the story be told. We now return you to your regularly scheduled "me too" and "First post!" :-)
--Nathan Torkington
Re:Larry deserves an award however..... (Score:1)
I absolutely agree with the cheerleader aspect - but do not understand why Perl needs cheerleaders. Do we really need someone to show us Perl is still a vibrant and fun language? Please - we know that already! It is fun watching one of Damian's wonderful lectures - no one derives more pleasure from them then he does!! But so far I chose not to contribute a second time to a fund that sponsors him. I just do not believe we need someone doing 'that kind of stuff' for yet another year.
The obvious counter argument is 'things are a changing in Perl - we need a cheerleader to support 6.' I do not accept this - everyone is waiting for Perl 6 with such baited breath we all smell like a tackle shop!!
As far as all the unsung work Damian has done - clearly I cannot comment because it is deliberately unpublicized. It sounds like it is incredibly important to the delivery of 6. Why is it deliberately unpublicized? It does not sound like the Damian I know (and love) to do a bunch of valuable work and keep it to himself. If it really does exist, can it perhaps be publicized? If it were my tune (and probably the tunes of others) would change.
Re:Did anyone notice this? (Score:1, Redundant)
Oh well, moderate it to oblivion, please!
Soko
Re:If I wasn't so laid off a week ago... (Score:1, Troll)
"Perl has helped me in so many ways. Like the way my laptop formatted itself at 8PM on Friday.
Cost of loading Perl == Free
Getting a call from my boss on Monday, "What's wrong with the laptop?" == Priceless"