Perl 5.7.3 out!

jeek writes "Perl 5.7.3 is out. This should be the last development version before 5.8.0 comes out in April or May." You can download it from CPAN or get a copy of it from SourceForge.net. If you have some free time try downloading it and testing it. According to the included perldelta.pod file, the highlights are: better Unicode support, new thread implementation, many new modules, better numeric accuracy, safe signals, and a completely overhauled and improved regression test suite.

Perl 6

[Fweeky]

Perl 6 should be rather more interesting; it'll be a completely new architecture, with the Perl itself parsed by, um, Perl (5), which will then generate bytecode for the semi-language-independent bytecode engine Parrot [parrotcode.org], which will execute it (and let the Perl5 'compiler' migrate and become self hosting).

This will allow Perl to concentrate on developing the language rather than the engine that drives it, and even better, let other languages in on the act; want to write your own little language and want it to run anywhere *and* use Perl modules? Code to Parrot bytecode.

This extends to other languages; Python and Ruby bods seem to take it quite seriously, so even if your admins refuse to install $flavour_of_the_month language, you can still grab the backend in Parrot bytecode and target your scripts to Parrot.

And, being Perl, it's sure to end up everywhere. That is, assuming they every actually come up with something that works before the Universe ends :)

* waits for someone to compare it to .NET, only with Perl as the base language rather than C#

Re:Perl 6

[Anonymous Coward]

Perl 6 should be rather more interesting

If Perl 6 continues trickling out at this incredibly slow pace, Perl 5 will begin to steal its feature set and developers not to mention interest.

Oh wait. That's already happening!

Re:Perl 6

[gooberguy]

So if I want fast Perl 6 support in apache, I'll have to compile it with mod_parrot? It just doesn't sound as cool. ^_^

D/\ Gooberguy

Re:Perl 6

[sharkey]

...mod_parrot? It just doesn't sound as cool. ^_^

Perhaps it'll be called mod_pirate instead? Or mod_LJ-Silver.

Re:Perl 6

[Fweeky]

> .NET's intermediate language isn't C#

I said base, as in, the language it is primarily aimed for, with other languages having to be sufficiently like it to fit in.

Luckily the reference implimentations for the other languages Parrot wants to support aren't going away, so I doubt it's going to pull a "VB.Net = VB#" type thing .NET is alleged to be doing.

Re:Perl 6

[Anonymous Coward]

* waits for someone to compare it to .NET, only with Perl as the base language rather than C#

Um, do you mean like this [perl.com]?

Re:Perl 6

[ZiZ]

* waits for someone to compare it to .NET, only with Perl as the base language rather than C#

I'd compare it to .NET, but then I'd just be parroting you. *ahem*

Re:Perl 6

[armitage_23]

Why not have Perl 6 compile to Java bytecode? The VM is already written for multiple platforms.

Re:Perl 6

[Fweeky]

JVM is aimed more at static strongly typed languages (well, language); Perl and it's ilk are much more dynamic and like to do things that would make Java want to kill itself.

Still, work is going on to make use of the JVM (I believe the JRuby [sourceforge.net] guys were talking about that), and there's talk of Java bytecode/Parrot bytecode converters, but JVM isn't really made with that in mind.

Re:Perl 6

[while(new char)]

Actually, no. It won't be parsed by Perl 5. Perl 6 will be written in classic ol' C. Parsing with Perl 5 would simply be too slow: Think about it. Spawn Perl 6 which then spawns Perl 5, which has to run its parser, which implements a parser, that builds a parse tree and gives it to Perl 6.
Perl wants to be fast with startup as well as running, and this certainly isn't the way to do it.
As for .NET, it's completely different because, um, Perl's, uh, better.

Re:Note:

[ajmarks]

Actually, I do know Perl (and Java, and C/C++, and...). I just find that I can develop far faster in PHP, so I tend to use it more.

Re:Note:

[red5]

Some one is a little sensitive.
Time of the month?

Re:Note:

[dash2]

You can do the same thing using embperl, HTML::Mason, HTML::Template, Template::ToolKit (and a few others) in perl. And you get perl!