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Perl Programming

Yet Another Perl Conference - Canada 140

Posted by michael from the canada-oh-canada dept.
minaguib writes "For anyone interested in Perl, Yet Another Perl Conference is coming to Ottawa, Canada May 15th and 16th. Pre-Registration is now open and the calendar is not completely finalized, as they are still accepting presenter entries. This is a great way to get involved either as a presenter or an attendee."
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Yet Another Perl Conference - Canada More

Yet Another Perl Conference - Canada

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  • not only is something fun finally coming to my little ol' town, but its coming to my univeristy too :D
  • Sure lot's of Perl programmers have time on their hands but:
    How many people can afford the travel expenses during a depression?

  • YAPAYAPC (Score:1, Redundant)

    by dj28 ( 212815 )
    Yet another post about yet another perl conference.

  • What is it good for? (Score:2, Informative)

    by t0ny ( 590331 )
    A few years ago I was interested in learning Perl. However, job requirements took me another way, and I ended up going thru KiXtart, INF files, Active Directory, and a whole lot of other things.

    My question, however, is what are the strengths of Perl? And is it well suited for manipulating information in a database?

    • PERL is AMAZINGLY well suited for string manipulation and fast up and running programs.

      Much of genetics sequencing (the small chunks) and Wall Street uses PERL to parse their data (RegExp!!).

      However, the main backbone is still often C because it's just simply the fastest.

    • Re:What is it good for? (Score:3, Informative)

      by dodobh ( 65811 )
      Perl's greatest strengths are in text manipulation.
      Perl has some fantastic regex support.
      www.cpan.org [Central Perl Archive Network] has Perl modules for almost everything you need it for.
      To talk to a SQL handling RDBMS,
      perl -MCPAN -e 'install DBI'
      perl -MCPAN -e 'install DBD::DBtype'

      DBI is like ODBC, a wrapper over DBMS specific drivers.

      If you want to talk to a Directory server, install Net::LDAP.

      Perl greatest strength is its flexibility, and tis weakness as well. It takes some effort to write good code in Perl, because it is so easy to write very bad unmaintainable Perl code. You need to discipline yourself when writing Perl.
      • It takes some effort to write good code in Perl, because it is so easy to write very bad unmaintainable Perl code. You need to discipline yourself when writing Perl.
        On the other hand, if you're writing in a *real* language like Python or Java, bug-free, easily maintainable code flows out of your finger tips like bullshit from the white house.
        • Not really. I have seen good C code, good Perl code, unmaintainable Java code, bad Python code.
          It finally depends on the quality of the programming team, which designs and implements the program.
          I am an administrator primarily, with enough knowledge of code to know buggy programs.
          Writing code is easy, writing good code is hard.

          I prefer to learn more than one language, and use the right tool for the right job.
          I have no desire to implement graphics in C, or high performance on low memory systems in Java.

          Perl is great for text processing, for database work, but not for numeric manipulation.
          IDEs are nice for doing user interfaces (unless the user is a poweruser/admin, in which case, shell access has to be available for piping data around.)

          Finally, it boils down to the right tool for the right job, and one language does not fit all requirements.
          And programmer discipline is always needed for good code.
          • Not really.
            Right. And just to make myself perfectly clear, that was saracasm.

            I didn't mean to imply that your summary of perl's strength/weaknesses was a bad job. For one thing, you point out that it is indeed possible to use discipline in developing perl code, something that many of it's detractors seem to miss.

            And as for that "right tool for the job" philsophy, that's another cliche I'm a little tired of, though I don't know that I really want to get into it... briefly there is no "right tool": e.g. your opinion that perl isn't the best for numeric work probably has some technical merits, but if you've got a shop full of perl programmers, and it turns out you need to do some numeric crunching, the "right thing to do" might be to use the "wrong" tool.

            • My apologies for missing the sarcasm. Too many people are dead serious when they speak about the one true language.
              As for the right tool, TMTOWTDI :P
              Use the tool you know works. I would rather that programmers know more than one language, and the strengths and weaknesses o the language.
              Just because you can do everything in sendmail.cf macros, does not mean you should. Different languages exist for a reason, and the developer should be able to judge what best fits the situation.
    • Perl's DBI module allows to connect to different databases directly (as in SQL queries). I know that ODBC is supported, but I haven't used it.

      Perl is amazingly fast for text manipulation - both in development and execution time. To me, the strengths are ease of development (obviously), and the availability of a whole spectrum of modules that run natively.

  • What can I say - the above title is clearly needed and has a fantastic sales oppotunity waiting several times a year.
  • Shoot. How the hell do we all get to Canada and back when half of all Perl developer population are on green cards. God dam mother----s!
  • in London, Ontario, Canada that I can afford? MacWorld London anyone?
    • London is a very interesting place. I did a year of my degree at Western, and was back there last year too for a holiday/catchup.

      Ironically, I also learnt Perl while living in Sydenham Hall using a book from the Taylor Library ;)
    • Well, as the duely elected leader of London Perl Mongers...Oh, wait, wrong London...let's try that again ;-)

      I remember people were saying that about London UK not so many years ago. That was back in 2000. Then my fellow London.pm members got their act together and organised one! And that was YAPC::Europe, and the rest is history as they like to say.

      Of course, they got help from YAS [yetanother.org]. YAS is Yet Another Society designed to help people, amongst other things, set up their own conferences.

      So, if there's no conference near you...why not try and hold your own? From what I saw, it wasn't easy, but everyone I know that was involved had a hell of a lot of fun.

  • Void marketing scheme? (Score:5, Interesting)

    by tedhiltonhead ( 654502 ) on Sunday March 09, 2003 @12:20AM (#5470024)
    I smell a marketing scheme. According to yapc.ca, the only scheduled training sessions are from employees of ExitCertified, an IT training company. Conveniently, ExitCertified is also in Ottawa [exitcertified.com]. Further, why would I fly to a conference where they're still looking for speakers *two months* out? All they have are "Dick Hardt, founder of ActiveState" and two ExitCertified guys. If you want a truly amazing training/networking/fun experience, try a GeekCruise [geekcruises.com]. I went on Linux Lunacy II in the Caribbean and hung out with Linus, Guido van Roosum (sp; invented Python), and Eric S. Raymond.
    • Man you need to get out more. When you consider a vacation to be a cruise with more geeks there's something really wrong.
    • The next GeekCruise goes to Hawaii, and one of the listed attractions is "Pearl Harbor". I'm not kidding ;-).
    • The Geek Cruises certainly are great, I haven't gone on any but the list of luminaries that give presentations are impressive, and I've heard good things [macdevcenter.com] about them. Is the Ottawa YAPC turning into a marketing scheme at all? ExitCertified has been quite active & helpful for not only the local PerlMongers [pm.org] group, but also the Ottawa Unix Users' Group (OCUUG [ocuug.on.ca]); as you'll notice from their Meetings page, they're actually held every month at ExitCertified. There's also substantial cross-pollination between ExitCertified people, the Ottawa Capital Linux Users' Group (OCLUG [oclug.on.ca] which hold monthly meetings just around the corner from ExitCertified, hmmm...), as well as PMs and some of the same suspicious characters can be seen at the Macintosh User's Group of Ottawa (MUGOO [mugoo.com]) (ahem, Jay et al)

      These nefarious groups indeed seem to be as thick as theives. But if a firm like ExitCertified is devoting their time, office space, and personnel to so much in the local OSS/programming communities, haven't they earned the respect of our community? Just because they're an active company dosen't mean they're all bad. I wouldn't worry about the vacancies either; speakers were still being lined up for the local Open Source Weekend/Business Of Open Source Conference (BOSS) held a few weeks ago in the city and look who showed up [www.osw.ca].
  • While all of you perl developers are here in the great white north, why not enjoy some of famous beer, and have a quick chance to check out our famous igloos, and our great Parliment buildings made of ice( Like your white house eccept ours doesn't need to be painted, it get painted daily by Mr. Winter)

  • Wait a second... (Score:4, Funny)

    by Akardam ( 186995 ) on Sunday March 09, 2003 @12:27AM (#5470043)
    Canada is a Perl conference?

    That would explain so many things on so many levels.

    I wonder what the Perl syntax for "... eh?" is...
    • I know!

      "eh?" is the official pronunciation of the ";" character.

    • Re:Wait a second... (Score:4, Funny)

      by jdkincad ( 576359 ) <insane.cellist@gmail.com> on Sunday March 09, 2003 @02:04AM (#5470323)
      I wonder what the Perl syntax for "... eh?" is...

      I don't actually know Perl, but my guess would be @#!$&^%eh!@#$@$*&
    • I wonder what the Perl syntax for "... eh?" is..

      There is no such word as _the_ in Perl. TMOWTDI.

    • I nominate '... or die;'.

      open(FH, 'file') or die;
      print FH "test\n" or die;
      close FH or die;

      This code is much simpler in a language (like Python) that throws an exception when something goes wrong rather expecting you to remember to check the return value every single time.

      (Yeah yeah I know the quotation: 'failing to open a file is hardly exceptional'. I submit that what's truly exceptional is the time when you don't want to throw an error on opening a file but instead handle the problem at the same level. It's that less common case that should require extra code, not the more common case of 'if the file couldn't be opened, throw an exception and let the caller handle it if he wants'.)


  • You must see me eat a donut. It's remarkable.

    Click the link below.

  • Did we forget about the florida one? (Score:4, Informative)

    by Anonymous Coward on Sunday March 09, 2003 @01:29AM (#5470224)
    YAPC is also coming to Boca Raton, Florida. Hopeful speakers should volunteer their time for lightning talks and general speech topics soon!

    http://www.yapc.org/America/venue.shtml

    They didn't list it on the "Seeing Boca Raton" section, but there are other things to do in the Boca area, such FLUX (Florida Linux Users eXchange - http://www.flux.org/) and the 2600 meeting (not to mention Sawgrass Mills Mall which is an attraction all it's own - just come on a friday night).
  • All you Americans can attend "half price" because of our sagging currency/exchange rate, while us "Canadians" can't afford to buy lunch there let alone travel.

    Yo Grark
    Canadian Bred with American Buttering

    • Re:Quit Bitchin (Score:3, Informative)

      by RobinH ( 124750 )
      All you Americans can attend "half price" because of our sagging currency/exchange rate, while us "Canadians" can't afford to buy lunch there let alone travel.

      You haven't been watching the exchange rate recently, have you? 12 months ago, 1 U.S. dollar was worth $1.60 Canadian, but my last exchange occurred at the rate of $1.47, and the U.S. dollar is still dropping in value.

      Whoever is in charge of the dollar policy in the U.S. recently changed. The previous guy was an advocate of a strong U.S. dollar (I'm not sure why), but the new guy realizes that was hurting U.S. exports, so you can expect the rate to settle somewhere around $1.35 to $1.40 after the dust settles. That would at least bring it inline with purchasing power on both sides of the border.

      It will also bring comparative salaries more inline on both sides, so it might slow down the "brain drain" of Canadian talent to the U.S.

  • Perl shmerl (Score:1, Flamebait)

    by houseofmore ( 313324 )
    Time to let go [fingers.co.za]

  • Whew! (Score:3, Funny)

    by Lord_Slepnir ( 585350 ) on Sunday March 09, 2003 @01:57AM (#5470303) Journal
    This is a great way to get involved either as a presenter or an attendee.

    And I was going to go as a sharpshooter on the roof, but this is an even better idea!

  • Perl in Canada (Score:3, Funny)

    by RealBeanDip ( 26604 ) on Sunday March 09, 2003 @10:26AM (#5471065)
    perl -eh 'print "pass the poutine\n"'

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