Ed Grimm wrote:
Incidentally, another stratigic issue that is looming over the Perl
horizon causing some people to look elsewhere is Perl 6. While it is
supposed to be a good thing, there's enough issues surrounding backwards
compatibility (it'll be there, sometime. But my impression is, this is
the big bit that is holding up release.) that several people I know have
stated they don't feel safe in investing time learning Perl right now.
Long term, I don't believe Perl has a big problem. Short term, however,
is another matter.
That's a very good point, but I would go further and posit that it *is* harmful long term. I am
feeling that any technology needs younger programmers to be buying into it, if it is to survive long
term. Otherwise it is living on borrowed time, because all those existing, experienced programmers
will eventually retire. Of course you can always say that experienced programmers influence younger
programmers and determine how projects are implemented, but that is swimming in smaller and smaller
pools, and you cannot overestimate the "perception" effect. If younger programmers aren't drawn to
the tool, then it will have a limited life.
Perl 6 looks to me like a huge white elephant. It may work, eventually. In fact, when it does, it
may be a beautiful, finely crafted virtual machine (Parrot?) that can run multiple languages with
aplomb. However, it will likely do all this to a largely empty room - everyone will have left
already to go do stuff using other languages such as Ruby. The big bet is that people will use
things like Ruby under Parrot. Maybe, maybe not. Don't know yet. All I know is that right now, my
experience (and resume) seems to be getting more and more marginalized. The geeks in charge seem to
have rewrite mania, with no regard for the huge pre-existing user base that is left wondering where
to turn while the new version is getting stable. Do you use the old version, which is, well, old? Or
do you use the new version, which doesn't really work yet? Over the last few years, people started
using this stuff for *real* projects, which have *real* users. It's not just for hobby use any more.
I certainly don't want to put this experimental code on my production server.
The reason Microsoft was so successful with Windows 3.1 and Windows 95 was that MS went to great
lengths to make them able to run earlier DOS programs. They even went so far as to "fake" some
memory quirks that some popular programs happened to depend on. Nowadays, Microsoft appears to have
lost that attitude (see: .NET, Longhorn), and I feel like the Open Source crowd is doing the same.
It doesn't matter how many people were using the old version, this new version is "better" and
that's all that matters, right? That's a supremely geeky, insulated, closed attitude that ignores
the real users, and risks alienating people wholesale.
I thought that learning Open Source technologies would be safer than going the proprietary route
(read: MS Windows), since nobody could force me to upgrade. The community is in charge, right?
Wrong. The developers in charge of the projects are in charge. If they decide to stop developing the
old version and focus instead on an incompatible new version, then what can we do? Nothing much,
unless you want to take the fantasy route and fork all these projects yourself. There does in fact
seem to be just as much pressure to upgrade from the Open Source projects, since apparently I now
have to abandon the old, reliable, tried and tested versions (apache 1.3, mod_perl 1.x) for new,
completely rewritten, untested and buggy versions if I want to continue developing the same project
that I started a few years back. It grates on me how I trusted these projects, they told me that
nobody could force me to upgrade, but there is now this attitude of "just upgrade, it's no big deal,
and the old code isn't being developed any more so you don't want to get left behind do you?"... how
is this any different from Microsoft saying that you have to upgrade or else they will stop
supporting you? I feel like I invested a lot of time learning about some stuff, and I apparently now
have to spend a whole bunch more time re-learning new APIs for the same tools, just because somebody
thought it would be cool to rewrite everything to "get it right this time". I guess I thought that
Open Source would be more stable than that.
/Neil
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