Well, I've gone and done it now. I work as a security adminisrtator at a small NIH sub-organization. I've been a fairly passionate perl programmer since 1999. I got my share of "stop reinventing the wheel" from Randal on Perlmonks, and I've amassed a collection of O'Reilly books on perl that I actually _read_. I've digested Perl Best Practices and use it as a guideline for my coding practices. I also wrote a few articles for developer.com (which thanks to brian d. foy's "So you want to write about Perl" YAPC presentation I learned was not the best sort of deal).
Using PBP and my personal experiences with the community I constructed a "Perl Introduction for ISSO's (Information System's Security Officers)" at NIH. The presentation went _really_ well. I have the course materials available online at: http://divisionbyzero.net/blog/perl-isso-class/ It was supposed to be a one time deal to get other NIH Security Staff interested in hiring perl programmers so I'd have people to talk to. However, the class was well received and thanks to things like BioPerl, NIH wants me back to o a full day "hands on programming perl class" with a target audience of systems, network, and security admins with some programming background. Most of the people on this list making their living teaching perl and I'm not interested in competing. I'm interested in wetting people's appetites for Perl. I'd gladly include contact information for anyone on this list as "further instruction can be provided by these great people" on the slides and printouts. My motivation is to give back to the community, who are entirely responsible for my inability to not type "use strict;\nuse warnings;\n" after typing "#!/usr/bin/perl". I also have been giving consideration to putting together a presentation for a YAPC or other perl conference, only being a dork, I need to work on my "comfort level in front of a large group of people". Is there any advice for what my expectations of material coverage will be for a 9-4 class ? My first class was an overview. I didn't actually have any coding exercises, which I'd like to have in this new class. I'd be eternally grateful for any advice or sample material that would save me some time preparing the class. I'm not getting paid for the class besides the fact that my boss considers the time spent preparing and instructing "work time". I'm not asking for anyone "to do my homework". I'm just asking for any "helpful" advice the veterans would be willing to bestow on a fledgling perl trainer? -- Brad Lhotsky
