On Mon, Sep 25, 2000 at 09:18:40AM -0500, Jonathan Scott Duff wrote:
> On Mon, Sep 25, 2000 at 06:02:51AM -0000, Perl6 RFC Librarian wrote:
> > =head1 ABSTRACT
> >
> > File tests (-r/-w/-x/...) made sense when Perl's shellness was an
> > attribute. Most new Perl programmers are not coming from a shell
> > programming background, and the -X syntax is opaque and bizarre.
> > It should be removed.
>
> No! Gratuituous removal of syntax is anti-Perl. Perl is about
> providing options, not taking them away.
Well, at least I succeeded in generating fruitful discussion. :-)
Making '@permissions = -rwx $filename;' work is an interesting new
suggestion.
Of course, I should say that I've been hanging out with some
snake-hearders recently. I'll revise the RFC to add
'readable()', 'writable()', and such synonyms for -r and -w that
are more like 'use english' and less like 'use English'.
Z.
