Hi Kishor, On Sun, Jul 25, 2010 at 10:49 PM, P Kishor <[email protected]> wrote: > Padre is an IDE. It works and can work on its own. Its job is to > create programs, not run them. Personally, I don't use Padre. I don't > (yet) like it. So, I can live without it, and still have PDL. PDL, for > me, is part of a bigger plan, a larger work flow and project. It would > be very difficult, confusing, perhaps insanely difficult to use one > installation of Perl for part of the work and another installation of > Perl for PDL related work. > > In fact, Perl is such an integral part of the system that I want to > leave the system Perl alone. That is why, I have my own custom Perl > where I personally install everything I want to, and that includes > PDL.
I have no doubt whatsoever that for an existing Perl user, a traditional module that integrates with your existing installation is best. I realize that. Existing Perl users are not the target audience for my post. You are not the target audience. The target audience I'm talking about is a Matlab user who wants a stand-alone program with an IDE that is easy to install and doesn't require going very deeply into Perl to get going. For this user, the module-only PDL represents a significant barrier to adoption. > However, PDL's strength is that it is *not* a > standalone program. Instead, it is built using Perl, so you can do > everything with Perl, and do PDL things with PDL. It would be foolish to make this strength also be a weakness. It doesn't have to be. There is no reason to have a high barrier of adoption by requiring the user to mess with Perl and CPAN before they can even *try* PDL on their computer. It is much more reasonable to give the non-Perl user an easy to setup standalone program. If they like it, and they want to go deeply into Perl, they can. >> This is a slight tangent, but I actually side with those people. If >> you choose to base your software on an unreliable platform, you are >> responsible for that choice. > > Not really. PDL is not based on PGPLOT or PLplot. PDL will work just > fine without them. You need those modules *only* if you want to use > them. I see it differently. If I buy a car and the radio doesn't work because the manufacturer got the radio from a company that they knew was unreliable, I blame the manufacturer. If the car dealership told me that it's not their fault because they didn't build the radio, I'd be tempted to punch the guy in the stomach. You cannot make parts of your functionality depend on stuff that you know to be unreliable, and then claim to have no blame when those parts don't work. If you choose to make PDL's plotting abilities depend on an unreliable plotting library, you are responsible for that choice and you can't wash your hands by pointing the finger at the library. Daniel. -- Intolerant people should be shot. _______________________________________________ Perldl mailing list [email protected] http://mailman.jach.hawaii.edu/mailman/listinfo/perldl
