Re: One liner

[Philip Newton]

Jonathan Peterson wrote:
> Probably all you people who program for a living think this is 
> [crap/obvious/can be done in 3 bytes] but I liked it:
> 
> $|++; print qw(\ | / -)[$i%4]."\r"; $|--;
> 
> Put a spinning progress thing in your loops...

Hm, if you knew autoflushing was turned off before you started, you could
replace the "$|++" with "$|--" for nice symmetry, and watch people's minds
go wonky as they try to figure out why you're only decrementing. (The more
enterprising amongst the audience might have a look in the source).

--$|-as-toggle was something I learned from Abigail, I think. Offered
without explanation, of course.

Cheers,
Philip
-- 
Philip Newton <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>
All opinions are my own, not my employer's.
If you're not part of the solution, you're part of the precipitate.

One liner

[Jonathan Peterson]

Probably all you people who program for a living think this is 
[crap/obvious/can be done in 3 bytes] but I liked it:

$|++; print qw(\ | / -)[$i%4]."\r"; $|--;

Put a spinning progress thing in your loops...



-- 
Jonathan Peterson
Technical Manager, Unified Ltd, 020 7383 6092
[EMAIL PROTECTED]

Re: one liner

[Tony Bowden]

On Mon, Jan 08, 2001 at 07:38:04PM +, Dave Cross wrote:
> > Oh, and Amazon.com have the Learning Tk book at 90% off at the minute
> > if anyone's interested ..
> That'll explain the increase in sales that Nat noted the other day then :)

Well, I expected one of their "Oops, we made a pricing error, so we can't
sell you the large quantity of the book you requested, but hey, we're nice
people, so we'll let you have one of them cheap instead" emails.

But they claim to have shipped them all. At 90% off. Which I like.

Tony
-- 
-
 Tony Bowden | Belfast, NI | [EMAIL PROTECTED] | www.tmtm.com | www.blackstar.co.uk
the woods are lovely, dark, and deep, but I have promises to keep
-

Re: one liner

[Michael Stevens]

On Thu, Jan 11, 2001 at 12:24:59PM +, Shevek wrote:
> On Mon, 8 Jan 2001, Michael Stevens wrote:
> 
> > I'm sure there are reasonable number of online manuals we'd all like
> > printed copies of.
> > 
> > Maybe we should see about costs for getting some of them printed fairly
> > nicely and bound.
> 
> I think the uni offers such a service here.

What about us poor, benighted souls who aren't at a uni? :)

Re: one liner

[Shevek]

On Mon, 8 Jan 2001, Michael Stevens wrote:

> I'm sure there are reasonable number of online manuals we'd all like
> printed copies of.
> 
> Maybe we should see about costs for getting some of them printed fairly
> nicely and bound.

I think the uni offers such a service here.

--
Shevek
I am the Borg.
sub AUTOLOAD { ($s=$AUTOLOAD)=~s/.*:://; eval qq{ *$AUTOLOAD=$s
?sub {$s*&{$s-1}} :sub {1}; }; goto &$AUTOLOAD; } print &{'4'}; 

Re: one liner

[Dave Cross]

On Mon, Jan 08, 2001 at 07:22:31PM +, Tony Bowden ([EMAIL PROTECTED]) 
wrote:
> On Mon, Jan 08, 2001 at 10:14:59AM -0700, Nathan Torkington wrote:
> > We also have another Perl/Tk book coming out.  It's more advanced than
> > "Learning ..." and, we hope, learns from the criticism levelled at
> > that book.  In particular, look for examples.
> 
> Oh, and Amazon.com have the Learning Tk book at 90% off at the minute
> if anyone's interested ..

That'll explain the increase in sales that Nat noted the other day then :)

Dave...

-- 
http://www.dave.org.uk | [EMAIL PROTECTED] | [EMAIL PROTECTED]

Data Munging with Perl

Re: one liner

[Tony Bowden]

On Mon, Jan 08, 2001 at 10:14:59AM -0700, Nathan Torkington wrote:
> We also have another Perl/Tk book coming out.  It's more advanced than
> "Learning ..." and, we hope, learns from the criticism levelled at
> that book.  In particular, look for examples.

Oh, and Amazon.com have the Learning Tk book at 90% off at the minute
if anyone's interested ..

Tony
-- 
-
 Tony Bowden | Belfast, NI | [EMAIL PROTECTED] | www.tmtm.com | www.blackstar.co.uk
 girlboys may nothing more than boygirls need
-

Re: one liner

[David H. Adler]

On Mon, Jan 08, 2001 at 04:44:53PM +, Greg McCarroll wrote:

[re: ORA]

> yip they have the pretty cover animals as well ;-)

I would just like to point out at this juncture that monkeys are
funny.

cheers,

dha

-- 
David H. Adler - <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> - http://www.panix.com/~dha/
Perl should only be studied as a second language.  A good first
language would be English. - Larry Wall

Re: one liner

[Nathan Torkington]

I wrote:
> I'm shit-scared of talking about books in progress, in case I jinx
> them.

We also have another Perl/Tk book coming out.  It's more advanced than
"Learning ..." and, we hope, learns from the criticism levelled at
that book.  In particular, look for examples.

Nat

Print on Demand (Re: one liner)

[Andy Wardley]

On Jan 8,  8:25am, Nathan Torkington wrote:
> Yeah, but if O'Reilly were to print them, you'd complain that the
> book was nothing more than the online manual :-)

Hmmm.  I can see it working if you take a slightly different
perspective on it.

Let's say O'Reilly acts as a content provider.  In addition to their
existing role as a regular book publisher, they also collect and edit
content in the form of FAQs, manuals, other documentation, etc.  They
make it freely available online for those who want it.  This would be
all the content that isn't up to scratch, complete or unique enough to
warrant publishing as a regular book.

Joe Random Hacker browses online, finds something he likes, and clicks
twice to order it (one click being a patent infringement, of course :-)
Content gets sent to his local print centre (something like an existing
copy bureaux, run by a company like, oh, I don't know, someone like Canon
perhaps?) where it gets printed, bound and posted for next day delivery.

For an extra charge a guy on a Moped would risk life and limb dodging
London taxis to get it on his desk within the hour.  Do you want fries
with that?

The author, publisher and printer all get a cut of the profit.  Rinse and
repeat.

I should add that this isn't a new idea.  POD[1] has been floating around
Canon for a while (oops, I hope I'm not broadcasting company secrets, oh
well :-) but no-one's been sufficiently interested to do anything about
it as far as I know.  Most probably because they haven't figured out where
the content would come from.  But with the right partnership(s) between
authors/publishers/printers, the idea might fly.


A

[1] that's Printing On Demand, not Plain Old Documentation.

-- 
Andy Wardley <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>   Signature regenerating.  Please remain seated.
 <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>   For a good time: http://www.kfs.org/~abw/

Re: one liner

[Greg McCarroll]

* Michael Stevens ([EMAIL PROTECTED]) wrote:
> On Mon, Jan 08, 2001 at 08:25:54AM -0700, Nathan Torkington wrote:
> > Michael Stevens writes:
> > > I'm sure there are reasonable number of online manuals we'd all like
> > > printed copies of.
> > Yeah, but if O'Reilly were to print them, you'd complain that the
> > book was nothing more than the online manual :-)
> 
> Yes, but that's because you have such a good reputation for delivering
> *more* than the online manual!
> 

yip they have the pretty cover animals as well ;-)

-- 
Greg McCarroll  http://www.mccarroll.uklinux.net

Re: one liner

[Michael Stevens]

On Mon, Jan 08, 2001 at 08:25:54AM -0700, Nathan Torkington wrote:
> Michael Stevens writes:
> > I'm sure there are reasonable number of online manuals we'd all like
> > printed copies of.
> Yeah, but if O'Reilly were to print them, you'd complain that the
> book was nothing more than the online manual :-)

Yes, but that's because you have such a good reputation for delivering
*more* than the online manual!

Michael

Re: one liner

[Nathan Torkington]

Michael Stevens writes:
> I'm sure there are reasonable number of online manuals we'd all like
> printed copies of.

Yeah, but if O'Reilly were to print them, you'd complain that the
book was nothing more than the online manual :-)

Nat

Re: one liner

[Redvers Davies]

> Tk.  Seems a lot more simple that Java or GTK stuff to do.  Sure, infinite
> themeability is all very nice and all, but most of the time I just want to
> do something really quickly.

One of the reasons that I use Gtk and not Tk (or glade for that matter)
is that some of my applications require re-parenting and recreation
of widgets.

Tk doesn't feel OO enough for me to be happy.  To create one widget you
execute a method on its parent.  I'm not really comfortable with that
model.

Glade is really really sweet and really really good for simple Gtk apps.
When you need to do something a bit cleverer and need to reparent widgets
or get to the guts it can't offer the same flexibility as working direct
in code.

I do use Glade extensivly[sp] for prototyping my X applications and using
it to design my widget packing.

Red

Re: one liner

[Redvers Davies]

> What is missing is a nice GUI drawing program like VB that writes out
> perl code GUI's and calls perl code for events. Activestate's work on

glade

Re: one liner

[Mark Fowler]

> I have to say "where do I sign" on this one. I would really like to
> purchase this book :)

I printed out the mod_perl guide and it killed a tree.  It took me an
afternoon to get it all printed out correctly (mostly because I was doing
it double sided, was to thick to work which way up the pages should go in
the printer, and it was just post-xmas) and bound.

It's about 12cm (That's like, 3inches ish) thick, including bindings.

No I leave it up to you to decide just how much I would have paid for
something to be produced for me and with just a few clicks of the mouse a
purchase to be made and it to arrive on my desks a few days later...

Later.  

Mark.

-- 
print "\n",map{my$a="\n"if(length$_>6);' 'x(36-length($_)/2)."$_\n$a"} (
   Name  => 'Mark Fowler',Title => 'Technology Developer'  ,
   Firm  => 'Profero Ltd',Web   => 'http://www.profero.com/'   ,
   Email => '[EMAIL PROTECTED]',   Phone => '+44 (0) 20 7700 9960'  )

Re: one liner

[Michael Stevens]

On Mon, Jan 08, 2001 at 10:43:06AM +, Mark Fowler wrote:
> I printed out the mod_perl guide and it killed a tree.  It took me an
> afternoon to get it all printed out correctly (mostly because I was doing
> it double sided, was to thick to work which way up the pages should go in
> the printer, and it was just post-xmas) and bound.
> 
> It's about 12cm (That's like, 3inches ish) thick, including bindings.
> 
> No I leave it up to you to decide just how much I would have paid for
> something to be produced for me and with just a few clicks of the mouse a
> purchase to be made and it to arrive on my desks a few days later...

I'm sure there are reasonable number of online manuals we'd all like
printed copies of.

Maybe we should see about costs for getting some of them printed fairly
nicely and bound.

Michael

Re: one liner

[Michael Stevens]

On Sun, Jan 07, 2001 at 10:58:33PM -0700, Nathan Torkington wrote:
> Beyond that, we have a mod_perl book by Stas and Eric coming along.
> It's going to be enormous.  I'm in awe of the amount of writing
> they've done on it.  Stas and Eric are pretty well known by their
> writing (look for Stas's mod_perl columns in apacheweek), talks, and
> tutorials.  They know their stuff.

I have to say "where do I sign" on this one. I would really like to
purchase this book :)

(Writing apache modules with perl and C is excellent, another at or
above that level would be superb)

Michael

Re: one liner

[Piers Cawley]

Greg McCarroll <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> writes:
> of course you need a name, I personally like Rope - its
> a play on Zope and it conveys the idea that the rope is strong
> because it has many strands within it

And you get the opportunity to do SOAP on Rope jokes when someone adds
that functionality to it...

-- 
Piers

Re: one liner

[Nathan Torkington]

Dean S Wilson writes:
> Uncross those fingers. ;) Since your in the know what perl books are
> forthcoming? Anything on Perl XML?

I'm shit-scared of talking about books in progress, in case I jinx
them.  I can say that Tom and I have begun talking about a second
edition of the Cookbook.  I've got my eyes on XML, Tk, Gtk, mod_perl,
and XS as topics we should cover more.  I'm very open to your
suggestions for recipes or sections to add, delete, or fix.

Beyond that, we have a mod_perl book by Stas and Eric coming along.
It's going to be enormous.  I'm in awe of the amount of writing
they've done on it.  Stas and Eric are pretty well known by their
writing (look for Stas's mod_perl columns in apacheweek), talks, and
tutorials.  They know their stuff.

XML is obviously a topic we need to cover, and we're working on it.
We had a few false starts with authors, so I don't want to say too
much in case it fizzes again.  One thing you learn quickly in the book
biz is that as many, if not more, books fizzle than ever make it onto
shelves.  I don't carry rabbits' feet with me for luck, but some days
I think about it.

Your suggestions for books are, as always, welcome.  Actual
manuscripts are, of course, even more welcome :-)

> Your probably right, i would have prefered something with a higher
> emphasis on hands on. I'm curious as to how you view the book though,
> to me it is an OK reference. Its not a tutorial or an intorduction and
> it's not really for advanced principles. I lumped it in as a reference
> as that was what i thought it was best at.

I learned tcl/tk at Uni, in 1992 or so, and so I knew the
fundamentals.  What bugged me was that I couldn't find anything
definitive on how it worked in Perl.  I might have been playing with
Perl/Tk before the webpages were written, or maybe I'm just a lousy
web searcher, but I definitely felt information pain that the book
helped to alleviate.

> Building Linux
> Clusters which was a waste of paper but i was contacted by someone at
> ORA over my views on that and i was satisfied by their responce (They
> saw my comments on (void). Beware ORA agents are everywhere! :))

Yeah, not our most glorious moment.  *sigh*  That's the trouble with
having such a great reputation for books ... any slipups and they're
*really* noticed.  You can bet that if SAMS published a shit book,
nobody would notice.  Some say this has already happened :-)

> Good question, I can't see it either. And they seem to have dropped
> the "Perl Tools" book.

Like I said, it's a long road from idea to a printed book.  Sometimes
authors lose interest, sometimes they have babies, move, divorce, burn
out, or something else intrudes that prevents them from finishing.
Sometimes the publisher messes up and drives an author away.  Just be
thankful for the books that do, miraculously, make it through this
minefield.

Nat

Re: one liner

[David H. Adler]

On Sun, Jan 07, 2001 at 05:46:35PM -, Dean S Wilson wrote:
> -Original Message-
> From: Nathan Torkington <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>

> >The TPJ that's stalled at the printers has a fantuckingfastic article
> >on getting started with Glade and Perl/Gtk.
> 
> 
> I now hate you.

It took *this* long???  Nat, you're slipping... :-)

dha

-- 
David H. Adler - <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> - http://www.panix.com/~dha/
My theory is that his ignorance clouded his poor judgement.
- Alice, in Dilbert's office

Re: one liner

[David H. Adler]

On Sun, Jan 07, 2001 at 10:18:14AM -, Robert Shiels wrote:
> 
> Once the unwashed masses know the word perl, that's half the battle won.

Presumably, the other half is when we get them to bathe?

:-)

-- 
David H. Adler - <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> - http://www.panix.com/~dha/
Learned?  You must be crazy.  Do you think I could play as badly as
this if I had had lessons?  - Patrick Troughton

Re: one liner

[Greg McCarroll]

* Robert Shiels ([EMAIL PROTECTED]) wrote:
> 
> Visibility is the key, how many of your clueless cowworkers have heard of
> Visual Basic, or Visual C++, but couldn't even tell the difference between
> them let alone use them. I've never met a non-programmer who has heard of
> Perl.
> 
> Maybe we need major websites (Blackstar!) to display "Powered by Perl"
> logos, or mention perl in their weekly email to subscribers. The Damian
> Conway funding story is certainly newsworthy, has anyone aproached a TV
> station to make a documentary about his year.
> 
> Once the unwashed masses know the word perl, that's half the battle won.
> 

yup, this was pretty much what was going on in the back of my brain, but
i tried to disguise it with the one liner to see what people thought.

i get the feeling perl needs to better sold and not just the language,
CPAN or the user groups

it needs perl certification and online open training in best practices 

maybe CD images that contain things like the apache/mod_perl/other stuff 
application server that was discussed or some form of perl install with a 
basic IDE using emacs and some of the visual debuggers

i know this is old ground and its all been said before in n different
forums, but i've just got it rammed up my ass at the minute (i just
made up that expression, don't ask me to explain it) 

has www.pdn.org gone yet? (perl developer network), yup of course it
has ... sigh

-- greg

-- 
Greg McCarroll  http://www.mccarroll.uklinux.net

Re: one liner

[Greg McCarroll]

* Robert Shiels ([EMAIL PROTECTED]) wrote:
> > -Original Message-
> > From: Michael Stevens <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>
> >
> >
> > Greg are you trolling? If so let me play ;)
> >

Of course, trolling is the game the whole family can enjoy! Later
on I think I might start a rant about how Perl will only be sucessful
because Microsoft shall ensure all languages that meet their qualifying
condition of not being Java are invested in to decrease the dominance
of Java.

-- greg

-- 
Greg McCarroll  http://www.mccarroll.uklinux.net

Re: one liner

[Robert Shiels]

> -Original Message-
> From: Michael Stevens <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>
>
>
> Greg are you trolling? If so let me play ;)
>
> >> the only thing that gives potential for the marketing of a language
> is the
> >> projects that are achieved using it and java has a hell of a lot
> more cool
> >> projects than perl
>
 How many netusers see the powered by python
> logo on mailman each day? Whats our answer to that? Slashcode?
>

Visibility is the key, how many of your clueless cowworkers have heard of
Visual Basic, or Visual C++, but couldn't even tell the difference between
them let alone use them. I've never met a non-programmer who has heard of
Perl.

Maybe we need major websites (Blackstar!) to display "Powered by Perl"
logos, or mention perl in their weekly email to subscribers. The Damian
Conway funding story is certainly newsworthy, has anyone aproached a TV
station to make a documentary about his year.

Once the unwashed masses know the word perl, that's half the battle won.

/Robert

Re: one liner

[Dave Cross]

On Sun, Jan 07, 2001 at 08:02:14PM +, jo walsh ([EMAIL PROTECTED]) wrote:
> > 
> > of course you need a name, I personally like Rope - its
> > a play on Zope and it conveys the idea that the rope is strong
> > because it has many strands within it
> 
> how about 'Pope' because it is infallible?

This _must_ happen :)

Dave...

-- 
http://www.dave.org.uk | [EMAIL PROTECTED] | [EMAIL PROTECTED]

Data Munging with Perl

Re: one liner

[Greg McCarroll]

* jo walsh ([EMAIL PROTECTED]) wrote:
> 
> how about 'Pope' because it is infallible?
> 

or because it doesn't go down ;-)

-- 
Greg McCarroll  http://www.mccarroll.uklinux.net

Re: one liner

[Dean S Wilson]

-Original Message-
From: Greg McCarroll <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>


>* Aaron Trevena ([EMAIL PROTECTED]) wrote:
>> I was wondering how hard it would be to put together a mini
Application
>> server toolkit.


Hows this for a starting point?
http://www.apachetoolbox.com/

He has porting it to perl as a future plan... Maybe with London PM's
help?

> of course you need a name, I personally like Rope - its

Yeah "We give you enough software to hang yourself" :)

Dean
--
Profanity is the one language all programmers understand.
   ---  Anon

Re: one liner

[jo walsh]

> 
> of course you need a name, I personally like Rope - its
> a play on Zope and it conveys the idea that the rope is strong
> because it has many strands within it

how about 'Pope' because it is infallible?

jo

Re: one liner

[Greg McCarroll]

* Aaron Trevena ([EMAIL PROTECTED]) wrote:
> 
> I was wondering how hard it would be to put together a mini Application
> server toolkit.
> 

i think this is a wondeful idea and it ties into what dave hodgkinson
was talking about before about the mod_perl site.

> A pre-built apache with mod_perl, ssl, etc, template toolkit (or mason),
> perl corba module for apache (assuming it doesn't already have one) kind
> of like IBMs websphere but less massive and not proprietary. 

exactly, the first thing to do is to create a core release of what
people feel you need to implement websites with Perl

maybe include MySQL or Postgres and the DBI stuff

some well used modules such as XML::Parser would also be good

then stick together a build mechanism (i recommend ant for this)

build it and put it in an rpm and get it out there

once thats done ...

maybe add some basic scripts such as website stats reporting
and/or a user registration page, database and PM to access it

then add some documentation for this specific platform

of course you need a name, I personally like Rope - its
a play on Zope and it conveys the idea that the rope is strong
because it has many strands within it

-- 
Greg McCarroll  http://www.mccarroll.uklinux.net

Re: one liner

[Peter Corlett]

In article <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> you write:
> My heresy of the day: if I want to write a graphical app, I'll write the
> front-end in Java, with a perl back-end and some kind of RPC gluing them
> together.

That's not a heresy at all, that's just common sense in using the best tool
for the job. I've done a few sites like this, and they worked fine (or at
least better than the alternatives...)

Re: one liner

[David Cantrell]

On Sun, Jan 07, 2001 at 06:28:10PM +, Mark Fowler wrote:

> The main problem I've faced when dealing with the Tk stuff is that I have
> no idea how a good way to slam standard components together is.

The best way is to use a graphical interface to build the interface.
Something VB, and to a slightly lesser extent Java, are very good at.
>From what I hear, Glade ain't there yet.

My heresy of the day: if I want to write a graphical app, I'll write the
front-end in Java, with a perl back-end and some kind of RPC gluing them
together.

-- 
David Cantrell | [EMAIL PROTECTED] | http://www.cantrell.org.uk/david

  Any technology distinguishable from magic is insufficiently advanced

Re: one liner

[Dean S Wilson]

-Original Message-
From: Nathan Torkington <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>


>Before I launch in a kind of defence of the book, let me remind you
>all that I liked the book before Tim started signing my paycheque.
:-)


Uncross those fingers. ;) Since your in the know what perl books are
forthcoming? Anything on Perl XML?

>There are perldoc pages?  When I was learning, I struggled for months
>to find a comprehensive set of manpages on Perl/Tk.  It seemed that
>there were patchy Perl docs (some widgets covered, some not), and all
>the Tcl/Tk docs (leaving me with no idea of how the widget options
and
>calling conventions work in *Perl*).


I was interested in perl/tk about 10 months ago and found both a
newsgroup and some miscellaneous postings linking to lots of perl docs
for it. Guess I was just lucky. None of the stuff I found covered
reasonable sized apps though.

>I wonder whether the fact that you wanted a different book isn't
>clouding your opinion of this one.  It sounds like you wanted
>something else.  Other than having "a couple of complete sample
>applications", and without the detailed widget descriptions, I can't
>work out what it was.  I would like to know, though.

Your probably right, i would have prefered something with a higher
emphasis on hands on. I'm curious as to how you view the book though,
to me it is an OK reference. Its not a tutorial or an intorduction and
it's not really for advanced principles. I lumped it in as a reference
as that was what i thought it was best at.

>Learning Perl/Tk isn't really *meant* to be a reference.  Like the
>other Learning books, it's supposed to be an introduction to the
>subject.  The Perl/Tk Pocket Ref, as you point out, is a much better
>reference.  Learning Perl/Tk tells you how to write Perl/Tk programs,
>what widgets are at your disposal, and what they do.


I know that it's not intended to be a full reference but that was the
best use i found for it, there were no real intorductions to Tk just
an overview of a widget and maybe one example of its use, and they
were pretty scarce. A couple of self contained examples of use for
each widget, thirty lines or so would have pushed it towards being an
introduction but as it stands i'd class it as a reference book because
of the comprehensive option lists.

>In fairness, I do have to say that the writing in the Perl/Tk book
>needed another editorial pass.  We realize that in hindsight.  It's
>still readable, just a little ... quirky :-)


I liked the authors style, it gave it more of a... personal, not too
polished touch :) The only two ORA books i've ever really disliked
were Apache The Definitive guide first edition which just seemed to be
all over the place (Nice technical description) and Building Linux
Clusters which was a waste of paper but i was contacted by someone at
ORA over my views on that and i was satisfied by their responce (They
saw my comments on (void). Beware ORA agents are everywhere! :))

>I can't even find this on their web site.  Is it still being worked
>on?


Good question, I can't see it either. And they seem to have dropped
the "Perl Tools" book.

Dean
--
Profanity is the one language all programmers understand.
   ---  Anon

Re: one liner

[Roger Burton West]

On Sun, Jan 07, 2001 at 11:40:32AM -0700, Nathan Torkington wrote:
>Dean S Wilson writes:

>> Learning Perl/TK should be used as an off-line reference if its used
>> at all.

>Learning Perl/Tk isn't really *meant* to be a reference.  Like the
>other Learning books, it's supposed to be an introduction to the
>subject.  The Perl/Tk Pocket Ref, as you point out, is a much better
>reference.  Learning Perl/Tk tells you how to write Perl/Tk programs,
>what widgets are at your disposal, and what they do.

But it doesn't seem to be an introduction: I don't want a list of
every option, which seems to be what most of the book consists of,
because I have the P/TPR and the perldoc pages and the web. I do
want short example programs showing how the things are used, and
longer ones showing how they can come together. I'm still writing
most of my Perl/Tk programs based on the first example in the
documentation, because I haven't seen any other examples.

Roger

Re: one liner

[Nathan Torkington]

Dean S Wilson writes:
> I dislike the Learning Perl/TK book

Before I launch in a kind of defence of the book, let me remind you
all that I liked the book before Tim started signing my paycheque. :-)

> Learning Perl/TK just seemed to be too much of a rehash of the
> perldoc pages

There are perldoc pages?  When I was learning, I struggled for months
to find a comprehensive set of manpages on Perl/Tk.  It seemed that
there were patchy Perl docs (some widgets covered, some not), and all
the Tcl/Tk docs (leaving me with no idea of how the widget options and
calling conventions work in *Perl*).

This book is the only one to tell me what I wanted to know: how do I
use these bloody widgets in Perl?

I wonder whether the fact that you wanted a different book isn't
clouding your opinion of this one.  It sounds like you wanted
something else.  Other than having "a couple of complete sample
applications", and without the detailed widget descriptions, I can't
work out what it was.  I would like to know, though.

> Learning Perl/TK should be used as an off-line reference if its used
> at all.

Learning Perl/Tk isn't really *meant* to be a reference.  Like the
other Learning books, it's supposed to be an introduction to the
subject.  The Perl/Tk Pocket Ref, as you point out, is a much better
reference.  Learning Perl/Tk tells you how to write Perl/Tk programs,
what widgets are at your disposal, and what they do.

In fairness, I do have to say that the writing in the Perl/Tk book
needed another editorial pass.  We realize that in hindsight.  It's
still readable, just a little ... quirky :-)

> I'm waiting for the Manning one which seems to have been delayed
> more times than the railtrack service

I can't even find this on their web site.  Is it still being worked
on?

Nat

Re: one liner

[Mark Fowler]

> O'Reily's Perl/Tk book, discussion there of.

I bought it pre-Christmas and read it through.  I do like the idea of
Tk.  Seems a lot more simple that Java or GTK stuff to do.  Sure, infinite
themeability is all very nice and all, but most of the time I just want to
do something really quickly.

The main problem I've faced when dealing with the Tk stuff is that I have
no idea how a good way to slam standard components together is.  The book
is great at explaining how all the components work, how pack and the other
'layout managers' work and all, but never touches on the whole putting
everything together thing.  Basically, what I need is a whole host of more
examples, with some kind of explanation of good and bad approaches, and why
you should use them, and more description of the pitfalls.

For example, discussion of how to cope with synchronising content between
windows.  Of building up standard dialogs.  How to ensure that your stuff
always lines up nicely and looks consistent.  It's not that these subjects
aren't covered (for all the options are discussed) it's that there's no
guidelines or examples that I can learn from.

I guess what I'm looking for was more of a Programming Perl equivalent
book.  Something that doesn't just explain how things work, but also
details techniques and practices that can greatly help you.

Later.

Mark.

-- 
print "\n",map{my$a="\n"if(length$_>6);' 'x(36-length($_)/2)."$_\n$a"} (
   Name  => 'Mark Fowler',Title => 'Technology Developer'  ,
   Firm  => 'Profero Ltd',Web   => 'http://www.profero.com/'   ,
   Email => '[EMAIL PROTECTED]',   Phone => '+44 (0) 20 7700 9960'  )

Re: one liner

[Dean S Wilson]

-Original Message-
From: Nathan Torkington <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>

>Data point: the O'Reilly Perl/Tk book mysteriously jumped in the
>Amazon sales rankings lately.  It's been in the 100-300 range the
last
>few weeks.


Toilet paper must be scarce ;)

I dislike the Learning Perl/TK book and I'm waiting for the Manning
one which seems to have been delayed more times than the railtrack
service. Learning Perl/TK just seemed to be too much of a rehash of
the perldoc pages, a couple of complete sample applications in the
later half of the book would have been nice rather than wasting four
pages listing the options for a button, something thats both in the
docs and in the much better purchase Perl/Tk pocket reference (Which
has all the options but takes a lot less time to read and reference.)

There were no nice self-contained applications that showed all the
basic details that you build from for your own use, the book just
seemed like a selection of unconnected option lists. Simon Cozen's
articles are a much better read and learning point and Learning
Perl/TK should be used as an off-line reference if its used at all.
IMHO

Then again I've never written a book so what do I know :)

Dean

--
Profanity is the one language all programmers understand.
   ---  Anon

Re: one liner

[Dean S Wilson]

-Original Message-
From: Nathan Torkington <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>


>Dean S Wilson writes:
>> Has anyone tried Linux glade recently? Is it stable with perl yet?

>The TPJ that's stalled at the printers has a fantuckingfastic article
>on getting started with Glade and Perl/Gtk.


I now hate you.

Dean
--
Profanity is the one language all programmers understand.
   ---  Anon

Re: one liner

[Aaron Trevena]

On Sat, 6 Jan 2001, Greg McCarroll wrote:
> 
> Ok, we are not (void) but we are pretty close so here is a one liner that
> hopefully will provote discussion 
> 
> the only thing that gives potential for the marketing of a language is the
> projects that are achieved using it and java has a hell of a lot more cool 
> projects than perl

I was wondering how hard it would be to put together a mini Application
server toolkit.

A pre-built apache with mod_perl, ssl, etc, template toolkit (or mason),
perl corba module for apache (assuming it doesn't already have one) kind
of like IBMs websphere but less massive and not proprietary. All the
necessary parts are there its just an issue of packaging and spinning it
to the punters.

I am fed up with seeing java/proprietary kudges when there are clean and
open ways to do the job better.

A.

-- 
http://termisoc.org/~betty"> Betty @ termisoc.org 
"As a youngster Fred fought sea battles on the village pond using a 
complex system of signals he devised that was later adopted by the Royal 
Navy. " (this email has nothing to do with any organisation except me)

Re: one liner

[Nathan Torkington]

Dean S Wilson writes:
> Has anyone tried Linux glade recently? Is it stable with perl yet?

The TPJ that's stalled at the printers has a fantuckingfastic article
on getting started with Glade and Perl/Gtk.

Nat
(tease)

Re: one liner

[Nathan Torkington]

Leon Brocard writes:
> Yes. This is because Perl is not thought of as being a GUI
> language[1]. Discuss.
> [1] Simon's articles on Perl Gnome are a good step though
> 
> ps I'm back from Venezuela and only now find out the box has been
>/.-ed...

Data point: the O'Reilly Perl/Tk book mysteriously jumped in the
Amazon sales rankings lately.  It's been in the 100-300 range the last
few weeks.

Nat

Re: one liner

[Michael Stevens]

On Sun, Jan 07, 2001 at 02:46:04PM -, Dean S Wilson wrote:
> Does anyone think that compilation is an issue with perls lack of user
> space apps? Discuss[1].

As a vague point I was looking for a good jabber client. Tried jarl, which
is perl, and gabber, which is C. jarl is perl/Tk, I think. gabber is a
GNOME thing.

Switched to gabber because it feels MUCH FASTER on my machine, to the
point where I won't go mad using it. And this is a PIII 500.

Michael

Re: one liner

[Dean S Wilson]

-Original Message-
From: Leon Brocard <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>

>Greg McCarroll sent the following bits through the ether:

>> the only thing that gives potential for the marketing of a language
is the
>> projects that are achieved using it and java has a hell of a lot
more cool
>> projects than perl
>
>Yes. This is because Perl is not thought of as being a GUI
>language[1]. Discuss


Perls very good at GUI's, we've got bindings for TK, Gnome (A module
that I can't find the alpha code for...), GTK, GTK-Perl, Win32::GUI,
Qt-Perl and Qt...

Hang on maybe this is part of the problem... ;)

What is missing is a nice GUI drawing program like VB that writes out
perl code GUI's and calls perl code for events. Activestate's work on
making perl com components has done some inroads with this on Windows.
Has anyone tried Linux glade recently? Is it stable with perl yet?

I'm not advocating VB over perl but VB has its niche, its good for
drawing quick frontends for apps like small databases and similar.
Having a similar tool that allowed you to write all the call-backs in
perl while getting rid of the monotony of writing combo boxes would be
nice. Which is what I'm hoping glade will become.

When I'm forced into GUI's I end up using Tk because it'll normally
run under Windows and Linux.

Does anyone think that compilation is an issue with perls lack of user
space apps? Discuss[1].

Dean

[1] Yes we have become one with (void) Wheres arp.

--
Profanity is the one language all programmers understand.
   ---  Anon

Re: one liner

[Leon Brocard]

Greg McCarroll sent the following bits through the ether:

> the only thing that gives potential for the marketing of a language is the
> projects that are achieved using it and java has a hell of a lot more cool 
> projects than perl

Yes. This is because Perl is not thought of as being a GUI
language[1]. Discuss.

Leon

[1] Simon's articles on Perl Gnome are a good step though

ps I'm back from Venezuela and only now find out the box has been
   /.-ed...
-- 
Leon Brocard.http://www.astray.com/
yapc::Europehttp://yapc.org/Europe/

... All new improved Brocard, now with Template Toolkit!

Re: one liner

[Greg McCarroll]

* Paul Makepeace ([EMAIL PROTECTED]) wrote:
> On Sat, Jan 06, 2001 at 10:12:37PM +, Greg McCarroll wrote:
> > the only thing that gives potential for the marketing of a language is the
> > projects that are achieved using it and java has a hell of a lot more cool 
> > projects than perl
> 
> I've been playing with Akopia ne' MiniVend/Tallyman which of course is
> written in perl and certainly from a functionality point of view it's
> very, very cool and is a serious-weight app.
> 

but this is server side, and while Perl is currently on level terms for
server side stuff with more and more of the fresh faced grads coming out,
abominations such as EJBs look like a good idea

take my weekends work, i just finished writing a java program that 
will run on a mobile phone, ok this is a very specific field of interest, but 
in a few months when i get the prototype device i'll be like a kid on
christmas day seeing the software run on it - before i get run out of town
i would say that the server side is written in Perl, but it is unlikely
that the server side software in production would ever be written in Perl

> Like it not, Matt Wright's stuff is a perl success story if
> only from a bums-on-seats PoV...

i agree with this as well, it comes back to issues of elegance/beauty/quality
vs. getting the job down - this is why Visual Basic is a good product



-- 
Greg McCarroll  http://www.mccarroll.uklinux.net

Re: one liner

[Paul Makepeace]

On Sat, Jan 06, 2001 at 10:12:37PM +, Greg McCarroll wrote:
> the only thing that gives potential for the marketing of a language is the
> projects that are achieved using it and java has a hell of a lot more cool 
> projects than perl

I've been playing with Akopia ne' MiniVend/Tallyman which of course is
written in perl and certainly from a functionality point of view it's
very, very cool and is a serious-weight app.

I haven't dug into its internals yet but it looks pretty sophisticated
with shades of Template.pm even.

http://developer.akopia.com/

I would definitely count this as a Perl success story.

Like it not, Matt Wright's stuff is a perl success story if
only from a bums-on-seats PoV...

Paul

Re: one liner

[alex]

On Sat, 6 Jan 2001, Dean S Wilson wrote:
> I agree but I also think that this is one of the problems, the only
> people who see the modules are other perl coders.

indeed.  there are few end-user perl apps.

in my eyes Perl is not particularly good for programs written by one
person, or in small groups working closely together, or by highly
experienced programmers.  maybe this is why you don't end up with many
good, generalised Perl applications.  at the least, Perl development needs
to be well managed, perhaps a little more than most.

perhaps perl6 will solve this, but it seems to me that Perl programmers
have so much choice, that every Perl hacker uses a different sub-language
within Perl.  for example, i dislike Perl with map()'s that throw away
return values, and most uses of unless(), but do plenty to annoy other
programers - for example strange data hiding techniques.

well that's all negative, so i'll go on to say why Perl is the best
language for me...  i believe that Perl allows human expression better
than any other language i've heard of.  most importantly, i can get things
working fast.  i can't use c++ to create art because there is too much
time between the idea and execution - so the idea gets stale before it can
be realised.  with Perl, the creative process continues while i'm in the
coding phase; in fact, that's the only phase i have for my personal
projects...

also the amount of choice allows me to write programs that match my way of
thinking.  i can write a large program and be confident that it will work
first time (apart from syntax errors), because i have been able to
construct the program in my own terms.  i have control over my medium.

the impressive data munging capabilities allow me to create art quickly
and expressively, that has direct 'influences' from the external world...
for example, creating audio based on the structure of motorways taken from
GPS data, or from mailing lists.

and of course the community - CPAN is very useful but exists because of a
sharing and (mostly) friendly community.  if i'm going to use other
people's code in my art this is a highly important point.

so to me, Perl is the most human computer language, and so the most
suitable language for computer art.

alex

ps Tangram and Template Toolkit are great!

-- 
Snack pastries are dramatic when shapes are combined

Re: one liner

[alex]

On Sat, 6 Jan 2001, Dean S Wilson wrote:
> I left (void) and you'l not take me back alive! Outlook canne take the
> strain!

i think london.pm is busier than (void) nowadays, a lot of the
thought-provoking people left

-- 
Snack pastries are dramatic when shapes are combined

Re: one liner

[Dean S Wilson]

-Original Message-
From: Greg McCarroll <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>


>Ok, we are not (void) but we are pretty close so here is a one liner
that
>hopefully will provote discussion 


I left (void) and you'l not take me back alive! Outlook canne take the
strain!

>the only thing that gives potential for the marketing of a language
is the
>projects that are achieved using it and java has a hell of a lot more
cool
>projects than perl

I think that marketing is the key term in this mail. Java has a good
marketing team and is being taught in universities at the moment,
nothing better than having a lot of fresh faced advocates being
spawned at the end of each term.

Dean (Playing both sides in this one)

--
Profanity is the one language all programmers understand.
   ---  Anon

Re: one liner

[Dean S Wilson]

-Original Message-
From: Michael Stevens <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>


Greg are you trolling? If so let me play ;)

>> the only thing that gives potential for the marketing of a language
is the
>> projects that are achieved using it and java has a hell of a lot
more cool
>> projects than perl

>What are these mysterious cool java projects that no-one's been
telling
>me about?


Fortay's a good example. A Java IDE written in Java, and under Linux
it's pretty quick even on 64 MB ram.


IBM developerworks and Alphaworks have tftp and dhcp servers in Java.
I wouldn't run them though :)

>I think the best thing people can do for the language is create good
things
>and modules and whatever using it.

I agree but I also think that this is one of the problems, the only
people who see the modules are other perl coders. I'm not saying that
modules are a bad thing or a waste of effort, I'd hate to think about
writing the code for half of the modules I use on a regular basis but
the only people who really understand and use them are perl coders,
people who know that perl is good. I think Greg means making something
a little more visible, How many netusers see the powered by python
logo on mailman each day? Whats our answer to that? Slashcode?

Plying devils advocate is fun.
Dean
--
Profanity is the one language all programmers understand.
   ---  Anon

Re: one liner

[Michael Stevens]

On Sat, Jan 06, 2001 at 10:12:37PM +, Greg McCarroll wrote:
> Ok, we are not (void) but we are pretty close so here is a one liner that
> hopefully will provote discussion 
> the only thing that gives potential for the marketing of a language is the
> projects that are achieved using it and java has a hell of a lot more cool 
> projects than perl
> 

What are these mysterious cool java projects that no-one's been telling
me about?

> 
> /me is thinking of a new london.pm project called ``ignore the perl 6 body
> and parallel to it lets create our own perl propoganda/marketting/best 
> practice/for the good fo the language movement''  

I think the best thing people can do for the language is create good things
and modules and whatever using it.

one liner

[Greg McCarroll]

Ok, we are not (void) but we are pretty close so here is a one liner that
hopefully will provote discussion 

the only thing that gives potential for the marketing of a language is the
projects that are achieved using it and java has a hell of a lot more cool 
projects than perl





































































































/me is thinking of a new london.pm project called ``ignore the perl 6 body
and parallel to it lets create our own perl propoganda/marketting/best 
practice/for the good fo the language movement''  

-- 
Greg McCarroll  http://www.mccarroll.uklinux.net