Perl Demo
Perl is the one development language that is indissolubly linked with the growth of the Web. In fact it is widely known as 'the duct-tape of the internet'.
Twenty-first century web developers are spoilt for choice, and can mix and match from a bewildering selection of functionalities: PHP, Coldfusion, VBScript... There are scores of possibilities ranging from the exotic to the deeply traditional.
But in the early days of the Web, providing functional pages boiled down to a choice between hammering a traditional programming language like C into place, or doing it the easy way - and that meant using Perl.
Duct-tape of the Internet
The internet community as a whole owes an enormous debt of gratitude to Perl. From its public unveiling in 1987 as the primary net 'scripting language' through the launch of the commercial internet in the early 1990s, Perl allowed the rapid creation of server-based solutions at a time when coding speed was of the essence, not to speak of its role in meeting the automation demands of server administrators. Hence its common deployment as a quick fix has led to it being known as the 'duct-tape of the internet'.
As a result, Perl has accumulated a huge fan base among both professional and amateur developers, that has kept it alive and well in the face of challenges from brash new competitors. may thousands of off-the-shelf' scripts are available for download in Perl - and most cheap server hosting will support at least some basic Perl scripting, so it is available to most users, should they wish to make use of it. Modern implementations of Perl, such as the excellent ActivePerl, also offer full database support and a host of added features.
Downtime
But, perhaps unfairly, its 'duct-tape' role has hampered the more widespread use of Perl on the modern web. With the growth of the commercial net, the web in particular has increasingly had to meet the demands of system builders. Building a complete system generally requires the creation of an integrated suite of maintainable software, and if Perl has one flaw it may well be its relative lack of maintainability. Along with C/C++ it shares the epithet of being a 'write-only' language.
Of course, some of this can be blamed on Perl developers themselves, since Perl can be laid out clearly and a little thought and analysis would allow perfectly viable systems to be created using it. But even blaming developers is slightly unfair - in an environment where a quick patch is needed fast, like yesterday, readability and systems integration is usually the last thing on anyone's mind.
Just read the script
Another spoiler, most definitely not Perl's fault, is that many freely downloadable scripts have proven in the past to jeopardise server and site performance and security. Most online script repositories are perfectly respectable and check for such problems, but script users are advised to be wary here.
Whatever the pros and cons, Perl stubbornly refuses to go away, with an estimated base of 1 million developers. It is still a good idea for any web developer to have some, at least basic, knowledge of its use, and we look forward to celebrating its 20th anniversary.
Perl links:
Perl.org (The Perl directory)
Activestate (ActivePerl)
