introspection (and Perl 6)

[Jonathan McKeown]

On Wednesday 23 January 2008 17:13, David Cantrell wrote:
> > On Jan 22, 2008 5:49 AM, Ovid <publiustemp-londonpm at yahoo.com> wrote:
> > > In short, if people can't read the code I write, that's my fault.  If
> > > they can't read the language I write in, that's their fault.
>
> I take it that you consider yourself to be reasonably competent in perl
> 5?  Good, thought so.  Now, what does this do, and how does it work?
>
> #:: ::-| ::-| .-. :||-:: 0-| .-| ::||-| .:|-. :||
> open(Q,$0);while(<Q>){if(/^#(.*)$/){for(split('-',$1)){$q=0;for(split){s/\|
> /:.:/xg;s/:/../g;$Q=$_?length:$_;$q+=$q?$Q:$Q*20;}print
> chr($q);}}}print"\n"; #.: ::||-| .||-| :|||-| ::||-| ||-:: :|||-| .:|
>
> If it's not immediately obvious to you, well, that's your fault for
> being incompetent in perl 5.

I think you're actually proving Ovid's point. I reckon writing code is like 
writing prose: having a technical grasp of the language doesn't constitute 
competence; you're only competent when you can write comprehensibly. That 
doesn't always mean simply - imagine your morning paper written in the style 
of the Teletubbies (unless you're a Sun reader, in which case try to imagine 
the opposite).

> Yes, that's an obfuscated perl contest entry.

And the Bulwer-Lytton contest for prose has different rules too. So?

Being able to read Perl code is fundamental for a Perl programmer; competence 
comes when you can criticise it effectively. ``War and Peace has too many 
long words and not enough brightly-coloured pictures'' is a criticism - but 
not perhaps a very useful one for most purposes.

Jonathan