Perl School 4: Database Programming with Perl and DBIx::Class

[Dave Cross]

Quoting Lyle <webmaster at cosmicperl.com>:

> On 06/02/2013 21:43, Dave Cross wrote:
>> The first two Perl Schools (August and October) were called "Modern  
>> Perl for Non-Perl Programmers"[1].
>>
>> Not aimed at absolute beginners, but trying to get users of other  
>> languages interested in Modern Perl. I had about 25 people at each  
>> class.
>
> I'm of the opinion that Perl 5 is easier to sell to complete  
> beginners, than to pull them away from other (likely more popular  
> and newer) languages. From my experience people tend to stick with  
> the language they know. The free Perl 5 class I ran in a secondary  
> school was well received by the staff and most of the children who  
> attended.

Well, as I said, I had 50 programmers of various types who came along  
to the two classes last year. Some of them were "old school" Perl  
programmers who wanted a chance to get their skills up to date. Others  
were people who used other languages (I remember people mentioning  
Python, Ruby and Java) and were interested in adding another skill to  
their CV.

I think the best programmers don't "stick with the language they  
know". I think they see a new language as largely a case of learning  
new syntax and enjoy having a number of languages to choose from so  
they can use the best one for each individual task.

It's a shame that Perl seems to have fallen of the radar for  
programmers like that and these courses were an attempt to put that  
right. I think they were (slightly) successful in that and I hope to  
do it again later this year.

Teaching programming to beginners using Perl is a completely different  
area. I'm involved in some conversations about a project that might  
help here. And there could well be a Perl School which addresses that  
at some point in the future. But currently I'm really focussed on  
spreading the Perl love amongst existing programmers.

I'm not saying that I don't agree that beginners courses are  
important. Just that I only have so much time and I'm currently not  
working on that problem.

> However, when the time comes, I think Perl 6 for Non-Perl  
> Programmers would have a better chance of pulling people (back)? to  
> perl.

I expect it'll be a couple of years at least before I start thinking  
about Perl 6 courses.

Cheers,

Dave...