Re: Re: [patch rfc 1/3] xen arch header rework.

[Julian Davison <julian-xen_devel@tech.cbhs.school.nz>]

Gerd Hoffmann wrote:
> I don't think adding perl as build dependency is a big problem, almost
> everyone has it on the machine anyway.  Try "rpm -e perl" on any linux
> distro and watch the error message with the long list of stuff which
> depends on perl.

While I realise this is drifting from the topic somewhat,
if I could just say:
jade:~# rpm -e perl
rpm: To install rpm packages on Debian systems, use alien. See 
README.Debian.
error: cannot open Packages index using db3 - No such file or directory (2)
error: cannot open /var/lib/rpm/packages.rpm

Perl is most certainly on that system, but 'perl is everywhere'
is a little like 'rpm is everywhere'.

> Wrt. readability of the scripts:  That is IMO more a matter of the
> programming style than of the programming language.  Sure you can easily
> write unreadable perl code, but you don't have to.  And you better
> shouldn't, just in case you have to touch the scripts again one year later.

I spend far more time with python than I do perl, I confess,
however one of my colleagues spends no time with either and
has far less trouble understanding python than perl.
In terms of novice-readability perl has a whole bunch of
(really useful) line noise constructs. =~, say.

In many cases having a tool in an 'odd' language is better than
no tool at all, but in general the fewer dependencies the better.


-- 
Julian Davison
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