I stumbled upon this really nice page from Ruby, describing the language from the perspective of other common programming languages:

https://www.ruby-lang.org/en/documentation/ruby-from-other-languages/

The page is written in a friendly tone, inviting programmers familiar with other programming languages to Ruby. No programming language is being viewed as inferior, quite the contrary: all mentioned languages are praised and even defended from haters, for example:

• "Perl is awesome. Perl’s docs are awesome. The Perl community is … awesome. For those Perlers who long for elegant OO features built-in from the beginning, Ruby may be for you."
• "Happily, it turns out that Ruby and C have a healthy symbiotic relationship. And, of course, Ruby itself is written in C."
• "Java is mature. It’s tested. And it’s fast (contrary to what the anti-Java crowd may still claim)."
• "Python is another very nice general purpose programming language."

I believe Perl could greatly benefit from having a similar page. With its friendly philosophy and TMTOWTDI, it seems natural to invite programmers from other languages, with an approach of "Don't be afraid to keep programming the way you are used to, if it works in Perl, there are no limits enforced".

Since Perl is now not a common choice for new code or for learning, it makes a lot of sense to bring over people from other languages. Especially in an age where strict conventions seem to be praised, I can see Perl becoming a source of some fresh air.

submitted by /u/Lenticularis39
[link] [comments]