I went out and bought $90 of books from ORA as I didn't want to risk them going out of business before gnat finishes the new cookbook :)
In the post are: Linux Server Hacks (after seeing the Slashdot Review and spotting it for $15 from Bookpool), Unix Power Tools, and Programming Perl 3e. I can't belive it's taken me so long to buy the latter.
This week I've had to explain to a client that having a 375k homepage is probably not fair on modem users, especially with a 146k animated banner. I've also been attempting to do some crazy (but fun!) things with Javascript, which makes me appreciate the DOM even more (even though DOM programming is a bit wordy).
Strange anti-Perl comments from Rafe Colburn. I'm pretty fed up of reading that idiomatic Perl is evil and [Java|Python] is our savior. Tim Bray confesses to hacking at XML with regexps. Ick! Hasn't he heard of XML::Twig?
I've also been trying to do low level stuff with HTML::Parser to mangle html no matter how broken it is. It's a bit strange to be using it at a level where you are using substr and tokenpos to fixup attributes but it works well once you get your head around it.
It looks like we might be hiring another Perl programmer if anyone is in Vermont. That's probably a grand total of 0 people that read this, but on the off chance, get in touch.
Re: Rafe's comments on Perl
Dom2 on 2003-03-20T10:30:29
I agree; bloxsom is quite obscure in places. However, it doesn't have to be. A few well named functions would make all the difference to it.I also feel that the sample java code is even more obscure than the perl code. But maybe I've been hacking Perl too long. Neither extract is that good though. A correct implentation would have a nice function called count_slashes().
I seem to recall schwern using the phrase "sufficiently encapsulated magic". Here, I'd agree with him. By all means have nasty code. Just hide it away in a function with a nice name.
-Dom
Re: Rafe's comments on Perl
nicholas on 2003-03-20T12:03:34
I seem to recall schwern using the phrase "sufficiently encapsulated magic". Here, I'd agree with him. By all means have nasty code. Just hide it away in a function with a nice name.Piers Cawley did a nice lightning talk on "just" at a london.pm techmeet recently. The thrust was the same - you can hide as much technical complexity as you wish, if you are able to provide a nice, simple API
Re: Rafe's comments on Perl
Dom2 on 2003-03-20T12:26:15
Yeah, I agree wholeheartedly. Alas, API/interface design is hard. I always try to think lots about it, and still don't get it right.:-( -Dom
Well, you don't really need a good reason to buy ORA books.
You might also support ORA through Safari. I love the try-before-you-buy aspect.
Nice to hear that your organization is hiring. In this economy, that's a sign that you are doing something right!
Re:Health of ORA
gav on 2003-03-20T17:01:39
I feel sad about the passing of Wrox. Back in 1993, I was the proud owner of the Revolutionary Guide to Assembly Language, a weighty tome at 986 pages. This was the book that got me interested in programming.
I used to always tell people to either buy ORA or Wrox. You'd be assured of a good book. I haven't personally bought one for a few years; they seem to be very focused on the Microsoft platform while I have been moving in the opposite direction.
For some reason I really dislike reading things on the screen. I am a lot more comfortable printing things out first. I like buying and reading books, Safari just doesn't appeal to me.
