= Perl in the 21st Century =

speaker:  EricWilhelm

I started using Perl just over six years ago, when 5.6.2 was already
getting old and 5.8.1 was on the way.  By the time I put my first module
on the CPAN, over half of the current contributors had already shipped.

I have often read the source of a core module and asked "Why?" only to
discover some unknown feature or historical accident.  The history
lesson continues all the way into the roots of Unix in some cases, but
also often leaves me thinking "So?".  And now I am quickly approaching
my 40th CPAN distribution.

In this talk, I will share my own experiences in developing with Perl
and explore the idea of the "Modern" or "Enlightened" Perl.  Did I miss
the heyday of Perl or are we still making that now?  How does today's
Perl code look different than it did 5 or 10 years ago?  Is there a Perl
renaissance coming, and what does it have to do with Perl 6?  What
modules should you be using for new development?  Where is my flying
car?  Why am I still programming in Perl?  And why am I programming at
all?

I will try to find answers to some of these questions and invite you to bring
questions (or answers!) of your own.

[http://scratchcomputing.com/software/developers/talks/perl21st/ Slides] and [http://pdxpm.podasp.com/archive.html Podcast]
