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Programming Perl (3rd Edition) Perl is a powerful programming language that has grown in popularity since it first appeared in 1988. The first edition of this book, Programming Perl, hit the shelves in 1990, and was quickly adopted as the undisputed bible of the language. Since then, Perl has grown with the times, and so has this book. Programming Perl is not just a book about Perl. It is also a unique introduction to the language and its culture, as one might expect only from its authors. Larry Wall is the inventor of Perl, and provides a unique perspective on the evolution of Perl and its future direction. Tom Christiansen was one of the first champions of the language, and lives and breathes the complexities of Perl internals as few other mortals do. Jon Orwant is the editor of The Perl Journal, which has brought together the Perl community as a common forum for new developments in Perl. Any Perl book can show the syntax of Perl's functions, but only this one is a comprehensive guide to all the nooks and crannies of the language. Any Perl book can explain typeglobs, pseudohashes, and closures, but only this one shows how they really work. Any Perl book can say that my is faster than local, but only this one explains why. Any Perl book can have a title, but only this book is affectionately known by all Perl programmers as "The Camel." This third edition of Programming Perl has been expanded to cover version 5.6 of this maturing language. New topics include threading, the compiler, Unicode, and other new features that have been added since the previous edition.
Customer Review: An Encyclopedic Reference -- or a Baptism by Fire
"Programming Perl" simply has everything about Perl you will ever need to know. If it's in Perl, it's in this book, as far as I can tell. Finding what you're looking for will be another matter. The organization of this volume leaves much to be desired. But the index is pretty helpful so searching through this book is a little like looking for a needle in a hay stack, but with a magnet in hand.
But don't let the name fool you: This book is not the place to learn Perl, as I found the hard way. It just simply assumes too much knowledge on the part of the reader, and has a horrendous paucity of example code. If Perl is something you are going to explore and use to a great extent, "Programming Perl" will eventually become indispensible to you, I am certain. But if you are new to the language: DANGER! DANGER! ABUNAI!
All things considered, I would give it four stars -- five for its breadth of coverage minus one for its poor organization. But the book's title implies that it is meant as an introduction to Perl, but an introduction it just ain't! The authors say as much themselves in their introduction, but I think the unsuspecting novice deserves to see it on the front cover too. So I am taking away one more star for a total of three.
"Programming Perl": a great reference, a horrid learning tool.