[Verdex_2]

For some reason, when I started my software engineering career I got it into my head that I needed to learn as much as I could about programming languages.

I learned ruby, perl5, python, lisp, forth, ml, ocaml, scheme, haskell, r, c#, java, lua, c++, factor, idris, asm, erlang, prolog, rust, d. But that wasn't quite enough because haskell and idris kept on talking about complicated type theory stuff. So I also learned lambda calculus, type theory, set theory, domain theory, topology, category theory, information theory, sub-structural logic.

What I'm trying to say is that I'm not afraid of learning new things. Even if they seem hard or esoteric.

When I heard that perl6 was ready, I took a look. I like the idea of a lot of what is present in the language (hey look, a grammar engine, that's neat). But ultimately, I decided that it was too much stuff that I would have to learn. Maybe that's just a perception problem on my part, but I have to think that they have some sort of problem if someone like me feels overwhelmed by all of the things that you have to grok in order to understand the language.

[daotoad]

Perl 6 is designed to be a large, feature rich language that can be learned and used incrementally. The intent is that, like users of natural languages, Perl 6 practitioners gain fluency and nuance in their expression over time.

So, if you want to learn Perl6, don't worry about writing "baby talk" Perl 6. Write something that works and solves your problem. Later on you may learn that there are multiple other ways to express the same ideas you wrote already. Maybe one of them better expresses the heart of your algorithm, then you update your code.

Now, you may think, how the heck am I going to maintain code written by a bunch of people at different phases of learning Perl6?

The Perl community has responded to this challenge by putting a huge amount of work into writing excellent documentation. Perl6 docs are readily searchable and carefully indexed. It's a big, new language with lots to write about, so the docs are not yet complete, but they are already fantastic and keep getting better.

So, please, just pick a problem to solve and jump on in. The water's fine.

[SwellJoe]

Also, errors are mostly pretty good and getting better. I think a big and overlooked part of learning a new language is the quality of the errors the language provides. Some do this better than others, and some get it right in the core language but by the time you've stacked up enough libraries and extensions to get things done nicely, the errors aren't so good anymore because they talk about things at a lower level than you're thinking of them (Perl 5 can fall prey to this latter problem, even though the core language has pretty good errors these days).

[oblio]

While I encourage OP to dive in and don't want to dismiss your points, in my experience life is more about perpetual intermediates: https://blog.codinghorror.com/defending-perpetual-intermedia...

As a result, a language like Perl is very nice and maybe even artistic but in many situations downright "dangerous".

[daotoad]

Perpetual intermediates exist in every field, many of them with far more nuance than any mere programming language has to offer. The way to extract productivity from these people is the same in software development as it is in any endeavor: leadership.

Good leaders identify and propagate conventions that can keep their teams functioning in a complex millieu.

You can't get rid of the irreducible complexity of any system. You can only move it around.

In my experience, if you use an expressive language well, you can fit the code to the problem domain in a way that better communicates the underlying approach you have taken to solving the problem.

Relying on strict, small languages, like Java, means that you gain a consistency of syntax by sacrificing flexibility.

I've seen monstrous turds written in many languages, the problem in all these cases was poor or absent leadership.

[lixquid]

That's understandable; if you look at the slides and see all of the integrated features in one big blast, you're going to think "holy moly this was not meant for mortal men".

In a way that's correct, because ultimately Perl6 is designed as the ultimate "kitchen sink" language; it has all the little features you could think of already baked in, which will include a lot of features you won't use.

The main reason for this stems from the overarching design philosophy; "There is more than one way to do something". The language ultimately tries to be as flexible as possible, going so far as to support modification the the core grammar, the object system, etc.

This is meant to make the developer as comfortable as possible, but it can lead the common case of perl-itis, also known as "write-once, read-nonce" code.

[raiph]

Another way to look at it is that it's designed to be a great "babytalk" language, the idea that everyone should be able to relatively easily learn enough of the language to easily get done what they need to easily get done. I'm not saying it's there yet -- doc is critical -- but that's part of the idea.

Conversely, whereas the P5 motto was TIMTOWTDI, the P6 motto is closer to TIMTOWTDIBSCINABTE, so there's usually relatively few idiomatic ways to do something.

[throwaway7645]

Think of it as incorporating many of the features in all of the languages you mentioned above, but in one language that is designed to grow. The language can easily be enhanced both officially and by the end user. So not too many new concepts for you, just a different syntax.

[awkwarddaturtle]

> I learned ruby, perl5, python, lisp, forth, ml, ocaml, scheme, haskell, r, c#, java, lua, c++, factor, idris, asm, erlang, prolog, rust, d.

With all due respect, you didn't "learn" these languages. You got a superficial understanding of these languages. It's like someone who learns to say "hello, name is John, what is your name" in 17 human languages saying they learned 17 languages.

Being able to write "hello world" in all these languages doesn't mean you "learned" it.