[zdw]

perl has a less divergent set of options across different unix versions - for example, trying to run `sed` in place across MacOS and Linux you'll soon find that the options are different. There are similar issues with BSD vs GNU options in other programs as well.

There's an old quip that "perl is portable sed" - in my experience this is pretty true.

[Ultimatt]

Yeah this is actually a major reason everyone should at least know or use some perl. macOS is a popular dev environment but the quirky macOS/BSD versions of grep and sed are super annoying for portable build scripts.