[jsrn]

    > In CLOS I don't even have to override
    > a function and then call the base version,
    > I can just use :before/:after methods.

that is possible in Perl, too, with method modifiers: http://search.cpan.org/~drolsky/Moose-1.19/lib/Moose/Manual/...

in fact, Moose took many ideas from CLOS (and Smalltalk, Ruby, Perl 6, ...)

you write:

    > When people say things like this about
    > perl they're usually talking from '98 or so
    > when perl was the most flexible game in
    > town. A lot has changed since then.

true, but don't forget Perl itself has changed a lot, too.

[loewenskind]

Yea, as I said, Moose looks pretty good. And I realize perl has changed itself. Today it looks like the biggest issue with perl5 is you need a page long preamble [1] to get a relatively modern language.

[1] Use statements to bring in the right libraries, turn off bad defaults, turn on needed features, etc. Stuff that is the default behavior in today's languages.