[noptic]

Sorry but sounds awfully arrogant.

Lowest common intelligence? Sounds like anyone unfamillar with perl is stupid.

Perl is very different from other languages an has a very special syntax. The only way to REALLY understand perl is reading and writting lots of perl code from different authors.

In perl nearly every problem can be solved in many different ways.

If you are used to one style of perl you might still have trouble understanding the code someone else wrote.

[Mithaldu]

> Lowest common intelligence? Sounds like anyone unfamillar with perl is stupid.

No, someone who uses things they don't understand without looking at the documentation is stupid. One could similarly make such comments about the user interfaces of vi or emacs, and get the justified response to RTFM. Only in programming languages is RTFM apparently not expected.

> The only way to REALLY understand perl is reading and writting lots of perl code from different authors.

No, the way to understand Perl is to read the documentation. There is nothing special to Perl about this and the same applies to any language. Just look for example at how many blog posts are written to explain with() and decorators in Python.

> In perl nearly every problem can be solved in many different ways.

The same is true for any language.

> If you are used to one style of perl you might still have trouble understanding the code someone else wrote.

Only if you don't read the documentation.

[GotAnyMegadeth]

> someone who uses things they don't understand without looking at the documentation is stupid

I disagree, that's sometimes the best way to learn something. I learnt C, Java and Perl just by ploughing in without reading anything. Change something, see what happens, if it doesn't make sense ask Google.

Also programming languages aside, I never read computer game manuals before playing

[Mithaldu]

If you'll allow me a bit of pedanty, that's learning and playing, not using. :)

I learned Perl the same way and play my games the same way, but when i write code that'll be used for anything that isn't frivolity, out comes the documentation to ensure the code doesn't destroy cash (or worse, lives) by the fistful.

[GotAnyMegadeth]

Good point. If someone's life depended on it, I probably would read the Street Fighter manual, just in case