Perl's greatest features (for me) have always been community and documentation/literature. In the beginning I thought every technical community was like Perl just because it was all I knew. I was quite surprised to find out how poor documentation was elsewhere and how disconnected the users were.
I owe a lot to random Perl community people for helping pull me up (literally since I was a child) to the point that I could get a job, then get better jobs, and eventually choose my own work and support a family.
Its been years since Perl has been the main tool in my toolbox but there is plenty in ~/bin and I plan to give Perl 6 another go. Still, I think of Perl often and fondly.
Has anyone else ever had that "If I am ever wealthy I will help __some open source community__"? More and more I realize life is passing by and being wealthy isnt important to me at all. So I better just say thank you here. ;)
The problem I've found in newer communities is they are so disconnected now.
Perl had p5p to guide them, and various conferences and very close knit groups which I was proud to be a part of.
I'm now more in the node.js crowd, which is huge, but feels like there's no good guiding group. I'm a mod in #node.js but the traffic there isn't communal. The node.js mailing list gets about 5 posts a day. I don't even know where people go to ask/talk about Node any more. Is it stack overflow? Somewhere else? Or do people just flail about not really knowing what they are doing? Sadly it feels like the latter.
And yes, the documentation of perl modules still far surpasses anything I've ever seen in other languages.
Yes! Close your eyes and flail your arms around and eventually you will hit something.
The way I use Stack Overflow makes me feel dirty. Usually it starts when I Google an error message because I'm using a new (to me) combination of language/framework/module/plugin. My mindbrain and fingers conspire to automatically select the Stack Overflow link even though it might be 3rd result and #1 and #2 might be from the official docs of whatever technology.
When I get to SO I read the answers first. That is often enough to shake something loose in my brain about my own problem. If that doesnt help I'll read the question to make sure I'm reading the right thread. I only comment or answer on rare occasion because it means that 1. I ended up on an inappropriate thread but actually know the answer and 2. it happens to be a fresh unanswered question. Seriously, I hope some of you are using SO the way they want it to be used and clicking on ADs or whatever. ;)
I used to answer questions in IRC channels just because I was already hanging out there, knew some people, and hey- I got answers from this group I might as well give back. But on SO I dont feel any attachment to a community, its just about Internet points. And for those who arent keeping score its just get-in-get-out. Maybe its just me.
If you don't yet, I recommend you subscribe to the perl weekly: http://perlweekly.com it's a great, concise overview of what's happening in perl (5 and 6). A very simple, low effort way to give back financially would be to sponsor the newsletter via GratisPay http://szabgab.com/gratipay.html Obviously there are also many other ways, financial and non-financial, to contribute to the community.
I owe a lot to random Perl community people for helping pull me up (literally since I was a child) to the point that I could get a job, then get better jobs, and eventually choose my own work and support a family.
Its been years since Perl has been the main tool in my toolbox but there is plenty in ~/bin and I plan to give Perl 6 another go. Still, I think of Perl often and fondly.
Has anyone else ever had that "If I am ever wealthy I will help __some open source community__"? More and more I realize life is passing by and being wealthy isnt important to me at all. So I better just say thank you here. ;)