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Any experience on teaching Perl programmers Java

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  Any experience on teaching Perl programmers Java saxo123@gmx.de - 2011-10-24 15:07 -0700
    Re: Any experience on teaching Perl programmers Java markspace <-@.> - 2011-10-24 16:10 -0700
      Re: Any experience on teaching Perl programmers Java Arne Vajhøj <arne@vajhoej.dk> - 2011-11-05 22:16 -0400
    Re: Any experience on teaching Perl programmers Java William Colls <william.colls@rogers.com> - 2011-10-24 22:24 -0400
      Re: Any experience on teaching Perl programmers Java blmblm@myrealbox.com <blmblm.myrealbox@gmail.com> - 2011-10-25 07:06 +0000
        Re: Any experience on teaching Perl programmers Java Jim Gibson <jimsgibson@gmail.com> - 2011-10-25 10:03 -0700
          Re: Any experience on teaching Perl programmers Java Lew <lewbloch@gmail.com> - 2011-10-25 20:00 -0700
            Re: Any experience on teaching Perl programmers Java Martin Gregorie <martin@address-in-sig.invalid> - 2011-10-26 20:59 +0000
    Re: Any experience on teaching Perl programmers Java saxo123@gmx.de - 2011-10-25 02:48 -0700
      Re: Any experience on teaching Perl programmers Java Robert Klemme <shortcutter@googlemail.com> - 2011-10-25 04:18 -0700
        Re: Any experience on teaching Perl programmers Java Ten Blade <ten.blade@tenblade.com> - 2011-10-26 13:49 +0000
    Re: Any experience on teaching Perl programmers Java saxo123@gmx.de - 2011-10-26 00:52 -0700
      Re: Any experience on teaching Perl programmers Java Wojtek <nowhere@a.com> - 2011-10-26 23:27 -0700
        Re: Any experience on teaching Perl programmers Java saxo123@gmx.de - 2011-10-27 00:58 -0700
      Re: Any experience on teaching Perl programmers Java Robert Klemme <shortcutter@googlemail.com> - 2011-10-27 08:07 -0700
        Re: Any experience on teaching Perl programmers Java Gene Wirchenko <genew@ocis.net> - 2011-10-27 10:18 -0700
    Re: Any experience on teaching Perl programmers Java Patricia Shanahan <pats@acm.org> - 2011-10-26 08:35 -0700
      Re: Any experience on teaching Perl programmers Java Tom Anderson <twic@urchin.earth.li> - 2011-10-26 21:51 +0100
        Re: Any experience on teaching Perl programmers Java RedGrittyBrick <RedGrittyBrick@spamweary.invalid> - 2011-10-27 11:32 +0100
          Re: Any experience on teaching Perl programmers Java Jef <e70838@gmail.com> - 2011-10-27 05:45 -0700
          Re: Any experience on teaching Perl programmers Java Gene Wirchenko <genew@ocis.net> - 2011-10-27 10:28 -0700
    Re: Any experience on teaching Perl programmers Java Tom Anderson <twic@urchin.earth.li> - 2011-10-26 21:54 +0100
    Re: Any experience on teaching Perl programmers Java Joshua Cranmer <Pidgeot18@verizon.invalid> - 2011-10-26 20:45 -0500
      Re: Any experience on teaching Perl programmers Java Jim Gibson <jimsgibson@gmail.com> - 2011-10-27 16:31 -0700
    Re: Any experience on teaching Perl programmers Java Roedy Green <see_website@mindprod.com.invalid> - 2011-10-27 17:02 -0700
    Re: Any experience on teaching Perl programmers Java Roedy Green <see_website@mindprod.com.invalid> - 2011-10-27 17:07 -0700

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#9156 — Any experience on teaching Perl programmers Java

Hello,

I lately applied for quite an ineresting Java job. It turned out that
I would also have to teach Perl programmers Java. Now, there's the
rub... I once had to teach SAP developers Java. That was a little
nightmare. The SAP programmers were not all interested, had basically
no interest in computer science as such. Worst of all the boss thought
Java was something like SAP just from a different manufacturer and
everybody could learn it like SAP itself. I fear this could turn out
the same again with teaching Perl programmers Java ...

Problem is now that I have no clue about Perl. So I cannot judge
whether they would be interested. Have to ask whether I could meet
these guys, sure. Found lot's of stuff on the Internet, but that
doesn't tell me that much about how it will be to teach Perl people
Java. Anybody that gained some experience here is welcomed to drop a
comment or send me a mail to saxo123@gmx.de.

Cheers, Oliver

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#9157

On 10/24/2011 3:07 PM, saxo123@gmx.de wrote:
> I once had to teach SAP developers Java. That was a little
> nightmare. The SAP programmers were not all interested, had basically
> no interest in computer science as such. Worst of all the boss thought
> Java was something like SAP just from a different manufacturer and
> everybody could learn it like SAP itself.


'Cuse my ignorance but what is SAP?  I see the product on WikiPedia by 
the company SAP, but that doesn't tell me much about it.


> I fear this could turn out
> the same again with teaching Perl programmers Java ...


I'd state your concerns up front to the class and gather their feedback. 
  I know one Perl programmer who is very concerned about structure and 
organization of code.  But I'll admit he seems to be the exception.

Other than that, I'd start at the beginning and teach it to them as if 
they were new programmers, except in deference to the fact that they are 
not, I'd go faster.  I don't however have any experience teach 
professionals programming, so ymmv.

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#9635

On 10/24/2011 7:10 PM, markspace wrote:
> On 10/24/2011 3:07 PM, saxo123@gmx.de wrote:
>> I once had to teach SAP developers Java. That was a little
>> nightmare. The SAP programmers were not all interested, had basically
>> no interest in computer science as such. Worst of all the boss thought
>> Java was something like SAP just from a different manufacturer and
>> everybody could learn it like SAP itself.
>
> 'Cuse my ignorance but what is SAP? I see the product on WikiPedia by
> the company SAP, but that doesn't tell me much about it.

It is a standard ERP system (financials etc.) for large corporations.

It is mainly for big corporations because it usually cost XX M$
or XXX M$ to customize the "standard" system to that corporation.

I have heard about SAP installations with 150000 database
tables.

Working with it is supposedly horrible, but SAP consultants make
really good money.

Arne

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#9158

On 10/24/11 18:07, saxo123@gmx.de wrote:
> Hello,
>
> I lately applied for quite an ineresting Java job. It turned out that
> I would also have to teach Perl programmers Java. Now, there's the
> rub... I once had to teach SAP developers Java. That was a little
> nightmare. The SAP programmers were not all interested, had basically
> no interest in computer science as such. Worst of all the boss thought
> Java was something like SAP just from a different manufacturer and
> everybody could learn it like SAP itself. I fear this could turn out
> the same again with teaching Perl programmers Java ...
>
> Problem is now that I have no clue about Perl. So I cannot judge
> whether they would be interested. Have to ask whether I could meet
> these guys, sure. Found lot's of stuff on the Internet, but that
> doesn't tell me that much about how it will be to teach Perl people
> Java. Anybody that gained some experience here is welcomed to drop a
> comment or send me a mail to saxo123@gmx.de.
>
> Cheers, Oliver

Perl is not Object Oriented.

They will understand the usual types of programming constructs, looping, 
if..then..else, and so on. Biggest problem may be helping them get their 
heads around objects, classes and the like.

My $0.02 Cdn.

-- 
Programmers, with their inbuild sense of order and discipline, should 
really be running the world.

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#9164

In article <j856kr$25q$1@theodyn.ncf.ca>,
William Colls  <william.colls@rogers.com> wrote:
> On 10/24/11 18:07, saxo123@gmx.de wrote:
> > Hello,
> >
> > I lately applied for quite an ineresting Java job. It turned out that
> > I would also have to teach Perl programmers Java. Now, there's the
> > rub... I once had to teach SAP developers Java. That was a little
> > nightmare. The SAP programmers were not all interested, had basically
> > no interest in computer science as such. Worst of all the boss thought
> > Java was something like SAP just from a different manufacturer and
> > everybody could learn it like SAP itself. I fear this could turn out
> > the same again with teaching Perl programmers Java ...
> >
> > Problem is now that I have no clue about Perl. So I cannot judge
> > whether they would be interested. Have to ask whether I could meet
> > these guys, sure. Found lot's of stuff on the Internet, but that
> > doesn't tell me that much about how it will be to teach Perl people
> > Java. Anybody that gained some experience here is welcomed to drop a
> > comment or send me a mail to saxo123@gmx.de.
> >
> > Cheers, Oliver
> 
> Perl is not Object Oriented.

Well ....  It doesn't have to be, but it can be.  The man page
for perl lists the following, under "Tutorials":

perlboot            Perl OO tutorial for beginners
perltoot            Perl OO tutorial, part 1
perltooc            Perl OO tutorial, part 2
perlbot             Perl OO tricks and examples

Some (many? several?) of the Perl library add-ons are packaged as
classes/objects.

> They will understand the usual types of programming constructs, looping, 
> if..then..else, and so on. Biggest problem may be helping them get their 
> heads around objects, classes and the like.

Agreed that they will presumably understand basic programming
logic (assignment, conditionals, repetition) and that this will
help quite a bit (teaching complete novices is *not* easy!).
Whether you have to start from zero in teaching them about classes
and objects may depend on what kind of Perl they know.  But if
all they know is Perl, the idea of variables having types will be
new to them, and that may be significant.  At my PPOE I'm teaching
C to undergraduates, some of whom started in Python, and they do
seem to be struggling a bit with the notion of types.

-- 
B. L. Massingill
ObDisclaimer:  I don't speak for my employers; they return the favor.

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#9177

In article <9gn5f8FmomU4@mid.individual.net>, <blmblm@myrealbox.com>
wrote:

> In article <j856kr$25q$1@theodyn.ncf.ca>,
> William Colls  <william.colls@rogers.com> wrote:
> > 
> > Perl is not Object Oriented.
> 
> Well ....  It doesn't have to be, but it can be.  The man page
> for perl lists the following, under "Tutorials":
> 
> perlboot            Perl OO tutorial for beginners
> perltoot            Perl OO tutorial, part 1
> perltooc            Perl OO tutorial, part 2
> perlbot             Perl OO tricks and examples
> 
> Some (many? several?) of the Perl library add-ons are packaged as
> classes/objects.

There is also the book "Object Oriented Perl", Damian Conway, Manning
Publications, 1999.

<http://www.manning.com/conway/>

Object-oriented features were added in Perl 5: classes, encapsulation,
inheritance, polymorphism, etc. The one thing Perl doesn't have is data
hiding:

³Perl doesn't have an infatuation with enforced privacy. It would
prefer that you stayed out of its living room because you weren't
invited, not because it has a shotgun² -- Larry Wall

(I am a Perl fan, if you can't tell.)

-- 
Jim Gibson

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#9192

Jim Gibson wrote:
> Object-oriented features were added in Perl 5: classes, encapsulation,
> inheritance, polymorphism, etc. The one thing Perl doesn't have is data
> hiding:
> 
> ³Perl doesn't have an infatuation with enforced privacy. It would
> prefer that you stayed out of its living room because you weren't
> invited, not because it has a shotgun² -- Larry Wall
> 
> (I am a Perl fan, if you can't tell.)

Calling data-access control an "infatuation" doesn't make it a bad thing.  Cute analogies with rabid defenders of one's home don't make an engineering argument, either.

-- 
Lew

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#9218

On Tue, 25 Oct 2011 20:00:02 -0700, Lew wrote:

> Calling data-access control an "infatuation" doesn't make it a bad
> thing.  Cute analogies with rabid defenders of one's home don't make an
> engineering argument, either.
>
Larry Wall has a somewhat ironic, self-deprecating sense of humour and 
merely meant that Perl has much less dependence on variable scoping than 
some other languages. 

Self-deprecating because it was he who said that PERL is an acronym for 
"Pathologically Eclectic Rubbish Lister" and, in the early days, 
described it as the result of combining features of the Bourne shell, awk, 
grep and several a few UNIX filters such as tr wc into one scripting 
language.
 

-- 
martin@   | Martin Gregorie
gregorie. | Essex, UK
org       |

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#9168

Hi All,

thanx for the replies. What I'm wondering about most is whether
typical Perl people out there in the companies are mentally awake and
will show interest in learning new things. That kind of question is a
bit tentative, I admit. My experience with SAP people was somewhat
negative there. SAP is a data maintenance system, basically a
programming layer on top of a SQL database with predefined business-
oriented modules for accounting, credit business, hr, stockkepping,
etc. The SAP programming language is somewhat an extension to SQL on
an Algol-68 like language level. Now, that was mean, but basically
correct.

Now Perl is surely on a higher level than ABAP, but you can live a
quite life as long as you know how to convert data streams with Perl.
No more interest in computer science is required then to get that kind
of job done. And that kind of people will not be able to get into
something like Java and all the tools and libraries where you need to
have an interest in computer science as such. Otherwise you ran mad,
because of all the things that pop up new every year and you then have
to learn as well.

Regards, Oliver

Regards, Oliver

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#9170

On Oct 25, 11:48 am, saxo...@gmx.de wrote:
> thanx for the replies. What I'm wondering about most is whether
> typical Perl people out there in the companies are mentally awake and
> will show interest in learning new things. That kind of question is a
> bit tentative, I admit.

It's also something which we cannot answer.  In ignorance of the real
pupils you have we can only offer speculation and prejudice.  That
would only make things worse.  Better enter the training with an open
mind and find out who they are and what they expect from the
training.  Then adjust accordingly.

> My experience with SAP people was somewhat
> negative there. SAP is a data maintenance system, basically a
> programming layer on top of a SQL database with predefined business-
> oriented modules for accounting, credit business, hr, stockkepping,
> etc. The SAP programming language is somewhat an extension to SQL on
> an Algol-68 like language level. Now, that was mean, but basically
> correct.
>
> Now Perl is surely on a higher level than ABAP, but you can live a
> quite life as long as you know how to convert data streams with Perl.
> No more interest in computer science is required then to get that kind
> of job done.

Unfortunately that seems to be the case for many Java programmers as
well.  I do not think that attitude depends on programming language.
Maybe it's the other way round (i.e. people with certain attitudes
pick specific languages) but even that is speculation and won't help
you because your group could be totally different.

> And that kind of people will not be able to get into
> something like Java and all the tools and libraries where you need to
> have an interest in computer science as such. Otherwise you ran mad,
> because of all the things that pop up new every year and you then have
> to learn as well.

CPAN is also quite large and I don't think that you can get away with
only a few core library functions throughout your Perl life.

As I said: better find out who you are dealing with than try to create
expectation and press real people into that frame.  Imagine this forum
would agree that Perl programmers are stupid and dumb: you would be
preoccupied and have insulted them already the very moment you enter
classroom.  I do not think there would be a successful teaching and
learning experience with such a start - at least it's a lot harder
than otherwise.

In any case I believe it to be important to come to a common agreement
on what the purpose of the course is.  It won't help if you want to
teach CS topics but people are more interested in learning how to
solve particular problems.  If people are not interested to learn
though, then teaching anything will be hard and you will first have to
build up motivation.

Kind regards

robert

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#9204

Robert Klemme <shortcutter@googlemail.com> wrote in news:c083623a-05a8-
483e-86b9-4a3a243b185b@g25g2000yqh.googlegroups.com:

> On Oct 25, 11:48 am, saxo...@gmx.de wrote:
>> thanx for the replies. What I'm wondering about most is whether
>> typical Perl people out there in the companies are mentally awake and
>> will show interest in learning new things. That kind of question is a
>> bit tentative, I admit.
> 
> It's also something which we cannot answer.  In ignorance of the real
> pupils you have we can only offer speculation and prejudice.  That
> would only make things worse.  Better enter the training with an open
> mind and find out who they are and what they expect from the
> training.  Then adjust accordingly.
> 
Actually, it might be better if you found out what the person who has 
booked the students into the course wants. After years as a professional 
IT trainer, I can tell you that the students on the course aren't always 
there because they want to be. Typically, a manager has decided that they 
need to learn such-and-such and the student is not necessarily thrilled 
about it or even very interested in the subject at hand. Sometimes, the 
students' interests differ significantly from what their manager wants. 
Sometimes, the students are more-or-less in the dark: the new language 
they are enrolled to learn was not their idea and their management will 
not have necessarily given them much background on why they are going to 
learn it. It's possible that the students have simply been told that they 
need to learn it for some upcoming project. That means that what 
interests the students about the language may be at odds from what the 
manager wants them to know. For instance, students may be keen to know 
how to do something they do with their existing language while the 
manager may be putting them on this course so that they can learn 
something that the new language is better suited to doing. 

The cold hard reality is that your ultimate success as an instructor will 
be teaching them what the manager wants them to know, not what the 
students themselves are interested in. If you please the students but not 
the manager, you will not likely get the chance to teach for that 
customer again. If you please the manager by covering what he wants you 
to cover and the students have the expected level of proficiency when 
they get back to work, you will likely get further business from that 
company.  

>> My experience with SAP people was somewhat
>> negative there. SAP is a data maintenance system, basically a
>> programming layer on top of a SQL database with predefined business-
>> oriented modules for accounting, credit business, hr, stockkepping,
>> etc. The SAP programming language is somewhat an extension to SQL on
>> an Algol-68 like language level. Now, that was mean, but basically
>> correct.
>>
>> Now Perl is surely on a higher level than ABAP, but you can live a
>> quite life as long as you know how to convert data streams with Perl.
>> No more interest in computer science is required then to get that kind
>> of job done.
> 
> Unfortunately that seems to be the case for many Java programmers as
> well.  I do not think that attitude depends on programming language.
> Maybe it's the other way round (i.e. people with certain attitudes
> pick specific languages) but even that is speculation and won't help
> you because your group could be totally different.
> 
>> And that kind of people will not be able to get into
>> something like Java and all the tools and libraries where you need to
>> have an interest in computer science as such. Otherwise you ran mad,
>> because of all the things that pop up new every year and you then have
>> to learn as well.
> 
> CPAN is also quite large and I don't think that you can get away with
> only a few core library functions throughout your Perl life.
> 
> As I said: better find out who you are dealing with than try to create
> expectation and press real people into that frame.  Imagine this forum
> would agree that Perl programmers are stupid and dumb: you would be
> preoccupied and have insulted them already the very moment you enter
> classroom.  I do not think there would be a successful teaching and
> learning experience with such a start - at least it's a lot harder
> than otherwise.
>
I agree completely: don't go into the class assuming that the students 
are not very bright or motivated because that will just put everyone in 
an antagonistic mood. They may in fact turn out to be less than you hoped 
but I've only had that happen a very few times in hundreds of classes 
over the years and even those classes had more to do with the culture at 
that company. 
 
> In any case I believe it to be important to come to a common agreement
> on what the purpose of the course is.

I agree, provided that the manager who wants these students on the course 
is consulted for what he/she wants the students to learn. Bear in mind 
that some managers are not very technical themselves; they are, perhaps, 
professional project managers with little if any programming skills. 
Their input may be minimal as a result but SOMEONE in the company with 
programming skills is likely to be behind the push to offer the course 
you are teaching and they will likely be the best person to discuss the 
focus of the class with. If you can get that person involved in the 
planning of the course, you should be very successful in delivering what 
the students need.

>  It won't help if you want to
> teach CS topics but people are more interested in learning how to
> solve particular problems.

Agreed. Where possible, include practical hands-on exercises that are 
closely related to what students will actually need to do. Abstract 
theoretical knowledge like OO Concepts is still going to be necessary but 
don't dwell on that too long, especially at the expense of giving 
students some practical examples of how the theory is applied in the real 
world and some actual exercises for them to code that illustrate those 
points. 

>  If people are not interested to learn
> though, then teaching anything will be hard and you will first have to
> build up motivation.
> 
At that point, you have become, in effect, a high school teacher in front 
of a room full of disinterested, unmotivated students, not a trainer. 
Luckily it only rarely comes to that. Most people being paid to program 
are at least sufficient professional to make an effort to learn, even if 
they are a bit dubious of the particular course or subject they have been 
told to take by their employers. 


-- 
Ten-Blade 

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#9197

> The one thing Perl doesn't have is data hiding.

As a matter of fact Smalltalk doesn't have that, either. Once you add
getters and setters for a variable it becomes public. Nevertheless,
Smalltalk teaches you a lot of good things.

I remembered a former working collegue who works as a Java developer
in an IT department with some Perl programmers and asked him how he
would compare a Perl programmer to a SAP programmer. He said comparing
a Perl programmer with a SAP programmer deserves maximum punishment.
That was the information I needed ...

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#9231

saxo123@gmx.de wrote :
>> The one thing Perl doesn't have is data hiding.
>
> As a matter of fact Smalltalk doesn't have that, either. Once you add
> getters and setters for a variable it becomes public.

Um, no.

A getter/setter can also be private or default (package visible). And 
the actual variable (field) is still hidden (private).

A getter/setter is a method. You can stuff as much code as you want 
into it, though you should follow the basic contract of a 
getter/setter, ie saving the passed value and returning it.

I've written setters that store the passed value, then manipulate it in 
some way and then store that. So a single setter actually sets two 
values, and there are two related getters.

-- 
Wojtek :-)

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#9235

> Actually, it might be better if you found out what the person who has booked the students into
> the course wants.

It's about teaching Perl developers in a company Java to transfer them
to Java/OO development. It will be something like a continouing part-
time job beside my min work.

> I'm a Perl programmer, as well as a Java programmer, and a Fortran
> programmer, and a Forth programmer, and an assembly language programmer,
> and a C programmer ...

Yes, I see. The issue is that in companies like banks or insurance
companies a Perl programmer can spend a work life time with Perl-based
stream processing without doing anything else. That kind of people
don't have a horizon like you.

> I suspect that you will most notably find grousing about explicit static
> typing, as opposed to Perl's implicit duck typing. To a lesser degree,
> people may grouse about Java needing to put methods in classes.

Yes, but I let the moan about those things. Not my job to bother about
that. I'm thinking of letting them do some groovy programming. Teaches
them OO as well and many higher-level constructs they need for Java
development. With groovy they will feel much more at home. Once the
company wants them to do some real Java work, they'll have to switch
like myself wo would prefer some groovy/groovy++ work as well :-).

--Oliver

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#9248

On Oct 26, 9:52 am, saxo...@gmx.de wrote:
> I remembered a former working collegue who works as a Java developer
> in an IT department with some Perl programmers and asked him how he
> would compare a Perl programmer to a SAP programmer. He said comparing
> a Perl programmer with a SAP programmer deserves maximum punishment.
> That was the information I needed ...

What information did that statement convey to you?  I don't find it
unambiguous at all.

Cheers

robert

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#9253

On Thu, 27 Oct 2011 08:07:28 -0700 (PDT), Robert Klemme
<shortcutter@googlemail.com> wrote:

>On Oct 26, 9:52 am, saxo...@gmx.de wrote:
>> I remembered a former working collegue who works as a Java developer
>> in an IT department with some Perl programmers and asked him how he
>> would compare a Perl programmer to a SAP programmer. He said comparing
>> a Perl programmer with a SAP programmer deserves maximum punishment.
>> That was the information I needed ...
>
>What information did that statement convey to you?  I don't find it
>unambiguous at all.

     I find it unambiguous.  It is obvious that there is ill-will.

     OTOH, I do not find it useful.

Sincerely,

Gene Wirchenko

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#9205

On 10/24/2011 3:07 PM, saxo123@gmx.de wrote:
> Hello,
>
> I lately applied for quite an ineresting Java job. It turned out that
> I would also have to teach Perl programmers Java. Now, there's the
> rub... I once had to teach SAP developers Java. That was a little
> nightmare. The SAP programmers were not all interested, had basically
> no interest in computer science as such. Worst of all the boss thought
> Java was something like SAP just from a different manufacturer and
> everybody could learn it like SAP itself. I fear this could turn out
> the same again with teaching Perl programmers Java ...
>
> Problem is now that I have no clue about Perl. So I cannot judge
> whether they would be interested. Have to ask whether I could meet
> these guys, sure. Found lot's of stuff on the Internet, but that
> doesn't tell me that much about how it will be to teach Perl people
> Java. Anybody that gained some experience here is welcomed to drop a
> comment or send me a mail to saxo123@gmx.de.

I'm confused about this whole discussion, because it seems to assume
that programming in a language such as Perl has implications for the
programmer's general skills, interests, and ability to learn other
languages.

I'm a Perl programmer, as well as a Java programmer, and a Fortran
programmer, and a Forth programmer, and an assembly language programmer,
and a C programmer ...

How can you possibly deduce from the fact that someone is currently
programming in Perl anything beyond the conclusion that they probably
know Perl?

Patricia

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#9213

On Wed, 26 Oct 2011, Patricia Shanahan wrote:

> On 10/24/2011 3:07 PM, saxo123@gmx.de wrote:
>
>> I lately applied for quite an ineresting Java job. It turned out that I 
>> would also have to teach Perl programmers Java. Now, there's the rub... 
>> I once had to teach SAP developers Java. That was a little nightmare. 
>> The SAP programmers were not all interested, had basically no interest 
>> in computer science as such. Worst of all the boss thought Java was 
>> something like SAP just from a different manufacturer and everybody 
>> could learn it like SAP itself. I fear this could turn out the same 
>> again with teaching Perl programmers Java ...
>> 
>> Problem is now that I have no clue about Perl. So I cannot judge 
>> whether they would be interested. Have to ask whether I could meet 
>> these guys, sure. Found lot's of stuff on the Internet, but that 
>> doesn't tell me that much about how it will be to teach Perl people 
>> Java. Anybody that gained some experience here is welcomed to drop a 
>> comment or send me a mail to saxo123@gmx.de.
>
> I'm confused about this whole discussion, because it seems to assume
> that programming in a language such as Perl has implications for the
> programmer's general skills, interests, and ability to learn other
> languages.
>
> I'm a Perl programmer, as well as a Java programmer, and a Fortran
> programmer, and a Forth programmer, and an assembly language programmer,
> and a C programmer ...
>
> How can you possibly deduce from the fact that someone is currently 
> programming in Perl anything beyond the conclusion that they probably 
> know Perl?

It doesn't seem unreasonable to infer that they probably either prefer 
Perl to other languages, or don't know other languages. Some people might 
be trapped writing Perl when they'd rather be writing something else, but 
i would guess that would be a corner case.

It doesn't seem entirely appalling to proceed to infer that they either 
don't know about object orientation, static typing, enterprisey 
frameworks, debuggers, etc, or they don't care for them.

More generally, my experience has been that different programming 
languages have different cultures around them, and it is not unreasonable 
to guess that a programmer of some particular language is part of that 
culture. You won't be right all the time, but you don't necessarily need 
to be.

tom

-- 
The art of medicine consists in amusing the patient while nature cures
the disease. -- Voltaire

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#9237

On 26/10/2011 21:51, Tom Anderson wrote:
> On Wed, 26 Oct 2011, Patricia Shanahan wrote:
>>
>> How can you possibly deduce from the fact that someone is currently
>> programming in Perl anything beyond the conclusion that they probably
>> know Perl?
>
>
> It doesn't seem entirely appalling to proceed to infer that they either
> don't know about object orientation, static typing, enterprisey
> frameworks, debuggers, etc, or they don't care for them.

It seems appalling to me. I have written OO in Perl. There are Perl OO 
frameworks; Perl debuggers. Why should they exist if (a substantial 
number of) Perl programmers don't care for them?

If I was teaching Java to Perl programmers I'd show them Perl OO code 
and the equivalent Java OO code. Then I'd compare thinking in Perl with 
thinking in Java. I wouldn't start out assuming I was trail-driving a 
bunch of illiterate curmudgeonly idiots to the pool of enlightenment.


> More generally, my experience has been that different programming
> languages have different cultures around them, and it is not
> unreasonable to guess that a programmer of some particular language is
> part of that culture. You won't be right all the time, but you don't
> necessarily need to be.

There's some truth in this but I program Perl, I program Java. Which 
cultural pigeon hole should I cower in? A trainer might address the 
different language cultures but I wouldn't focus on it too much.

-- 
RGB

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#9240

Hello, Perl is the language I use the most.
Perl programmers are in general litterate in CS and will probably be
very critic about Java language. An introduction of the reflection API
will probably please a lot. A Perl programmer wants to know the
internal to understand what can be done and can not be done with a
language.
Perl programmer have many modules available on CPAN and are not used
to IDE (like eclipse or netbeans). I think you should take time to
explain how to use the IDE and how to find help about the available
libraries. Show them how to navigate the sources of java libraries.
Perl programmers are used to very short programs to solve complex
problems thanks to the smart libraries. You should make your examples
very consise and do not hesitate to use syntactic tricks. Normally a
Perl programmer knows about objects, closure, garbage collectors (Perl
has only reference counting). Multiple inheritence is almost never
used in Perl. Interfaces are not needed because the language is
dynamic.

Perl is generally bad for creating GUI, but excellent for text
processing. If you put your examples inside a GUI, they will be less
tempted to compare. Before you start teaching them, you must undestand
that any java programm can be programmed in Perl in about a tenth of
the time and with a tenth of the code.

There are some exceptions: I have encountered some bad "Perl
programmers" that were using Perl like a shell scripting language.
They were often less literrate, but may be very good in other
languages. Switching to java maybe an excellent idea for them, but
this does give you no clue about how to teach them.

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