What is Perl?
Depending
on whom you ask, Perl stands for “Practical Extraction and Report
Language” or “Pathologically Eclectic Rubbish Lister.” It is a
powerful glue language useful for tying together the loose ends of
computing life.
History
Perl
is the natural outgrowth of a project started by Larry Wall in 1986.
Originally intended as a configuration and control system for six
VAXes and six SUNs located on opposite ends of the country, it grew
into a more general tool for system administration on many platforms.
Since its unveiling to programmers at large, it has become the work
of a large body of developers. Larry Wall, however, remains its
principle architect. Although the first platform Perl inhabited was
UNIX, it has since been ported to over 70 different operating systems
including, but not limited to, Windows 9x/NT/2000, MacOS, VMS, Linux,
UNIX (many variants), BeOS, LynxOS, and QNX.
Uses of Perl
1. Tool for
general system administration
2. Processing
textual or numerical data
3. Database
interconnectivity
4. Common Gateway
Interface (CGI/Web) programming
5. Driving other
programs! (FTP, Mail, WWW, OLE)
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