Tools like this really show the strength of opensource. I've recently upgraded my perl to 5.8 as well.
Perl and CPAN for the Unknowing. Perl and CPAN for the Unknowing
For those who haven't ever done more than a few lines of Perl (and, amazingly, that's most people seemingly), Perl remains this cryptic, bizarre language that often looks rife with "comic book cursing" --- from all the regular expression syntax. And I'd have to agree with that. Perl is cryptic but it also has one of the single best assets in the history of programming, CPAN. CPAN or Comprehensive Perl Archive Network is a giant distributed source code repository where you can find just about anything. And the only way to illustrate it is to really post my daily CPAN mailing from Pudge. Here's what was new yesterday.
New CPAN Distributions for October 1, 2002
posted by pudge on Tuesday October 01, @18:30 (modules)
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* [0]Apache-ASP-2.41 -- Active Server Pages for Apache with mod_perl
* [1]Apache-iTunes-0.06 -- control iTunes from mod_perl
* [2]Benchmark-Thread-Size-0.03 -- report size of threads for different
code approaches
* [3]CGI-SpeedyCGI-2.21 -- Speed up perl scripts by running them
persistently.
* [4]ConfigReader-Simple-1.14 -- Simple configuration file parser
* [5]Decision-Markov-0.02 -- Markov models for decision analysis
* [6]EasyTCP-0.16 -- Easily create secure, bandwidth-friendly TCP/IP
clients and servers
* [7]Encode-compat-0.03 -- Encode.pm emulation layer
* [8]Graphics-RGBManipulate-0.01 -- HSV adjustment tool for RGB colours
* [9]HTML-TagReader-0.12 -- Perl extension module for reading
html/sgml/xml files by tags.
* [10]HTTP-Size-0.4 -- Get the byte size of an internet resource
* [11]Log-Agent-0.303 -- logging agent
* [12]Log-Dispatch-Jabber-0.2 -- Log messages via Jabber
* [13]Mac-iTunes-0.7
* [14]Net-DNAT-0.07 -- Psuedo Layer7 Packet Processer
* [15]Netscape-Cache-0.45 -- object class for accessing Netscape cache
files
* [16]PDF-Report-1.00 -- A wrapper written for PDF::API2
* [17]PersistentPerl-2.21 -- Speed up perl scripts by running them
persistently.
* [18]Petal-0.74 -- Perl Template Attribute Language
* [19]Scraper-2.26 -- framework for scraping results from search
engines.
* [20]Set-IntRange-5.1 -- Sets of Integers
* [21]Test-Data-0.6 -- test functions for particular variable types
* [22]Test-Data-0.7 -- test functions for particular variable types
* [23]Test-Manifest-0.8 -- interact with a t/test_manifest file
* [24]Test-Prereq-0.07 -- check if Makefile.PL has the right
pre-requisites
* [25]Thread-Conveyor-0.13 -- transport of any data-structure between
threads
* [26]Thread-Conveyor-Monitored-0.09 -- monitor a belt for specific
content
* [27]Thread-Exit-0.04 -- provide thread-local exit(), BEGIN {} and END
{}
* [28]Thread-Pool-0.28 -- group of threads for performing similar jobs
* [29]Thread-Pool-Resolve-0.08 -- resolve logs asynchronously
* [30]Thread-Rand-0.04 -- repeatable random sequences between threads
* [31]Thread-Serialize-0.05 -- serialize data-structures between
threads
* [32]Thread-Signal-1.06 -- deliver a signal to a thread
* [33]Thread-Status-0.03 -- report stack status of all running threads
* [34]Thread-Tie-0.08 -- tie variables into a thread of their own
* [35]Thread-Use-0.03 -- use a module inside a thread only
* [36]Tk-DateEntry-1.34 -- Drop down calendar widget for selecting
dates.
* [37]dbMan-0.25
* [38]load-0.02 -- control when subroutines will be loaded
* [39]load-0.03 -- control when subroutines will be loaded
That's right -- everything from thread code to PDF creation to database routines to iTunes stuff to an ASP compatible page interpreter written in Perl for Apache so you don't have to run IIS if you don't want to and more. And that's just one day worh of updates. I'm certainly not saying that Perl is perfect by any means or that even CPAN is perfect (it's not) but it is a tremendous resource that many folks just aren't aware of. If you've ever wondered why people are so enthusiastic about Perl, CPAN's a large part of it. [The FuzzyBlog!]
3:21:50 PM 
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