Phoenix Network Forums

i have read an article saying that perl and cgi are being replaced by asp, php and other new server side scripting languages, i strongly dis-agree with this statement. What do you think about it?

i haven't used perl/cgi for years... php became sufficient for my needs. So yeah, sure, why not.

But perl isn't only a scripting language, its a fully functional programming langauge as well, php can only go so far when using it in a shell environment rather than a web one and I don't know is asp can even do that much.
Perl may be being replaced php and others when it comes to the web but thats because they are newer, they were made easier to use and faster to use.
Most people wouldn't goto the trouble of learning/using C/C++ type languages for simple tasks like managing and syncronizing local and remote users, or restoring backups while they could use somthing much simpler which requires less actual coding like perl.

true, you can create a perl script much faster then a c, or c++ program, and you don't have to go through the trouble of compiling the program :D

PHP is easier to integrate into HTML than Perl. PHP is easier to learn than Perl.
Both of them are quick. It's an absurd idea that PHP is "greater" than Perl. Both of them have different purposes [but sometimes they're crossing :) ]

In my opinion perl is a powerfull language but i see it dying out as time goes on, If i am hired to do a webbased project i would use PHP rather then CGI, where as if i am going to be doing a application i would probably use C or C++, Although if you would have asked me a year or so ago when i was a die hard PERL fanatic i would have spoken otherwise. It's all a matter of opinion really what you feel comfortable with.

I Don't know how about an CGI but Perl is finishing his days of web scripting i think. :-)

Actually CGI is part of perl.

But i don't remember where i've been whit perl page now everythink is setting on PHP :-)

perl is much stronger and many people swear by it. ive wanted to take time out to learn it but i really only get around to do webdev work so i've just stuck with php. after doing mirc script for years on irc, php was easy to pick up as its relatively the same, as with all other C-ish languages.

im still considering picking up perl to work on non-http apps of some sort

also many sites (slashdot, dslreports, etc) run flawlessly and solely on perl, where php would not be able to handle the load as well. although ive heard slashdot was poorly written, but thats just the word.

Perl is still in development and I think it's user base is still way too big. I've coded a few websites in PERL/cgi and I will stick with it! It's string tools are great, file access, it's data structures. It can do anything I'll ever want it to and more!

I can't say I have coded a lot of php, but I like how perl generates that page more than php, but I can see how php could be good/easier for some people.

_neil wrote:perl is much stronger and many people swear by it.

If perl can't do it, it's probably not worth doing.

Funny that we're on web scripting and nobody's mentioned Python yet ^^.

i know, perl can be used for cgi programming

Perl's String manipulation is ridiculous. Ive scene the most complicated string manipulations done with perl and regex in just a few lines of code... However i feel that perl is a harder language to learn, esp when being compared to ASP... ASP can be scripted with JS or VBScript, which makes it a lot easier to learn and shortens the learning time needed...