| Larry Wall | |
 | |
| Born | September 27, 1954 |
|---|---|
| Nationality | American |
| Occupation | Programmer, Author |
| Known for | Perl |
| Religious beliefs | International Church of the Nazarene |
| Spouse | Gloria Wall |
| Children | 4 |
| Website www.wall.org/~larry/ | |
Larry Wall (born September 27, 1954) is a programmer and author, most widely known for his creation of the Perl programming language in 1987. Events 489 - Odoacer attacks Theodoric at the Battle of Verona and is defeated again Year 1954 ( MCMLIV) was a Common year starting on Friday (link will display full 1954 Gregorian calendar) A programmer is someone who writes Computer software. The term computer programmer can refer to a specialist in one area of computer programming or to a generalist An author is defined both as "the person who originates or gives existence to anything" and that authorship determines responsibility for what is created NOTES FOR EDITORS "Perl" is not an acronym (read the "Name" section below The Church of the Nazarene, often referred to as the Nazarene Church is an International evangelical Christian denomination that began in Events 489 - Odoacer attacks Theodoric at the Battle of Verona and is defeated again Year 1954 ( MCMLIV) was a Common year starting on Friday (link will display full 1954 Gregorian calendar) A programmer is someone who writes Computer software. The term computer programmer can refer to a specialist in one area of computer programming or to a generalist An author is defined both as "the person who originates or gives existence to anything" and that authorship determines responsibility for what is created NOTES FOR EDITORS "Perl" is not an acronym (read the "Name" section below A programming language is an Artificial language that can be used to write programs which control the behavior of a machine particularly a Computer. Wall earned his bachelor's degree from Seattle Pacific University in 1976. A bachelor's degree is usually an Undergraduate Academic degree awarded for a course or major that generally lasts for three four or in some cases and Seattle Pacific University (SPU is a Christian University of the Liberal arts, Sciences and professions located on the north slope of
While in graduate school at UC Berkeley, Wall and his wife were studying linguistics with the intention afterwards of finding an unwritten language, perhaps in Africa, and creating a writing system for it. A graduate school or ("grad school" is a school that awards advanced degrees such as doctoral degrees with the general requirement that students must have earned Linguistics is the scientific study of Language, encompassing a number of sub-fields A writing system is a type of Symbolic system used to represent elements or statements expressible in Language. They would then use this new writing system to translate various texts into the language, among them the Bible. Etymology According to the Online Etymology Dictionary, the word bible is from Latin biblia, traced from the same word through Medieval Latin and Late Latin Due to health reasons these plans were canceled, and they remained in the U. S. , where Larry instead joined the NASA Jet Propulsion Laboratory after he finished grad school. The National Aeronautics and Space Administration ( NASA, ˈnæsə is an agency of the United States government, responsible for the nation's public space program [1]
Wall is the author of the rn Usenet client and the nearly universally used patch program. rn (short for Read News) is a News client (or 'newsreader' written by Larry Wall and originally released in 1984 patch is a Unix program that updates text files according to instructions contained in a separate file called a patch file. He has won the International Obfuscated C Code Contest twice and was the recipient of the first Free Software Foundation Award for the Advancement of Free Software in 1998. The International Obfuscated C Code Contest (abbreviated IOCCC) is a Programming contest for the most creatively obfuscated C Code The Free Software Foundation ( FSF) is a Non-profit corporation founded by Richard Stallman on 4 October 1985 to support the Free software movement Free Software Foundation (FSF grants two annual awards Since 1998 FSF has granted the award for Advancement of Free Software.
Beyond his technical skills, Wall is known for his wit and often ironic sense of humor [2] , which he displays in the comments to his source code or on Usenet. In Computer science, source code (commonly just source or code) is any sequence of statements or declarations written in some Human-readable Usenet, a Portmanteau of "user" and "network" is a world-wide distributed Internet discussion system For example: "We all agree on the necessity of compromise. We just can't agree on when it's necessary to compromise," and:
For example, it's been several decades now since a certain set of Bible translations came out, and you'll notice a pattern: the New English Bible, the New American Standard Bible, and the New International Version, to name a few. It's really funny. I suspect we'll still be calling them “new this” and “new that” a hundred years from now. Much like New College at Oxford. Do you know when New College was founded. Any guesses? New College was new in 1379. [2]
He is the co-author of Programming Perl (often referred to as the Camel Book), which is the definitive resource for Perl programmers. Programming Perl,ISBN 0-596-00027-8best known as the Camel Book among Programmers is a book about writing programs using the Perl programming He has edited the Perl Cookbook. The Perl Cookbook, ISBN 0-596-00313-7 is a book containing solutions to common short tasks in Perl His books are published by O'Reilly. O'Reilly Media (formerly O'Reilly & Associates) is an American media company established by Tim O'Reilly
Wall's qualification as a linguist is apparent in his books, interviews and lectures. He often compares Perl to a natural language and explains his decisions in Perl's design with linguistic rationale. He also often uses linguistic terms for Perl language constructs, so instead of traditional "variable", "function" and "accessor" he sometimes says "noun", "verb" and "topicalizer". For English usage of verbs see the wiki article English verbs. In Linguistics, the topic (or theme) is the part of the proposition that is being talked about ( predicated)
Wall's Christian faith has influenced some of the terminology of Perl, such as the name itself, a biblical reference to the "Pearl of great price" (Matthew 13:46). Christianity ( Greek Χριστιανισμός from the word Xριστός ( Christ)is a monotheistic Religion centered on the life and teachings The Gospel of Matthew (Gk Κατά Ματθαίον Ευαγγέλιον is one of the four Canonical gospels in the New Testament and is a Synoptic gospel [1] Similar references are the function name bless, and the organization of Perl 6 design documents with categories such as apocalypse and exegesis. Perl 6 is a planned major revision to the Perl Programming language. Exegesis (from the Greek 'to lead out' involves an extensive and critical interpretation of an authoritative text, especially of a Holy Wall has also alluded to his faith when he has spoken at conferences, including a rather straightforward statement of his beliefs at the August, 1997 Perl Conference and a discussion of Pilgrim's Progress at the YAPC (Yet Another Perl Conference) in June, 2000. The Pilgrim's Progress from This World to That Which Is to Come by John Bunyan (published February 1678) is a Christian Allegory Yet Another Perl Conference, usually given as the abbreviation YAPC, is a series of conferences discussing the Perl computer programming language usually organised
Wall continues to oversee further development of Perl and serves as the Benevolent Dictator for Life of the Perl project. His role in Perl is best conveyed by the so-called 2 Rules, taken from the official Perl documentation:
- Larry is always by definition right about how Perl should behave. This means he has final veto power on the core functionality.
- Larry is allowed to change his mind about any matter at a later date, regardless of whether he previously invoked Rule 1.
- Got that? Larry is always right, even when he was wrong.
Wall along with Randal L. Schwartz and Tom Christiansen writing in the second edition of Programming Perl, outlined the Three Virtues of a Programmer:
- Laziness - The quality that makes you go to great effort to reduce overall energy expenditure. Randal L Schwartz (born November 22, 1961) is an American author system administrator and programming consultant Tom Christiansen (also nicknamed "tchrist" or occasionally "thoth" is a well-known Unix developer and user especially known for his many contributions to Programming Perl,ISBN 0-596-00027-8best known as the Camel Book among Programmers is a book about writing programs using the Perl programming It makes you write labor-saving programs that other people will find useful, and document what you wrote so you don't have to answer so many questions about it. Hence, the first great virtue of a programmer. Also hence, this book. See also impatience and hubris.
- Impatience - The anger you feel when the computer is being lazy. This makes you write programs that don't just react to your needs, but actually anticipate them. Or at least pretend to. Hence, the second great virtue of a programmer. See also laziness and hubris.
- Hubris - Excessive pride, the sort of thing Zeus zaps you for. Hubris, sometimes spelled hybris ( Ancient Greek ὕβρις is a term used in modern English to indicate overweening Pride, self-confidence Also the quality that makes you write (and maintain) programs that other people won't want to say bad things about. Hence, the third great virtue of a programmer. See also laziness and impatience.
See also
References
- ^ Sims, David (1998-04-98). NOTES FOR EDITORS "Perl" is not an acronym (read the "Name" section below This is a list of Programmers notable for their contributions to software either as original author or architect or for later additions This is a list of well-known computer scientists, people who do work in Computer science, in particular researchers and authors Q&A With Larry Wall, Creator Of Perl, David Sims Q&A With Larry Wall, Creator Of Perl. TechWeb. Retrieved on 2007-08-05. Year 2007 ( MMVII) was a Common year starting on Monday of the Gregorian calendar in the 21st century. Events 642 - Battle of Maserfield - Penda of Mercia defeats and kills Oswald of Bernicia.
- ^ a b Wall, Larry (1999-03-03), “Perl, the first postmodern computer language”, The following is the text of Larry Wall's talk at Linux World on Wednesday, March 3. He explains why Perl is a fitting language for the postmodern era. As a member of the audience commented: "Another mindbender from Larry. ", San Jose Convention Centerr, San Jose, California: O’Reilly Media, Inc.
External links
- Larry Wall's personal home page
- Slightly Skeptical View on Larry Wall and Perl (Softpanorama Larry Wall's page)
- Authoritative list of Larry Wall quotes
- Perl, the first Postmodern Language
Please note that as the State of the Onion speeches are often primarily based on visual humour, the transcripts may seem confusing or nonsensical.
| Persondata | |
|---|---|
| NAME | Wall, Larry |
| ALTERNATIVE NAMES | |
| SHORT DESCRIPTION | programmer, linguist, and creator of Perl |
| DATE OF BIRTH | September 27, 1954 |
| PLACE OF BIRTH | |
| DATE OF DEATH | |
| PLACE OF DEATH | |
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