Python surpasses Perl in popularity?

Tam Ha not-for-mail at sonic.net
Sat Nov 29 11:23:49 EST 2008


Jorgen Grahn <grahn+nntp at snipabacken.se> wrote: 
>(I could get away with using Bash in these cases. It has functions, 
>local variables and so on. Writing portable Bourne shell is not as 
>much fun.)

Can you explain this?  Bourne is always more portable than Bash.
That's why you'll find experienced shell programmers writing everything
that doesn't absolutely require a bash feature in /bin/sh.  Boot scripts,
install scripts, etc. should never be written in bash and if where you
find one using bash you can be sure a Linux-only newbie has written it.
For one there are too many versions of bash, for two it is not installed
by default on every Unix/Linux OS, for three it has poor backwards
(and forwards) compatibility.  It is also found at different places on
the path.

As to the "study" that started this thread, clearly 100% pure garbage out.

Tam



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