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I browsed through a copy of his new book downstairs in Powell's, so I thought I'd attend Peter Scott's talk on legacy Perl applications. Normally when you use the word legacy in relation to Perl, you're talking about Perl as the solution to some horrible legacy problem. However as a mature language, there is also more and more legacy Perl code around. For some people Perl is no longer the solution, it's also part of the problem...

Amongst other things he recommends Perl::Tidy to clean up poorly styled code, or even to be run automatically at CVS check-in and check-out so you never have to see any other coding style other than your own. Cute idea...

Another good idea he suggested was a cure for "monolithic madness",

{
   use strict;
   [ ... ] 
   {
      no strict;
      [ ... ]
   } 
}

gradually migrating code from inside to outside.

Tags: OSCON 2005 Perl Peter Scott Perl Medic Legacy Code