CrossNodes: Scripting Clinic: Slice and Dice Text with Perl

“No no, don’t run away just because I said ‘Perl!’ Perl is a
really nice scripting language, don’t be afraid. Pretend you have
never been abused by mean people on the Perl mailing lists. Pretend
that you have never looked at a long, complex Perl program and
wondered if it was really a program, or a random collection of
characters generated as a practical joke. The key to using Perl
effectively is to focus on two basic principles:

• “Learn a few basic Perl tools well. You can do a lot with a
  little in Perl. Don’t worry about the show-offs who flaunt their
  strange, arcane Perl knowledge, just stay focused on the tasks you
  need to accomplish.
• “Write your Perl code for clarity and human understanding. Some
  Perl geeks love to compete to write the most obfuscated code.
  You’re welcome to join in; but for writing easy-to-maintain
  scripts, clarity is the way to go…”

Complete
Story