IntermediatePerl

Intermediate Perl Bootcamp is an intensive 5-day class designed to help Perl programmers take their skills to a higher level. This intermediate Perl class is perfect for programmers who have completed the O'Reilly Nutshell book, Learning Perl, or who otherwise have a good background in the basics of Perl.

The class is intensive, and the student should be prepared to work hard. Perl is a rich, expressive language that puts a lot of power into the hands of its users. We will learn to use Perl as a programming language, and not just a scripting language, in less than a week.

Perl Bootcamp will:

• Turn the Perl dabbler into a Perl programmer
• Help you make the leap from the easy things to the hard ones
• Cover Perl Objects, References, and Modules
• Introduce creative ways to handle complex coding issues

What You’ll Learn

Upon completion of Intermediate Perl, the student will be able to:

Intermediate Perl Bootcamp

• Write real Perl applications more effectively, efficiently, and elegantly
• Implement object-oriented concepts in Perl
• Use packages and namespaces
• Manage references and scoping
• Manipulate complex data structures
• Create reusable modules for individual use or for distribution
• Test and debug Perl code
• Contribute to CPAN

Section	Contents

Intermediate Perl	Click to Show

Intermediate Perl	Click to Hide
What to expect	An introduction to Perl, the instructor, and the course
Perl Libraries	Writing good code, multiple libraries, using the package directive, declaring global variables
Introduction to References	Introducing PeGS - Perl Graphical Structures, dealing with references, arrays, and complex data structures
References and Scoping	Managing complex data structures using references and scoping
Manipulating Complex Data Structures	Debugging Perl code, a look behind the scenes
Subroutine References	Good conversations: sharing code and variables
Practical Reference Tricks	Sorting issues and the Schwartzian Transform
Introduction to Objects	Object-orientation for the Perl coder
Objects with Data	What if an instance needs more data? How to build a horse
Object Destruction	Making a dead horse become useful, dying on schedule, ...
Some Advanced Object Topics	Understanding what's beyond
Using Modules	What modules can do, importing and exporting
Writing a Distribution	Wrapping up the code to give it away and the joy of Makefile.PL
Essential Testing	Writing a healthy test suite, object-oriented and other test functions
Contributing to CPAN	The Comprehensive Perl Archive Network

Requirements

For best results, students should have basic experience with Perl programming or scripting, and should be familiar with object-oriented programming. The class is taught on Mac OS X, and makes use of the Unix command line interface, which students should be comfortable with. None of the Perl taught will be specific to one platform over another.