Best of a Bad Bunch, 4 April 2002

By	David Cross "davorg" (London, UK) - See all my reviews

The first edition of this book was very much in that camp. The Perl you learnt from it was terrible. The second edition is much better. It now includes a number of acknowledged Perl "best practices" that other books ignore, including "use strict", "-wT" and "CGI.pm".

My problem is that whilst it uses these features, I don't think it really explains _why_ you should use them. It all sounds a bit too close to "cargo-cult" programming to me (where you program simply by copying existing code, you don't make any effort to understand what's going on).

If you want a simple introduction to programming in Perl to write CGI programs then this book is head and shoulders above any of its competitors. However, if you want to understand more about Perl and CGI then you've be better off reading "Elements of Programming with Perl" following by "CGI Programming with Perl".

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Simple But Good Reference, 30 April 2003

Certainly an excellent beginners book, but still useful for general reference one you know what you are doing!

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This book is a load of rubbish, 28 Feb 2002

Also, there is no straightforward glossary of terms, in particular of perl commands etc. These are just thrown into the mix with what looks like only partial explanations. In fact this seems to be true of the book in general: In an effort to make the book accessible, we are presented with half-facts, which leaves one with the feeling not only of having been patronised, but also that information is being withheld, which has the net result of undermining one's confidence that what one learns from the book is the whole story, ie can be used outside the context of the book.

If you want to be able to do exactly what it says in the book,and nothing more, without very much real understanding of why you're doing what you're doing, then fine, but this book does not equip you to use Perl for your own creative uses, not at all. I'm no better off for having read it, that's for sure.

Very disappointed. Worse than useless.

Am taking it back to the shop for a refund.

Complete load of rubbish.

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