FAQ 1.13 Is it a Perl program or a Perl script?
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From: PerlFAQ Server on 10 Apr 2010 12:00 This is an excerpt from the latest version perlfaq1.pod, which comes with the standard Perl distribution. These postings aim to reduce the number of repeated questions as well as allow the community to review and update the answers. The latest version of the complete perlfaq is at http://faq.perl.org . -------------------------------------------------------------------- 1.13: Is it a Perl program or a Perl script? Larry doesn't really care. He says (half in jest) that "a script is what you give the actors. A program is what you give the audience." Originally, a script was a canned sequence of normally interactive commands--that is, a chat script. Something like a UUCP or PPP chat script or an expect script fits the bill nicely, as do configuration scripts run by a program at its start up, such .cshrc or .ircrc, for example. Chat scripts were just drivers for existing programs, not stand-alone programs in their own right. A computer scientist will correctly explain that all programs are interpreted and that the only question is at what level. But if you ask this question of someone who isn't a computer scientist, they might tell you that a *program* has been compiled to physical machine code once and can then be run multiple times, whereas a *script* must be translated by a program each time it's used. Now that "script" and "scripting" are terms that have been seized by unscrupulous or unknowing marketeers for their own nefarious purposes, they have begun to take on strange and often pejorative meanings, like "non serious" or "not real programming". Consequently, some Perl programmers prefer to avoid them altogether. -------------------------------------------------------------------- The perlfaq-workers, a group of volunteers, maintain the perlfaq. They are not necessarily experts in every domain where Perl might show up, so please include as much information as possible and relevant in any corrections. The perlfaq-workers also don't have access to every operating system or platform, so please include relevant details for corrections to examples that do not work on particular platforms. Working code is greatly appreciated. If you'd like to help maintain the perlfaq, see the details in perlfaq.pod. |