I'm relatively new to mod_perl - moving to a new job who's application is solely written in it. This is a return to Perl for me, having worked in PHP, Java, and .NET since Perl 4. As I'm learning to love mod_perl and Perl in general, perhaps it's a good time for me to contribute back by writing perl/mod_perl blogs and tutorials to help others easing in from other languages (written with a set of assumptions). I've seen the "to-do" list, if you will, on the mod_perl Advocacy page (http://perl.apache.org/docs/general/advocacy/advocacy.html) but not sure how dated this is or what is the best to tackle.
Let me know how to get involved - it is my job security after all =). Seriously, though, the flexibility of mod_perl is just not available in many of the other languages and I think it's "don't know what you don't know" sort of thing...so much work is done in the application code when it could be solved with a few lines using mod_perl at the httpd abstract layer. I have a blog site but if perl.apache.org desires host tutorials and blogs, so much the better (better discoverability). I've also noticed the mod_perl advocacy mailing list is all but dead. Perhaps this is the best channel to bring these issues up? Regards, Steve On Mon, Nov 10, 2008 at 8:59 AM, Adam Prime <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> wrote: > André Warnier wrote: >> >> The responses there are indeed a bit scary. It feels like we're a dying >> breed. >> I believe this is to a large extent a "marketing issue" for perl in >> general, and mod_perl by extension, with regard to the younger programmers >> generation. At least in various European countries I know, perl is not >> really being taught in programming schools as a "serious" programming >> language for applications. These young people have all heard the name, but >> seem to consider it as a powerful but somewhat messy scripting language to >> create system administration scripts. >> I am personally doing my best to introduce these newbies to the beauties >> of perl and mod_perl, but it feels rather lonely sometimes. >> Java and PHP seem definitely more popular, or better-known. > > I agree that this does echo perl's problems in general, but mod_perl has a > long history of not really being very good at marketing itself. I know > Perrin and some other people did try at the launch of mod_perl2, but that > effort (and the associated mailing list) has long since dried up. > >> - A surprising number of people are running mod_perl under the worker MPM. >> What is so surprising about this ? (genuine curious question) > > It's surprising to me, and probably to Torsten, because the perceived common > wisdom is to run prefork, because worker may or may not be as well tested, > and has all the bonus issues related to thread-safeness. > >>>> - the documentation could use some work. Specifically more tutorial / >>>> intro kind of stuff. >> >> Agreed. There is a definite need also for something like a new mod_perl >> Guide and Cookbook all-in-one, updated for mod_perl 2 and with a section >> about the framework/template systems mentioned above. Written in a style >> meant to show that these are not old-fashioned technologies only practised >> by oldies like me (us?). >> What I mean is that to cover all one needs to know to create some serious >> web applications in Java, you'd need at least 6 thick volumes, while for >> Perl 800-1000 pages would be more than enough. >> O'Reilly, where are you ? > > Honestly, I think this stuff is currently better handled by the community. > As such, i'm going to take a stab at writing some very basic intro / > tutorial kind of documentation to be added to perl.apache.org. When i > started with mod_perl 1, the Guide on thought the "guide" perl.apache.org > was amazing, but it seems to me that mod_perl 2 doesn't have that in the > same way. Much of the content has been ported over to the 2.0 section, but > there are many pages that haven't been updated from the 1.0 tree at all. > > Adam >
