Path: utzoo!attcan!uunet!snorkelwacker!usc!brutus.cs.uiuc.edu!lll-winken!elroy.jpl.nasa.gov!jpl-devvax!lwall
From: lwall@jpl-devvax.JPL.NASA.GOV (Larry Wall)
Newsgroups: comp.lang.perl
Subject: Re: shortest self-reproducing Perl program
Message-ID: <7501@jpl-devvax.JPL.NASA.GOV>
Date: 21 Mar 90 20:17:19 GMT
References: <1990Mar20.203516.8429@iwarp.intel.com> <7490@jpl-devvax.JPL.NASA.GOV> <1990Mar21.163855.13099@iwarp.intel.com>
Reply-To: lwall@jpl-devvax.JPL.NASA.GOV (Larry Wall)
Organization: Jet Propulsion Laboratory, Pasadena, CA
Lines: 28

In article <1990Mar21.163855.13099@iwarp.intel.com> merlyn@iwarp.intel.com (Randal Schwartz) writes:
: In article <7490@jpl-devvax.JPL.NASA.GOV>, lwall@jpl-devvax (Larry Wall) writes:
: | Note the blank line at the end.  A not-so-obvious improvement is that
: | the last semicolon is now optional.  (For shame!  You of all people
: | should have thought of this one, Randal!)
: 
: I thought that was just for 'eval' (because of my original request).

That was for -e.  eval has assumed a semicolon for a long time.

But it was easier to assume ; on all perl scripts than just on -e.

: Does that mean the book is off? :-)

It just means it doesn't have to end with a semicolon.
Now if we could just get it to reproduce itself...

Actually, I'd settle for it PROducing itself.  I'm still slogging through
the tutorial...

If you folks out there have any examples you think are instructive for
novices, we'd sure like to see them.  We can't promise to work them
in, but we're particularly looking for small scripts that illustrate
particular constructs constructively.  You could get your name in print...

Say, Randal, do you think we should have an appendix of signature scripts?

Larry