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From: ccount@athena.mit.edu (Craig A Counterman)
Newsgroups: comp.lang.perl
Subject: Ode to My Thesis, a Perl Poem
Summary: I'm a sick puppy, I can't believe I did this
Message-ID: <1991Apr29.222231.13561@athena.mit.edu>
Date: 29 Apr 91 22:22:31 GMT
Sender: news@athena.mit.edu (News system)
Organization: Massachusetts Institute of Technology
Lines: 95

Well, I was showing my thesis to Marc Horowitz, pointing out the
acknowledgment for Larry and perl, the figures which were generated in
PostScript by perl scripts from the output data from C programs, the
tables generated in LaTeX direct from sets of data files by perl
scripts, and so on.  He made the comment 'What, no perl scripts in the
document?'.  Indeed, there were none.

Now, I was looking for a way of unwinding and spending some time
relatively uselessly, having completed the document (Ph.D in Materials
Science, looking for a job preferably in the Northeast, please email
if you know of job opportunities :) and waiting for my final defense.
Someone suggested I write some poetry.

This is the result.  It actually produces output (under 4.000 and
4.003).  It's going in the final printing of my thesis (the page after
the acknowledgments which would otherwise be intentionally left blank).

I count it as a four-for.  (1) english language poem, (2) functional
perl program which produces (3) output in an (4) obfuscated manner.


Enjoy,
Craig

#!/usr/local/bin/perl

# Ode to My Thesis, a Perl Poem

<<birth                                                                 ;
G
   r
      o
         w
            t
               h
re-
birth

seek                                                                    (
        enlightenment, knowledge, experience                            );

goto MIT;

sleep "too little", study $a_lot,
wait, then                                                              .
        "B.S.",

leave.  then, return to                                                 ;
                MIT                                                     :
now,
        $done = 'a Ph.D.                                                ">&2';

warn pop @mom, "    I'll be here a while                                \n";

study, study, do study;

push                                                                    (
        myself, computers, experiments                                  ),

read                                                                    (
        data, references, books                                         ),

study,
        write,
                write,
                        write,

do more if time                                                         ;
redo if $errors                                                         ;

do more_work if questions_remain                                        ;

$all_are_answered?  yes.

now :
        write,
        chop if length $too_great                                       ;

format                                                                  =
          Thesis
.
                        tell all,
                        done, finally                                   .
                        now, do rest                                    .

shout.
        and                                                             .
                hear                                                    .
                        it                                              .
                                `echo                                   "

                Now I am $done`

# Craig Counterman
# April 27, 1991