PERL? Perl? perl? What's good style?
I know the answer—I just wanted to make sure the question was out there and questioners were aware that there is a correct form.
PERL? Perl? perl? What's good style?
I know the answer—I just wanted to make sure the question was out there and questioners were aware that there is a correct form.
Despite a lot of anecdote to the contrary, "PERL" was never really an acronym -- it's a "backronym". The name Perl was chosen first, then some people jokingly applied expansions to it, which caught on.
The PerlMonks community (highly recommended!) taught me the convention, and it's similar to Java's:
That said, it doesn't make a whole hill of beans if you do it "wrong".
Quoting the Perl article on Wikipedia.
Also check the perlfaq about this question.
While, as has been said, it doesn't make THAT much difference if you get it wrong, some folks do use correct capitalization (or at least, NOT referring to 'PERL' or any of the more sensible backcronyms) as a shibboleth for clue in job ads. :)
"The name is normally capitalized (Perl) when referring to the language and uncapitalized (perl) when referring to the interpreter program itself since Unix-like file systems are case-sensitive." From wikipedia at time of posting.
<pkrumins> perlbot: PERL
<perlbot> It's Perl (for the language) or
perl
(for the interpreter) but NEVER 'PERL'!Here's the answer from perlfaq1: