Greetings, wise ones.

I find myself in a unique position; my current client has asked me to develop guidelines for all future project management involving Perl (since I am, frighteningly enough, the local Perl expert). This is not a development shop, but tools for administration and automation are regularly developed. The organization is standardizing on Perl.

Now, of course I know the obvious:

• Require unit tests
• Store all documentation and code in the RCS
• Backup, backup, backup

I read Random thoughts on programming (thanks, tilly), but what I would like to know is what tips the Monks wiser than I may have about project management and 'best practices' for small to medium Perl projects. Are there neat Perl tricks anyone uses to help with such things? What should I require (beyond use strict; use warnings;) for code spec?

My management style tends toward making as little restriction as possible, so I'm not about to provide a laundry list of requirements. But, I would most sincerly appreciate a bit of enlightenment, if only in the form of what you have experienced and the positive and negative aspects of them.

Perl was chosen as the standard based on the combined recommendation of the former team lead and me (even though I was contracted only to admin a cluster); now that he left for greener pastures, it is left in my lap to write all the standards and best-practice documents.

I thank you all in advance for your wisdom.