Today is six months since I created an account here in the Monastery...

Seldom have more than a few days passed without me kicking myself that I didn't do so much, much earlier. I have been writing Perl code since the mid-1990's but have learnt more in the last six months than in most of the time before. I managed to get quite a bit of 'stuff' working, mostly web based but also quite a few client tools. Even a handful of GUI tools using Tk. Over the years I has to do some C++ coding as part of my physics degree which I did not get on with and knew I never wanted to revisit... I've had a couple of brushes with Java including recently to create a couple of simple Android apps. But it has always been Perl that has been the language of choice.

When I needed to do something, I found out just enough to make it work. Then didn't go any further. Why would I? I didn't know there was a better way to do things!

A great example was when I posted some code and suddenly found out about placeholders in database queries...I had vaguely heard about the things but thought they were just for reusing one query multiple times. I soon found out they were a lot more useful than that. So useful in fact that all my code is slowly being converted.
Re^5: Splitting the records into multiple worksheets

The Monastery changed all that from almost immediately entering. Straight away I was implored to use strict. Something I knew of but didn't understand. I thought it was a pain and made coding much slower. But I tried using it and, yes, I have to be more careful with my coding but that's no bad thing. Now all my code has use strict at the start. Just today I've refactored a script to include it and had to change 638 lines, mostly adding my to the start!

All my code now uses Template's where appropriate. All thanks to the Monastery. Yes, it was quite a learning curve but has enabled me to refactor an entire website and incorporate AB Testing right into the core. We just create test templates rather than having to duplicate all the code. So much easier to create, test and maintain. Certainly worth the learning curve.

My blind uncle now has automated curtains thanks to Controlling USB on Raspberry Pi which quite possibly would never have been successfully completed without the help of fellow Monks.

Plus, I have published a module on CPAN - Business::Stripe::WebCheckout
Something else that almost certainly would not have happened without the help and encouragement of so many Monks

Thanks for making the last 6 months sch a great period of learning....
Here's to plenty more time. Hopefully, over time I will be able to pass something on to new Monks.