Well, that seems like an open door. But I disagree. Part of programming is finding a trade-off between conflicting goals. Portability is one goal. But readability is another - and not necessarely a less important goal than portability. For the majority of the code I write, if there are any portability issues they are whether they will work with a different version of the kernel, or different versions of other used tools.

The loss in readability between:

    $file = "fnord/glop/bibba";
[download]

and

    $file = File::Spec -> catfile (qw /fnord glop bibba/);
[download]

is significant. Enough for me to offset the loss of portability to, say, MacOS. Note that according to perlport, fnord/glop/bibba works, or can be made to work, under Unix, Windows, DOS, OS/2, VMS, VOS and RiscOS.

The XP folks wisely warn against designing in extra functionality "just in case"

Writing from the middle of an XP-to-Linux port

I know couple of meanings of XP: 1) a range of disk servers sold by HP, 2) a version of an OS made in the Pacific Northwest, 3) extreme programming. I'm pretty sure you aren't using "XP" in meaning 1). But I can't figure out whether you mean meaning 2) or meaning 3).

Abigail