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<p>The term "scripting language" is so ill-defined as to be rather useless as a focus for discussion.</p>
<p>To me, the opposite of a scripting language is one in which each change to a program requires a lengthy build process, and the usual indication of a bug is a coredump or a (slow or fast) runaway memory hog. The speed of the edit/test cycle and the elimination of many classes of bugs common in C code are big plusses for scripting languages in general, and perl in particular.</p>
<p>There are a variety of languages that offer this "scripting" benefit; maybe some of those are not suited to building large applications, but I suspect in most cases all they need are the right methodology - certainly, after I had spent only a year or two working with perl it is unlikely I could have designed something the size of my current work project with any success, but I've experimented with enthusiasm, and now I'm perfectly comfortable tackling large projects.</p>
<p>Next time you are on Andrea's sofa, maybe you should try asking the guy what "scripting language" means to him, and then exploring his individual points in relation to perl.</p>
<p>Hugo</p>
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