Welcome to the Monastery!

This node is being developed as a collaborative effort by Perl Monks to help people who may be unfamiliar with online forums in general, or sites based on the Everything engine which drives the site in particular. This is the 'Executive Summary' - for a more detailed version of this doc and its history click New Monks. New posters to Perl Monks may (in the fullness of time) be sent a link to here to provide a useful entry point to all things Monastery and Perl. This is our attempt to help newcomers get the most out of the monastery and a language we love.

We believe there are no stupid questions, so if you can't find an answer just ask.

1. Instant answers for common Perl problems

Perl Monks has its own extensive Question and Answer section which has a different focus from the standard Perl FAQ. Most common perl coding problems are addressed in these two documents, so if you need an answer yesterday...

2. Please, please, please use the following

#!/usr/bin/perl -w # "-w" turns on all sorts of warnings about probable errors. 

use diagnostics;   # optional; causes warnings to be explained in greater detail.

use strict;        # generates compile and run-time errors for certain unsafe constructs.

For a complete discussion of this see Use strict warnings and diagnostics or die

3. Getting Answers

To get the fastest, friendliest, most useful answer we recommend you read these:
How to get the most of your question from the monks | Before You Post ...

4. Finding help

There are a number of resources at the monastery for new users:
Guide to the Monastery | Perl Monks FAQ | New Monks | Tutorials

5. SuperSearch

Super Search is an online Perl Monks utility that allows you to comprehensively search the Monastery for answers.

6. Just who/what are Perl Monks?

Basically the Monks are a group of individuals from across the globe who share a common interest in Perl. All are welcome and experience levels range from novice to guru. Everyone gets a home node that they are free to decorate as they see fit. You may like to check out some of the home nodes of our resident gurus, they are as eclectic as Perl itself but contain a wealth of knowledge and experience. You will find them here: Saints in our Book.

7. Want more?

For extensive link lists try ybiC, merlyn, outside links, or new monks for starters.

Hope to see you back soon.

Cheers!

Credits

As of Jun 10, 2001 the following monks have all contributed to this document : tachyon, petdance, LD2, VSarkiss, jptxs, Vizjerai, Brovnik, ar0n , myocom, boo_radley, TStanley, perigeeV, converter, frag, ZZamboni, arhuman, mpolo, kudra, marcink, tilly, Abigail, Vynce, Lexicon, mpolo, Odud, da. Thank you all. Increasingly loosely based on a c.l.p.m. document by Nathan Torkington.

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