Higher-Order Perl

(via Keith)
Higher-Order Perl is about functional programming techniques in Perl. It's about how to write functions that can modify and manufacture other functions.

Why would you want to do that? Because that way your code is more flexible and more reusable. Instead of writing ten similar functions, you write a general pattern or framework that can generate the functions you want; then you generate just the functions you need according to the pattern. The program doesn't need to know in advance which functions are necessary; it can generate them as needed. Instead of writing the complete program yourself, you get the computer to write it for you.

The book was published on the 8th of March, and the text will likely appear soon on the web site and will remain freely available.

Comment viewing options

Select your preferred way to display the comments and click "Save settings" to activate your changes.

HO Perl links

As is suggested good practice, here is the links subnode for this story and the interview with Dominus. Reply to this item bearing appropriate links.

  1. Node #633: Dominus talks about HO Perl, about interview in The Perl Review.
  2. Perl contains the Lambda-calculus; article also by Dominus, link via Anton.

Full text download