Perl's culture and community has developed alongside the language itself.
Usenet was the first public venue in which Perl was introduced, but over the course of its evolution, Perl's community was shaped by the growth of broadening Internet-based services including the introduction of the World Wide Web. The community that surrounds Perl was, in fact, the topic of Wall's first "State of the Onion" talk. State of the Onion is the name for Wall's yearly
keynote-style summaries on the progress of Perl and its community. They are characterized by his hallmark humor, employing references to Perl's culture, the wider hacker culture, Wall's linguistic background, sometimes his family life, and occasionally even his Christian background. Each talk is first given at various Perl conferences and is eventually also published online. In email, Usenet, and message board postings, "Just another Perl hacker" (JAPH) programs are a common trend, originated by
Randal L. Schwartz, one of the earliest professional Perl trainers. In the parlance of Perl culture, Perl programmers are known as Perl hackers, and from this derives the practice of writing short programs to print out the phrase "Just another Perl hacker". In the spirit of the original concept, these programs are moderately obfuscated and short enough to fit into the signature of an email or Usenet message. The "canonical" JAPH as developed by Schwartz includes the comma at the end, although this is often omitted. Perl "golf" is the pastime of reducing the number of characters (key "strokes") used in a Perl program to the bare minimum, much in the same way that
golf players seek to take as few shots as possible in a round. The phrase's first use emphasized the difference between pedestrian code meant to teach a newcomer and terse hacks likely to amuse experienced Perl programmers, an example of the latter being JAPHs that were already used in signatures in Usenet postings and elsewhere. Similar stunts had been an unnamed pastime in the language
APL in previous decades. The use of Perl to write a program that performed
RSA encryption prompted a widespread and practical interest in this pastime. In subsequent years, the term "
code golf" has been applied to the pastime in other languages. A Perl Golf Apocalypse was held at Perl Conference 4.0 in Monterey, California in July 2000. As with C,
obfuscated code competitions were a well known pastime in the late 1990s. The
Obfuscated Perl Contest was a competition held by
The Perl Journal from 1996 to 2000 that made an arch virtue of Perl's syntactic flexibility. Awards were given for categories such as "most powerful"—programs that made efficient use of space—and "best four-line signature" for programs that fit into four lines of 76 characters in the style of a Usenet
signature block. Perl poetry is the practice of writing poems that can be compiled as legal Perl code, for example the piece known as "
Black Perl". Perl poetry is made possible by the large number of English words that are used in the Perl language. New poems are regularly submitted to the community at PerlMonks.
Yet Another Perl Conference Yet Another Perl Conference (also called
YAPC), from 2016–2019 called
The Perl Conference (
TPC), from 2020 on
The Perl and Raku Conference, is a series of conferences discussing the
Perl programming language, that has run since 1999. It is usually organized under the auspices of
The Perl Foundation and
Yet Another Society, a "non-profit corporation for the advancement of collaborative efforts in computer and information sciences".
History The first YAPC was held at
Carnegie Mellon University in
Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania, US on June 24 and June 25, 1999, YAPC's origins were in the not-for-profit Perl Mongers user group. The first conference assembled 31 different speakers into the schedule on various Perl-related topics. The idea of a low-cost Perl conference quickly spread. The first
European version of YAPC was organized by members of the Perl Mongers in London in 2000,
Israel in 2003, which is the former name of
O'Reilly Open Source Convention (OSCON). As of 2020, it is now calling itself The Perl and Raku Conference to reflect the renaming of Perl 6 to
Raku.
Reception By 2002, ''The Perl Developer's Dictionary'' listed YAPC as the second-most important conference in the Perl scene, after
O'Reilly's Open Source Conference. The conference is recommended in various other books about Perl programming from the 2000s. The Dutch
Linux Magazine reviewed the second European YAPC conference, held in Amsterdam in 2001, and describes the consternation when organisers revealed they had been listening in on network traffic and had found that several participants used unencrypted passwords, despite the conference theme being security. • 2002:
Munich, Germany (September 18–20, 2002) YAPC::EU 2002 • 2003:
Paris, France (July 23–25, 2003) YAPC::EU 2003 • 2004:
Belfast, Northern Ireland (September 15–17, 2004) YAPC::EU 2004 • 2005:
Braga, Portugal (August 31 – September 2, 2005) YAPC::EU 2005
Perl Everywhere • 2006:
Birmingham, England (August 30 – September 1, 2006) YAPC::EU 2006 • 2007:
Vienna, Austria (August 28–30, 2007) YAPC::EU 2007
Social Perl • 2008:
Copenhagen, Denmark (August 13–15, 2008) YAPC::EU 2008
Beautiful Perl • 2009:
Lisbon, Portugal (August 3–5, 2009) YAPC::EU 2009
Corporate Perl • 2010:
Pisa, Italy (August 4–6, 2010) YAPC::EU 2010
The Renaissance of Perl • 2011:
Riga, Latvia (August 15–17, 2011) YAPC::EU 2011
Modern Perl • 2012:
Frankfurt, Germany (August 20–22, 2012) YAPC::EU 2012 • 2013:
Kyiv, Ukraine (August 12–14, 2013) YAPC::EU 2013
Future Perl • 2014:
Sofia, Bulgaria (August 22–24, 2014) YAPC::EU 2014 • 2015:
Granada, Spain (September 2–4, 2015) YAPC::EU 2015
Art+Engineering • 2016:
Cluj-Napoca, Romania (August 24–26, 2016) YAPC::Europe 2016 • 2017:
Amsterdam, the Netherlands (August 9–11, 2017) The Perl Conference in Amsterdam • 2018:
Glasgow (August 13–17, 2018) The Perl Conference in Glasgow • 2019:
Riga (August 7–9, 2019) PerlCon • 2020:
Amsterdam (August 10–14, 2020) Perl & Raku Con in Amsterdam – cancelled due to the Coronavirus pandemic • 2023:
Helsinki (August 14–18, 2023) Perl & Koha Conference in Helsinki
Israel • 2003:
Haifa (May 11, 2003) YAPC::Israel::2003 • 2004:
Herzliya (February 26, 2004) YAPC::Israel::2004 • 2005: Herzliya (February 17, 2005) YAPC::Israel::2005 • 2006:
Netanya. In 2006, YAPC::Israel became
OSDC::Israel. OSDC::Israel 2006
Russia & Ukraine • 2008:
Moscow, Russia (May 17–18, 2008) YAPC::Russia 2008
May Perl • 2009: Moscow, Russia (May 16–17, 2009) YAPC::Russia 2009
May Perl 2 • 2010:
Kyiv, Ukraine (June 12–14, 2010) YAPC::Russia 2010
May Perl + Perl Mova • 2011: Moscow, Russia (May 14–15, 2011) YAPC::Russia 2011
May Perl + Perl Mova • 2012: Kyiv, Ukraine (May 12–13, 2012) YAPC::Russia
May Perl • no event held in 2013, due to YAPC::Europe 2013 taking place in Kyiv • 2014:
St. Petersburg, Russia (June 13–14, 2014) YAPC::Russia 2014 • 2015: Moscow, Russia (May 16–17, 2015) YAPC::Russia 2015 • 2017: Moscow, Russia (November 4, 2016) YAPC::Russia 2017
Australia • The first YAPC::Australia was held as part of the 2004
OSDC in
Melbourne from December 1-December 5, 2004, and has been held jointly thereafter.
South America These events are held in conjunction with
CONISLI. • 2006:
Porto Alegre/
RS (April 19–22, 2006) YAPC::SA::2006 • 2007: Porto Alegre/RS (April 11–14, 2007) YAPC::SA::2007 • 2008: Porto Alegre/RS (April 17–19, 2008) YAPC::SA::2008 • 2009: Porto Alegre/RS (June 24–27, 2009) YAPC::SA::2009
Brazil • 2005: Porto Alegre/RS (June 1–5, 2005) YAPC::Brasil 2005 • 2006:
São Paulo/SP,
Brazil (November 3–5, 2006) YAPC::Brasil 2006 • 2007: São Paulo/SP,
Brazil (November 9–11, 2007) YAPC::Brasil 2007 • 2008: São Paulo/SP,
Brazil (October 18–19, 2008) YAPC::Brasil 2008 • 2009:
Niterói/RJ,
Brazil (October 30 – November 1, 2009) YAPC::Brasil 2009 • 2010:
Fortaleza/CE,
Brazil (October 25–31, 2010) YAPC::Brasil 2010
Perl: Solução e Integração de Negócios • 2011:
Rio de Janeiro/RJ,
Brazil (November 4–6, 2011) YAPC::Brasil 2011 • 2012: São Paulo/SP,
Brazil (October 19–20, 2012) YAPC::Brasil 2012
A revolução dos dados • 2013:
Curitiba/PR,
Brazil (November 15–16, 2013) YAPC::Brasil 2013
Universo Científico e Perl Hacking • 2014:
Itapema/SC,
Brazil (September 19–20, 2014) YAPC::Brasil 2014
Soluções Tecnológicas para Gestão Pública • 2015:
Taubaté/SP,
Brazil (September 18–20, 2015) YAPC::Brasil 2015
Perl Community and CPAN Asia • 2004:
Taipei,
Taiwan (March 27–28, 2004) YAPC::2004::Taipei • 2005: Taipei, Taiwan (March 26–27, 2005) (held as YAPC::Taipei) YAPC::2005::Taipei • 2006:
Tokyo, Japan (March 29–30, 2006) YAPC::Asia 2006 • 2007: Tokyo, Japan (April 4–5, 2007) YAPC::Asia 2007 • 2008: Tokyo, Japan (May 15–16, 2008) YAPC::Asia 2008 • 2009: Tokyo, Japan (September 10–11, 2009) YAPC::Asia 2009 • 2010: Tokyo, Japan (October 15–16, 2010) YAPC::Asia 2010 • 2011: Tokyo, Japan (October 14–15, 2011) YAPC::Asia 2011 • 2012: Tokyo, Japan (September 27–29, 2012) YAPC::Asia 2012 • 2013: Tokyo, Japan (September 19–21, 2013) YAPC::Asia 2013 • 2014: Tokyo, Japan (August 28–30, 2014) YAPC::Asia 2014 • 2015: Tokyo, Japan (August 20–22, 2015) YAPC::Asia 2015 • 2016: Hokkaido, Japan (9–10 December 2016) YAPC::Hokkaido • 2017: Kansai (3–4 March 2017) YAPC::Kansai 2017 • 2017: Fukuoka (30th June – 1st July) YAPC::Fukuoka 2017 • 2018: Okinawa (2–3 March 2018)YAPC::Okinawa 2018 • 2019: Tokyo, Japan (25–26 January 2019) YAPC::Tokyo 2019 • 2020: Kyoto, Japan (March 27–28, 2020) YAPC::Kyoto 2020 • 2021: Online, YAPC::Japan (February 18–19, 2021) YAPC::Japan 2021 • 2022: Online, YAPC::Japan (March 4–5, 2022) YAPC::Japan 2022 • 2022: Kyoto, Japan (March 19, 2023) YAPC::Kyoto 2023 • 2024: Hiroshima, Japan (February 10, 2024) YAPC::Hiroshima 2024 • 2024: Hakodate, Japan (October 5, 2024) YAPC::Hakodate 2024 • 2025: Fukuoka, Japan (November 14–15, 2025) YAPC::Fukuoka 2025 ==See also==