B10[m|g]

Perl can be a real mess, yes. Everyone knows it, a few try to disagree, but in the end, you can make Perl code look very cryptic. So maybe this post isn't really fair. Never the less, I'd like to point out an annoyance I have noticed for some time now.

All over the web, websites exist that allows you to dump some code. The website will highlight it accordingly to the chosen language. While this usually works fine, it fails a lot of times on the Perl variable $#. This special variable specifies the last index of a list. As you might guess, most highlighters see the hash and think: comment!

Let's use this code:

#!/usr/bin/perl

my @test = qw(Just another Perl Hacker);
print "Last index of the test list is:", $#test, "\n";
print "Oh, of course ... ", join " ", @test, "\n";

This is fairly easy code to follow, even for a non-Perl programmer, I believe, so it's up to you to figure out what it does ;-)

Now, let's see how a 10 random sites handle this:

Wrong (see the hash as a commenting prefix):

• hashbin.com
• nopaste.info
• paste.linode.com
• paste2.org
• pastebin.ca
• pastebin.osuosl.org
• privatepaste.com
• rafb.net

Correct:

• attachr.com
• pastebin.ubuntu.com

Sad but true ...

perl, pastebin, highlight, code

Recently, my contract with Debitel (a Dutch phone company) ended. Since another company could make me a nice deal (with my Nokia N95 8GB), I decided to switch over to them and to cancel my account with Debitel.

Today I received a call by one of the Debitel telemarketing guys. The slick guy told me my contract was about to end (yeah, duh, I already canceled it) and that he could offer me a really nice deal.

As usual, I let him finish his whole story (which, like usual, was way too long). And to make it more fun, I just didn't reply, making him feel awkward and chatting longer. After his whole speech, he asked me if I was interested. I told him politely that I already canceled the account and moved on to another provider.

"Ok", he said, "than we just have to check the information real quick. Your name is [full name]?". In my privacy paranoia, I asked him "Why do you need my information. I already canceled the account and thus I have nothing to do with you anymore. "Oh?", he replied, "I thought you wanted to accept the new offer". So I believe my privacy paranoia saved me here. If I'd confirm the records they already had on file, he'd probably trick me into accepting the new offer.

... bastards.

debitel,, telemarketing