[Off-topic] Sysadmins (was Re: can some one help a newbie?)

[Phil Hunt]

In article <7pp2fk$7ul at dfw-ixnews9.ix.netcom.com>
           aahz at netcom.com "Aahz Maruch" writes:
> In article <935273107snz at vision25.demon.co.uk>,
> Phil Hunt <philh at vision25.demon.co.uk> wrote:
> >In article <7pmv4j$gtt at dfw-ixnews14.ix.netcom.com>
> >           aahz at netcom.com "Aahz Maruch" writes:
> >> In article <935227166snz at vision25.demon.co.uk>,
> >> Phil Hunt <philh at vision25.demon.co.uk> wrote:
> >>>In article <7pkke6$lut at dfw-ixnews6.ix.netcom.com>
> >>>           aahz at netcom.com "Aahz Maruch" writes:
> >>>>
> >>>> Overall, if your background is as a sysadmin using shell scripts, grep,
> >>>> awk, sed, and so on, you'll find Perl a bit easier.
> >>>
> >>>I've used all these, and find Python easier than Perl. Perl would
> >>>probably be easier than Python for 1-liners, if I could remember
> >>>the syntax.
> >> 
> >> Note that I'm specifically assuming a sysadmin with little actual
> >> programming experience.
> >
> >The idea that a company would employ someone, who can't really code,
> >as a sysadmin is IMO frightening. Unless they don't care whether
> >their computer system works, of course.
> 
> I guess I'm missing something, because the prospect doesn't "frighten"
> me.  There are a lot of activities for which a little bit of programming
> goes a long way, but I've seen a lot of people capable of doing that who
> really are not programmers in any sense of the word that you and I would
> use.  That's precisely a large part of why Perl has been so successful;
> it lends itself readily to the kind of "cookbook" programming that
> sysadmins do.

I think it depends on how complex your system is -- imagine a fairly 
complex setup, with hundered of little Perl scripts, all undocumented,
in different directories, depending on each other. 

-- 
Phil Hunt....philh at vision25.demon.co.uk