Perl for Dummies

I've never been a big fan of the "Dummies" line of books because I've had some bad experiences with some of them. This book was a pleasant surprise. I wanted to learn Perl for doing CGI on the web, and I wanted to learn it quickly. This book did not dissapoint. I used it as a starting point and then moved on to the O'reilly books, which was an excellent way to do it. Here's the funny thing, I still go back to this book as a quick reference at times. There have been times that I have not been able to find the answer quickly enough in the O'reilly books and I've ended up turning back to this one. I just had one of those occasions where I quickly found a small section in this book on concatenation. It gave an excellent example. After sifting through O'reilly for a couple of hours, I wish that I had looked through this one first.With a good amount of work and concentration, you should be able to learn Perl with this book. Think of it as a starting point, because it will not likely teach you everything that you want to know. That's not the purpose of the dummies books.In conclusion, I'm very happy that I chose this book as a starting point.

I learned how to program perl with this book, having no previous experience in programming. I have since gone on to other languages, but I never would have gotten started if I hadn't read Perl5 for Dummies. Why, oh, why take it out of print?

This book is excellent, if they sold it as a necklace at a jewelry store for a million dollars I would still buy it. This book should be ranked #1 on your charts. The only draw back is that there wasn't enough chapters on CGI, so I had to go out and buy a seperate book on CGI. But I still love my "diamond" PERL FOR DUMMIES.

Wow! This book was a great way to learn Perl. It explains everything, and has a nice pace. This book is great for anyone who has no programming experience. Not even halfway through the book, I was able to right basic perl programs. It doesn't teach you everything about perl, but all the basics, and a little more. It is a great way to start learning about perl. I suggest this book to anyone!

This is a very easy to understand introductory book on Perl 5. I have been frustrated by other books but this one covers the main issues in plain english. I did not give it a 10 because you may need more information than this book can hold to become an advanced Perl programmer, but it is close. Great Job.