FAQ 1.14 What is a JAPH?

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1.14: What is a JAPH?

(contributed by brian d foy)

JAPH stands for "Just another Perl hacker,", which Randal Schwartz used
to sign email and usenet messages starting in the late 1980s. He
previously used the phrase with many subjects ("Just another x
hacker,"), so to distinguish his JAPH, he started to write them as Perl
programs:

print "Just another Perl hacker, ";

Note the trailing comma and space, which allows the addition of other
JAxH clauses for his many other interests.

Other people picked up on this and started to write clever or obfuscated
programs to produce the same output, spinning things quickly out of
control while still providing hours of amusement for their creators and
readers.

CPAN has several JAPH programs at http://www.cpan.org/misc/japh .



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