Learning Perl and over 400,000 other books are available for Amazon Kindle � Amazon�s new wireless reading device. Learn more

Buy Used

Used - Very Good See details

$3.87 & eligible for FREE Super Saver Shipping on orders over $25. Details

Fulfilled by Amazon

94 used & new from $0.08

See All Buying Options

Have one to sell? Sell yours here

Share with Friends

Share your own customer images

Look inside this book

Start reading Learning Perl on your Kindle in under a minute. Don�t have a Kindle? Get your Kindle here.

Learning Perl, Third Edition (Paperback)

~ (Author), Randal L. Schwartz (Author)

4.2 out of 5 stars See all reviews (299 customer reviews)

Available from these sellers.

23 new from $3.95 71 used from $0.08

	Amazon Price	New from	Used from
Kindle Edition Kindle Edition $15.39 Available for download now. Published February 9, 2009	$15.39	--	--
See # more Kindle books
Show fewer Kindle books
School & Library Binding School & Library Binding $51.30 Usually ships within 6 to 12 days. Published July 2001	$51.30	$51.30	--
Paperback Paperback $26.39 In Stock. Published June 27, 2008	$26.39	$23.99	$16.79
Paperback, July 15, 2001 Paperback Available from these sellers. Published July 15, 2001	--	$3.95	$0.08
See # more paperbacks
Show fewer paperbacks

There is a newer edition of this item:

Learning Perl, Fourth Edition 4.2 out of 5 stars (299)
56 used & new from $1.49

What Do Customers Ultimately Buy After Viewing This Item?

	86% buy the item featured on this page: Learning Perl, Third Edition 4.2 out of 5 stars (299)
	8% buy Programming Perl (3rd Edition) 4.1 out of 5 stars (114) $32.97
	2% buy Perl Cookbook, Second Edition 4.7 out of 5 stars (114) $32.97
	2% buy Sams Teach Yourself Perl in 21 Days (2nd Edition) 4.0 out of 5 stars (76) $34.99

Explore similar items

Customers Who Bought This Item Also Bought

Intermediate Perl

by brian d foy

4.5 out of 5 stars (10) $26.39

Programming Perl (3rd Edition)

by Jon Orwant

4.1 out of 5 stars (114) $32.97

Perl Cookbook, Second Edition

by Tom Christiansen

4.7 out of 5 stars (114) $32.97

Perl Pocket Reference, 4th Edition

by Johan Vromans

4.0 out of 5 stars (9) $9.95

Mastering Perl

by brian d foy

4.4 out of 5 stars (9) $26.39

› Explore similar items

Editorial Reviews

Amazon.com Review

In this smooth, carefully paced course, a leading Perl trainer teaches you to program in the language that threatens to make C, sed, awk, and the Unix shell obsolete for many tasks. This book is the "official" guide for both formal (classroom) and informal learning. It is fully accessible to the novice programmer. --This text refers to an out of print or unavailable edition of this title.

Review

'Learning Perl makes for an enjoyable, exciting course for any absolute Perl beginner.' Linux User, October 2001 "Recommended reading". .Net, November 2001

See all Editorial Reviews

Product Details

Paperback: 336 pages
Publisher: O'Reilly Media; 3rd edition (July 15, 2001)
Language: English
ISBN-10: 0596001320
ISBN-13: 978-0596001322
Product Dimensions: 9.1 x 7 x 0.8 inches
Shipping Weight: 1.2 pounds

Average Customer Review: 4.2 out of 5 stars See all reviews (299 customer reviews)

Amazon.com Sales Rank: #220,868 in Books (See Bestsellers in Books)

Would you like to update product info or give feedback on images?

More About the Authors

Discover books, learn about writers, read author blogs, and more.

Look Inside This Book

Browse Sample Pages:
Front Cover | Table of Contents | First Pages | Index | Back Cover

Citations (learn more)

47 books cite this book:

A Biologist's Guide to Analysis of DNA Microarray Data by Steen Knudsen on page 96, page 104, and page 118
The Cgi/Perl Cookbook by Craig Patchett in Front Matter, page 9, and Back Matter
Foundations of Web Technology (The Springer International Series in Engineering and Computer Science) by Ramesh R. Sarukkai in Back Matter
An Introduction to Language Processing with Perl and Prolog: An Outline of Theories, Implementation, and Application with Special Consideration of English, French, and German (Cognitive Technologies) by Pierre M. Nugues in Back Matter
XML for Bioinformatics by Ethan Cerami in Back Matter

See all 47 books citing this book

Tags Customers Associate with This Product

(What's this?)

Click on a tag to find related items, discussions, and people.

perl(13)

programming(7)

coding - perl(3)

computer programming(3)

oreilly(3)

software development -- tools(2)

computer(1)

software development(1)

software engineering(1)

unix(1)

Agree with these tags?

Customer Reviews

299 Reviews

5 star:		(163)
4 star:		(77)
3 star:		(31)
2 star:		(17)
1 star:		(11)

Average Customer Review

4.2 out of 5 stars (299 customer reviews)

Share your thoughts with other customers:

Create your own review

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

440 of 457 people found the following review helpful:

3.0 out of 5 stars Good Intro to Perl for Unix hackers only, October 31, 1999

By	J. Park "JP" (New York, NY USA) - See all my reviews (REAL NAME)

This review is from: Learning Perl, Second Edition (Paperback)

There are 2 sets of reviewers rating this book. The first set, who compose the majority of reviewers, are experienced Unix programmers who have used sed, awk, grep and the various Unix shells. For those Unix hackers, this book is a great intro to Perl because it covers the basics of the language quickly and efficiently without belaboring the obvious (or I should say, the obvious to experienced Unix users).

The second set of reviewers (of which I am one), who have just about universally panned this book, are Windows or Mac users who had no clue what sed, awk and grep were and then attempted to tackle Perl with this book. For those people, this book is a big mistake.

When I was searching for a beginning Perl book, I flipped through the llama book and got confused not only by the first chapter, but with several of the succeeding chapters as well. I learned Perl with Laura LeMay's "Teach Yourself Perl in 21 Days" which is a much gentler intro to Perl and also covers Perl in Windows and the Mac. Now that I have some Perl and Linux experience, I went back to the bookstore and started flipping through the llama again, and this time I thought, "Hey this book is really good."

Learn from my Jekyll and Hyde experience with the llama: if you are trying to learn Perl and you have previous Unix experience, buy the book. If you don't have previous Unix experence, get something else.

I hope this explanation clears up why some people gave this book rave reviews while others ripped it.

Help other customers find the most helpful reviews

Was this review helpful to you?

Report this | Permalink

Comment Comments (3)

114 of 118 people found the following review helpful:

4.0 out of 5 stars Buy the camel, but read the llama first, December 3, 1999

By	Brian Neal (Raleigh, NC) - See all my reviews

This review is from: Learning Perl, Second Edition (Paperback)

Excellent.

I came to this book knowing next to nothing about Perl, and with a few misconceptions to boot (that Perl's syntax is 'write-only', it's primarily a CGI tool, etc.), and now I am not sure that epiphany would cover it. In 12 years of learning and using programming languages, I don't think I have come across anything so enchanting.

One of the best parts of the book: the authors. Add Schwartz & Christiansen to Elliotte Rusty Harold, Petzold, and a very few others who are truly effective technical writers. Classic O'Reilly easygoing style, never condescending, and eerily consistent in presenting just the right amount of information on the given topic.

Every programmer (even non-Perl ones) should read 'Programming Perl' by Larry Wall. But to learn Perl, and take the first step down a long and magical road, buy this book.

I had a few nits, but by the time I finished the book, I had forgotten most of them. As close to 5 stars as I will ever give for a technical book.

Help other customers find the most helpful reviews

Was this review helpful to you?

Report this | Permalink

Comment Comment

71 of 73 people found the following review helpful:

4.0 out of 5 stars Yes, it works for Windows 98 users too! =), August 13, 2000

By	Cedric Chong (Singapore) - See all my reviews

This review is from: Learning Perl, Second Edition (Paperback)

Before I buy this book, I was reading the reviews in this site and I was particularly concerned about the requirement of an UNIX-based OS. Since my only workstation is a PC running Windows, I was very uncertain about buying this book, despite the great review.

Now, listen up.

-I only know the basics of C++ programming;

-I do not know anything about UNIX OS;

-I create websites using HTML and JavaScripts;

-This book help me understand enough about Perl to write my own CGI scripts and run them on the Internet!!! (I've got 3 forums running now and several voting sections!)

If you are a pure Windows user, like myself, but would like to learn the basics of Perl, get this book, period!

Now the cons: As mentioned with so many reviews, this book is very brief. Although I was stuck in chapter for 1 week (!!!), I "fly" through the rest of the chapters in 2-3 days! The biggest problem I find is the lack of adequate explanation for each operators, regular expressions, etc. When writing my own CGI, I have to continuously look for alternative sources of Perl references to clear up my queries and help me to understand a few particular properties of Perl.

For example, I have to use the s///; and the tr///; many times in my scripts, but without extensive understanding of all their properties, I find it "crippling" to my work.

Enough said. For an introduction to Perl, I would give this book 5 stars. If you hunger for much more information, like myself, get this book first, before trying out the lastest Programming Perl (3rd Edition).

Help other customers find the most helpful reviews

Was this review helpful to you?

Report this | Permalink

Comment Comment

Share your thoughts with other customers: Create your own review

› See all 299 customer reviews...

Most Recent Customer Reviews

5.0 out of 5 stars Great Book for Beginners
To go along with everyone else, this book is great for beginning to learn how to program in PERL. A must for everyone.

Published 5 months ago by M. Zavada

5.0 out of 5 stars Good, well-written introduction
I was pleased, as I often am with this publisher's books, with the clarity of the text. Within a few hours I was able to write my first useful perl scripts. Read more

Published 5 months ago by J. Barcelo

5.0 out of 5 stars Learning Perl
This book is a great place to start your programming adventure. It clearly lines out complex concepts in a way beginners can understand. Read more

Published 5 months ago by Jason R. Powell

5.0 out of 5 stars Good fast shipping
Good fast shipping. Shipped in the state that was stated. I have not had much time with the book so i will not comment on the contents of the book.

Published 6 months ago by Ryik Draicon

5.0 out of 5 stars Start from the beginning and read every word
There could not ever be a better book for learning the Perl programming language than this one. The clarity of thought is unbelievable - the authors manage to provide a huge... Read more

Published 6 months ago by Benjamin G. Selfridge

5.0 out of 5 stars Best source for Learning Perl...
This is an excellent Perl book for everyone from freshers to experts.
Its interesting to read with good examples wherever required & exercises for practice. Read more

Published 9 months ago by P. Kumar

5.0 out of 5 stars Great for learning Perl.
This is a great book for those who are new to programming in Perl. Very good explanations of Perl and the examples are very good too.

Published 10 months ago by John Hughes

4.0 out of 5 stars Good book but could be excellent
I have already programmed Perl for years, but decided to spend a few days' free time re-reading the latest (5th) edition. Read more

Published 13 months ago by hukeli

4.0 out of 5 stars Great book
I needed to have a book that outlined the syntax for the coding of Perl. This was an excellent book to give me the basics of Perl. Read more

Published 13 months ago by Clyde Chiever

4.0 out of 5 stars Good book for beginners to PERL
For folks who are new to PERL this is a good book to learn the language. The presentation is easy to understand and illustrations help us grasp the concepts faster. Read more

Published 16 months ago by Narayanan D. Potti

› See all 299 customer reviews...

.jsOffDisplayBlock { display: block; } .jsOffDisplayInline { display: inline; } .jsOffVisibility { visibility: visible; } .jsOnDisplayBlock { display: none; } .jsOnDisplayNoneBlock { display: block; } .jsOnDisplayNoneInline { display: inline; } .jsOnDisplayInline { display: none; } .jsOnVisibility { visibility: hidden; } .jqOnDisplayBlock { display: none; } .jqOnDisplayInline { display: none; } .jqOnVisibility { visibility: hidden; } .jqOnDisplayNoneBlock { display: block; } .jqOnDisplayNoneInline { display: inline; }