Larry Wall

American computer programmer and author · United States · Developers · Born 1954 · age 72

Larry Wall is read about 121 times a day, in 44 languages.

Counted to 16 September 2026, not since.

The middle day of the days counted, so one week of news cannot move it. The line under it is the last 60 days, one point a day.

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Larry Arnold Wall is an American computer programmer, linguist, and author known for creating the Perl programming language and the patch tool.

A life in dates

2015“As for whether Perl 6 will replace Perl 5, yeah, probably, in about 40 years or so.”In their words21 December 2015"Developers can unwrap Perl 6 on Christmas", Infoworld, 2015-12-21Read the whole statement

2004“[Boxed] Multiple bouncing balls in a box are a metaphor for community. Notice how the escaping balls explode. This is what happens to people who move from Perl to Ruby.”In their words18 August 2004"The State of the Onion", perl.com, 2004-08-18Read the whole statement

2003“One thing I do understand is that people get scared when I start thinking out loud.”In their words2003Read the whole statement

“We don't have enough parallel universes to allow all uses of all junction types--in the absence of quantum computing the combinatorics are not in our favor...”In their words2003Read the whole statement

“I try not to confuse roles and traits in my own life. Being the Perl god is a role. Being a stubborn cuss is a trait.”In their words2003Read the whole statement

“And in the limiting case where the optimizer is completely broken because it's not implemented yet, we get to work around that too. Optionally...”In their words2003Read the whole statement

1998FSF Award for the Advancement of Free SoftwareAward1997STUG AwardAward1954Born27 September 1954

Also in Deutsch

Photos 1

In their own words 10

Larry Wall

10 statements, newest first

As for whether Perl 6 will replace Perl 5, yeah, probably, in about 40 years or so.
Dec 21, 2015, "Developers can unwrap Perl 6 on Christmas", Infoworld, 2015-12-21, Own words
The only reason I've managed to run this open source project, is that I have learned to delegate even the delegation to other people. (final words of the video).
2008, Larry Wall Speaks at Google (2008), Own words
[Boxed] Multiple bouncing balls in a box are a metaphor for community. Notice how the escaping balls explode. This is what happens to people who move from Perl to Ruby.
Aug 18, 2004, "The State of the Onion", perl.com, 2004-08-18, Own words

Wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0

Awards

FSF Award for the Advancement of Free Software1998

STUG Award1997

In their orbit

Child: Aron C. Wall

About this person

Country

United States

In common with Larry

Fabrice BellardBoth received STUG Award

Developers from the United States 5

Richard Gray55.0 Luke Dashjr54.7

Andy Hertzfeld55.0

Hans Reiser54.7

Leonard Adleman55.0

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