[realperl] (was Re: [perl] tag is a cruel joke, and user-definedtags don't do jack , squat. HELP! How do I use Perl!?)

[Kyle Hayes <kyle540@quicknet.net>]

Hmm, this [realperl] tag is very nice.  You can really do some scary stuff
with it :-)  It should come with a little warning on the label :-)

This is all very well and good, but your performance will be pretty bad.
I moved a lot of code into UserTags and GlobalSubs and saw a _noticable_
difference in speed.  My pages are still very Perl-heavy.

Perhaps the keeper of the "infinite monkeys" site could put this like code
snippet up there?  It is a good example of the kind of things you can do
in MV if you really want to.  It still should have a warning label :-)

All the talk about the docs being a bit hard for a beginner is very near
and dear to my heart.  I have only used MV for about four weeks.  It took
at least two before I got _anything_ to work.  In the two weeks since, I
was able to code a credit card authentication gateway tag, create dynamic
regions on a page, move all primary databases to MySQL etc.  Those first
few weeks were very, very rough though.  

One problem I have is that the "simple" demo actually does far too much.
I think it would be better (but who has the time to do it?) to have a
series of demos:

1) simple1 -- two "widget" products and a dirt simple ordering page.  No
discounts, no images, _nothing_ fancy. 
2) simple2 -- add some images, and a more complex checkout sequence.
3) simple3 -- add discounts.
4) simple4 -- add shipping calculations with both UPS and a made-up
shipper.
5) simple5 -- add credit card handling.
6) simple6 -- add multipage checkout (not hard, but needs some thought).
7) simple7 -- deal with frames.
8) simple8 -- deal with SSL at a high level.

You get the idea.  The above roughly follows what I ended up doing.  I got
thoroughly confused and frustrated and stripped the simple demo down to
the point where nearly every file was less than one page.  I could simply
look at single page printouts to follow _every_ part of the pages.  I
slowly added pieces back in as I understood what was happening.  I still
don't think I have frames turned off completely.  I have to fit my pages
into an existing external frame system, so I just want to have my pages be
totally flat and ignore whatever frames are set up around them...

Best,
Kyle