GNU Bash vs Perl

Overview

Perl

Stacks4.3K

Followers935

Votes575

GitHub Stars2.2K

Forks602

GNU Bash

Stacks1.4K

Followers723

Votes8

GNU Bash vs Perl: What are the differences?

Introduction

This Markdown code provides a comparison between GNU Bash and Perl, highlighting the key differences between the two programming languages.

Syntax and Purpose: GNU Bash, also known as Bash or Bourne Again SHell, is a command language primarily used for scripting and running shell commands. It focuses on executing scripts and managing system resources. Perl, on the other hand, is a general-purpose programming language known for its flexibility, text processing capabilities, and support for regular expressions.
Programming Paradigm: GNU Bash is primarily an imperative programming language, following a procedural programming paradigm. It focuses on executing commands and scripts sequentially. Perl, however, is a multi-paradigm programming language that supports procedural, functional, and object-oriented programming styles. It allows for a more versatile and diverse programming approach.
Variable Declaration and Scope: In GNU Bash, variable declaration is simple and doesn't require explicit type specifications. Variables are by default treated as strings. The scope of Bash variables is typically within the script or the shell session. Perl, on the contrary, offers a more structured variable declaration process, allowing explicit data typing. Perl variables have different scopes, including global, local to a subroutine, and lexically scoped variables.
String Manipulation: GNU Bash provides basic string manipulation capabilities, such as concatenation and substitution using pattern matching. However, Perl is widely known for its powerful string manipulation features, including built-in regular expression support, string interpolation, and various string manipulation functions. Perl simplifies complex string operations and provides a more extensive toolkit for working with text data.
Array and Hash Manipulation: GNU Bash supports arrays, but they are limited to one-dimensional arrays and lack built-in functions for array manipulation. Perl, on the other hand, has built-in support for both one-dimensional and multi-dimensional arrays. Perl arrays offer an extended set of functionalities, including sorting, searching, and slicing. Additionally, Perl provides hash data structures, allowing efficient key-value pair manipulations.
Flexibility and Functionality: GNU Bash is primarily focused on shell command execution and system-level interactions, making it suitable for automating simple tasks and running scripts on a Unix-like command line. Perl, with its extensive libraries, modules, and advanced language features, offers more flexibility and functionality. Perl can handle complex programming tasks, ranging from text processing and file manipulation to web development and network programming.

In summary, GNU Bash is a command language primarily used for scripting and managing system resources, while Perl is a general-purpose programming language known for its flexibility, text processing capabilities, and support for regular expressions. The key differences between the two languages include their syntax and purpose, programming paradigms, variable declaration and scope, string manipulation capabilities, array and hash manipulations, as well as the overall flexibility and functionality offered by each language.

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Manual

Advice on Perl, GNU Bash

Justin

Open Source Program Manager at Reblaze

Aug 15, 2019

Review

If you have a file (demo.txt) that has 3 columns:

Column-1    Column-2    Column-3
Row-1a      Row-2a      Row-3a         
Row-1b      Row-2b      Row-3b
Row-1c      Row-2c      Row-3c
Row-1d      Row-2d      Row-3d
Row-1e      Row-2e      Row-3e

and you want to only view the first column of the file in your CLI, run the following:

awk {'print $1'} demo.txt

Column-1
Row-1a
Row-1b
Row-1c
Row-1d
Row-1e

If you want to print the second column of demo.txt, just replace $1 with $2

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Comments

Detailed Comparison

Perl	GNU Bash
Perl is a general-purpose programming language originally developed for text manipulation and now used for a wide range of tasks including system administration, web development, network programming, GUI development, and more.	The Bourne Again SHell is an sh-compatible shell that incorporates useful features from the Korn shell (ksh) and C shell (csh). It is intended to conform to the IEEE POSIX P1003.2/ISO 9945.2 Shell and Tools standard.
-	Command line editing; Unlimited size command history; Job Control; Shell Functions and Aliases; Indexed arrays of unlimited size; Integer arithmetic in any base from two to sixty-four
Statistics
GitHub Stars 2.2K	GitHub Stars -
GitHub Forks 602	GitHub Forks -
Stacks 4.3K	Stacks 1.4K
Followers 935	Followers 723
Votes 575	Votes 8
Pros & Cons
Pros 72 Lots of libraries 66 Open source 61 Text processing 54 Powerful 49 Unix-style Cons 4 Messy $/@/% syntax 3 No exception handling 2 "1;" 2 No OS threads 2 Bad OO support	Pros 3 Customizable 3 Powerful scripting language 2 Widely adopted 0 Cross platform Cons 1 Too Slow
Integrations
No integrations available	Codecov

What are some alternatives to Perl, GNU Bash?

JavaScript

JavaScript is most known as the scripting language for Web pages, but used in many non-browser environments as well such as node.js or Apache CouchDB. It is a prototype-based, multi-paradigm scripting language that is dynamic,and supports object-oriented, imperative, and functional programming styles.

Python

Python is a general purpose programming language created by Guido Van Rossum. Python is most praised for its elegant syntax and readable code, if you are just beginning your programming career python suits you best.

PHP

Fast, flexible and pragmatic, PHP powers everything from your blog to the most popular websites in the world.

Ruby

Ruby is a language of careful balance. Its creator, Yukihiro “Matz” Matsumoto, blended parts of his favorite languages (Perl, Smalltalk, Eiffel, Ada, and Lisp) to form a new language that balanced functional programming with imperative programming.

Java

Java is a programming language and computing platform first released by Sun Microsystems in 1995. There are lots of applications and websites that will not work unless you have Java installed, and more are created every day. Java is fast, secure, and reliable. From laptops to datacenters, game consoles to scientific supercomputers, cell phones to the Internet, Java is everywhere!

Golang

Go is expressive, concise, clean, and efficient. Its concurrency mechanisms make it easy to write programs that get the most out of multicore and networked machines, while its novel type system enables flexible and modular program construction. Go compiles quickly to machine code yet has the convenience of garbage collection and the power of run-time reflection. It's a fast, statically typed, compiled language that feels like a dynamically typed, interpreted language.

HTML5

HTML5 is a core technology markup language of the Internet used for structuring and presenting content for the World Wide Web. As of October 2014 this is the final and complete fifth revision of the HTML standard of the World Wide Web Consortium (W3C). The previous version, HTML 4, was standardised in 1997.

C#

C# (pronounced "See Sharp") is a simple, modern, object-oriented, and type-safe programming language. C# has its roots in the C family of languages and will be immediately familiar to C, C++, Java, and JavaScript programmers.

Scala

Scala is an acronym for “Scalable Language”. This means that Scala grows with you. You can play with it by typing one-line expressions and observing the results. But you can also rely on it for large mission critical systems, as many companies, including Twitter, LinkedIn, or Intel do. To some, Scala feels like a scripting language. Its syntax is concise and low ceremony; its types get out of the way because the compiler can infer them.

Elixir

Elixir leverages the Erlang VM, known for running low-latency, distributed and fault-tolerant systems, while also being successfully used in web development and the embedded software domain.

Related Comparisons

GNU Bash vs Perl: What are the differences?

Introduction

This Markdown code provides a comparison between GNU Bash and Perl, highlighting the key differences between the two programming languages.

Syntax and Purpose: GNU Bash, also known as Bash or Bourne Again SHell, is a command language primarily used for scripting and running shell commands. It focuses on executing scripts and managing system resources. Perl, on the other hand, is a general-purpose programming language known for its flexibility, text processing capabilities, and support for regular expressions.
Programming Paradigm: GNU Bash is primarily an imperative programming language, following a procedural programming paradigm. It focuses on executing commands and scripts sequentially. Perl, however, is a multi-paradigm programming language that supports procedural, functional, and object-oriented programming styles. It allows for a more versatile and diverse programming approach.
Variable Declaration and Scope: In GNU Bash, variable declaration is simple and doesn't require explicit type specifications. Variables are by default treated as strings. The scope of Bash variables is typically within the script or the shell session. Perl, on the contrary, offers a more structured variable declaration process, allowing explicit data typing. Perl variables have different scopes, including global, local to a subroutine, and lexically scoped variables.
String Manipulation: GNU Bash provides basic string manipulation capabilities, such as concatenation and substitution using pattern matching. However, Perl is widely known for its powerful string manipulation features, including built-in regular expression support, string interpolation, and various string manipulation functions. Perl simplifies complex string operations and provides a more extensive toolkit for working with text data.
Array and Hash Manipulation: GNU Bash supports arrays, but they are limited to one-dimensional arrays and lack built-in functions for array manipulation. Perl, on the other hand, has built-in support for both one-dimensional and multi-dimensional arrays. Perl arrays offer an extended set of functionalities, including sorting, searching, and slicing. Additionally, Perl provides hash data structures, allowing efficient key-value pair manipulations.
Flexibility and Functionality: GNU Bash is primarily focused on shell command execution and system-level interactions, making it suitable for automating simple tasks and running scripts on a Unix-like command line. Perl, with its extensive libraries, modules, and advanced language features, offers more flexibility and functionality. Perl can handle complex programming tasks, ranging from text processing and file manipulation to web development and network programming.

GNU Bash vs Perl

Overview

GNU Bash vs Perl: What are the differences?