[Catalyst] RFC: The paradox of choice in web development

[Dave Rolsky]

On Tue, 17 Feb 2009, bill hauck wrote:

> I'm trying to put together a project to rewrite a job tracking database 
> currently running in FileMaker.  The functionality and scope of the job 
> tracking system has changed so instead of throwing more money in a 
> proprietary, closed system that requires a costly application on each 
> desktop I'm suggesting writing it as a web application with Perl & 
> Catalyst.  The only problem is that I've been told we would have to use 
> Java & Struts since it's our "corporate standard" for web applications. 
> Perl, ironically, is used in quite a few places in the company, mainly 
> in utility scripts.  However, since we don't have anyone whose job title 
> is "Perl developer" we can't use it for web applications.

This is hardly unreasonable.

I've worked at a number of smaller shops where we were developing a 
Perl-based app. If a developer had decided that they wanted to throw 
together some important tool in Java (or Python or Haskell or Smalltalk or 
...), that would have been problem.

The investment in a language is bigger than just the programmers, even. 
You have build & deployment tools, automated testing setups (you do, don't 
you? ;), sysadmin knowledge, packaging infrastructure, and so on.

Some of that may be language-agnostic, but often a lot of it ties into the 
language and its tools.

Once you've made that investment, it makes sense to stick with it. Just 
because Catalyst and Perl are great tools for webapps doesn't mean that 
they're the _right_ tool at your job.


-dave

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