Try an Interpreted Language

I hope everyone is having a great winter holiday. Another reason to celebrate - Perl turns 20 this month! I have to admit I've always been a big fan of 'scripting' languages. While some folks may have a certain amount of disdain towards interpreted languages, I've always found them to be a bit more flexible, efficient (in terms of coding - imagine, only one line of code for 'hello world'!) and a bit more elegant than their lower level counterparts. It's probably the same reason I prefer the command line over any GUI (I've never figured out how to pipe commands with a window manager).

I'm also particularly fond of the Perl - after all, with most tasks "there's more that one way to do it (TMTOWTDI)." We built SundayMorningRides.com using Perl. If you prefer a bit more structure, try the Python based Django project or the popular Ruby on Rails. If web apps aren't your thing, check out the Open Source Applications Foundation (OSAF) Chandler Project. They've developed a "personal information manager designed for small group collaboration" using wxPython for the desktop application.

While there will always be a place for compiled languages (e.g. embedded systems), interpreted languages are often a great choice for software development. What do you think?