Updating Existing Perl to 'use strict' Standards

     Now that a little over a week and a half has passed at my new place of employment, I find that I understand my new environment enough to make some observations in a not-too-specific manner out of respect for my new employer.

    First let me state that all of the existing software is a product of its environment and that it all functions as it was intended.  That being said I’m able to say with a clean conscience (after that little preamble) state that the code was ... lacking.  

    I am thankful for this to some degree.  For one thing it provided an opportunity for employment at a place I enjoy with some very intelligent individuals who all seem to have their own special abilities and areas of expertise.  

    More importantly though, I’m thankful because it places me in a situation I find most mentally stimulating.  It makes me re-think an entire existing architecture and being that I have held the role of Software Architect (amongst others) for much of my professional life, it is all the more appropriate. 

    It is one thing to walk into an new environment with a clean slate in which one may design to their heart’s content, yet another wholly different situation when the software exists in a production environment of one form or another.  There are so many more facets with which to deal when the database structure and all of the depending software is tightly build upon that aforementioned code base.  

    The whole point of this rambling is that my first week and a half has passed and while I have done much more with the database redesign, class design, object handlers, etc., I have finally been able to enjoy that great feeling which comes when turning previously un ‘strict’able perl code into a fully compliant piece of code.  I might also add that I ensured the code conformed within the guidelines of Damnian Conway’s “Perl Best Practices” book, which while a little different than my own manner of laying out perl code, is wonderful none the less.

    Now that this honeymoon is over, I can move onward and upward to greater code causes to champion, and based upon the intents of the owner of the company I don’t doubt that there will be a wonderful logic requiring plethora of future projects for which I am to contend.  I only hope that others out there are as lucky in their endeavours.