Disturbing Errors

[flwyd]

I tried to post from the web just now and got the message [Error: Couldn't get db master at /home/lj/cgi-bin/LJ/User.pm line 2919. @ w84] (When I copied and pasted that, I got a bunch of JavaScript, even though it doesn't show up on select all. Even more odd.)

I like perl in situations where it's useful. I didn't realize that core parts of LiveJournal's website was driven by perl. But what really scares me is that I got an error in line 2919. Maybe they (a) add code comments obsessively or (b) generate User.pm with metaprogramming. But if not, a file containing 3,000 lines of perl worries me about their software engineering practices. Can only one developer work on code relating to a user at a time? Are all of their regular expressions extended with comments after each portion?

Comments

[smashingstars.livejournal.com]

I would assume a lot of the lines are comments. Er, then again, I know nothing about perl, so I could have just spoken gibberish. There is indeed something going on around here, though, because I'm getting a lot of errors myself, and others are reporting it, too.

[flwyd.livejournal.com]

Perl lets you write code fairly tersely. Even if 3,000+ lines were 75% comments, it's still close to 1,000 lines of perl. My day job is writing Java which is significantly less terse than perl and I start to get worried when a core class gets much above 1,000 lines with comments.

[smashingstars.livejournal.com]

Heh, well, that could explain why LJ is so fussy. Not just today, but usually.