Rating: 
Summary: Four stars if you know UNIX or are already a developer
Review: This is not a bad book, but I'm still surprised by the generosity of the reader reviews. Perl is something of a cult, so I think in a lot of cases a positive review means "I like Perl" more than it means "I like 'Learning Perl.'" People hesitate (understandably, I think) to insult a book that's closely associated with a great open-source language. I myself think Perl is great, but I have some serious problems with the way this book was written and edited. The authors can't seem to decide whether this should be an easy book for programmers, a difficult book for non-programmers, or even (at times) an easy book for non-programmers. That is to say, the tone, style, and assumptions about the audience change throughout, sometimes from page to page. Key concepts are glossed over with a minimum of explanation (the chapter on hashes, particularly, is a disgrace); then, defying all reason, very simple concepts are overexplained for two or three pages. The authors have been too close to their subject for too long, and they seem to have forgotten what they learned and the order in which they learned it. Maybe a newbie co-author might have helped. If you are an experienced developer or are comfortable with UNIX, you'll get a lot of benefit from "llama." Otherwise, though, start with another book, or learn something about UNIX first. Then return to this book, and you should have an easier time of it.
Rating: 
Summary: A stroll through mud
Review: I picked up Learning Perl with very little programming experience (only having completed a compulsory Visual Basic course in high school), and found it easy to read and understand. The first chapter, A stroll Through Perl, is perhaps the biggest flaw in the book. Rather than introducing the capabilities of Perl (which I think is what the author's intended), it bogs the new reader down in detail and seems to set forth an avalanche of cryptic code at you. It was so bad that, thinking that Chapter 1 was an indication of the rest of the book (ie it was all too cryptic and meant for seasoned programmers), I set the book aside for a few months. I came back to the book when a friend of mine picked it up, and, after skimming over Chapter 1, was pleasantly suprised. The rest of the book is easy to read and understand, though at times a little dense for the new programmer, and immediately useful. The examples are good illustrations of implementation ideas for concepts described in a chapter, and the excercises at the end of each chapter are good indications of what you've learnt. The book introduces new concepts smoothly and quickly integrates them into existing material, and culminates in an especially interesting and useful chapter on CGI (which is really what I wanted to use Perl for). Overall, it's a great book, even for people who are new to programming: with a little dedication you'll be able to blaze through the chapters and become proficient at Perl basics. Some organisational errors let it down and make the introductory pages unjustifiably daunting for those new to programming, but other than that, it was a very satisfying and self-contained tutorial for Perl users.
Rating: 
Summary: It is Unix-specific, but still useful for any perl platform
Review: Many reviews below said that this book is good for Unix hackers only, but I found the refrences to Unix more an enlightening than an impediment; I was learning some unix features in the context of perl :) . And, for those few platform specific tasks you will most likely need, there is more than enough online documentation, and much of it is included in the Perl download for whatever port you'll use. I myself started using MacPerl, and shortly after was writing a command line interpreting shell-like program as an educational project. (Which reminds me, does anyone know how to send backquote-like commands to MPW? any advice appreciated!)... So even if this book has a few Unix-specific features, the amount of documentation availible will fill in the gaps for your OS.
Rating:
Summary: Great learning book
Review: Wall's book is a refernce book. This is the book to buy if you want to learn Perl (which is a beautiful little language.)
Rating:
Summary: Great for aspiring Perl programmers
Review: If you are new to Perl, this is the book you should go for. It provides an entertaining and thorough stroll through the language. If you are quite familiar with this type of language (like C, C++, or scripting languages) then you should acquire Programming Perl (but then, you should buy that book in any case). I bought both Learning Perl and Programming Perl, and I have not regretted Learning Perl at all, because of its great tutorial ability.
Rating:
Summary: Great book for beginning programming on a *NIX platform.
Review: If you haven't done much programming on a *NIX box, then this book is for you. If you have, but just need an intro to Perl, it's still pretty good, but very light reading - you might as well buy a copy of Programming Perl at the same time, so you can just shift over when you're done. Especially good if you have no programming experience whatsoever, but don't fault the book for not teaching you *NIX - it's not meant to do that.
Rating:
Summary: Really good book, but..
Review: I would reccomend going with Programming Perl if you already have some knowledge of other programming languages. Go with Learning Perl if perl is your first programming language (which it shouldn't be). Over all, I'd reccomend that you buy both Programming Perl and Learning Perl to get your perl book collection started :), but Programming Perl if you can only get one book right now.
Rating:
Summary: Not straightforward, but contains valuble information
Review: While this book isn't quite as comprihensive as 'Programming Perl' by Larry Wall, it still assumes basic knowledge of procedural programming. I bought this book after one semester of C++, and shortly thereafter, I was rewriting that semester's work in Perl. Also, the 'Regular Expressions' Chapter does make several refrences to grep and sed, which seems to irritate some non-UNIX savvy reviewers. I have no real knowledge of UNIX shell scripting, but I was able to understand the sections in the book which make heavy reference to it, those references may just make it easier for UNIX programmers to undestand; it's hardly an impediment to anyone else. Overall, the book is not easy reading, but if you got an 'A' in your introductory C/C++ class, this book should not be a problem. One common thing I've noticed about programming books on amazon is that, either reviewers praise or bash a particular book, so make sure you 'get' programming before spending $50 on a non-introductory book like this one.
Rating:
Summary: Very good book
Review: A very good book to learn the basic fonction of perl...perl is my first programmation language and this book is very helpfull for me
Rating:
Summary: Not great for people unfamiliar with UNIX/C/awk
Review: I found this book to be extremely easy and useful reading. I taught myself the basics of Perl using this book in only a few days and wrote a substantial program immediately afterwards. It is not, however, a great book unless one already has a certain familiarity with UNIX and scripting, like shell scripts or awk or ANSI C itself. This book has elevated me to a higher level but only I think because I was already at a point where I could take in the material. Even so, there may not be a better introductory level Perl book out there. It may merely take more than a few days to wade through the book.
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