Wikipedia:Articles for deletion/Tom Christiansen


 * The following discussion is an archived debate of the proposed deletion of the article below. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page (such as the article's talk page or in a deletion review).  No further edits should be made to this page.

The result was   keep. (non-admin closure) Sue Rangell ✍ ✉ 02:43, 5 January 2013 (UTC)

Tom Christiansen

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Non-notable individual. Article previously WP:PRODed but restored through WP:REFUND. Lacks reliable independent secondary sources to establish notability as required by WP:GNG and WP:ANYBIO. Sources offered are WP:PRIMARY and not helpful. Msnicki (talk) 16:06, 29 December 2012 (UTC)
 * I don't understand how you can say that Tom Christiansen (the Perl/software developer, not the Norwegian athlete) is not notable. He:
 * Co-authored several books which were published on papers and many of them were best-sellers.
 * Contributed a lot of documentation and code to perl.
 * Wrote "csh considered harmful" and "Plural of Virus" which are well-known Internet documents.
 * Has his own consulting company
 * Used to maintain perl.com and other domains.
 * Shlomif (talk) 17:32, 29 December 2012 (UTC)
 * Replying to myself, I'd like to note that the phrase “only perl can parse Perl” is attributed to Christiansen, and that he also (inadversatedly) coined the term the “Schwartzian transform”. If secondary sources are needed, then they can be found, but it's no reason to delete an article.
 * Shlomif (talk) 17:51, 29 December 2012 (UTC)


 * At AfD, the standard is WP:NOTABILITY, not WP:FAME. To establish notability, we require WP:RS reliable sources written by people not associated with the subject.  The bio on his publisher's website, likely written by Christiansen himself, his own books, interviews and internet posts are not helpful.  It's important to establish what others say about him, not what he says himself, and that they do it in published sources with a reputation for fact-checking and accuracy.  I don't believe those sources exist.  Msnicki (talk) 20:16, 29 December 2012 (UTC)


 * Christiansen is the co-author of several Perl books, including "Programming Perl", widely known as the first and foremost Perl book (see Perl article), and the "Perl Cookbook", which has been called "the definitive Perl book" (see Perl Cookbook). That alone should be sufficient to make him notable as per ANYBIO. Chrissi (talk) 10:19, 30 December 2012 (UTC)


 * If you follow the link to the footnote, you'll discover that this approbation as "the definitive Perl book" was apparently a remark made in an article about Perl and security. The article's not online and the actual quote isn't given, so there's no way to know what else the article said or why. But it obviously wasn't an actual review of the book, it's implausible this remark was "fact checked" and it's not like this was even one of the "Top 10 books of the year" things where the editors got together to give a considered opinion.  And anyway, is this the definitive book?  Is it even more definitive than Programming Perl?  It looks to me like this was an off-hand remark meant to be more colorful than considered.  This book is the poster child for WP:BARELY notable.  To argue that it's on that basis that the author is notable is silly.  We need sources actually talking about the subject, not a list of his WP:MILL how-to books to establish his notability and those sources don't exist.  Msnicki (talk) 21:39, 31 December 2012 (UTC)


 * OK, I have just added some such sources, including a Linux Journal review of one of books Tom was a author of. Gryllida  13:33, 1 January 2013 (UTC)


 * Note: This debate has been included in the list of Computing-related deletion discussions. • Gene93k (talk) 00:59, 30 December 2012 (UTC)
 * Note: This debate has been included in the list of Authors-related deletion discussions. • Gene93k (talk) 00:59, 30 December 2012 (UTC)


 * Keep - being the co-author of one of the most important books about Perl is enough for establishing notability. --Amir E. Aharoni (talk) 10:28, 30 December 2012 (UTC)
 * It's a programmer's how-to book on Perl, barely distinguishable from many others including 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6 and 7 from just that one publisher, never mind other publishers. Besides a completely subjective opinion, what makes this "one of the most important books" on anything?  Msnicki (talk) 23:18, 30 December 2012 (UTC)


 * Keep. First, we are talking not about one, but about two of the most important books on Perl. Second, if you don't believe that, just ask anyone who has programmed in Perl or just google a bit. Ignorance is not an argument. Chrissi (talk) 11:20, 31 December 2012 (UTC)
 * I'm not asking for more personal opinions. (And, btw, I have his book, along with quite a number of the other O'Reilly books on Perl I mentioned, so I hardly think this is about ignorance.)  I'm asking if you can produce reliable sources that establish that what appear to be WP:BARELY notable how-to books are in fact so notable as to be "a body of work" that makes him notable as well.  Notability is not WP:INHERITED:  Not every author of a notable work is notable.  We still need sources, not personal opinions.  Msnicki (talk) 16:05, 31 December 2012 (UTC)
 * Actually, he meets several notability criteria for creative professionals (though meeting one should already be sufficient):
 * The person is regarded as an important figure or is widely cited by peers or successors.
 * That's clearly the case in the Perl community, warranted by the fact the he awarded one of the first White Camel awards given by Perl Mongers / The Perl Foundation to outstanding community members.
 * The person is known for originating a significant new concept, theory or technique.
 * Yes, he identified and named the Schwartzian transform, one of the best known programming idioms in Perl which got its own Wikipedia article. It can be argued that naming a technique is not the same as "originating" it, but without a memorable name it's unclear whether the technique would have been recognized and remembered as such.
 * The person has created, or played a major role in co-creating, a significant or well-known work, or collective body of work, that has been the subject of an independent book or feature-length film, or of multiple independent periodical articles or reviews.
 * Yes, he had played a major part in creating the Perl documentation (without which Perl wouldn't be a useable programming language), as recognized by the award: "He is responsible for much of the documentation that is provided free-of-charge with the standard Perl distribution.... He is tireless in his support and one of the reasons that Perl is as good as it is." And there is not just one book about Perl, but lots. Additionally, there are the books he co-authored, reviews of which should be easy to find (some of them are cited in their respective Wikipedia articles).
 * The person's work (or works) ... (c) has won significant critical attention....
 * Again, see the books he co-authored. That the Perl Cookbook has inspired a website generalizing it to other languages and and inspired O'Reilly to follow up with multiple "Cookbooks" on other topics should also make it clear that is it far from "run-of-the-mill". Chrissi (talk) 12:32, 1 January 2013 (UTC)


 * Keep As I have added few more independent sources, I can verify that it's not just the article author and the Oreilly website that think that Tom Christiansen was a notable contributor. Cheers, Gryllida  13:31, 1 January 2013 (UTC)


 * Did you actually read your sources before adding them? One is a search engine, the next is a one-line mention that "Other important contributors include Tom Christiansen, also a C-and-Unix expert from way back."  The Linux Journal mention is more (less!) of the same trivial stuff:  "The second edition of UNIX Power Tools ... is made up of hundreds of individual articles by many different people, including UNIX luminaries Tom Christiansen and Simson Garfinkel." My favorite is Xan Lee's page, which you can't possibly have read.  This is some random programmer's page of personal opinions, including, "The three characteristics of Perl programers: mundaneness, sloppiness, and fatuousness. ... Perl provides the DWIM feature. DWIM stands for Dim Wit I Am, and is pronounced Dim Wit. It is a fashionable locution of the Perl Republic, trumpeted by priests like Tom Christiansen. Perl is a lousy hack used by sloppy unix sys admins. (because it's free)."  And here's what he has to say about ''Programming Perl":  "This is the worst tech book ever written." These are not sources except to people whose argument really only boils down to WP:IKNOWIT and WP:ILIKEIT.  Msnicki (talk)


 * Keep NB-NB (talk) 00:03, 2 January 2013 (UTC)
 * Keep Calling Programming Perl just another Perl how-to book is like calling The C programming language by K&R just another C how-to book. Co-written by the creator of Perl, Programming Perl is the closest thing to a definitive reference the Perl community has outside of the man pages. Given Programming Perl, Perl Cookbook and the good work of  Gryllida  in finding and adding independent references to the article, Tom Christiansen meets notability guidelines. The article should be kept. Mark viking (talk) 00:29, 2 January 2013 (UTC)
 * Comment I have added some references indicating Christiansen's pioneering work in Perl and a link to a 1997 interview with him and Larry Wall at Web Review magazine. The interview serves as an in-depth independent secondary source from a reliable publisher. Mark viking (talk) 01:37, 5 January 2013 (UTC)
 * The above discussion is preserved as an archive of the debate. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page (such as the article's talk page or in a deletion review). No further edits should be made to this page.