The Obfuscated Perl contest is a competition for programmers of Perl which has been held annually since 1996.

Entrants to the competition aim to write "devious, inhuman, disgusting, amusing, amazing, and bizarre Perl code" [1]*.

The competition is divided into four categories and each entrant is allowed to submit twice to each category. The categories include;

• The best four-line signature
• Most powerful (limit of 1024 bytes)
• Most creative (limit of 2048 bytes)
• Best The Perl Journal (code which generates the words The Perl Journal, limit of 2048 bytes)

The entries are judged on aesthetics, output and incomprehensibility. One entrant per year will gain the Best of Show award.

Entrants are advised to try and demonstrate a range of Perl knowledge, whilst being humorous, surprising and deceitful. Code which purposefully crashes the judges' machines is not recommended.

See also

• Obfuscated code
• Perl
• Just another Perl hacker
• Obfuscating software
• The International Obfuscated C Code Contest

*You may need to subscribe to the Perl Journal to be able to view this link, which is the source of the quote given.