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I am doing my dissertation project on NP-Hard Problems: I am going to implement various algorithms for problems such as the partition, the subset sum, the knapsack, etc and then compare the results, the running time, etc. Also, I am going to see what happens with the algorithms when you modify the problem (how does the algorithm behave on the reduced problem, etc).
Now I picked this topic as my project because I am interested in theoretical computer science but I am also not sure if I want to go on as an academic/researcher or join a company/startup and this project has both a theoretical and a practical (actual coding) side.
My question is, which programming language should I use? Should I stick to what I feel more familiar with (Java and maybe Python), or should I go with the web languages (HTML, CSS, PHP, RoR, etc), having in mind that web development skills are on high demand nowadays?
EDIT: HTML and CSS would be obviously used just for the UI.
I want my project to be something that will impress in an interview (for either a job or a masters course) and I am not confident that "yet another project in Java" can do that. I understand that as long as the work on it is good and the result is satisfactory I should be ok but if, let's say, using Ruby can give me some points I am totally going with that. In the same time, I understand that deciding which language to use is part of the project so I am not willing to complicate things just to try and look cool.
Thanks in advance!
EDIT: In case this changes any of the answers, this is a undergrad. dissertation project, not a PhD one.
First of all this is a subjective question, not perfectly suitable for SO, but we forgive you :)
Contrary to popular opinion here (looking at the previous answers), if you're trying to solve NP-Hard problems, I would definitely not write the programs in C or C++. Mainly because dynamic programming methods tend to look like absolute dog poop when written in low-level languages. For example, here's someone's dynamic programming solution to the knapsack problem: http://www.joshuarobinson.net/docs/knapsack.html.
It's well-written and well-formed, but barely readable simply due to the sheer amount of malloc, memcpy, and free you need to do. Go with Java or Python, no question about it. You want people to actually read (and maybe even enjoy?) your dissertation, I would assume.
Don't write it in PHP or Ruby because those languages aren't particularly applicable to computer science theory. With that said, if you're applying for a web-dev job and you're trying to impress your future employees with a knapsack problem or dynamic programming NP-Hard solvers, it's like shooting a sparrow with a cannonball.
If your project's subject is impressive, no one will care what language it's in. Do it in the language you feel is appropriate for the task. Knowing how to make the appropriate language choice and defending that choice should be more impressive than "OMG I used RoR XSL ActionScript CSS!!!"
Also, how long do anticipate this project will take? If you go with a language that's flashy and trendy today, do you know it will still be cool and popular when this project wraps up? Just saying in another way, popularity is not the reason to choose the language for something like this.
if you can invest effort and time, then i recommend c/c++. it will be an impressive add-on skill.
My language of preference would be Python. You could use Django and, in my opinion, it would be very applicable to things that are being done in the industry (especially with startups). Plus, you can't beat Python when it comes to readability and speed of development.
I would have thought that Python would be doing too much clever stuff under the hood to really be able to measure relative performance accurately.
Wouldn't it be better to use a lower-level language like C? Employers would respect you more for that than using something because it's "cool".
The languages you know look fine to me. The old saw is that a CS PhD makes you unemployable anyway, so I wouldn't worry about it. :-)
The other ones you mentioned are mostly specialized web presentation languages. I'm not real sure how one even goes about implementing the knapsack problem using CSS...
Well, as much as this might look fine on the web page, it seems to me that Java would do a better job doing what you need.
PHP, HTML and CSS knowledge is good for job finding, but not applicable very much on the subject you picked.
Also, I noticed a bunch of answers, so I guess this is a question very much related to personal taste and opinion. Hm... You asked for it, anyways ;)
Since you're already familiar with Python, I'd recommend using it. You can use the popular scipy and numpy libraries for your project. You'll probably find something of use in them.
That would be the core, or backend part of your project. When this part is finished, you should think about polish and presentation. You don't want to have an impressive looking presentation with wrong calculations.
Related
I'm net-java developer with some small projects implemented. I'm going to start a new project which is portal with many typical features (posts, comments, messaging, users, catalog, news, galleries, etc).
I believe the best solution would be use any mature CMS (joomla, drupal...) and customize it where needed. The problem is that I'm not familiar with PHP (CMS written on PHP has far better set of features, plugins, community, information I believe) I'm not planning to learn PHP, I want to improve my java-net skills.
So the question for me is:
write all by myself, improving my programming skills and risking to finish my project in relatively long period
on the other hand
I could spend some time learning tools and languages, which I think while, I don't need in the future and more likely finish my project in some shorter time
what would you advise?
Learning another language will not hurt you, and as most of the differences are in syntax and supporting libraries, you would be surprised at how quickly you can pick up a new language.
Your choice should be on what language is best for the task, not simply the one you know.
So, my suggestion is - learn PHP and go with a mature CMS.
A LOT of effort goes into developing a CMS, so writing your own will likely take some time. Put together a project plan and work out how long it would take you to develop something from scratch, then do some research on existing CMS packages and how they fit your needs.
I'm a .NET developer but have used Joomla in the past - it's actually quite easy to put together a website even if you're not too familiar with PHP.
Better yet, find a CMS package in your preferred language - they oughta be some out there.
i.e.
http://java-source.net/open-source/content-managment-systems
Learning new tools is seldom a waste of time. Especially not when it comes to such well known and world wide spread languages such as php. I would say it's best using the tools most suited for the project you're up to, rather than reinventing the wheel.
You should take a good look at your requirements. If you're sure you can get them all from a CMS, that makes most sense. Take a good look at the compatibility and reliability of all components.
Otherwise, you might be better served by a .net or java CMS.
Writing your own CMS without having extensive experience in the current available ones is not going to lead to a good result, except for you learning some programming skills.
If you don't have a "due date" for your project write it by yourself.
Or take a look at http://www.opencms.org/en/ ;)
There are a lot of opensource CMS written in Java ;)
Even if you don't write in PHP again, the benefit of knowing another programming language is going to give you some valuable perspective on net-java.
The task of learning a new language is going to be an asset. Learning to learn something. Identifying what you need to know and how to find the answers is a transferable skill.
Your job will be to complete your project in the most efficient manner with the highest quality output practical. Use the tool that is going to best help you achieve this. The language it's written in should be largely irrelevant.
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With the interest of creating a roguelike RPG (such as Nethack, Rogue, and ADOM), which programming language would be most suitable and why?
With the language that you choose, be sure to list any libraries or facets of the language that make it particularly well-suited.
Way back in the day I tried to write Roguelike games using QuickBASIC out of all things (it was 1988.) Not the recommended approach...
There are still some development circles out there. Here's an FAQ on Roguelike Development and also a blog dedicated to the same.
My language of use (I'm trying to create roguelike too) is Python, because:
It's high level programming language, I don't need to think about memory allocation all the time, etc, but keep my mind on algorithms.
There's tons of useful libraries for almost everything. Recently I've found TDL/libtcod which can be useful for roguelike development.
With bindings you can easily use C/C++ libraries or even write few critical functions in C/C++, and use them.
It's the most readable programming language I've ever seen.
While programming in Python I've learned to use internal documentation. It's very helpful thing, I just read my code few months later and I still know what it's doing.
That's a very personal choice as always :-)
I wrote my Roguelike game (Tyrant) in Java for the following reasons:
Very portable (even with graphics)
Garbage collection / memory management
Lots of good free / open source libraries available (helpful for algorithms, data structures and manipulating save game files etc.)
It's a statically typed language - this has performance and robustness benefits which I judged to be worth the additional coding complexity
I wanted to hone my Java skills more generally for use in other projects
EDIT: For those interested it is open source, all code is available at SourceForge
Well I've made a couple roguelikes in C, spending a fair amount of time at roguebasin, which is a great site for anything related to roguelike development.
As for what language you should use, I don't really see it making a huge difference. I pick C because of the portability, and a lot of libraries work well with it.. But an object oriented language can clean up some things that you may not want to keep track of.
There aren't any languages that I would consider to be specifically greater than the rest for roguelikes. If you're making it graphical, you may prefer something that has that built-in, such as flash / silverlight. But even then there are libraries for any other languages that bring them to about the same degree of difficulty in that regard.
So I'd say take a language you know and like, or that you don't know and want to learn..
Most of these answers are great, but there's something to be said for the combined power of object-oriented stuff and low-level commands that can be abused in C++. If you're looking for some inspiration, the C sourcecode to NetHack is widely available and documented well enough that you can certainly poke around to learn some things. That said, it's a huge project that's been growing for decades, and not everything is as clean as you're going to want things for your own project - don't get roped into making poor design choices based off of what you find in NetHack.
Honestly, though, in terms of what you use it probably doesn't matter at all - though I'd highly recommend using an OO language. There's so much crap to handle in a roguelike (heck, any CRPG really) that OOP is the easiest way of staying sane.
The original nethack was written in C, and the source is available if you want to get some ideas about how it was written, and the challenges you may find which might be a good way to start deciding on a language.
My first question would be whether the game is going to have a web based UI or be some kind of console/window affair like the original Rogue-like games? If the former I would say that any language you're comfortable with would be a good choice. Ruby on Rails, Python/Django, PHP/CakePHP, etc. would all be great.
But if the answer is the latter, this is a game that you want people to be able to download and install locally, I'm going to go with Java. It's a great language with no memory management for you to deal with. It achieves very high performance thanks to just-in-time compilation and optimization, and it has an extremely rich library to help you with data structures, Swing makes for some really beautiful UIs, and the 2D library allows for the most rich cross-platform rendering outside of PostScript. It also has the availability across Windows, Mac OS X, and Linux that you're not going to get from some other choices.
Finally, distribution of your application is easy via Java Web Start as well, so people can download and install the game with just a couple of clicks once they have Java and keep it on their machine to run as long as they like.
For making any game, any language will be right if :
you can use it (you are able to use it, by knowledge or if it's easy enough to learn right now for you or your team)
it produce applications that runs on your client's computer
it can easily produce applications that runs fast enough for your game's needs.
I think that for a Rogue-Like, any language you know will be right as far as it runs on you target. Performances are not really a problem in this kind of game. World generation can require high performance if your world generation is really complex though...
just go with something that will handle the low-level details for you. whatever you know should work.
hey, they can write one in javascript.
I recommend Actionscript for those games.
You could consider Silverlight.
It sits on top of C# and .Net so theres not much need to worry about memory management. With SL you'll get built in support for scene graph type rendering - culling of things not on screen, Key board, mouse events, clicks on objects etc.
There's an initial learning curve, but I find it's a great environment to work in.
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I've never written functional specs, I prefer to jump into the code and design things as I go. So far its worked fine, but for a recent personal project I'm writing out some specs which describe all the features of the product, and how it should 'work' without going into details of how it will be implemented, and I'm finding it very valuable.
What are your thoughts, do you write specs or do you just start coding and plan as you go, and which practice is better?
If you're driving from your home to the nearest grocery store, you probably don't need a map. But...
If you're driving to a place you've never been before in another state, you probably do.
If you're driving around at random for the fun of driving, you probably don't need a map. But...
If you're trying to get somewhere in the most effective fashion (minimize distance, minimize time, make three specific stops along the way, etc.) you probably do.
If you're driving by yourself and can take as long as you like, stopping any time you see something interesting or to reconsider your destination or route, you may not need a map. But...
If you're driving as part of a convoy, and all need to make food and overnight lodging stops together, and need to arrive together, you probably do.
If you think I'm not talking about programming, you probably don't need a functional spec, story cards, narrative, CRCs, etc. But...
If you think I am, you might want to consider at least one of the above.
;-)
For someone who "jumps into the code" and "design[s] as they go", I would say writing anything including a functional spec is better than your current methods. A great deal of time and effort can be saved if you take the time to think it through and design it before you even start.
Requirements help define what you need to make.
Design helps define what you are planning on making.
User Documentation defines what you did make.
You'll find that most places will have some variation of these three documents. The functional spec can be lumped into the design document.
I'd recommend reading Rapid Development if you're not convinced. You truely can get work done faster if you take more time to plan and design.
Jumping "straight to code" for large software projects would almost surely lead to failure (as immediatley starting posing bricks to build a bridge would).
The guys at 37 Signals would say that is better to write a short document on paper than writing a complex spec. I'd say that this could be true for mocking up quickly new websites (where the design and the idea could lead better than a rigid schema), but not always acceptable in other real life situations.
Just think of the (legal, even) importance a spec document signed by your customer can have.
The morale probably is: be flexible, and plan with functional or technical specs as much as you need, according to your project's scenario.
For one-off hacks and small utilities, don't bother.
But if you're writing a serious, large application, and have demanding customers and has to run for a long time, it's a MUST. Read Joel's great articles on the subject - they're a good start.
I do it both ways, but I've learned something from Test Driven Development...
If you go into coding with a roadmap you will get to the end of the trip a helluva lot faster than you will if you just start walking down the road without having any idea of how it is going to fork in the middle.
You don't have to write down every detail of what every function is going to do, but define you basics so that way you know what you should get done to make everything work well together.
All that being said, I needed to write a series of exception handlers yesterday and I just dove right in without trying to architect it out at all. Maybe I should reread my own advice ;)
What a lot of people don't want to admit or realize is that software development is an engineering discipline. A lot can be learned as to how they approach things. Mapping out what your going to do in an application isn't necessarily vital on small projects as it is normally easier to quickly go back and fix your mistakes. You don't see how much time is wasted compared to writing down what the system is going to do first.
In reality in large projects its almost necessary to have road map of how the system works and what it does. Call it a Functional Spec if you will, but normally you have to have something that can show you why step b follows step a. We all think we can think it up on the fly (I am definitely guilty of this too), but in reality it causes us problems. Think back and ask yourself how many times you encountered something and said to yourself "Man I wish I would have thought of that earlier?" Or someone else see's what you've done, and showed you that you could have take 3 steps to accomplish a task where you took 10.
Putting it down on paper really forces you to think about what your going to do. Once it's on paper it's not a nebulous thought anymore and then you can look at it and evaluate if what you were thinking really makes sense. Changing a one page document is easier than changing 5000 lines of code.
If you are working in an XP (or similar) environment, you'll use stories to guide development along with lots of unit and hallway useability testing (I've drunk the Kool-Aid, I guess).
However, there is one area where a spec is absolutely required: when coordinating with an external team. I had a project with a large insurance company where we needed to have an agreement on certain program behaviors, some aspects of database design and a number of file layouts. Without the spec, I was wide open to a creative interpretation of what we had promised. These were good people - I trusted them and liked working with them. But still, without that spec it would have been a death march. With the spec, I could always point out where they had deviated from the agreed-to layout or where they were asking for additional custom work ($$!). If working with a semi-antagonistic relationship, the spec can save you from even worse: a lawsuit.
Oh yes, and I agree with Kieveli: "jumping right to code" is almost never a good idea.
I would say it totally "depends" on the type of problem. I tend to ask myself am I writing it for the sake of it or for the layers above you. I also had debated this and my personal experience says, you should since it keeps the project on track with the expectations (rather than going off course).
I like to decompose any non trivial problems loosely on paper first, rather than jumping in to code, for a number of reasons;
The stuff i write on paper doesn't have to compile or make any sense to a computer
I can work at arbitrary levels of abstraction on paper
I can add pictures and diagrams really easily
I can think through and debug a concept very quickly
If the problem I'm dealing with is likely to involve either a significant amount of time, or a number of other people, I'll write it up as an outline functional spec. If I'm being paid by someone else to develop the software, and there is any potential for ambiguity, I will add enough extra detail to remove this ambiguity. I also like to use this documentation as a starting point for developing automated test cases, once the software has been written.
Put another way, I write enough of a functional specification to properly understand the software I am writing myself, and to resolve any possibile ambiguities for anyone else involved.
I rarely feel the need for a functional spec. OTOH I always have the user responsible for the feature a phone call away, so I can always query them for functional requirements as I go.
To me a functional spec is more of a political tool than technical. I guess once you have a spec you can always blame the spec if you later discover problems with the implementation. But who to blame is really of no interest to me, the problem will still be there even if you find a scapegoat, better then to revisit the implementation and try to do it right.
It's virtually impossible to write a good spec, because you really don't know enough of either the problem or the tools or future changes in the environment to do it right.
Thus I think it's much more important to adapt an agile approach to development and dedicate enough resources and time to revisit and refactor as you go.
It's important not to write them: There's Nothing Functional about a Functional Spec
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We don't teach children calculus first. We first teach them arithmetic, then algebra, then geometry, the analytical geometry, then finally calculus.
Why then, do we teach our computer scientists frameworks and IDE first. Some curriculum do force students to learn computer science fundamentals, but the vast majority of graduates that I see could not compose a framework of their own to save their lives.
Where then is the next generation of tool builders?
How can we promote the understanding necessary to create frameworks and development environments?
This is of course a generality. Not all education is lacking, but it seems to be the majority and it brings down the quality of our profession as a whole.
I think the analogy is a bit off. A better analogy would be "We don't teach our kids to use calculators to add and subtract, why teach programmers to use an IDE to program?"
Get rid of HR departments that require X years experience in Y. The universities are just tailoring their course to the HR department's requirements.
I employ graduates who can code in something (I really don't care what language) and who can learn.
I see your point, although I think the math analogy doesn't quite fit. You have to know basic arithmetic to be able to get anything done in any other math discipline.
When I began programming frameworks were mostly unheard of. If you wanted a binary tree, by God, you went and wrote one. In C or Assembler. That was basically it, so to get anything done at all you had to know a lot.
Today, Frameworks and IDEs and designers make it possible for "noobs" to create actually pretty brilliant things without knowing the first thing about how to build a framework, or a compiler, or manage memory allocation.
The real issue is, what about all the dingbats that think they are awesome, great programmers because they used Frontpage or Access? Managers have a hard time telling the difference between that kind of programmer and one that really knows software development as a discipline.
So, specifically, why is it that way? Because everyone wants a job and nobody hires programmers that know how to build a binary tree. They want programmers that know .Net or J2EE, etc.
I would argue that there is probably enough work out there for 9 to 5 programmers who can start at the framework level and go up from there. The truly good ones - mostly your program as a career and/or program as a hobby - are going to get the knowledge they may have missed in college over time anyway. You can't force everyone to be a wonderful programmer no matter what curriculum you teach. Inquisitive students are going to learn about the fundamentals whether its taught to them in class or entirely on their own.
There are tool makers and tool breakers. And of course there are tools, but let's not go there.
If you have a good look at an automotive workshop, you will see a lot of funny little tools that you don't see on the shelves in hardware stores. Like the ones for pushing back brake caliper pistons. Or the clamps for compressing valve stems so you can get the collets out with one hand while talking to your mates about nailing the new secretary (instead of watching them fly across the room when the spring slips out from your screwdriver).
These were designed by mechanics. They're really effective, generally small and cheap, and totally incomprehensible until you seen them in action.
Most of the profound changes in automotive technology were bottom-up, but top-down is also needed. Individual mechanics can't make fundamental technology changes like the switch from cast iron to alloy heads. A new broom sweeps clean, an old broom knows the corners. You need both.
But I digress: the point is that the mechanics couldn't design these tools if they lacked fundamental skills and knowledge. My father built me an entire motorcycle from scrap iron when I was a kid. As an adult, because I lack his skills and knowledge and modes of thought, I can barely maintain the bike I bought from Honda, much less take to it with an oxy like Mr T in a creative frenzy.
With code, I am as my father was with steel. Donald Knuth is my constant companion, and when the wireless protocol for our GPS loggers needs to be implemented in .NET it's me they come to see. The widget monkeys wouldn't know where to start.
I think the problem is in fact the GUI paradigm in general.
Microsoft made using computers much easier, they popularized the Graphical User Interface. They brought this interface metaphor, (the desktop, the file) to the domain of programming as well and very effectively too with their Visual Basic tool.
But just as the GUI obscures what happens "under the hood" so does the IDE obscure the manipulation of bits and bytes. The question is, of course, risk to reward ratio - how much understanding do programmers lose in exchange for productivity?
A cursory look at "The Art of Computer Programming" might show why IDEs are useful; "The ultimate packing density is achieved when we have 1-bit items, because we can cram 64 of them into a single 64-bit word. Suppose, for example, that we want a table of all odd prime numbers less than 1024, so that we can easily decide the primality of a small integer. No problem; only eight 64-bit numbers are required:
p0 = 011101101101001100101101001001001100101100101001000101101101000000
p1 = . . ."
Programming is really hard, you can see how an IDE might help. :^)
Learning the abstraction is easier than learning the details when it comes to programming. It's harder to teach someone to hand-code assembler to print "Hello World" than it is to have them throw together a form with a button on it that shows a "Hello World" message when the button is clicked.
You didn't know how to build the engine of a car before learning to drive, did you? Because it's not necessary in order to drive. In the same vein, you don't need to learn how a linked list or binary tree works in order to maintain a list of names and search them.
There will always be those who want to get under the hood and learn the "why" of things, but I don't think it's required to get things done.
I always screen applications by asking difficult questions that they could only answer if they understood how something really works. I think it is a real shame colleges and universities are teaching people framework based development but not focusing on core software principles. I agree that what matters more than anything is someone who understands how programming works and has the drive to learn anything they can about it.
Most universities I know of have an introduction to computer programming course that teaches basic programming concepts. Unfortunately it is impossible to teach programming without actually writing code.
The problem is that some prefer to teach this course using some OO language such as JAVA or C# and so the students must use Visual Studio (or the Java equivalent).
It is very hard to explain the basic concepts when the IDE forces you to work in a certain way.
I think that the first language students learn should be functional language such as C. This way you have less layers of abstraction between them and the basic CS concepts.
Agree with cfeduke.
I looked at the work for the same CS courses I did from 2 years previously, and they were way harder. 5 years previously, way way harder.
The CS bar is being lowered more and more, presumably because there are more and more jobs that don't require any working knowledge of any of the complicated CS subjects. There are huge numbers of jobs for people to just cut code.
Since traditionaly people who wanted to be programmers did CS courses as coding has gotten easier this is still the case.
What really needs to happen is for CS to not be a requirement for professional software development. Instead there needs to be another curriculam that focuses more on getting people out the door and cutting code.
This would leave CS to be that course for you next generation of tool builder.
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Can you suggest some good MVC framework for perl -- one I am aware of is catalyst
The need is to be able to expose services on the perl infrastructure which can be called by Java/.Net applications seamlessly.
I'll tell you right now that Catalyst has by far the best reputation amongst Perl developers in terms of a rapid application development MVC framework.
In terms of "pure" MVC I'm not sure there are even that many "mature" or at least production-ready alternatives.
If Catalyst doesn't seem right to you, then you could build upon the lightweight framework CGI::Application to suit your needs or take a look at some of the lesser known MVC frameworks like PageKit and Maypole.
Since this old thread popped up, I will mention two exciting new additions to the Perl MVC world:
Dancer (CPAN) which is heavily influenced by Ruby's Sinatra, known for being very lightweight
Mojolicious (CPAN) which is written by the original developer of Catalyst to use what he learned there, it has no non-core dependencies, with very modern builtins (HTML5/CSS3/Websockets, JSON/XML parsers, its own UserAgent/templating engine)
(N.B. I have used Mojolicious more than Dancer, and as such if I missed some features of Dancer that I listed for Mojolicious then I apologize in advance)
Another alternative besides the ones already mentioned is Continuity; however, it is (as the name is meant to imply) continuation-based rather than MVC in the typical sense. Still, it’s worth mentioning because it is one of the better Perl web frameworks.
That said, I like Catalyst much better than any of the alternatives. And it’s still getting better all the time! The downside of that is that current preferred coding approaches continue to evolve at a fairly hurried clip – but for the last couple of versions, there has been strong emphasis on API compatibility, so the burden is now mostly mental rather than administrative. The upcoming port of the internals to Moose in particular is poised to provide some excellent benefits.
But the biggest argument in favour of Catalyst, IMO, is the Chained dispatch type. I have seen nothing like it in all of web-framework-dom, and it is a most excellent tool to keep your code as DRY as possible. This couples well with another great thing that Catalyst provides, namely uri_for – a method which takes a controller and a bunch of arguments and then constructs a URI that would dispatch to that place, which it returns. Together, these facilities mean that you can structure your URI space any way you deem right, yet at the same time can structure your controllers to avoid duplication of logic, and keep templates independent of the URI structure.
It’s just brilliant.
Seconding comments made by others: Catalyst (which more or less forked from Maypole) is by far and away the most complete and robust of them. There is a book by Jonathan Rockway that will certainly help you come to grips with it.
In addition to the 'Chained' dispatch type, the :Regex (and :LocalRegex) dispatch methods provide enormous flexibility. The latest app we've built here supports a lot of disparate-looking URLs through just a handful of subs using :LocalRegex.
I also particularly like the fact that you are not limited to a particular templating language or database. The mailing list (and the book) both have a preference for Template::Toolkit (as do I), and DBIx::Class (we continue to use Class::DBI), but you can use pretty much anything you like. Catalyst is marvelously agnostic that way.
Don't be put off by the fact Catalyst seems to require half of CPAN as dependencies. Once you get it up and running, it is a well-oiled machine. It has reached a level of maturity now that once you come to grips with it, you find it 'fades into the background'. You spend your time solving business needs, not fighting with the tools you use.
It does what it says on the tin. Catalyst++
Been playing with Squatting the last few days and I have to say it looks very promising and been fun to use.
Its a micro webframework (or web microframework ;-) and is heavily influenced by Camping which is written in Ruby.
NB. Squatting (& Camping) don't have model components baked into the framework. Here's the authors comments on models... "Models? The whole world is your model. ;-) I've always been ambivalent about defining policy here. Use whatever works for you"
There is also CGI::Application, which is more like the guts of a framework. It helps a person to write basic CGI's and glue bits on to it to make it as custom as they like. So you can have it use hardly any modules, or just about everyone under the sun.
Catalyst is the way to go. There is also Jifty, but (last time I looked), it had terrible documentation.
If you are already aware of Catalyst, then I recommend focusing on it. It is mature, well-documented, and has a very large user-base, community, and collection of plug-ins.
For your problem I would take a look into Jifty::Plugin::REST which allows access to models and actions using various formats.
Let me just say that Jifty doesn't have terrible documentation. However, most of included documentation is API documentation, but there is very low-noise mailing list which has useful tips and links to applications.
Wiki at http://jifty.org/ is another resource which has useful bits.
If your goal is to make video store (my favorite benchmark for 4GLs and CRUD frameworks) in afternoon, it's really worth a look!
Another options is Gantry when used in conjunction with the BigTop module it can reduce the time it takes to build simple CRUD sites.
There is also Clearpress which I can recommend as a useful database backed application. It needs fewer dependencies than Catalyst. We have written a few large applications with it, and I run a badminton ladder website using it.
I have built some applications with Kelp, it's easy to learn and very helpful.