Can't speak for perl because I have only seen some horribly complicated code in it (which probably speak more of the author and not the language itself) but what's not fun about JavaScript ?
- many mistakes are silently ignored. If you mistype object field name, divide a number by zero, add number to a string, access missing array element, no error is raised
- no proper OOP and classes
- no type hints for variables, function arguments or return values (well, there is TypeScript but it is another language)
- package manager (npm) loves to create deep hierarchies of folders
I used Perl for years, and it's still my go to language for quick text parsing. I stayed away from the bizzare "object oriented" syntax (They're not classes. They're packages, just called with arrow operators instead of like normal functions. But being Perl, you can just use the package and call the functions yourself because TMTOWTDI! (Blech.)) Also Perl's support (or at least Perl 5 (Does 6 even exist? It's like a unicorn like Duke Nukem Forever or Guns-n-Roses Chinese Democracy, only those eventually got released.)) for complex data structures (including multidimensional arrays) requires explicit reference instanteation and dereferencing, like C pointers. It's the biggest pain point.
especially with React Native, NodeJS and Electron... you can pretty much write anything you want, easily, that will run on a bunch of platform. I still prefer Python/Ruby/Perl... over JS. But I would pick JS anytime over Java.
