The State of the AWK
The new namespaces look interesting, although I really don't think the lack of namespaces it what has hindered Awk from widespread use.I am speculating of course, but as someone who evangelizes Awk the most common thing I hear from people as to why they don't use it, is that they just don't know the language all that well.  For people that don't know much about Awk, it looks really complex and esoteric.To address the Awk ignorance, I put together a talk for Linux Fest Northwest last year, and it was so popular that I gave it again (virtually due to COVID-19) this year.  The conference was fully remote so the talk is on Youtube.If you've ever wanted to learn Awk, this will take you from zero to proficient.  There are exercises as well for practice:* Presentation:  https://youtu.be/43BNFcOdBlY* Exercises:- Source:  https://github.com/FreedomBen/awk-hack-the-planet- My solutions with explanation:  https://youtu.be/4UGLsRYDfo8