rakudobrew

Then I recommend perlbrew[1] for Perl 5, and rakudobrew[2] for Perl 6 if you decide you want to take a look there as well. They will let you quickly build and install any particular version of Perl you like, and allow switching between versions if you have the need. The Version of Perl included in most distros is rather old as, Perl 5 sees regular releases with new features. The one main hint I have for you (beyond reviewing the Modern Perl book, as my sibling comment recommends) is to understand context and what that means in Perl. Perl can look deceptively similar to C and other procedural languages, but there are some somewhat (still) radical ideas underneath that will leave you either scratching your head or grumbling in frustration if you don't understand context (list or scalar), and how it's relevant in almost everything Perl do

Fwiw most Rakudo devs now prefer MoarVM for most things because it's generally the fastest, leanest, least buggy and most specification compliant of the currently available backends (MoarVM, JVM, Parrot). MoarVM is definitely the right pick for folk who want the leanest startup P6 can deliver. http://moarvm.org/ Even with the MoarVM backend, Rakudo takes a lot more time and RAM to startup than the compiler for most mainstream languages. It handily beats the JVMs devs use but that's not saying much. On the third hand, a few devs have said they are regularly using Rakudo at $work, including for one-liners. If anyone wants to try P6 I recommend RakudoBrew: https://github.com/tadzik/rakudobrew