learning another language, particularly a very high level lang like perl is VERY useful. i didn't say it was a bad idea. in fact, i program a LOT more in perl than in C++. often, it's the difference between 2 lines of codes and 200.
but, it definitely makes you a lazy coder when you rely on all that loose typing, automatic memory management, and easy I/O.
bottom line is this. if you learn c++ first and move onto perl/php, you'll sigh with great relief and say "man, this is a lot easier." moving in the other direction, you'll say "jesus, this is a pain in the ass." and you're likely to be stuck using your VHL language forever, throwing to the wind the geek points you would have acquired otherwise.
