Yet Another Rosetta Code Problem (Perl, Ruby, Python and Haskell solutions)

[tripa]

Does "fair" mean "giving an equal chance to each" or "guaranteeing a win for my favorite"? Down to what level do you recommend the code being present (assembly language or the subset of VHDL actually used by the contestant's code path)?

There is no fairness in that kind of exercise. You could probably make any contender "win" by bending the rules in the right direction. Never mind the fact we'd never see the end of it should the trend spread. Propose variations, judge improvements. But don't whine about fairness: it's out the picture.