Scripting Language for Automation

I'm curious what type of scripting languages people have used or
recommend for Industrial Automation.  For example, at my work we are
testing our product in various configurations and capturing data using a
DAQ board.  We are doing things like open valve A at time T0 then wait
for time T1 and reduce pressure on Source B.  Later at time T2, open
Value C, etc.  Currently I am using a perl script for the data
capturing and actual interfacing to the hardware, mostly sending
commands through a serial port to the real hardware.  My perl script
receives command through a fifo from a sh script running the actual
test.  They invoke the perl script with the command runtest test1 and it
looks for a test file test1.txt which it converts to a bourne shell
script by converting it to unix from dos if needed, then adding the
appropriate headers and making it executable.  The test writers never
need to see the headers, just the body of the test.  The headers are
bourne shell function definitions like:

setFlow {
	echo "R00:${1}" >> /tmp/runtest-fifo
}

This allows the product testers to write nice and simple scripts with no
complex syntax since most of them really aren't programmers and I don't
want to subject them to Perl or C.  Since most tests are relatively simple,
this has been ok, but for some more complex tests I have to be called in
to write something in perl.
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