5 ms·

Ask HN: Why is Python popularity rising?

14 points by galfarragem 9y ago

The other day I saw a chart where Python popularity seems to be rising a lot. Is it because of machine learning? https://insights.stackoverflow.com/trends?tags=python%2Cjavascript

fiedzia 9y ago
Machine learning and programming education in general.
insulanian 9y ago
Besides simplicity, IMO being opinionated matters a lot. People don't like choices when starting to learn the language.
smt88 9y ago
It's increasing use in science/statistics is probably helpful. I know data scientists, lab scientists, an economist, and people in finance who only know Python and haven't considered learning anything else (including R).
CarolineW 9y ago
It has its wrinkles, absolutely, but in general it's clean, consistent, and even beginners tend to write code that's clear. There's very little syntactic noise, very few mysterious incantations, the easy is easy, the difficult isn't so bad, and it stays out of the way of the expert and just lets you get on with it. You can program in OO style, FP style, and where it's appropriate, imperative style. It comes with libraries that cover almost everything you need (although that's where many, many wrinkles can be found). And when you need speed, it plays nicely with other languages, is easily extended, and can be compiled to run on the metal. Yes, it has its problems, but the above list is why Python is my "go to" language for play, experiments, and in some cases, deployable packages.
aprdm 9y ago
Why wouldn't it be rising? From my perspective, I used to work with embedded systems and we used python from ARM processors to automating tests of embedded systems. Now I use it to build microservices, to do machine learning... It seems that it's used from A to Z. Python 3.x has interesting features regarding async io which some say perform better than node. It's a solid proven language.
joeclark77 9y ago
It's easy for beginners to learn programming, and it doesn't necessarily ever reach a performance bottleneck where you outgrow it and need something different. Python has libraries for practically everything, so you can use it for everything from coding a web app, to automating server administration tasks, to statistical analyis and data graphics, to orchestrating a MapReduce job on a cluster, so you also never really come to a task that forces you to choose a new language. Therefore, even if other languages are better for certain tasks, the Python programmer is rarely ever forced to go looking for them.
jotux 9y ago
Seems like python became popular as a teaching language in the last few years [1] and now we're seeing the results of that. [1] https://cacm.acm.org/blogs/blog-cacm/176450-python-is-now-the-most-popular-introductory-teaching-language-at-top-u-s-universities/fulltext https://cacm.acm.org/blogs/blog-cacm/176450-python-is-now-th...
almostkorean 9y ago
I just attended Pycon and the keynote was about why Python is an effective tool for science. I recommend watching the video, Jake is an astronomer and gave a great presentation: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZyjCqQEUa8o https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZyjCqQEUa8o His four main points were (I'm stealing this directly from his slides): 1. Interoperability with other languages 2. "Batteries Included" + third-party modules 3. Simplicity and dynamic nature 4. Open ethos well-fit to science
proussea 9y ago
Imo because "It’s more important to get stuff done than to make it go fast." https://hackernoon.com/yes-python-is-slow-and-i-dont-care-13763980b5a1 https://hackernoon.com/yes-python-is-slow-and-i-dont-care-13...
ern0 9y ago
It seems very tiny issue, but what I can write 5 lines in other languages (from PHP to CPP), it's only 2 lines in Python. I am writing my tools in Python, and there are lot of 1-line methods.
adamb_ 9y ago
I heard a lot of computer science departments started picking it as the introductory programming language a few years ago.

14 points by galfarragem 9y ago

The other day I saw a chart where Python popularity seems to be rising a lot. Is it because of machine learning? https://insights.stackoverflow.com/trends?tags=python%2Cjavascript

fiedzia 9y ago

Machine learning and programming education in general.

insulanian 9y ago

Besides simplicity, IMO being opinionated matters a lot. People don't like choices when starting to learn the language.

smt88 9y ago

It's increasing use in science/statistics is probably helpful. I know data scientists, lab scientists, an economist, and people in finance who only know Python and haven't considered learning anything else (including R).

CarolineW 9y ago

It has its wrinkles, absolutely, but in general it's clean, consistent, and even beginners tend to write code that's clear. There's very little syntactic noise, very few mysterious incantations, the easy is easy, the difficult isn't so bad, and it stays out of the way of the expert and just lets you get on with it. You can program in OO style, FP style, and where it's appropriate, imperative style. It comes with libraries that cover almost everything you need (although that's where many, many wrinkles can be found). And when you need speed, it plays nicely with other languages, is easily extended, and can be compiled to run on the metal. Yes, it has its problems, but the above list is why Python is my "go to" language for play, experiments, and in some cases, deployable packages.

aprdm 9y ago

Why wouldn't it be rising? From my perspective, I used to work with embedded systems and we used python from ARM processors to automating tests of embedded systems. Now I use it to build microservices, to do machine learning... It seems that it's used from A to Z. Python 3.x has interesting features regarding async io which some say perform better than node. It's a solid proven language.

joeclark77 9y ago

It's easy for beginners to learn programming, and it doesn't necessarily ever reach a performance bottleneck where you outgrow it and need something different. Python has libraries for practically everything, so you can use it for everything from coding a web app, to automating server administration tasks, to statistical analyis and data graphics, to orchestrating a MapReduce job on a cluster, so you also never really come to a task that forces you to choose a new language. Therefore, even if other languages are better for certain tasks, the Python programmer is rarely ever forced to go looking for them.

jotux 9y ago

Seems like python became popular as a teaching language in the last few years [1] and now we're seeing the results of that. [1] https://cacm.acm.org/blogs/blog-cacm/176450-python-is-now-the-most-popular-introductory-teaching-language-at-top-u-s-universities/fulltext https://cacm.acm.org/blogs/blog-cacm/176450-python-is-now-th...

almostkorean 9y ago

I just attended Pycon and the keynote was about why Python is an effective tool for science. I recommend watching the video, Jake is an astronomer and gave a great presentation: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZyjCqQEUa8o https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZyjCqQEUa8o His four main points were (I'm stealing this directly from his slides): 1. Interoperability with other languages 2. "Batteries Included" + third-party modules 3. Simplicity and dynamic nature 4. Open ethos well-fit to science

proussea 9y ago

Imo because "It’s more important to get stuff done than to make it go fast." https://hackernoon.com/yes-python-is-slow-and-i-dont-care-13763980b5a1 https://hackernoon.com/yes-python-is-slow-and-i-dont-care-13...

ern0 9y ago

It seems very tiny issue, but what I can write 5 lines in other languages (from PHP to CPP), it's only 2 lines in Python. I am writing my tools in Python, and there are lot of 1-line methods.

adamb_ 9y ago

I heard a lot of computer science departments started picking it as the introductory programming language a few years ago.