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The double standard is that people still stick to Python despite those problems. If we're being honest and all conspiracy aside, imagine the same story for Ruby

The double standard is that people still stick to Python despite those problems. If we're being honest and all conspiracy aside, imagine the same story for Ruby (a very similar language in terms of capability, features and performance), everyone would be laughing at them and the language would be pulling a Perl right now.

stealthcat 9y ago
Ruby took off because of Rails. Rails' convention over configuration defies Ruby's flexible nature. It feels more like Python. People prefer dumb unambiguous code over clever code. That's why Python and Rails succeeded
- ComputerGuru 9y ago
  “Dumb, unambiguous code” does not rely on magic conventions that change with the whim of the framework developer.
toyg 9y ago
That massive chip on your shoulder is weighing you down. If you really think something like that is happening (big if - I’ve gone through so many py3 flames...), the only answer is: because people love the language SO DAMN MUCH that they will overlook its warts. And the next logical step would be to find out how an independent research project, staffed mostly by volunteers and without a marketing budget of any sort (and not running in every browser nor shipping preinstalled on the most popular operating system), ended up with this sort of mindshare. There might be some good lessons there.
simonh 9y ago
I do not think double standard means what you think it means.
jamesgeck0 9y ago
Ruby had 1.9. It was like the Python 3 situation in miniature, and Matz has said he’s keen to avoid such a mistake again.
- takeda 9y ago
  It also was in a minor version change 1.8 -> 1.9, but people moved on because 1.8 was declared EOL this is what Python was missing. Python 3 is 10 years old and 2.7 is still supported (bufixes, but still). If you look at timing, Python 3 picked up for new projects in 2015, when PSF declared that no new features will be backported to Python 2 from 3. I believe the industry will wait for 2020 to start migrating existing code after Python 2.7 will be declared EOL.
username223 9y ago
Those three scripting languages actually an interesting comparison. Perl 5 -> 6 broke all your code in exchange for a whole new language. Some people moved to Perl 6, some to other languages, and a lot stayed with Perl (5), which still runs programs written in Perl 1. Ruby 1.8 -> 1.9 broke most of your code in exchange for minor cleanups. But Ruby was Rails, so the culture accepted constant rewriting and breakage, and people went along. Python 2 -> 3 also broke most of your code in exchange for minor cleanups. Users expected some stability, but the language's culture demanded conformity. The result has been a decade-long war in which Python fans try to shame Python users into moving to version 3.
- kec 9y ago
  > The result has been a decade-long war in which Python fans try to shame Python users into moving to version 3. I think that's the most succinct way to put this whole debacle I've ever seen. I'm totally stealing this.
- irishsultan 9y ago
  > But Ruby was Rails, so the culture accepted constant rewriting and breakage, and people went along. The main reason people switched probably wasn't rails making people expect breakage, the main reason was that (a) it was relatively easy to rewrite your code to work on both 1.8 and 1.9 (as long as your dependencies had already done it), and (b) 1.9 was much faster.

stealthcat 9y ago

Ruby took off because of Rails. Rails' convention over configuration defies Ruby's flexible nature. It feels more like Python. People prefer dumb unambiguous code over clever code. That's why Python and Rails succeeded

ComputerGuru 9y ago
“Dumb, unambiguous code” does not rely on magic conventions that change with the whim of the framework developer.

toyg 9y ago

That massive chip on your shoulder is weighing you down. If you really think something like that is happening (big if - I’ve gone through so many py3 flames...), the only answer is: because people love the language SO DAMN MUCH that they will overlook its warts. And the next logical step would be to find out how an independent research project, staffed mostly by volunteers and without a marketing budget of any sort (and not running in every browser nor shipping preinstalled on the most popular operating system), ended up with this sort of mindshare. There might be some good lessons there.

simonh 9y ago

I do not think double standard means what you think it means.

jamesgeck0 9y ago

Ruby had 1.9. It was like the Python 3 situation in miniature, and Matz has said he’s keen to avoid such a mistake again.

takeda 9y ago
It also was in a minor version change 1.8 -> 1.9, but people moved on because 1.8 was declared EOL this is what Python was missing. Python 3 is 10 years old and 2.7 is still supported (bufixes, but still). If you look at timing, Python 3 picked up for new projects in 2015, when PSF declared that no new features will be backported to Python 2 from 3. I believe the industry will wait for 2020 to start migrating existing code after Python 2.7 will be declared EOL.

username223 9y ago

Those three scripting languages actually an interesting comparison. Perl 5 -> 6 broke all your code in exchange for a whole new language. Some people moved to Perl 6, some to other languages, and a lot stayed with Perl (5), which still runs programs written in Perl 1. Ruby 1.8 -> 1.9 broke most of your code in exchange for minor cleanups. But Ruby was Rails, so the culture accepted constant rewriting and breakage, and people went along. Python 2 -> 3 also broke most of your code in exchange for minor cleanups. Users expected some stability, but the language's culture demanded conformity. The result has been a decade-long war in which Python fans try to shame Python users into moving to version 3.

kec 9y ago
> The result has been a decade-long war in which Python fans try to shame Python users into moving to version 3. I think that's the most succinct way to put this whole debacle I've ever seen. I'm totally stealing this.
irishsultan 9y ago
> But Ruby was Rails, so the culture accepted constant rewriting and breakage, and people went along. The main reason people switched probably wasn't rails making people expect breakage, the main reason was that (a) it was relatively easy to rewrite your code to work on both 1.8 and 1.9 (as long as your dependencies had already done it), and (b) 1.9 was much faster.