5 ms·

This kind of attitude makes me keep looking for ways to move away from Python-land. The new "we're better than everyone else" attitude is seriously grating. I l

by icey 16y ago

This kind of attitude makes me keep looking for ways to move away from Python-land. The new "we're better than everyone else" attitude is seriously grating. I like writing Python, but it sucks seeing this kind of crap every time I go into a mailing list or just about every other public programming forum around.

kaptainlange 16y ago
> The new "we're better than everyone else" He didn't say that at all.
- icey 16y ago
  I didn't say he did. Reread what I said.
  - kaptainlange 16y ago
    > This kind of attitude makes me keep looking for ways to move away from Python-land. The new "we're better than everyone else" attitude Is this not accusing him of having the "we're better than everyone else" attitude? If not, apologies, but that's what the comment seems to say.
    - icey 16y ago
      Yes, he has that attitude. No, he didn't explicitly say that. Those are two different things. There's no point in arguing about it. This is only my opinion, and really I'm nobody; just someone who uses this stuff.
      - jnoller 16y ago
        No, I don't have that opinion. Look at my history on my blog, or comment history here. Python, Django, etc have plenty to fix and get right. Your facts are wrong.
        icey 16y ago
        Jesse, I'm sorry for being an asshole. I've sent you an email with a proper apology; but I wanted to apologize here as well.
      - veemjeem 16y ago
        There are plenty of smug C++ developers out there but nobody really gives a crap about it. There will always be smug people, but who really cares?
        icey 16y ago
        Yeah, I think you're right. Point taken.
  - kingkilr 16y ago
    If you're not saying he said that, why leave the comment in reply to him? Either you think he said that (or conveys that attitude), or your comment is blatantly off-topic.
pcc 16y ago
Whoa, this seems a bit unfair. What feels like aeons ago, python-land created the huge monolithic monster, the Zope framework, which was absolutely great at the time. Then people were bitten by writing classes that would unexpectedly manifest some behaviour "as if by magic." The problems became (1) determining whether you would one day out of the blue have code "act weird", (2) figuring out where this behaviour was coming from. Save to say, many people got bit/burned/scarred. Lessons were learned. There is a fair bit of cross-polination going on; I can't think of any python framework that has not tried to learn from this, and also from the successes/challenges of others (and that includes those of Rails btw). So when a "battle scarred veteran" makes a terse statement such as this, I don't think by any means it expresses a "better-than-thou" attitude. But you can understand why there might be (rightly or wrongly) an anticipation of pain to come. When pythonistas look as Rails (for example) and say "hmmn, this pattern looks sort of familiar, wonder how they're going to avoid that type of pain we had", surely this is neither unfair nor over critical, it's just part of the technical dialogue that ultimately advances everyone's "state of the art." And I don't think anybody in the python world really claims to have the "one true answer." Rather it's more the case of "there is no one true answer, only many flawed attempts; so if you think you've found nirvana, be prepared for some disappointment down the road." Generally people acknowledge that it's a difficult problem and that we're all dealing with variations of the same issues, irrespective of language or framework. A bit like a balloon; you can squeeze it in one place to make it "thinner" there, but likely it will pop out some place else.
- icey 16y ago
  I probably wouldn't have had such a strong reaction if the comment hadn't started with "And based on the author's previous Django and ORM posts" as though the author is incapable of making technical decisions because he didn't like some aspect of Django previously. Between that, and the regular stream of ridicule about Rails , Node or just about anything else not Python it just seriously rubs me the wrong way. I don't see anyone changing my opinion of that; nor am I asking them to.
  - pcc 16y ago
    I have seen (for virtually every type of interesting technology ever) two classes of people (at least): 1. People who've somewhat recently discovered it, and realized how powerful it is. Not really surprising to see that people in this category would argue their tech of choice over next to anything out there; both because they're enamoured with what they've discovered, and also because it helps validate their choice. 2. People who've gotten past stage 1 and realized that everything has limitations. These people are far more pragmatic and will tend to seek the best tool for the job. Sometimes what they say may appear to be acerbic, often this is because it attempts to express the "there is no magic bullet"-conclusion that they've reached. Can guarantee you that Jesse does not fall into group 1. Also, I think in the above if you substitute "tech" for "community" the same will hold true. Ultimately these are all just tools in the toolbox and people in group 2 acknowledge this irrespective language/framework/community.
jnoller 16y ago
I was being sarcastic; and if you cannot name at least 5 things you dislike about the tools and languages you use you're either in the honeymoon period, or irrational. This includes fellow python-oriented people. Myself included.
- _pius 16y ago
  "... if you cannot name at least 5 things you dislike about the tools and languages you use you're either in the honeymoon period, or irrational." This is one of those things that sounds true, but falls apart on further inspection. Aren't you allowed to genuinely like your language or tools? Obviously there are tradeoffs with using any implementation of anything, but people can be completely satisfied and happy with their tools without being starry-eyed morons ...
  - btilly 16y ago
    This is one of those things that sounds true, but falls apart on further inspection. Aren't you allowed to genuinely like your language or tools? Yes, plenty of people genuinely like their languages and tools. However every language and tool has warts. You simply cannot build something that complex without either making mistakes that you can't reverse, or else making trade-offs that aren't going to fit someone else's use case. Plus no language or tool can fit every good idea, so it is in the nature of the beast that there are good ideas that simply didn't make it in. If you have not found those things yet, then you don't know your language and tools that well. Or else you don't know what is possible with other languages and tools. (That is the essence of the blub paradox - see http://www.paulgraham.com/avg.html http://www.paulgraham.com/avg.html for a detailed explanation.) Either way your opinion on how your language and tools compare with others is useless to more experienced people.
    - _pius 16y ago
      Heh, I understand the Blub paradox quite well. And, as I acknowledged, everything has design tradeoffs or even mistakes. Just because there are design tradeoffs or warts, doesn't mean they rise to the level of active dislike. For instance, most implementations of Ruby are relatively slow. Do I care? Generally, no ... certainly not enough to say it's something I "dislike." It's entirely possible to build tons of web apps (for example) and never bump against any language "mistakes" or "tradeoffs" that are relevant.
mkramlich 16y ago
> This kind of attitude makes me keep looking for ways to move away from Python-land. The new "we're better than everyone else" attitude is seriously grating. Wow. That sounds exactly like you're talking about Ruby/Rails.

by icey 16y ago

kaptainlange 16y ago

> The new "we're better than everyone else" He didn't say that at all.

icey 16y ago
I didn't say he did. Reread what I said.
- kaptainlange 16y ago
  > This kind of attitude makes me keep looking for ways to move away from Python-land. The new "we're better than everyone else" attitude Is this not accusing him of having the "we're better than everyone else" attitude? If not, apologies, but that's what the comment seems to say.
  - icey 16y ago
    Yes, he has that attitude. No, he didn't explicitly say that. Those are two different things. There's no point in arguing about it. This is only my opinion, and really I'm nobody; just someone who uses this stuff.
    - jnoller 16y ago
      No, I don't have that opinion. Look at my history on my blog, or comment history here. Python, Django, etc have plenty to fix and get right. Your facts are wrong.
      - icey 16y ago
        Jesse, I'm sorry for being an asshole. I've sent you an email with a proper apology; but I wanted to apologize here as well.
    - veemjeem 16y ago
      There are plenty of smug C++ developers out there but nobody really gives a crap about it. There will always be smug people, but who really cares?
      - icey 16y ago
        Yeah, I think you're right. Point taken.
- kingkilr 16y ago
  If you're not saying he said that, why leave the comment in reply to him? Either you think he said that (or conveys that attitude), or your comment is blatantly off-topic.

pcc 16y ago

Whoa, this seems a bit unfair. What feels like aeons ago, python-land created the huge monolithic monster, the Zope framework, which was absolutely great at the time. Then people were bitten by writing classes that would unexpectedly manifest some behaviour "as if by magic." The problems became (1) determining whether you would one day out of the blue have code "act weird", (2) figuring out where this behaviour was coming from. Save to say, many people got bit/burned/scarred. Lessons were learned. There is a fair bit of cross-polination going on; I can't think of any python framework that has not tried to learn from this, and also from the successes/challenges of others (and that includes those of Rails btw). So when a "battle scarred veteran" makes a terse statement such as this, I don't think by any means it expresses a "better-than-thou" attitude. But you can understand why there might be (rightly or wrongly) an anticipation of pain to come. When pythonistas look as Rails (for example) and say "hmmn, this pattern looks sort of familiar, wonder how they're going to avoid that type of pain we had", surely this is neither unfair nor over critical, it's just part of the technical dialogue that ultimately advances everyone's "state of the art." And I don't think anybody in the python world really claims to have the "one true answer." Rather it's more the case of "there is no one true answer, only many flawed attempts; so if you think you've found nirvana, be prepared for some disappointment down the road." Generally people acknowledge that it's a difficult problem and that we're all dealing with variations of the same issues, irrespective of language or framework. A bit like a balloon; you can squeeze it in one place to make it "thinner" there, but likely it will pop out some place else.

icey 16y ago
I probably wouldn't have had such a strong reaction if the comment hadn't started with "And based on the author's previous Django and ORM posts" as though the author is incapable of making technical decisions because he didn't like some aspect of Django previously. Between that, and the regular stream of ridicule about Rails , Node or just about anything else not Python it just seriously rubs me the wrong way. I don't see anyone changing my opinion of that; nor am I asking them to.
- pcc 16y ago
  I have seen (for virtually every type of interesting technology ever) two classes of people (at least): 1. People who've somewhat recently discovered it, and realized how powerful it is. Not really surprising to see that people in this category would argue their tech of choice over next to anything out there; both because they're enamoured with what they've discovered, and also because it helps validate their choice. 2. People who've gotten past stage 1 and realized that everything has limitations. These people are far more pragmatic and will tend to seek the best tool for the job. Sometimes what they say may appear to be acerbic, often this is because it attempts to express the "there is no magic bullet"-conclusion that they've reached. Can guarantee you that Jesse does not fall into group 1. Also, I think in the above if you substitute "tech" for "community" the same will hold true. Ultimately these are all just tools in the toolbox and people in group 2 acknowledge this irrespective language/framework/community.

jnoller 16y ago

I was being sarcastic; and if you cannot name at least 5 things you dislike about the tools and languages you use you're either in the honeymoon period, or irrational. This includes fellow python-oriented people. Myself included.

_pius 16y ago
"... if you cannot name at least 5 things you dislike about the tools and languages you use you're either in the honeymoon period, or irrational." This is one of those things that sounds true, but falls apart on further inspection. Aren't you allowed to genuinely like your language or tools? Obviously there are tradeoffs with using any implementation of anything, but people can be completely satisfied and happy with their tools without being starry-eyed morons ...
- btilly 16y ago
  This is one of those things that sounds true, but falls apart on further inspection. Aren't you allowed to genuinely like your language or tools? Yes, plenty of people genuinely like their languages and tools. However every language and tool has warts. You simply cannot build something that complex without either making mistakes that you can't reverse, or else making trade-offs that aren't going to fit someone else's use case. Plus no language or tool can fit every good idea, so it is in the nature of the beast that there are good ideas that simply didn't make it in. If you have not found those things yet, then you don't know your language and tools that well. Or else you don't know what is possible with other languages and tools. (That is the essence of the blub paradox - see http://www.paulgraham.com/avg.html http://www.paulgraham.com/avg.html for a detailed explanation.) Either way your opinion on how your language and tools compare with others is useless to more experienced people.
  - _pius 16y ago
    Heh, I understand the Blub paradox quite well. And, as I acknowledged, everything has design tradeoffs or even mistakes. Just because there are design tradeoffs or warts, doesn't mean they rise to the level of active dislike. For instance, most implementations of Ruby are relatively slow. Do I care? Generally, no ... certainly not enough to say it's something I "dislike." It's entirely possible to build tons of web apps (for example) and never bump against any language "mistakes" or "tradeoffs" that are relevant.

mkramlich 16y ago

> This kind of attitude makes me keep looking for ways to move away from Python-land. The new "we're better than everyone else" attitude is seriously grating. Wow. That sounds exactly like you're talking about Ruby/Rails.