3 ms·

Why does anyone use Python?

6 points by lkrubner 8y ago

detaro 8y ago
"There is an example of an application that offers the python package manager as an installation method, and I read a random tutorial recommending I do that and (pretend to?) don't understand what's going on" isn't a very good basis to criticize an entire language ecosystem IMHO. Uwsgi is pretty powerful, a bit odd, and probably provided as a proper package by your distro. It's an app server, not a library, and should be installed as such, just like you'd install php-fpm (which seems to be the current "default answer" for running PHP). Now there are some issues with packaging in general (discussions of which can be found all over the place) and packages with binary dependencies, although I'm not sure the cited examples handle them all that better (e.g. I remember ruby gems wanting the right native library in the system manually installed too) Various workarounds are available if building native bindings isn't easy, especially relevant for Windows. It's bad that it needs workarounds, but that's why it hasn't been in the way of Python too much I'd guess.
CyberFonic 8y ago
I use Python because I get things done quickly and relatively easily AND I hardly ever use third party packages. I avoid subsystems, e.g. Django, for many of the reasons pointed out in the article. In my experience, similar problems exist when using NodeJS/npm. On that note, I think that the problem is that many packages out there have been hacked together rather than designed. The low threshold for becoming a Python programmer means that the average quality gets reduced. Which is a shame, because there are many exceptional packages out there, but they become statistical outliers amongst the mass of dross.
dekhn 8y ago
I read the article and it was dumb. The author didn't run 'sudo' before pip, and pip (rightly) complained it couldn't install software install the system path for permissions reasons. Note: nothing about this is specific to Python. Any UNIX application that uses commands like install or cp and don't get target permissions do this. On my system, not only did pip install uwsgi work out of the box, it installed it to a user location.
nodnol212 8y ago
i use python on windows(sorry not a linux/unix guy here) and it works fine. i disagree with the atricle in question.

6 points by lkrubner 8y ago

"There is an example of an application that offers the python package manager as an installation method, and I read a random tutorial recommending I do that and (pretend to?) don't understand what's going on" isn't a very good basis to criticize an entire language ecosystem IMHO. Uwsgi is pretty powerful, a bit odd, and probably provided as a proper package by your distro. It's an app server, not a library, and should be installed as such, just like you'd install php-fpm (which seems to be the current "default answer" for running PHP). Now there are some issues with packaging in general (discussions of which can be found all over the place) and packages with binary dependencies, although I'm not sure the cited examples handle them all that better (e.g. I remember ruby gems wanting the right native library in the system manually installed too) Various workarounds are available if building native bindings isn't easy, especially relevant for Windows. It's bad that it needs workarounds, but that's why it hasn't been in the way of Python too much I'd guess.

CyberFonic 8y ago

I use Python because I get things done quickly and relatively easily AND I hardly ever use third party packages. I avoid subsystems, e.g. Django, for many of the reasons pointed out in the article. In my experience, similar problems exist when using NodeJS/npm. On that note, I think that the problem is that many packages out there have been hacked together rather than designed. The low threshold for becoming a Python programmer means that the average quality gets reduced. Which is a shame, because there are many exceptional packages out there, but they become statistical outliers amongst the mass of dross.

dekhn 8y ago

I read the article and it was dumb. The author didn't run 'sudo' before pip, and pip (rightly) complained it couldn't install software install the system path for permissions reasons. Note: nothing about this is specific to Python. Any UNIX application that uses commands like install or cp and don't get target permissions do this. On my system, not only did pip install uwsgi work out of the box, it installed it to a user location.

nodnol212 8y ago

i use python on windows(sorry not a linux/unix guy here) and it works fine. i disagree with the atricle in question.