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> It's really frustrating having to use a subpar and inexpressive language like Python because of the huge data science network effect. I'm afraid that the "ne
by geoalchimista 7y ago
> It's really frustrating having to use a subpar and inexpressive language like Python because of the huge data science network effect.
I'm afraid that the "network effect" is gonna continue for the years to come. NDArray is not the only thing you need for data analysis. DataFrame, statistical functions, and data visualization packages like matplotlib and ggplot are all indispensable components in a data analysis workflow. It has taken thousands of contributors a decade to build a solid ecosystem for data science in Python or in R. It's just unlikely for Java to become a mainstream data science language overnight.
I'd say if you are looking for a statically typed language for deep learning, C++ is probably a better bet than Java for now.
- stochastic_monk 7y agoPyTorch and Tensorflow both have C++ frontends now, which lowers the barrier of use for me. Being able to test quickly in Python without compiling is really nice; while I prefer C++ for final products, prototyping PyTorch in Python feels like a better use of my time. There’s a fuller ecosystem; I needed a PCA implementation. Instead of just using scipy, I had to choose an algorithm and use LAPACK myself.
- mruts 7y agoI don’t really want Java as a data science language, but Scala would be a perfect fit. There’s already a nice data frame library that I helped develop at my old company called Saddle. Now we just need some quant finance libraries (like the excellent zip line, pyfolio, and alpha lens), some industrial NNs, optimization libs (like cvxpy), and something like scipy. Is this ever going to happen? Probably not, but a man can dream..