7 ms·

AFAIK, macOS comes with Python 2.7 and without pip. For any serious, modern, Python development you need to install Python 3 yourself.

Waterluvian 7y ago
Again the word "serious" is there telling me people are absolutely aloof to the kinds of new developers there are and what it's like to be a non programmer.
- AlexeyBrin 7y ago
  What newbie will start with Python 2.7 at this point in time? Most books and tutorials are updated for Python 3. The default Python 2.7 interpreter from macOS is useless for newbies, it does more harm than good by confusing them.
  - Wowfunhappy 7y ago
    Apple could solve this problem by including python3 with macOS...
    - Twisell 7y ago
      They sure could, but is it worthy to maintain an alternative package and deployment system for which you have no use yourself? Will employees be careful and committed to something useless for their jobs? They previously deprecated Java runtime for similar reasons. And I can’t really blame them, roadmap is crystal clear now, they prefer to assign ressources to develop Swift/Swift UI and improve tooling for native code development.
      - Wowfunhappy 7y ago
        I agree overall, but I do think it's a little sad that you can no longer open a Terminal and start writing Python. I think this legitimately matters in terms of increasing overall tech and programming literacy. Mind, there's still a command line and shell built-in, which I consider far more important.
        unilynx 7y ago
        Its not like the rest of the terminal is friendly to newbies. An online ‘jsfiddle’ like environment suitable for newbies (with a bit of inline syntax hints without turning into a full IDE) would be more useful to get people to start playing with programming
        Wowfunhappy 7y ago
        Separately from including python, I've always thought it would be nice if TextEdit had some built-in syntax highlighting, that activated automatically for the right file extensions. I'm generally against bloating simple apps, but you'd never see this unless you opened a .py file (or .sh, .rb, etc), and if you open a .py file, you probably want syntax highlighting.
        jodrellblank 7y ago
        You can open https://repl.it/languages/python3 https://repl.it/languages/python3 and start writing Python.
        Godel_unicode 7y ago
        with open("~/Documents/important.csv", "r") as f: f.read() No? Oh well, I guess programming is hard, IT was right. Ok, back to excel...
        amasad 7y ago
        You can just drag and drop the file on repl.it and it'll just work :)
        Godel_unicode 7y ago
        Gee, thanks. My point was about discoverability and being able to Google for "read csv with Python", not whether experienced programmers can hack things together.
    - IshKebab 7y ago
      Presumably someone said that about python 2 back in the day and that turned out to be a pretty bad decision.
      - Wowfunhappy 7y ago
        Isn't this the same as saying, we should never include any software, lest it become outdated someday?
    - c256 7y ago
      Apple could solve this problems by including homebrew with macOS...
  - kccqzy 7y ago
    The young, bored but smart kid in an elementary or middle school tinkering with her computer and finding something to do. She doesn't need a book or a tutorial to tell her the "right" way. She experiments, only guided by her curiosity.
    - wyclif 7y ago
      The point is that Python 2.7x is being EOL'd now. The Python that person will likely encounter in the very near future will be Python3.
      - pieter_mj 7y ago
        per the link, macOS won't include any scripting languages by default in the future. So the bored user will be less likely to stumble upon an intresting programming language on their macs.
        wyclif 7y ago
        I don't know if that follows. I think it's likely that Apple will include a new installer upon setup that is essentially a one step 'click to install XCode Developer Tools and the following languages:' then has a list of options including Bash, Python, Ruby, Perl, &c. But all that is conjecture because we don't know what they're going to do yet. You'd have to be very bored and unmotivated to not install a programming language if you had even the slightest motivation to program (IOW, not a normie consumer). I understand what you're saying, but I just don't see how this would be a huge barrier to entry.
    - em500 7y ago
      There still Swift Playground, Safari JS console, not to mention old fashioned zsh/bash/ksh to tinker with. The part where the removal of the default macOS Python/Ruby/perl (which don't even have autocompletion) kills her curiosity seems far fetched.
      - TimTheTinker 7y ago
- x0x0 7y ago
  otoh, helping people start by just typing python is great! otoh, pointing people towards messing with system python... well, it's a trap. And they will get burned, and it will be a nightmare to straighten out.
  - lapnitnelav 7y ago
    Yeah you'd be better off having a proper clean install of Python + virtualenvwrapper as your starting point.
- AmericanChopper 7y ago
  Why would a new programmer want to start with a deprecated language?
  - TheOtherHobbes 7y ago
    Because they don't know it's a deprecated language. In fact they probably don't even know what "deprecated" means. It wasn't that long ago that Python 2.7 was the default on the Raspberry Pi. (That may still be true - I haven't checked recently.) There's a huge ecosystem of Python 2.7 tutorials, introductions, and sample code out there. Very little of it is prefaced with "Of course you should use Python 3 now."
    - AmericanChopper 7y ago
      I bet they know how versions work though, and that 3.7 is higher than 2.7. I just googled ‘Python tutorial’ and only one of the results on the first page was for python 2. The first result was ‘The Python Tutorial — Python 3.7.3 documentation’. If some non-programmer was going to start learning python, they’re most likely going to start with google. I can’t see them digging deeper into the results because they want to learn an older version of the language.

Waterluvian 7y ago

Again the word "serious" is there telling me people are absolutely aloof to the kinds of new developers there are and what it's like to be a non programmer.

AlexeyBrin 7y ago
What newbie will start with Python 2.7 at this point in time? Most books and tutorials are updated for Python 3. The default Python 2.7 interpreter from macOS is useless for newbies, it does more harm than good by confusing them.
- Wowfunhappy 7y ago
  Apple could solve this problem by including python3 with macOS...
  - Twisell 7y ago
    They sure could, but is it worthy to maintain an alternative package and deployment system for which you have no use yourself? Will employees be careful and committed to something useless for their jobs? They previously deprecated Java runtime for similar reasons. And I can’t really blame them, roadmap is crystal clear now, they prefer to assign ressources to develop Swift/Swift UI and improve tooling for native code development.
    - Wowfunhappy 7y ago
      I agree overall, but I do think it's a little sad that you can no longer open a Terminal and start writing Python. I think this legitimately matters in terms of increasing overall tech and programming literacy. Mind, there's still a command line and shell built-in, which I consider far more important.
      - unilynx 7y ago
        Its not like the rest of the terminal is friendly to newbies. An online ‘jsfiddle’ like environment suitable for newbies (with a bit of inline syntax hints without turning into a full IDE) would be more useful to get people to start playing with programming
        Wowfunhappy 7y ago
        Separately from including python, I've always thought it would be nice if TextEdit had some built-in syntax highlighting, that activated automatically for the right file extensions. I'm generally against bloating simple apps, but you'd never see this unless you opened a .py file (or .sh, .rb, etc), and if you open a .py file, you probably want syntax highlighting.
      - jodrellblank 7y ago
        You can open https://repl.it/languages/python3 https://repl.it/languages/python3 and start writing Python.
        Godel_unicode 7y ago
        with open("~/Documents/important.csv", "r") as f: f.read() No? Oh well, I guess programming is hard, IT was right. Ok, back to excel...
        amasad 7y ago
        You can just drag and drop the file on repl.it and it'll just work :)
        Godel_unicode 7y ago
        Gee, thanks. My point was about discoverability and being able to Google for "read csv with Python", not whether experienced programmers can hack things together.
  - IshKebab 7y ago
    Presumably someone said that about python 2 back in the day and that turned out to be a pretty bad decision.
    - Wowfunhappy 7y ago
      Isn't this the same as saying, we should never include any software, lest it become outdated someday?
  - c256 7y ago
    Apple could solve this problems by including homebrew with macOS...
- kccqzy 7y ago
  The young, bored but smart kid in an elementary or middle school tinkering with her computer and finding something to do. She doesn't need a book or a tutorial to tell her the "right" way. She experiments, only guided by her curiosity.
  - wyclif 7y ago
    The point is that Python 2.7x is being EOL'd now. The Python that person will likely encounter in the very near future will be Python3.
    - pieter_mj 7y ago
      per the link, macOS won't include any scripting languages by default in the future. So the bored user will be less likely to stumble upon an intresting programming language on their macs.
      - wyclif 7y ago
        I don't know if that follows. I think it's likely that Apple will include a new installer upon setup that is essentially a one step 'click to install XCode Developer Tools and the following languages:' then has a list of options including Bash, Python, Ruby, Perl, &c. But all that is conjecture because we don't know what they're going to do yet. You'd have to be very bored and unmotivated to not install a programming language if you had even the slightest motivation to program (IOW, not a normie consumer). I understand what you're saying, but I just don't see how this would be a huge barrier to entry.
  - em500 7y ago
    There still Swift Playground, Safari JS console, not to mention old fashioned zsh/bash/ksh to tinker with. The part where the removal of the default macOS Python/Ruby/perl (which don't even have autocompletion) kills her curiosity seems far fetched.
    - TimTheTinker 7y ago
x0x0 7y ago
otoh, helping people start by just typing python is great! otoh, pointing people towards messing with system python... well, it's a trap. And they will get burned, and it will be a nightmare to straighten out.
- lapnitnelav 7y ago
  Yeah you'd be better off having a proper clean install of Python + virtualenvwrapper as your starting point.
AmericanChopper 7y ago
Why would a new programmer want to start with a deprecated language?
- TheOtherHobbes 7y ago
  Because they don't know it's a deprecated language. In fact they probably don't even know what "deprecated" means. It wasn't that long ago that Python 2.7 was the default on the Raspberry Pi. (That may still be true - I haven't checked recently.) There's a huge ecosystem of Python 2.7 tutorials, introductions, and sample code out there. Very little of it is prefaced with "Of course you should use Python 3 now."
  - AmericanChopper 7y ago
    I bet they know how versions work though, and that 3.7 is higher than 2.7. I just googled ‘Python tutorial’ and only one of the results on the first page was for python 2. The first result was ‘The Python Tutorial — Python 3.7.3 documentation’. If some non-programmer was going to start learning python, they’re most likely going to start with google. I can’t see them digging deeper into the results because they want to learn an older version of the language.