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Ask HN: What would've been Python if Python didn't exist?
What language do you think would've taken the place of Python as the predominant language for ML and data manipulation if Python was never invented? Would languages that aim to be "Python except better" like Julia still exist? Would the "AI revolution" have even occurred?
- PaulHoule 7y agoHow about GNU Octave?
- dunefox 7y agoAs a programming language for ML? God no.
- LinuxBender 7y agoInitially, probably perl.
- KhoomeiK 7y agoYeah, I've definitely heard people say that Perl was effectively Python before Python. I'm not sure if it could scale in terms of computational ability for ML though.
- jwalgenbach 7y agoPython doesn't really scale -- it just calls out to C code for heavy computation and perl could do that too. The more difficult part would be making perl easily maintainable. You can write unmaintainable code in any language, but perl made it easier, and python makes it (relatively) harder.
- maxerickson 7y agoLua, Ruby and Javascript all exist relatively independently of Python and have quite similar features sets. I wonder if numpy being fairly usable in 2005 is the bigger factor than Python itself.
- dunefox 7y agoI'd honestly hope that it would have been something like Common Lisp or Ocaml... now I just hope that Julia replaces Python for ML.
- Khelavaster 7y agoRuby probably would've evolved from Perl. PHP probably would've been refined faster.
- wprapido 7y agoPerl, Ruby, PHP
- psv1 7y agoR - it's already good just not quite as good as Python.
- Spooky23 7y agoPerl
- claudiug 7y agoruby