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Python is the duct tape of programming languages. Never the best tool if you have strict performance requirements, but so damn versatile it will never go away.
by rmrfstar 6y ago
Python is the duct tape of programming languages.
Never the best tool if you have strict performance requirements, but so damn versatile it will never go away.
Cython does need better docs though, the steep learning curve means it is under-utilized.
- centimeter 6y agoAnd like things made out of duct tape, I’ve never found anything made using python that actually functioned well.
- NortySpock 6y agoDid it function well enough for your purposes? Because I don't need it to be hermetically-sealed perfection, I just need my python code to spit out a good result when I throw it at a problem; nevermind that it took a few seconds to spin up or needs more memory than a perfectly crafted C program.
- centimeter 6y agoMost python apps don’t function well enough for my purposes.
- coldtea 6y agoThen you have bizarro purposes, because Python is in production all over the world, in business critical, billion at stakes, systems...
- centimeter 6y agoOr maybe you just have very low standards.
- coldtea 6y agoWhat part of "business critical, billions at stake, systems" conveys "low standards"? And if Google, Amazon, NASA, etc (all places where Python is used heavily), are not high enough for you, what exactly are your standards?
- centimeter 6y ago> what exactly are your standards Not dog shit. Just because you can make money slinging dog shit doesn’t make it good
- entropicdrifter 6y agoIt might never be the best tool for the job, but it has certainly saved lives before: https://confessionsoftheprofessions.com/interesting-facts-of-duct-tape-and-nasa-astronauts-infographic/ https://confessionsoftheprofessions.com/interesting-facts-of...
- milquetoastaf 6y agoInstagram has - for me on iOS - always been one of the most stable apps out there and its backend is primarily Python
- gameswithgo 6y agoAlphaZero?
- bydo 6y agoWe said the same thing about Perl for a couple decades.
- ryl00 6y agoPlenty of us still do.
- hombre_fatal 6y agoAs a former Perl user, I think it's time we finally derank "plenty" into just "handfuls".
- rmrfstar 6y agoI feel like Python's readability and interoperability with C will give it more staying power. Is this wishful thinking?
- user5994461 6y agoPython is everywhere. The amount of python code that is written every day is staggering. It will be there 30 years from now doing the same thing and people will be looking at that code like it's COBOL. Perl is extinct in comparison. It's not been used for any projects anywhere for a long long time.
- johnisgood 6y ago> Python is the duct tape of programming languages. For some that glue is Forth. :D > A guy named Jean-Paul Wippler is considering using Forth as a super glue language to bind Python Perl and Tcl together in a project called Minotaur (http://www.equi4.com/minotaur/minotaur.html http://www.equi4.com/minotaur/minotaur.html). > Forth is an ideal intermediary language, precisely because it's so agile. Otherwise, it wouldn't have been chosen for OpenFirmware, which when you think about it, is a Forth system that must interface to a potentially wide variety of programming language environments.
- edsac_xyzw 6y agoThis duct type is the Python native extension api (not python ctypes) which allows creating native code modules (aka libraries) in C or C++ and creating wrappers to existing C or C++ libraries. This escape hatch that enables offloading cpu-intensive computations to high performance libraries written in C, C++ or Fortran. Another benefit of python modules written in C or C++ is that they are not affected by the GIL (Global Interpreter Lock) problem, thus they can take advantage of multi-core and SIMD instructions and achieve higher performance.