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Have some bad memories with zope.interface. Worked on a team composed mainly of ex enterprise .NET developers forced to work with Python (myself included). Some

Have some bad memories with zope.interface. Worked on a team composed mainly of ex enterprise .NET developers forced to work with Python (myself included). Some embraced the Python paradigm, others stubbornly clinged to old enterprise .NET habits. zope.interface was heavily used by the latter to essentially write something as close as possible to an enterprise .NET application, only in Python.

macintux 6y ago
I tried to create a web service using Zope in 2002 or so. I struggled for weeks trying to figure out how to get anything done, never did produce anything useful. Not sure that says more about Zope or my bootstrapping skills, which are admittedly pretty poor.
- dagw 6y ago
  Yea, Zope was weird. I learnt python in around 2000 and immediately fell in love with the language. Then I needed to to do some web stuff and wanted to move beyond simple cgi scripts and for some reason decided to pick up Zope. Almost stopped using Python all together then and there.
- smoe 6y ago
  I never worked with pure Zope, my first job in the mid 2000 was using Plone, a CMS build on top of it. Certainly overkill for simple websites, but I found it much more enjoyable than other big CMS of the time. It had some cool things, that I started missing once I moved on. How well the permission system, workflow engine and hierarchical content structure worked together, undo functionality, accessing things via urls like “/path/to/object/method” instead uf unreadable params, component based UI, having a single configuration file (zc.buildout) to have a reproducible environment for development and production, etc. In many regards they were ahead of the time I think, at least in the space of things between simple script driven websites and very enterprisey solutions.
padobson 6y ago
This is what I was thinking about reading this post. Why add things to Python to make it strongly typed? Why not just use Java or C#?
- Gibbon1 6y ago
  Because Java and especially C# aren't 'cool'
- ralmidani 6y ago
  Not an exhaustive list of possible reasons: - (number_of_people_who_enjoy_coding_with_python_more_than_coding_with_c_sharp_or_java > 0) == True - Some people have large existing codebases, and would rather add types gradually than have to port all their logic to another language. - In terms of being free and open source, Python > C# > Java (meta: can you even do a comparison like that in C# and/or Java?)
  - nerdponx 6y ago
    I thought Java being not-open-source in 2021 was a myth, no? What about OpenJDK (GPL licensed)?
    - ralmidani 6y ago
      GPL2 has no explicit patent grant, and Oracle's behavior does not signal good intentions.
- nerdponx 6y ago
  1. Because people like Python. 2. The type system is both gradual and not enforced by default. This means you benefit from the rapid prototyping and general freedom of dynamically-typed code, but you have the option to layer on the additional safety of static type checking as the project grows. There aren't many other gradually-typed languages out there anyway; Julia, Typed Racket, and Common Lisp aren't exactly in widespread industry use for general-purpose server dev.
  - 6y ago

macintux 6y ago

I tried to create a web service using Zope in 2002 or so. I struggled for weeks trying to figure out how to get anything done, never did produce anything useful. Not sure that says more about Zope or my bootstrapping skills, which are admittedly pretty poor.

dagw 6y ago
Yea, Zope was weird. I learnt python in around 2000 and immediately fell in love with the language. Then I needed to to do some web stuff and wanted to move beyond simple cgi scripts and for some reason decided to pick up Zope. Almost stopped using Python all together then and there.
smoe 6y ago
I never worked with pure Zope, my first job in the mid 2000 was using Plone, a CMS build on top of it. Certainly overkill for simple websites, but I found it much more enjoyable than other big CMS of the time. It had some cool things, that I started missing once I moved on. How well the permission system, workflow engine and hierarchical content structure worked together, undo functionality, accessing things via urls like “/path/to/object/method” instead uf unreadable params, component based UI, having a single configuration file (zc.buildout) to have a reproducible environment for development and production, etc. In many regards they were ahead of the time I think, at least in the space of things between simple script driven websites and very enterprisey solutions.

padobson 6y ago

This is what I was thinking about reading this post. Why add things to Python to make it strongly typed? Why not just use Java or C#?

Gibbon1 6y ago
Because Java and especially C# aren't 'cool'
ralmidani 6y ago
Not an exhaustive list of possible reasons: - (number_of_people_who_enjoy_coding_with_python_more_than_coding_with_c_sharp_or_java > 0) == True - Some people have large existing codebases, and would rather add types gradually than have to port all their logic to another language. - In terms of being free and open source, Python > C# > Java (meta: can you even do a comparison like that in C# and/or Java?)
- nerdponx 6y ago
  I thought Java being not-open-source in 2021 was a myth, no? What about OpenJDK (GPL licensed)?
  - ralmidani 6y ago
    GPL2 has no explicit patent grant, and Oracle's behavior does not signal good intentions.
nerdponx 6y ago
1. Because people like Python. 2. The type system is both gradual and not enforced by default. This means you benefit from the rapid prototyping and general freedom of dynamically-typed code, but you have the option to layer on the additional safety of static type checking as the project grows. There aren't many other gradually-typed languages out there anyway; Julia, Typed Racket, and Common Lisp aren't exactly in widespread industry use for general-purpose server dev.
- 6y ago