3 ms·

I feel like the entire point of a BDFL is that they can just ignore this sort of thing and make the hard call, but it never happened.

xapata 6y ago
On the whole, Guido's career as a BDFL was astoundingly effective. Maybe he made the right call. It'd have been a terrible idea to alienate the science community just when data science was taking off as a field.
- neolog 6y ago
  I don't know how much the original author had to do with Python's success in the last 20 years. The success of Python in data science is because of NumPy/Scipy/Pandas. Things like packaging that needed leadership never got any.
  - xapata 6y ago
    The leadership was that the science community would benefit from a science-specific tool, like Conda, and that making one ring to rule them all would be too difficult. Also, yes, Guido and many other early contributers have been been active for 30ish years.
    - neolog 6y ago
      Conda isn't really science specific, just like pip isn't webdev specific.
      - xapata 6y ago
        The result isn't, but the motivation was. And have you noticed who is using which tool?
        deleted 6y ago
        [deleted]
  - toyg 6y ago
    > The success of Python in data science is because of NumPy/Scipy/Pandas. And NumPy/Scipy/Pandas exist (and are successful) because...? /s
    - deleted 6y ago
      [deleted]
- staticassertion 6y ago
  I'm not disagreeing, but I am curious if you have anything specific you would point to with regards to Guido's role being successful. I'm just ignorant really, it's not intended to be a leading question at all.
  - xapata 6y ago
    Too many things to answer here. The easiest is to point to the popularity of the language. He's made decisions I disagree with, but I can't argue with success.
divbzero 6y ago
Maybe it could still happen? It seems like a super high value challenge that the BDFL could take on: build out the official set of tools (setup.py, twine, virtualenv, pip) to support features that make people seek out alternatives (pyproject.toml, poetry, flit, conda, pyenv, pipenv).
- staticassertion 6y ago
  I think the time has passed, both in terms of there no longer being a BDFL, as well as Python passing a point where the call can be made.
  - divbzero 6y ago
    Sadly I bet you’re right on this. My small sliver of hope is that Guido van Rossum’s ideas to “make using Python better” [1] include better packaging. [1]: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=25071847 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=25071847
    - takluyver 6y ago
      There are quite a lot of people working on better packaging (look at the Python discourse forum, for instance), but this is not really a topic that Guido has got involved in, at least in the time I've been paying attention. But with or without a BDFL, one packaging tool to rule them all is a pretty tall order. The needs of a package like scipy, which incorporates C & Fortran code, are pretty different from something like requests. And different communities using Python have their own entrenched tools and techniques. It takes more than someone saying "Foo is officially blessed" to shift that, even if everyone respects the person saying that.
- jolux 6y ago
  I realize this is controversial but from reading the docs I really thought Pipenv was the official solution. Took me a while to realize this wasn't the case.
  - deleted 6y ago

xapata 6y ago

On the whole, Guido's career as a BDFL was astoundingly effective. Maybe he made the right call. It'd have been a terrible idea to alienate the science community just when data science was taking off as a field.

neolog 6y ago
I don't know how much the original author had to do with Python's success in the last 20 years. The success of Python in data science is because of NumPy/Scipy/Pandas. Things like packaging that needed leadership never got any.
- xapata 6y ago
  The leadership was that the science community would benefit from a science-specific tool, like Conda, and that making one ring to rule them all would be too difficult. Also, yes, Guido and many other early contributers have been been active for 30ish years.
  - neolog 6y ago
    Conda isn't really science specific, just like pip isn't webdev specific.
    - xapata 6y ago
      The result isn't, but the motivation was. And have you noticed who is using which tool?
      - deleted 6y ago
        [deleted]
- toyg 6y ago
  > The success of Python in data science is because of NumPy/Scipy/Pandas. And NumPy/Scipy/Pandas exist (and are successful) because...? /s
  - deleted 6y ago
    [deleted]
staticassertion 6y ago
I'm not disagreeing, but I am curious if you have anything specific you would point to with regards to Guido's role being successful. I'm just ignorant really, it's not intended to be a leading question at all.
- xapata 6y ago
  Too many things to answer here. The easiest is to point to the popularity of the language. He's made decisions I disagree with, but I can't argue with success.

divbzero 6y ago

Maybe it could still happen? It seems like a super high value challenge that the BDFL could take on: build out the official set of tools (setup.py, twine, virtualenv, pip) to support features that make people seek out alternatives (pyproject.toml, poetry, flit, conda, pyenv, pipenv).

staticassertion 6y ago
I think the time has passed, both in terms of there no longer being a BDFL, as well as Python passing a point where the call can be made.
- divbzero 6y ago
  Sadly I bet you’re right on this. My small sliver of hope is that Guido van Rossum’s ideas to “make using Python better” [1] include better packaging. [1]: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=25071847 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=25071847
  - takluyver 6y ago
    There are quite a lot of people working on better packaging (look at the Python discourse forum, for instance), but this is not really a topic that Guido has got involved in, at least in the time I've been paying attention. But with or without a BDFL, one packaging tool to rule them all is a pretty tall order. The needs of a package like scipy, which incorporates C & Fortran code, are pretty different from something like requests. And different communities using Python have their own entrenched tools and techniques. It takes more than someone saying "Foo is officially blessed" to shift that, even if everyone respects the person saying that.
jolux 6y ago
I realize this is controversial but from reading the docs I really thought Pipenv was the official solution. Took me a while to realize this wasn't the case.
- deleted 6y ago