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Honest question: what views does one has to have to doesn't take non-browser JS seriously, and at the same time use Python? And what's unfortunate about node.js

Honest question: what views does one has to have to doesn't take non-browser JS seriously, and at the same time use Python? And what's unfortunate about node.js compared to it?

benreesman 5y ago
Python has (more than one actually) trivially seamless FFI stories down to native (read: C++) code. I personally like `pybind11`, but there are others. Python is basically a convenient way to invoke numpy or Tensorflow or Torch or whatever. It's got numpy/scipy/sklearn/BLAS bindings etc., and is for better or worse how you do scientific computing in the mid-to-upper-mid range these days (the HPC folks have their own whole story). It's a pain in the ass in it's own way, but you're kinda stuck with it if you want to do mainstream ML. As a language it's dumber in some ways that JS, definitely slower in some cases, but also way less weird. Prototype chains and stuff are a cool demo that BE knew about Self and shit in the week he had to write JS, but anyone who claims they like that has Stockholm's syndrome worse than someone who thinks Ruby metaclasses make sense.
- mrighele 5y ago
  I've been using python for many years, but these days I would prefer to use JS (or better, TS) even for backend. I find it more enjoyable to use than Python, and faster. Sure it has its warts, but if you write idiomatic code they are not much of a problem (e.g. I don't think there is a single class in the code I write, so prototype chains are a non-issue)
lstamour 5y ago
I can say that if someone is sold on Python, you’re not going to convince them to move to Rust but you might convince them to move to Go. Why? Go provides better performance than Python but without the language and keyword complexity of Rust. There’s less language to learn. That said, the more interesting question is TypeScript vs Rust. I can see how the complexity of C++ naturally leads folks to Rust. But I’ve had a hard time choosing Rust over TypeScript when trying to implement a basic service. It’s absolutely true that Node.js web servers aren’t optimized for multi-threaded data access times and the Node.js event loop can get in the way of responsive performance. But at the same time once you build, for example, an HTTP 1.1 web server for Node that is similar to what you’d build using semi-unsafe code in Rust and ships by default in Go standard library, it’s hard to say that JS is any less efficient than Rust when both are generally written to use async/green thread runtimes, make calls using a pool of Postgres or database connections, and either have PG return JSON or otherwise reshape and assign the results to a data model. Given more computing power, Rust obviously wins, but if you’ve a single thread to work with, and a small buffer so after each web request is served, GC can do its thing… where are the tangible Rust benefits besides maximum speed? I suppose I’m cheating by suggesting you could use Actix to power your Node application, but the problem I’m facing is that Rust is really complicated to learn and there are few frameworks that make it easier. The amount of published and shared knowledge there is around Go, PHP, TypeScript, Python and Ruby is enormous. Yes, Rust is clearly easier to learn than all the warts of C++, but it feels like Rust hasn’t gained enough traction to convert TypeScript fans, for example, or at least those building APIs and front ends. I’d really like to be convinced to use Rust because of how easy it is compared to TypeScript but I haven’t seen anyone actually suggest that in practice. Go? Yes, it’s easier to learn than to understand both JS and TS and you can put up with the lack of generics by having more verbose code compared to TypeScript. But Rust? Is it just the case that these other languages are more mature such that all the blog posts have been written? Also note that the hardest problem when getting started in any new language is package and framework selection. Unless you follow a book that has already picked a handful of packages such that you’re happily falling into the pit of success, I recognize that all languages (except maybe Rails or Spring) force the user to make hard choices upfront about their dependencies. But the only book I’ve seen that presents a coherent narrative for Rust APIs is Zero2Prod[1] and I’d feel more confident if there was at least one other similar set of learning materials. 1. https://www.lpalmieri.com/ https://www.lpalmieri.com/ for the book published as blog posts, https://www.zero2prod.com/ https://www.zero2prod.com/ to buy.

Honest question: what views does one has to have to doesn't take non-browser JS seriously, and at the same time use Python? And what's unfortunate about node.js compared to it?

benreesman 5y ago

Python has (more than one actually) trivially seamless FFI stories down to native (read: C++) code. I personally like `pybind11`, but there are others. Python is basically a convenient way to invoke numpy or Tensorflow or Torch or whatever. It's got numpy/scipy/sklearn/BLAS bindings etc., and is for better or worse how you do scientific computing in the mid-to-upper-mid range these days (the HPC folks have their own whole story). It's a pain in the ass in it's own way, but you're kinda stuck with it if you want to do mainstream ML. As a language it's dumber in some ways that JS, definitely slower in some cases, but also way less weird. Prototype chains and stuff are a cool demo that BE knew about Self and shit in the week he had to write JS, but anyone who claims they like that has Stockholm's syndrome worse than someone who thinks Ruby metaclasses make sense.

mrighele 5y ago
I've been using python for many years, but these days I would prefer to use JS (or better, TS) even for backend. I find it more enjoyable to use than Python, and faster. Sure it has its warts, but if you write idiomatic code they are not much of a problem (e.g. I don't think there is a single class in the code I write, so prototype chains are a non-issue)

lstamour 5y ago

I can say that if someone is sold on Python, you’re not going to convince them to move to Rust but you might convince them to move to Go. Why? Go provides better performance than Python but without the language and keyword complexity of Rust. There’s less language to learn. That said, the more interesting question is TypeScript vs Rust. I can see how the complexity of C++ naturally leads folks to Rust. But I’ve had a hard time choosing Rust over TypeScript when trying to implement a basic service. It’s absolutely true that Node.js web servers aren’t optimized for multi-threaded data access times and the Node.js event loop can get in the way of responsive performance. But at the same time once you build, for example, an HTTP 1.1 web server for Node that is similar to what you’d build using semi-unsafe code in Rust and ships by default in Go standard library, it’s hard to say that JS is any less efficient than Rust when both are generally written to use async/green thread runtimes, make calls using a pool of Postgres or database connections, and either have PG return JSON or otherwise reshape and assign the results to a data model. Given more computing power, Rust obviously wins, but if you’ve a single thread to work with, and a small buffer so after each web request is served, GC can do its thing… where are the tangible Rust benefits besides maximum speed? I suppose I’m cheating by suggesting you could use Actix to power your Node application, but the problem I’m facing is that Rust is really complicated to learn and there are few frameworks that make it easier. The amount of published and shared knowledge there is around Go, PHP, TypeScript, Python and Ruby is enormous. Yes, Rust is clearly easier to learn than all the warts of C++, but it feels like Rust hasn’t gained enough traction to convert TypeScript fans, for example, or at least those building APIs and front ends. I’d really like to be convinced to use Rust because of how easy it is compared to TypeScript but I haven’t seen anyone actually suggest that in practice. Go? Yes, it’s easier to learn than to understand both JS and TS and you can put up with the lack of generics by having more verbose code compared to TypeScript. But Rust? Is it just the case that these other languages are more mature such that all the blog posts have been written? Also note that the hardest problem when getting started in any new language is package and framework selection. Unless you follow a book that has already picked a handful of packages such that you’re happily falling into the pit of success, I recognize that all languages (except maybe Rails or Spring) force the user to make hard choices upfront about their dependencies. But the only book I’ve seen that presents a coherent narrative for Rust APIs is Zero2Prod[1] and I’d feel more confident if there was at least one other similar set of learning materials. 1. https://www.lpalmieri.com/ https://www.lpalmieri.com/ for the book published as blog posts, https://www.zero2prod.com/ https://www.zero2prod.com/ to buy.