> That's not Python doing numerical stuff. That's C code, called from Python. That's sort of a distinction without a difference, isn't it? Python can be good f

> That's not Python doing numerical stuff. That's C code, called from Python. That's sort of a distinction without a difference, isn't it? Python can be good for numeric code in many instances because someone has gone through the effort of implementing wrappers atop C and Fortran code. But I'd rather be using the Python wrappers than C or especially Fortran directly, so it makes at least a little sense to say that Python "does numerics [...] well". > Not unless they're pushed to, like Python was. R and Matlab, maybe. A web server in Stata would be a horrible beast to behold. I can't imagine what that would look like. Stata is a terrible general purpose language, excelling only at canned econometrics routines and plotting. I had to write nontrivial Stata code in grad school and it was a painful experience I'd just as soon forget.