5 ms·

This is exactly where I'm at. If I had to characterize Python with one phrase, it's "blandly practical". Sure, Python gets the job done, and it's not a horrid m

by j_baker 13y ago

This is exactly where I'm at. If I had to characterize Python with one phrase, it's "blandly practical". Sure, Python gets the job done, and it's not a horrid mess like some languages. But at the same time, it's just kind of there. There just aren't any projects out there that I want to write (day job-wise or spare-time wise) that scream "I have to use Python for this!". There are no new exciting projects or libraries using Python that I have to check out now. Javascript has Angular JS that I want to play with. Go is shaping up to be an efficient and easy-to-use server-side language. Rust is C++ that doesn't want to make me gouge my eyese out. But what about Python? Apart from throwaway command-line tools, I've got nothing.

aaron-lebo 13y ago
Someone explained "blandly practical" to me in terms of Python being very Dutch, pragmatic yet conservative. I am not versed in Dutch culture, but considering Van Rossum's background, I thought it was an interesting statement.
pekk 13y ago
This is something about you and what you hear as having buzz, not about Python
rwallace 13y ago
I've more or less reached the opposite conclusion for similar reasons. That is, yeah, when I'm programming in Python, I don't really notice the language at all. There's a definite flavor to the experience of programming in C++ and another to the experience of programming in Java and another to Haskell, the particular kinds of things I have to do in each case to get the language to do my bidding, but when I'm programming in Python, the language is almost transparent; the experience is almost entirely about the program I'm trying to write, the problem I'm trying to solve. And that's exactly what I want, these days.
- kamaal 13y ago
  >>when I'm programming in Python, I don't really notice the language at all. When you program in any language of your expertise you don't really notice the language at all.
  - collyw 13y ago
    I moved from Perl to Python. I noticed Python was harder to do "clever stuff" with - the sort you would see in Perl one liners. My code is a little more verbose in Python, but I notice I don't shoot myself in the foot by trying to be too clever too early, and ending up with a tangled mess a few days later.
bsder 13y ago
> If I had to characterize Python with one phrase, it's "blandly practical". Um, exactly? Not a horrid mess is high praise in programming languages. I can't think of many languages I use that come in for that description. Look at which languages come with a decent language, a decent standard library and a decent community. That's a really small subset.
dagw 13y ago
"Blandly practical" is the reason I still use python as my go to language for almost everything I do. The language is nice and stable, support for it is wide spread, there are nice and stable libraries for everything I need and so on. Python is the only language where I feel comfortable that can sit down and know I'll only have to think about my problem. I like that. I'm currently keeping my eyes on both Julia and Rust and regularly try to do things in Haskell and Clojure, but basically every time I start a new non-trivial project in a new language I often end up at a point where I'm facing a language problem not a problem domain problem. How do I deploy language X on platform Y and make it talk to application Z, why is there no library to read/write .foo files, how to I make these two incomplete, buggy, almost-but-not-quite-overlapping libraries I found on github play together. And don't get me wrong, that can be a fun challenge in its own way, but I don't always have time or desire to take 2 weeks out of what was really supposed to be a 2 week project to write a library to do something that would take me 2 minutes using a stable well tested python library. I don't know, maybe it's just me getting old, but these days I'd much rather spend my time solving problems using programming than solve programming problems, doubly so when people are paying me to solve problems.
Derbasti 13y ago
Unless you are a scientist. Then Python is the way to go. Julia may shape up to become a successor, Matlab and R are more specialized but generally worse languages.
weavie 13y ago
The reason I force myself to learn Python is because it is everywhere. My stepson is learning it at school. A lot of machine learning is done in python. If I want to learn machine learning it makes sense to know python so I can follow along. Python is just everywhere.. I do struggle with it though, because it is so bland.
swah 13y ago
Python has the libraries.

by j_baker 13y ago

aaron-lebo 13y ago

Someone explained "blandly practical" to me in terms of Python being very Dutch, pragmatic yet conservative. I am not versed in Dutch culture, but considering Van Rossum's background, I thought it was an interesting statement.

pekk 13y ago

This is something about you and what you hear as having buzz, not about Python

rwallace 13y ago

I've more or less reached the opposite conclusion for similar reasons. That is, yeah, when I'm programming in Python, I don't really notice the language at all. There's a definite flavor to the experience of programming in C++ and another to the experience of programming in Java and another to Haskell, the particular kinds of things I have to do in each case to get the language to do my bidding, but when I'm programming in Python, the language is almost transparent; the experience is almost entirely about the program I'm trying to write, the problem I'm trying to solve. And that's exactly what I want, these days.

kamaal 13y ago
>>when I'm programming in Python, I don't really notice the language at all. When you program in any language of your expertise you don't really notice the language at all.
- collyw 13y ago
  I moved from Perl to Python. I noticed Python was harder to do "clever stuff" with - the sort you would see in Perl one liners. My code is a little more verbose in Python, but I notice I don't shoot myself in the foot by trying to be too clever too early, and ending up with a tangled mess a few days later.

bsder 13y ago

> If I had to characterize Python with one phrase, it's "blandly practical". Um, exactly? Not a horrid mess is high praise in programming languages. I can't think of many languages I use that come in for that description. Look at which languages come with a decent language, a decent standard library and a decent community. That's a really small subset.

dagw 13y ago

"Blandly practical" is the reason I still use python as my go to language for almost everything I do. The language is nice and stable, support for it is wide spread, there are nice and stable libraries for everything I need and so on. Python is the only language where I feel comfortable that can sit down and know I'll only have to think about my problem. I like that. I'm currently keeping my eyes on both Julia and Rust and regularly try to do things in Haskell and Clojure, but basically every time I start a new non-trivial project in a new language I often end up at a point where I'm facing a language problem not a problem domain problem. How do I deploy language X on platform Y and make it talk to application Z, why is there no library to read/write .foo files, how to I make these two incomplete, buggy, almost-but-not-quite-overlapping libraries I found on github play together. And don't get me wrong, that can be a fun challenge in its own way, but I don't always have time or desire to take 2 weeks out of what was really supposed to be a 2 week project to write a library to do something that would take me 2 minutes using a stable well tested python library. I don't know, maybe it's just me getting old, but these days I'd much rather spend my time solving problems using programming than solve programming problems, doubly so when people are paying me to solve problems.

Derbasti 13y ago

Unless you are a scientist. Then Python is the way to go. Julia may shape up to become a successor, Matlab and R are more specialized but generally worse languages.

weavie 13y ago

The reason I force myself to learn Python is because it is everywhere. My stepson is learning it at school. A lot of machine learning is done in python. If I want to learn machine learning it makes sense to know python so I can follow along. Python is just everywhere.. I do struggle with it though, because it is so bland.

swah 13y ago

Python has the libraries.