Slashdot Mirror
Mark Lutz on Python
Betsy Waliszewski sent in this interview with Mark Lutz, author of Programming Python. He discusses the evolution of Python during its brief history, XML support and .NET, and takes a brief look at the future of Python.
← Back to Stories (view on slashdot.org)
I think you're underestimating the popularity of python. Python still has to ramp up a decent 'community module' system like perl has. Check out 'the Vaults of Parnassus' (google is your friend). It has not existed for too long, but there's a good set of useful modules there.
The fact is, when you see python, there is'nt "one magic application" that suddenly jumps out as "the perfect thing" to use python for. I think that's because sucn an application does not exist. Python is a bit like C - it's an extremely good general purpose programming language that does a lot of things well.
C is a simple, efficient, fast and portable low-level language for doing generic system programming.
Python is a simple, object oriented, modular, clean language for doing generic application programming.
Have you ever tried to do a large-scale project in perl? Something with a few ccomplicated nested data structures, a multiple threads modifying the same data model, some serious io handling? All of that rolled into one farm fresh breakfast unit. It's hard to do in perl - because perl was not designed with such uses in mind. It'd be LONG and annoying in C, because BSD sockets are a pain to work with, and C generally makes many things long and tedious (if you want to do them "right" anyway). C++ would be quite a bit better than C, but you'd still have to deal with the C system APIs, which will still be annoying. Java would probably give you quick development cycles, but nowhere near as quick as python.
I consider python as lying somewhere in between scripting languages and compiled languages. It lets you do structured programming and gives you a powerful OO structure and modules galore, but keeps the syntax simple and clean. To me, it's a lot closer to Java than Python (this stand is supported a bit by Jython).
It fulfills the 'glue' properties more than perl does for me. I see perl as sed with better syntax and modules (and I like perl, and use it quite a bit, dont get me wrong). Python is something you can use to quickly and painlessly write good, maintainable, modular, portable code.
-Laxitive
Where have you been hiding? Python has gotten pretty interesting, especially the nifty stuff you can do with Zope and Numeric Python. As for a CPAN equivalent, you may want to check out the Vaults of Parnassus at http://www.vex.net/parnassus/
For a language that hasn't taken off, there's a lot of stuff to be enjoyed (over 900 goodies at VoP last time I checked). Nifty net stuff, interesting numerics, GUI systems, sound and graphics libraries, and so on. Not to shabby.
I used to hack a lot more in Perl, but it got to the point where I do anything more than a few hundred lines in Python instead. It's just a lot easier to get it working and keep it working in Python.
I heard about Python several years ago, from a guy who was at Xerox PARC at the time. Yet today, the Python movement doesn't seem to be much farther along.
Java's lost some oomph in the marketing steamroller but gained some badly needed credibility with servlets.
Perl has gone from an obscure report munger to a community powerhouse. You want a feature? Perl has it.
Python's been ported to just about everything including PalmOS, but the shared source code I've found has been extremely limited or arcane. Yes, there are modules out there, but nothing like CPAN or gamelan or even MFC/C++ codeguru.
From the little I've investigated of Python, at three different occasions, it's clean, fast, easy to embed, easy to extend, easy to code for. Some people balk at the indentation style but that took me 30 seconds to get over. Some people balk at the shell interpreter aspect, but that felt like a prolog or lisp pmachine interface to me.
I'm not flaming, just wondering, what has Python been doing with itself, to have grabbed so little attention in the world stage?
[