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PyOpinion: Does Python Programming Marginalize You?

Michael Hudson mwh21 at cam.ac.uk
Tue Jun 6 12:53:49 EDT 2000 
"Richard P. Muller" <rpm at wag.caltech.edu> writes:

> Does Programming in Python Marginalize You?

I hope not.
 
> I love Python. Of the 10-15 programming languages I know, Python is
> the only language which I actually look forward to using. 

Then you should learn Common Lisp, Haskell, ocaml, scheme and
Smalltalk (? I don't know smalltalk, but it *looks* like fun).

> I wake up in the morning, ask myself, "Will I be using Python
> today?" and if the answer is "yes" I know that it's going to be a
> good day.
> 
> And yet, I worry that using Python marginalizes one. Python is hard to
> beat for writing applications that run on a single computer. But
> that's yesterday's computing model. The future of computing, heck, the
> present of computing, is in writing programs that run through a web
> browser. And the fact of the matter is that 99% of web browsers
> surfing the internet run Java and JavaScript, which gives these
> languages a huge advantage over Python, an advantage that Python's
> superior design may not be able to overcome. I have Ada-programming
> friends who mumble about Ada's superiority over C++; that may be the
> case, but does it really matter anymore?

That something of an assumption; there's a market for desktop
computers and applications yet (I hope!).

> I'm aware of CGI scripting with Python. It's great. But JavaScript
> pages load faster than CGI pages, and are easier to program, to
> boot. Plus, JavaScript can directly call Java Applet methods, enabling
> it to do functions that are simply impossible with CGI scripts.
> 
> I'm also aware of the JPython module, which promises to enable
> us to write applets in Python instead of Java. But who among us has
> actually *used* JPython? 

You might ask this question on the JPython-interest list...

> Or, for that matter, who has come across a random web page on the
> net that uses JPython applets?

How would you tell?

[schnipp]
> It would have been nice if Netscape had implemented Python's syntax
> for LiveConnect rather than Java, but it didn't happen that
> way. Think how wonderful it would have been to write PythonScript
> functions in web pages rather than JavaScript.

It's a bit hard to tell, but I don't think javascript (silly name...)
is actually that bad a language.  It's just that to actually do
anything with it involves interacting with Netscape Navigator and
Internet Explorer in their multiple incompatible versions.  Write it
in Python, it would still be a pain in the arse, if you ask me.

Tangentially, does anybody know of any implementations of JavaScript
(not necessarily connected to a browser) that let you type interactive
commands into a listener and genereally muck about with the language?

> What else should we be doing to make Python *the* programming language
> rather than *a* programming language?

Wait?  I think Python is getting there ... it's far more "in the
mainstream" now than it was a year ago, and I think the trend is
continuing.  Use Python, be successful with Python - these are the
best adverts surely?  I don't think there's a real need for a
Java-style hype monster.

optimistically-ly y'rs
Michael

-- 
  Of the four project development variables - scope, cost, time and
  quality - quality isn't really a free variable.  The only possible
  values are "excellent" and "insanely excellent", depending on
  whether lives are at stake.              -- Kent Beck, XP Explained
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