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Python Popularity: Questions and Comments

Justin Sheehy justin at iago.org
Thu Dec 27 13:31:11 EST 2001 
Ron Stephens <rdsteph at earthlink.net> writes:

> Furthermore, Ruby is aimed right at the heart of Python's niche.

What niche is that?

More importantly, why does this matter?  The "aimed right at the heart"
phrasing makes it sounds as though one must defeat and replace another.

There's no reason why Ruby can't do just fine without this meaning
anything negative about Python.

> If we view Microsoft's Visual Studio, especially Visual Studio.net's C#
> and VB, as the official 800 lb. gorilla of software development; and if
> we view Java as the 400 lb. gorilla pretender to the throne; and if we
> view Borland's Delphi and Kylix as no more than a smart leader of a
> chimp; then everything else is the pack of open source chimps.

Oh, you live in a windows-only world.

Those are definitely all big players, but a lot of large and
significant software happens in environments where VB et al are simply
not viable options due to the fact that they tie you so tightly to one
vendor's platform.

Python runs in more places than any of the products/languages that you
mention, and this matters a lot to a large number of people.

> Ruby folks include those who like its more Perl-like syntax

They can keep it.  I love not having line noise mixed in with my programs.

> They see Python as a compromise between object oriented and
> procedural programming.

So?  Idealists are fun to talk to, but compromises get work done just fine.

> What so you all think of Ruby, and its impact on Python?

Ruby - seems decent enough, but I have no reason to use it other than
       playing around and because I like seeing how new and different
       language implementations work

Ruby's impact on Python - Not much.  For a while the biggest impact
       was that a few people would yell about Ruby's superiority at
       inappropriate times in various non-Ruby-related forums.  That
       seems to have died off, and now Ruby seems to be doing just
       fine for a young language.  This doesn't really mean all that
       much to Python, as it is extremely unlikely that either of
       these two languages will fully supplant the other.  

> 2. The economy is hurting Python's open source development model.

It is?  From my observations, Python itself has seen far more
aggressive development in the past year or so than in any of the
previous several years.  Other than the one comment about Mark
Hammond's situation, what makes you say this?

-Justin
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