Zed Shaw on Python | Hacker News Reader

Zed Shaw on Python

zedshaw.com

26 pointsinklesspen10 comments

I like the following quote:

"I also still haven’t figured out why the fuck I was backing Ruby when the Python guys clearly did a way better job at building their community and infrastructure. I kind of feel like I backed the wrong horse completely."

As a Python fan, this makes me happy.

That's like being happy about an endorsement from Louis Farrakhan. I denounce and reject Zed's endorsement.

The Python community has the advantage of being older. The fanboys (if there were any) have moved on or calmed down. The libraries and documentation have had more time to be beefed up. A few years can make a lot of difference.

After a year of Ruby programming I am in the middle of learning Python. The language part seems very easy (the "mechanics" of programming process) but "thinking in Python" part suggests that Ruby is a significantly higher level language. Once I will have spent some more time with Python I may realize I was wrong.

Why switch, you ask? Well, I am not switching, it's just another project where quality of language implementation matters, one area Ruby can't be proud of.

"Slightly unhinged" comes to mind. Ruby and Python are both good. I actually started using Python about 9 years ago, but... I got kind of tired of it for some reason. Not that it's bad, but I happen to like Ruby a bit more. Entirely subjective though, and I'm not going to try to rationalize it, even though I think there are some good reasons to prefer Ruby in some situations.

I agree. Python code is generally much easier to read than Ruby, and it's just as succinct.

Did I miss the reason he like Python, or is it really just because he likes the Python documentation better?

"I fucking learned it in four hours."

Well I hate python, I wish it dies, but honestly I believe with the right documentation, you can learn right about any language in 4 hours, except maybe MDX you will need 8, but thats because MDX is stupid, like most the OLAP stuff.

Good porgramming languages book are rare, if they ever exist.

Finally, I believe in Perl, Perl is the language of choice for the discriminating hacker, lets wish for Zed to finally realize it!

Go right ahead and learn C in four hours - I think it would still be pretty difficult to use, because I doubt that you could cover enough pointer and memory management intricacy in four hours.

but you can learn OO and functional programming in 4 hours?

Again, I still think, a good writing essay can teach memory management and pointer, and it shouldn't take you more than a couple of hours to finish it, don't underestimate the powers of good writing and expression skills

some authors are really talented and if they know the topic well, can be concise enough, and clear enough to teach you Programming A to Z in few hours!

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