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Comment by actuallyalys | Hacker News Reader

I’m a little confused; it “looks like Python” but basically every snippet has elements that don’t look like Python. Ignoring the semicolons, which you do call out as a difference, I see let for introducing variables, new for creating objects, and a completely different lambda syntax.

Maybe the “looks like Python” means it uses significant whitespace? In that case I think the README should have an example demonstrating that.

To be clear, you can diverge from Python syntax all you want. I think you just need to be clearer about what you mean by “looks like Python,” maybe by providing an example that highlights the features that particularly resemble Python.

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You're totally right to ask — W++ borrows Python’s general feel (like significant indentation and dynamic typing), but its core is rooted in a C-style heritage due to the .NET foundation. So while let and semicolons aren’t Pythonic, the language avoids boilerplate, supports clean control flow, and aims for the readability people love about Python.

I’ll make the README clearer with a side-by-side W++ vs Python snippet to highlight the similarities better. Thanks a lot for pointing it out!

.NET by no means requires languages to be C-like, certainly not in trivial ways like having semicolons. F# for example (or for that matter, IronPython) is very unlike C. So whatever you’re trying to say here is still confusing.

Honestly I think you’re leaning too hard into the “Python” marketing. Python is not just a byword for “easy-to-learn dynamically typed language”. It is its own, specific thing, and your language is not the same. You could say something like “inspired by Python” (in certain ways), but claiming to target people who “wish they could write Python on .NET” strikes me as an exaggeration (especially since you can already do that).

Totally fair point — W++ isn’t meant to be a direct Python clone, just inspired by its simplicity and clean syntax (like indentation and dynamic typing). The goal was to make scripting on .NET feel lighter and more approachable.

I’ll tweak the README to make that clearer. Appreciate the honest feedback!

I think this project is incredibly cool and lots of people will use this, but...

> significant indentation and dynamic typing

are absolutely the worst parts of Python. I can understand dynamic typing for scripting purposes, no real qualms there, but significant whitespace is on its face absolutely insane (significant characters that are literally invisible).

I have the opposite opinion, having written Python for many years. Dynamic typing is almost never better or necessary, but significant whitespace makes for excellent syntax with no downsides.

Significant whitespace is a divisive enough choice that a non-zero percentage of programmers won't even consider the language unless forced to do so by economic circumstances.

It might not be a highly visible downside, but it's there nonetheless. It's better to be honest about that than pretend there is no cultural tradeoff that comes with making such a (IMO) terrible design decision in a language.

There are plenty of people that feel the same way about sigils (like `$foo` in Perl) and semi-colons. I've never understood it -- and likely never will, at this point -- but I don't pretend that there isn't a real demographic effect that these choices bring with them.

> but significant whitespace makes for excellent syntax with no downsides.

Biggest downside: copying and pasting code breaks in a lot of apps.

Jira, Teams, and probably some others, eat whitespace for breakfast. So if a coworker gives me a code snippet they have to manually edit it (often not even possible) OR I have to, or it won't even run. And since the whitespace is significant, it can't be auto formatted.

Whereas with C# you can copy the most fucked up snippet, put it in your editor and boom - auto-formatted and compiles.

There’s at least one downside: only having lambda expressions instead of full anonymous functions.

Python’s grammar works great for expressions-inside-statements (and expressions-inside-expressions), but it can’t do statements-inside-expressions. Every attempt to support the latter turns out really ugly, at least in corner cases.

Yep, W++ lambdas are statement-level on purpose My high school teacher once told me lambdas are “university-level,” so I made them the default function syntax in W++. It’s my way of saying: “nah, these aren’t scary — they belong in scripting too.”

That said, I totally agree that full anonymous functions would be useful (especially for more complex logic). Might explore adding those later, but I love the message the current model sends.

It works just fine for F#, for example. It’s doable, but it’s too late for Python.

Thanks! Totally fair — I know significant indentation and dynamic typing aren’t for everyone.

W++ leans that way just to reduce boilerplate and keep the syntax clean for smaller scripts, but it’s not trying to be the “one true way” to write .NET code. Honestly, it’s all about exploring what a lightweight .NET scripting layer could feel like.

Appreciate you checking it out

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