Re: Nice Automator article on O'Reilly
Re: Nice Automator article on O'Reilly
- Subject: Re: Nice Automator article on O'Reilly
- From: has <email@hidden>
- Date: Fri, 6 May 2005 16:21:16 +0100
Mark J Reed wrote:
>What you say about Perl is true, but it's also true about Python and PHP. I personally know many people who abhor those languages.
It's true of any language. Still some biases are more justified than others, and probably the biggest bias against Perl is there's so damn much of it: the core language is vast and baroque, and takes longer to get comfortable in than Python or PHP. (Personally I think Python and PHP are also bigger than is really desireable, but Smalltalk's not really an option here and I don't know anything else tighter that still has the same broad appeal so I guess they're the least offensive choices out of what's available.)
>I don't, for the record, hate either lang. I prefer Perl to either, but I also prefer Ruby to Perl, so what do I know. I'm really psyched about Perl6, but that seems like it's years away.
Yep, FWIW I'd considered suggesting Ruby as another possible choice, but it's not as popular (Perl and Python are the big two, and the programming world never seems so keen on the number three) and I don't think its Cocoa bindings are as well developed as Python's (which are excellent). The situation could be very different in a few years, of course, but at the moment I think Python has the significant edge and sooner is better.
>Python itself is a fine language as far as it goes - the whitespace thing drives me nuts,
The whitespace thing bothers everyone for about a week, then it becomes a non-issue. It's way overblown. The only real problems it causes is when you have to pass source code through a tool or medium that doesn't respect whitespace (e.g. HTML without <pre> elements), though that's really the tool's/medium's fault and folk just deal with it. IOW, a largely illusory barrier to adoption that's totally surmountable. A bit of sweet-talk and gentle education would calm the issue well enough; a simple outlining editor widget would near enough kill it completely.
>the lack of core OO stuff in such an OO-touted language boggles my mind
Python's thoroughly OO, as in everything's an object; it's not like ObC or Java which are half-and-half. The object system isn't particularly clean or compact, but it's serviceable; and while there's some inconsistency over what to implement as functions and what to implement as methods on objects it's liveable with.
> But the one thing I can't get past is the arrogance of the development team. The "Our Way Is The Only Way" attitude seems firmly entrenched in everyone from Guido on down.
To be fair, I think Python's "Only One Way To Do It" position is primarily about keeping the language core relatively compact, not about being inherently hostile to third-party suggestions for improvements. Perhaps your Perler's perspective is coloring your view here? Personally, while I do admire Perl's don't-give-a-damn-let's-try-everything-and-see-what-floats philosophy, I'm also glad I don't have to experience the results myself. ;)
What annoys me more is the core Python team can't quite seem to stop adding new non-essential features when they should really be freezing the language spec and concentrating on improving the actual guts of the language (slow function calls, obnoxious threading system, etc.). But that's hard, thankless work and who wants to be doing that when they can dink around with the fun, fluffy stuff instead?
>But I digress.
Eh, not the only one. ;)
>PHP is so clunky it makes Perl5's OO stuff look like a well-integrated design feature of the core language. I still don't know why it took off like it did; it's not like there weren't already five bajillion ways to embed your favorite programming language in a web page. The good thing about its popularity, of course, is that it's gotten a lot of attention and is steadily getting better.
Oh, I know. Craziest, dumbest, most impractical to design a programming language ever; or "somewhere under all that chaos, there's a sweet, elegant, simple macro system just begging to be let out". ;) But as you say, PHP's fundamental hackishness is gradually being addressed. And again, huge popularity and support is what really counts here, not abstract elegance and inner beauty (otherwise we'd all be using Lisp and Smalltalk and never be having this discussion in the first place;).
Cheers,
has
--
http://freespace.virgin.net/hamish.sanderson/
_______________________________________________
Do not post admin requests to the list. They will be ignored.
Applescript-users mailing list (email@hidden)
Help/Unsubscribe/Update your Subscription:
This email sent to email@hidden