On 6 June 2018 at 20:28, Ethan Merritt <[email protected]> wrote:
> On Wednesday, 06 June 2018 18:54:32 Robbie Joosten wrote: > > Right you are Kay. It would be very weird to start developing things on > Python 2.7 right now. Its days are numbered: https://pythonclock.org/ > > I would take a contrarian view. > Given the instability of python development, the promise to leave version > 2.7 > alone makes it more desirable than the current ever-changing version. > You can be reasonably sure that anything you write for 2.7 will continue > to work, since they won't change the 2.7 infrastructure underneath you. > > But in truth I would recommend staying away from python for new projects > altogether, precisely because it is continually unstable. The python > development philosophy places low priority on backwards-compatibility. > Combined with the explicit philosophy that python should only support one > way of accomplishing any given task, that is a recipe for frequent and > continual breakage. > > Here's an essay from a few years back that I think is still apposite. > https://jakevdp.github.io/blog/2013/01/03/will-scientists-ever-move-to- > python-3/ Your point of view may be valid in that Python 2 -> 3 breaks existing code. However you sound like you mean 3.3 -> 3.4 -> 3.5 -> 3.6 -> 3.7 would be an issue, and I think that is a rarely argued view. I certainly can't find anything in the essay backing this up. For what it's worth, in my opinion: If you are new to Python - learn 3. If you are using Python2/3 compatible libaries - learn 3 and use the libraries from there. If you are using libraries that are not yet Python3 compatible - well then you have to use Python2 and please nag the developers to make it Python3 compatible. On 7 June 2018 at 11:43, Marcin Wojdyr <[email protected]> wrote: > In other words, it's learning both Python2 and Python3 and using the > subset of the language that works with both interpreters. > You only have to care about making your code 2/3 compatible if you are writing a library that someone else will import, ie. if you publish on pypi or elsewhere. Otherwise - as a newcomer - definitely do not bother with Python 2 and go straight to Python 3 only. -Markus ######################################################################## To unsubscribe from the CCP4BB list, click the following link: https://www.jiscmail.ac.uk/cgi-bin/webadmin?SUBED1=CCP4BB&A=1
