So... wait. Before we continue: You're angry because someone used a line on my blog to state his dissatisfaction with IDLE? I'm to blame for starting a conversation about IDLE's issues?
Fair or not, the impression I get from most of the people I talk to is that they believe IDLE is an abandoned project. When I tell other Python developers that I use IDLE to teach, they look concerned and list off other tools I should be using instead. Perhaps that's not fair. Perhaps it's a problem of outreach, and letting people know that IDLE is still being worked upon. You didn't lose a week to me making a snarky comment. You lost a week because people really, truly think that nothing is happening in the IDLE world, and many are embarrassed by it. On Fri, Mar 22, 2013 at 2:16 AM, Terry Reedy <tjre...@udel.edu> wrote: > On 3/21/2013 10:37 AM, Katie Cunningham wrote: > > Katie, name-calling, which you did on your blog, and came close to here, is > not accepted in the Python development community. > > You wrote, with respect to IDLE, on a line by itself, without a smiley, with > blank lines around it, so no one could miss it, the following. > " > > Too bad it's broke as hell. > > " > http://therealkatie.net/blog/2013/mar/19/pycon-2013-young-coders/ > > A couple of days ago, a Python developer who strongly dislikes IDLE started > a thread on the pydev (Python developer) list which started with quoting the > lines before your negative comment and ended with it, leaving out the line > after. He went on to say that IDLE is quirky, ugly, badly maintained, > useless, a disgrace to Python, and should be quarantined in a separate > repository. Others chimed in, like #5 on your blog, 'yeah, IDLE is broken', > etcetera, etcetera, and opined that IDLE should not be quarantined but > should be removed from Python altogether. > > Whatever your intent, your comment was used as ammunition to block IDLE > improvement, at least for this week. Perhaps you can understand now why I > did not think it very funny. > > ---- > Now, what was my supposed crime? > > First, I parodied your comment. People *do* make exaggerated comments in > blogs to get attention. > > >> Too bad people exaggerate like hell -- especially in blog posts ;-). > > > Second, I let you know that I was ignorant of what you might have actually > meant, in any detail. > > >> I use IDLE almost daily and it works for me, especially with some of >> the more recent fixes. I have worked on IDLE issues on and off for >> over a year. But I have no idea what *you* think is 'broken as hell'. > > > Third, I invited you here to enlighten me as to your priorities for > improving IDLE. There are numerous IDLE issue I could work on. I gave you a > chance to influence my priorities. Let me ask it differently. Based on your > experience, what IDLE issue most gets in the way of kids just starting out > with IDLE and Python? > > >> Given your experience teaching with IDLE, I would be very interested >> in knowing what you think are the top 3 or so outstanding issues. As >> well as here, you could also post to the idle-dev list, >> http://mail.python.org/mailman/listinfo/idle-dev, which is mirrored as >> gmane.org newsgroup gmane.comp.python.idle. > > > Fourth, I let you know that IDLE has been actively improved, and hopefully > will be again, which means a) that any released version you might be using > is obsolete* and b) that 'soon' will be is a good time for others to join in > on improving it. > > >> You did not specify which Python version you used, but since 3.3.0 >> there have been about 30 patches pushed. I hope to see than many >> again in not too many months. You are welcome to join us to help make >> that happen. > > > * You said on your blog 2.7, which was last released as 2.7.3 last April. > That means it does not have the fix I committed last summer to fix the > problem of IDLE sometimes crashing when one typed '('. That was broken. I > would even agree with 'broken as hell' with respect to that particular > issue. The fix should be in the 2.7.4 release in about a week. > > -- > Terry Jan Reedy > > > _______________________________________________ > IDLE-dev mailing list > IDLE-dev@python.org > http://mail.python.org/mailman/listinfo/idle-dev _______________________________________________ IDLE-dev mailing list IDLE-dev@python.org http://mail.python.org/mailman/listinfo/idle-dev
