[Tardy as well as drifting off-topic:] Terry Reedy wrote:
> Richard Hanson wrote: > > > Jerry Pournelle commends Python and Guido in "The Annual Orchid > > and Onions Parade" portion of his Chaos Manor Reviews column: > > > > ><http://www.chaosmanorreviews.com/oa/2009/20090109_col.php> > > > > [snip] > > Great nomination. Thanks for the kind words, Terry. > In October [Jerry Pournelle] wrote > "Languages to Begin With > > If you want to try learning what programming is like, I recommend you > start with Python. (Python.org) It's free, it's fast, and there are a > lot of example programs you can look through. The Wikipedia article on > Python gives a good description of the language and its history, as well > as an example of a Python program. Don't let the capability of the > language fool you into thinking you need to learn a lot before you can > do anything: you can write simple good programs in Python within a > couple of hours of beginning. O'Reilly has several books on the > language; I recommend Learning Python as a beginning, and those more > serious about learning the language need the O'Reilly Python Cookbook > at least if you are like me and more comfortable learning languages by > studying examples. > > Peter Glaskowsky notes that "Python is a language that relies on dynamic > typing and other kinds of looseness in order to increase programmer > productivity," and may not be entirely suitable for learning good > programming practices. I have to agree, but it is free, it does work, > and I confess I use it when I have a job that needs doing fast. In my > case I often craft filters and other specialized text processing, and > Python is excellent for that. I've never attempted to write a large and > complex Python program." Thanks as well for that quote, Terry. I'd missed those comments of Jerry's. Nowadays, I hardly have time to keep up with colapy, py-dev, and Jerry's View and Mail pages -- let alone unimportant, real-life stuff. :-) On-topic to the thread: It's gratifying to see Python taking over the world of programming so thoroughly -- Jerry reaches a different audience and his evangelizing (above) can but add to the pythonicalization of the world. Lookin'-through-the-wrong-end-of-Guido's-time-machine-again-ly y'rs -- Richard "Tardis" Hanson -- http://mail.python.org/mailman/listinfo/python-list
