I think it's the same venting of frustration that caused veteran
VB6 developers to start calling VB.Net "Visual Fred" -- the
language was too different and too non-backwards-compatible.
The 2to3 tools are better (partly due to the less drastic
language changes compared to the Fred'ification of VB) than the
VB6->Fred conversion tools. I'd also agree that Py3 comes closer
to the language ideals that Py2.x aspired to be, but Py2.x was
held back by the fairly strict moratorium on the introduction of
backwards incompatible changes. The language changes also
introduce frustrations when searching for example code: what was
"Python" code examples now may or may not now work in Py3 or Py2
(and more importantly, may not have a caveat regarding which
interpreter to use).
Finally, the slow transformation of the vast volume of existing
Python libraries adds a bit of irritant to the masses. There was
some dialog on the Django mailing list a while back about Py3
transitions, but it's still pretty distant on the roadmap.
I've often wondered if changing the name of the language (such as
"Adder", "Served", "Dwarf" or "Fawlty" for the Britcom fans in
the crowd) would have mitigated some of the more vituperative
slurs on what became Py3, designating a shared legacy without the
expectation of 100% backwards-compatibility.
-tkc
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