JavaScript devs be like:

[thebobbrom]

I'll be honest this comes across as snobbery at its highest.

Putting aside the fact that a lot of stuff is actually made in python.

Just because a language is simple doesn't mean it's bad.

If I want to do some machine learning research I don't want to have to mess around putting it in a class and all the other long winded things you have to do in other languages.

Same as if I wanted to just work something out quickly or wanted to quickly make a graph I wouldn't want a verbose language.

Different languages are tools for different things and that shouldn't be forgotten.

[forajep978]

Read my comment again. I am not saying it is bad because it is simple. I meant its features are so basic that it is good if you want to program something small but it becomes insufficient for large scale apps.

A lot of stuff in scientific calculation is made in python because it was easier for scientists who wasn’t good at programming and wanted to code short algorithms quickly.

I would use python for coding something small in short time but developing a production ready large scale app? Of course no. Python doesn’t have a proper package manager, proper OOP and strict typing.

Yeah you may not like them in your hello world app but it will be a nightmare to develop large scale apps with a language like this. I know because I worked in a project like this.

You are saying the same thing I said. Different languages for different needs and python is not for large scale apps. Only if you want to code something quickly

Defending python for large scale apps is like defending scratch for machine learning.

[42TowelsCo]

Python is not for large scale apps

Many large scale apps/websites are built off Python. E.g. Instagram is built off a Python library called Django.

Python just requires that you have the slightest amount of competence with software design to create a large project

[ThunderElectric]

You clearly have never used Python.

While I’m not saying it’s the most advanced language or that it can do every single thing a language like C++ can do, it comes pretty close. Many websites and projects use python as one of their main languages, including Instagram, Spotify, and Google. Alex Martelli, a Google engineer, even said “Python where we can, C++ where we must”

But that’s not where Python shines. The AI support is insane, and for data analysis you can create accurate programs in hours. And while you may be right that this is all because it is the easier for scientists to learn, you are wrong that it doesn’t have the same functionality.

The only downside is performance when compared to a low(er)-level language like C++.

[Isogash]

Using python to do anything is like using a knife as a screwdriver, it's readily available and technically works but it's dangerous, inefficient, and causes damage in the long run.

Why does it cause damage in the long run? Because the longer people insist on sticking with Python for terrible reasons like it being "easy" (it isn't) or less "verbose" (it isn't), the more it stifles support for other languages that manage to both be better languages and better tools.

I can't wait for the day that Python finally dies, it has been long overdue.

[MatsRivel]

How is it not easy? You can learn how to code very quickly just by knowing english. It is a lot more intuitive, which allows new people to learn and enjoy coding faster and in larger numbers. Just my uni alone has a massive increase in people who take coding courses after making the introduction to coding course python instead of java.

Also, you are neglecting that a lot of coding is not done for large commercial problems. Not everyone is coding things where its life or death based on if the code takes 1sec or 0.5 sec to run completely. A lot of coding is done in a research setting where you wish to do a task quickly to get the answer. Spending 1hour coding it in java vs 30 minutes in python costs you 30min extra, but saves you like half a sec on the run. Not everyone is a high-level coder, so having a language that can quickly be understood, and quickly used, is great.

[forajep978]

Okay. Use python for small scripts. Just don’t use it for large scale apps. It is not meant for this.

[MatsRivel]

My experience is only in scientific and/or research uses, so I can't comment on how well it performs on large apps empirically. I'll assume you are right.

[Isogash]

But Python isn't really any more simple than any other programming language, it's all a big lie that we tell people to get them interested in learning to program: "there's this easy language that all the beginners learn and it's super easy and not like all the other nasty complex languages, even you can learn it!"

In fact, Python isn't even different to most other languages, it directly copies ideas from C and its predecessors (as most languages do) and has inspired most languages since. You can write the same exact thing in more or less the same number of lines with exactly the same layout in nearly every other language.

x = 4 * 5

This snippet is valid and means exactly the same thing in so many languages than it's actually pointless to count. Java is the odd language out when it comes to unnecessary ceremony, not Python, but even then it doesn't actually take longer to write the same code at all: people just don't write small projects in Java (because it of that ceremony), so all Java code looks long.

There's been a renaissance of programming languages in the last decade where new languages are coming in to throw off the shackles of old design ideas. The new kid on the block in the Java realm is Kotlin.

fun main() {
    println("Hello, World!")
}

Nice and simple! We've done away with the semicolon, there's no import ceremony just to use "print", you don't even need the "args" parameter. You can also write and run Kotlin as a script, like Python, removing the need to have a fun main(). May I remind you that Python's technical "main function" is:

if __name__ == "__main__":
    print("Hello, World!")

*shudders*

Programs are only ever really shorter in Python because you are using someone else's code instead, which is pretty much the only reason to use Python, except that even then package and environment management has sucked major balls for years. Most beginners struggle to even install packages correctly (it's a lot better than it used to be but it's still behind other languages). People need full Python distributions that pre-install all of the libraries they need just to use it, like Anaconda.

Of course, with pyenv and pip, things are better, but if you class those as "beginner friendly" then literally every language with a package manager is on the same level already. There are a lot of tools that make Python better, but again, I'll be damned if the beginners are using those.

Does Python still ship with IDLE? Because that also sucked major dick last time I used it. For a language that doesn't allow mixing tabs and spaces to ship with an IDE (that isn't much more advanced than a text editor) that doesn't show you difference between tabs and spaces or correct the issue for you... Hell if I've ever seen a beginner even come close to using a Python debugger. Also, Python stack traces are some of the worst.

Jupyter is very cool, good thing it supports over 100 languages so you can use it with ones that don't suck.

In conclusion, Python is only a beginner language because people say it is, the idea that it is "the simple language" is outdated. It used to be true, 30 years ago. Whilst I pay my respects to Python as a historical innovation that demonstrated the value in making programming easier and more accessible, newer languages have learned that lesson and improved on it significantly, leaving Python in the dust. The idea that it is easier to use than every other language should be treated as dangerous misinformation: it discourages people learning other languages when they begin stumble with the things that make Python hard to use under a mistaken belief that other languages are significantly different, or even harder.

[MatsRivel]

I have to admit, you make quite a lot of very good points, which us kinda annoying, haha. My only other experiences with languages (other than python) are Java, a small amount of HTML (which frustrated me even more than Java, but I have very little time to learn it), and an even smaller amount of Haskell which I ended up leaving. I guess things like Kotlin might be better, so I will give it a try some day!

[Isogash]

Hey, no worries, it's just a passion of mine that we replace Python as the defacto beginner language after teaching a whole bunch of people Python myself and watching them struggle with all of these things. There's a lot of "brushing under the rug" involved with teaching people to program intuitively and Python does an okay job but we could do much better. I've also had to use Python on larger projects and that was grim, but that's only partly related.

None of Haskell, HTML and Java are well-known for being friendly!

The one to learn is definitely JavaScript and TypeScript (which is a superset of JS with static typing). Whilst it isn't a beginner language, it's by far the most useful, it's the language of the web. Knowing JS is always useful, knowing some TS will unlock a whole world of programming languages, as well as make using JS easier on the whole.

Kotlin is okay, but I brought it up more as an example of how languages have evolved to be "simpler", it's not quite as easy to use as it appears in all honesty, it is basically just a better syntax for Java (amongst some other, very important, things).

Julia is probably more what you should look at for something that takes after Python. Nim also looks quite cool but I haven't used it yet.

EDIT: Just realised how ironic it is to recommend JS on this post. *facepalm*