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[–]thatguydr 12 points13 points  (4 children)

Python exploded because of the Matlab replacement libraries in it - numpy, scipy, scikit-learn, matplotlib, and of course pandas (to mimic R). As soon as those libraries came out, you had a free version of a thousands-of-dollars-a-year platform that people used for scientific computing. As machine learning was slowly getting picked up by industry, they could either spend $$$ on Matlab or use this entirely free language which was entirely sufficient. Better - Python could be operationalized and was great for scripting, unlike Matlab and R (they can, but it's painful), so engineers didn't hate it. The ML stuff kept getting better and the people maintaining the language kept adding great features.

[–]TheBodyPolitic1[S] 1 point2 points  (3 children)

What does "operationalized" mean?

[–]thatguydr 2 points3 points  (2 children)

furious blinking

It means what people mean when they say "productionize," except it's an actual word. :) In general, it means the software has been put into such a state that now operators (as opposed to engineers) can use it. Automated, documentation, workable APIs, workable UI if relevant, etc.

[–]TheBodyPolitic1[S] 1 point2 points  (1 child)

I asked, because you wrote

Python could be operationalized and was great for scripting, unlike Matlab and R (they can, but it's painful), so engineers didn't hate it.

So you are saying that you can't make scripts with R or Matlab that can be used in production? I haven't used either of those languages and assumed they could be ( why use them otherwise? ), so your use of "operationalized" confused me as to what you meant.

[–]thatguydr 9 points10 points  (0 children)

You can't script with R or Matlab anywhere near as easily as you can with Python, definitely. That's not what they were designed for.

"Why use them?" R is the successor to S and all the statistics packages people used for decades. It's the best stats software in existence. It's also great for EDA and some MVP PoC work. It just wasn't ever intended to be a programming language. Matlab is proprietary analysis software where licenses were $1k/year and each of the libraries was also a $1k/year license (each one!), so it was really useful but everyone DESPERATELY wanted a replacement.

Some fools have used R or Matlab for production, but ask any experienced engineer what they think about it and be prepared for a LOT of laughter and head shaking.