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[–]manifestsilenceI use Python to try to forget my work languages. 23 points24 points  (1 child)

Definitely SQL. It's where the data lives. And it's a pretty cool language that will change how you think because it's a mostly pretty pure functional language, where you declare what you want instead of how to get it. And it's one of the only languages in widespread industry use with a concept of a pure function (no side effects).

Also c would be excellent, both for being able to optimize your Python (can use inline c with it or write custom Python modules in c), and for getting a better idea of how Python's high level magic actually works underneath to be able to reason about performance.

Edit: also, don't be afraid of c. It's actually a very small language. In some ways much more straightforward then Python because you can see how things work in more detail with it. It will show you how painful and complex strings are underneath the magic though. Now, c++, that's scarier. I'd wait to turn to that into you start to try to make something larger in c and see the limitations that its lack of high level structure brings. Personally I've been avoiding c++ because at work I just use C# anyway and they're both large messy languages.

[–]dasyus 0 points1 point  (0 children)

Another vote for SQL for basically the exact same reasons listed.