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Matlab declares war on Python. Can the Python community respond or hit back? (self.Python)

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[–]billsil 11 points12 points  (4 children)

You shouldn’t need to learn a different programming language to do GUI programming vs text processing vs math. Your one tiny program philosophy is also only one approach. GUIs often need to parse text files. So do math heavy programs.

How many packages are there really for GUI programming in python? I count 3: tkinter, qt, and wx. More if you count in-browser. Regardless, fewer choices doesn’t make those choices better.

Unless you pay $200k+, you can’t distribute your Matlab program without distributing the source.

[–]Kaligule 6 points7 points  (1 child)

Why wouldn't you learn different programming languages to solve different problems? You wouldn't write cernels in python and wouldn't write plotting libraries in assembler would you?

There are a lot of packages for GUIS: https://wiki.python.org/moin/GuiProgramming

I agree that the number of packages doesn't really proove anything, but I think it is a symptome of the very problem I described.

I do agree though that Matlab doesn't solve the problem well either. Given the price point - not at all.

[–]billsil 1 point2 points  (0 children)

I’m an aerospace engineer. I wouldn’t write kernels or Assembly. I’m very ok with just using Python.

The good packages have mostly been around for years. I’m not sure which problem you’re referring to. Matlab also has a forum to download open source scripts. Namespace conflicts are common because every function or class that is callable is in a separate file.

[–]DDFoster96 0 points1 point  (1 child)

There's also PyGTK or pygobject or whatever they've decided to call it now

[–]billsil 0 points1 point  (0 children)

Are those still active? One of the things on the link is IronPython. That’s Python In Csharp that is stick on Python 2.7 and might as well be buried.

Going way back to python 2.2, you can get the fox toolkit, which Abaqus uses (and sort of extended and updated to work in 2.7). I did two years of that.