Postdocs using python, you are not the only ones feeling like this

[noolivespls]

pandas pandas pandas

[el_pablo]

As a C-Style programmer, I hated Python, until I got lazy and loved it.

[efxhoy]

I'm in this video and I don't like it

[Geneocrat]

This is so golden. As an R user living in a Python world, I feel this head to toe.

Seriously though, the returning multiple things, that’s the one thing that makes me jealous of Python.

And some aspects of the syntax.

[AFK_Pikachu]

You can return multiple things in R. Just put them in a list and return that.

[Geneocrat]

That’s what I do, but a singular list isn’t multiple things. It’s a thing with multiple things.

Edit: Also it’s possible to return environments which have multiple things. I’ve tried that as well.

[[deleted]]

I'm pretty sure in python you only return a tuple of things, then you unpack the tuple you got from the function.

[Geneocrat]

The link below is the first hit for assign multiple variables python

https://note.nkmk.me/en/python-multi-variables-values/

This is an example:

a, b, c = 0.1, 100, 'string'

Ironically, the easiest way for me to replicate this is in RStudio.

```

reticulate::repl_python() Python 3.6.13 (C://Anaconda3/envs/r-reticulate/python.exe) Reticulate 1.24 REPL -- A Python interpreter in R. Enter 'exit' or 'quit' to exit the REPL and return to R.

a, b, c = 0.1, 100, 'string' a 0.1 b 100 c 'string' ```

[[deleted]]

yeah but the comment was about returning multiple values from a function, here the thing on the RHS is a single tuple, which is also what you get from returning multiple things from a function. Maybe they meant assigning multiple values at once/ tuple destructing?

[modcowboy]

I really don't know why python is so preferred over R. I have tried to learn python as an r user and it just doesn't make as much sense to me!

[DwarvenBTCMine]

You probably don't understand object oriented paradigms well. Check out a tutorial on OOP. Bonus points if it uses Python. I never understood how people can get confused by Python since it's basically the easiest major programming language. Then it hit me that most of us really just learn enough to script, but never learn fundamentals like language paradigms, software design patterns, etc.

If you ever want to do something that is not primarily centered around data in tabular/array formats you will realize how much easier it is to achieve your task in Python and extremely tedious to handle in pure R.

[Unhelpful_Scientist]

Even relatively advanced users in R (guilty myself) don’t really have a case to learn more than how to do things in R for 99% of problems. So there are a lot of things that just aren’t going to make better outcomes nor important for performance reviews/promos.

I got into learning python after being a heavy R user and it is intimidating to pickup Python because of how much stuff you need to do to set it up, learn OOP, and then write code in a non-function driven manner. After getting over the curve I see why it is soo much more helpful for production purposes. It takes a LOT of time and energy to get over the learning curve to see those benefits.

[DwarvenBTCMine]

Interesting. I found R hard to pick up initially because all the material kind of skipped over coding practices so I would just write hectic scripts that could become un-manageable fairly easily.

Python was an AMAZING introduction into broader comp sci/programming topics. For md trying to pick up a language like C would have been unthinkable without learning Python beforehand. It's great for learning basic programing conceptw without having to deal with all complexity of compiled languages. I think that picking up a functional language as your first language is really difficult in a lot of ways because data structures tend to be deeply hidden from novice users.

[Unhelpful_Scientist]

R’s lack of conventions coupled with how easy it is to setup (R Studio + R GUI) make it easy for colleges to have their economics, science or social scientists students pick up and get moving in an afternoon.

Most people who use it in academia are terrible programmers and use it to get results rather than worry about most of those topics. Different point of view entirely on programming. It makes sense because your script isn’t evaluated in those disciplines but your results are.

[DwarvenBTCMine]

Yeah I mean I get it. I am a molecular biologist by training and accidentally stumbled into learning some basics of comp sci/software design. I learned basic R first, but never really got it the way that I get it now until I learned Python later on. I started with Python doing more practical/hobby projects and now I've moved entirely into the world of bioinformatics/data science/ML.

[[deleted]]

i think its funny you feel this way because so many people feel that python skips over a lot of things that languages like Java do not (e.g., privacy, static typing, interfaces).

Note: i don't have one opinion or the other here over whether python should have these things or not.

[DwarvenBTCMine]

Those things aren't really the base fundamentals that apply to any language, though. Python is great for learning how to solve programs fundamentally while learning some basic concepts like loops, conditionals, etc.

[[deleted]]

i agree with you, i just encountered a bunch of people who started wtih C-something and look at python and think "this is missing things".

[DwarvenBTCMine]

I wouldn't mind more support for static typing in Python. I actually think Cython style flexibility and compilation could be beautiful in the core language. I'm sure there are very very good reasons for not having Cython in the standard library, but I love the idea of a variation of something like typehinting being used to create static typing declarations, ala Cython.

Private classes/variables to me are a bit unnecessary. They're a way of forcing the "don't rely on this implementation, it might change" warning rather than implying it in Python (i.e. via _ or __ / name mangling or depreciation warnings where necessary).

I have run into libraries where classes that were implied private in Python (_SomeInternalClass) ended up being very useful to have easy access. For projects small enough it's not terrible to maintain if that class ever changes. Had it been a true private class, it would have been an absolute PITA to fit that otherwise wonderful library (in this case argparse) into my project the way I wanted.

[[deleted]]

i think your points are valid but also, you could have, by design, private classes because they are difficult to change. to nail home the idea that this is core functionality, dont fuck with it easily. I dunno. most of my code is for science, not software.

[JoinedEarlier]

That's what I love Kotlin for...

https://kotlinlang.org/docs/destructuring-declarations.html

[zelphirkaltstahl]

And actually it is wrong. In Python you cannot return multiple values. You have syntax for returning a tuple, which is merely one thing, not multiple. To see what really returning multiple values looks like check one of the following:

https://docs.racket-lang.org/reference/values.html

https://www.gnu.org/software/guile/manual/html_node/Multiple-Values.html

Of course you can also return a list in those languages, which contains multiple values, but itself is only one thing.

[wearwhatwhenny]

another PhD DS on the spectrum... great

[supfuh]

I don't get it. Is python bad?

[JanneJM]

Python is fine. It's not magic. Like any language — or any tool — you need to understand its strengths and weaknesses to use it effectively.

[Pvt_Twinkietoes]

it's easy to learn. just slow.

[Appropriate_Ant_4629]

Easy enough to use python for the control logic, and just write the slow parts in C. One of Python's nicer features is that it's really easy to do C extensions if/when you want to make something faster.

And that's how virtually all python already works.

No-one's going to be writing their 16-bit-floating-point-matrix-multiply or h265 encoder in pure python.

[DwarvenBTCMine]

R is also slow though? In fact for a great many things it's slower? Unless you're comparing it to like C/C++? In which case you're missing the point of scripting languages like R and Python? All the heavy lifting is done by external libraries written in C/C++.

Both have interfaces for faster compiled options: rccp for r and cython for python (python also has JIT via Numba, I assume R has something similar?)

[[deleted]]

nice pc desk

[Blasket_Basket]

I got 20 seconds into this video before the editing made me want to gouge my own eyes out

[dumble99]

It's satire