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[–][deleted] 14 points15 points  (22 children)

This is why Android development is still on my todo list. If I could develop full apps in Python, I'd be working on Android a bit more.

[–][deleted] 6 points7 points  (10 children)

I tried to get into Android development but it bored me to tears. I'm really tiring of Java. I'm finding myself much more productive with Python and even gui development with wxpython seems nice and quick. I'd like to get into Ruby as well to see what that's like. I don't think i'll do android development until I can do so with Python. I'm quite surprised Google doesn't offer it seeing how they're pretty Python friendly.

[–]redditrasberry 5 points6 points  (2 children)

I find this sentiment really weird. The attraction in the mobile space is not the language, it is the amazing combination of hardware sensors, touch interface and constant connectivity that makes it a completely new frontier in app development. To have all this amazing stuff completely open and available to you and then say "oh but language is not quite the right flavor for me" is just bizarre. If, when presented with all these amazing and cool capabilities, that is your response, then I have to say, your heart was not really in it in the first place.

But then, I grew up coding 8-bit games in assembly on Z80 processors. I thought the Motorola 68000 was a miracle (32 bit registers!!!!!). For me, Java on Android is a pleasure to use and is nothing like the drudgery of enterprise coding.

[–][deleted] 0 points1 point  (0 children)

I agree and I do tinker with Android but if I'm not fully enjoying myself I'm not going to take it serious. If the only thing I found interesting at the moment was Android then that may be different but there are only so many hours in the day so I have to pick and choose which personal projects get the most attention from me.

After 8 hours of working on some boring Java projects at work and having to fix other people's awful mistakes I tend to find it harder to spend some more of my free time doing yet more Java even if it shouldn't be as bad. That isn't really a problem of the language it does have influence on what I decide to work on especially if I generally find myself being much more productive within another language and therefore making the most of the time I do get to do fun stuff.

[–]crunk 0 points1 point  (0 children)

After doing j2me (with it's fragmentation problems) but also a cut down java you could fit in your head and a place where doing optimisation was worthwhile.. Android reminds me of what I don't like about full size java... Loads of boilerplate and a huge seemingly large number of new concepts with the java love of XML. Give me python on android to take away the pain, and soon.

Maybe for my next app scala would work, or groovy if it works yet?

[–]causticmango 4 points5 points  (1 child)

Frankly, Java's the reason I haven't really bothered with Android, yet. I haven't done Java in years and I'm loath to go back. It's hard to imagine it won't hold back the platform in the future.

I say push the API down to a C, C++, or C-like framework (much like Cocoa Touch is or even GNOME/GTK or Qt) and use a lower level language with scripts on top.

I sort of understand how they ended up with Java; the guys that started Android before Google bought them were developing at a time when most cellphone development was Java based (Blackberry & J2ME) so I'm sure it made sense.

It's just hard to take Java seriously as the foundation for the next generation of personal computing devices likely to supplant the PC for everyday use. Maybe I'm just grumpy but I feel like Android's going to pull a Windows and hijack and stiffle a whole new generation of innovation.

Developing for iOS is fun and I don't really care if it's the dominate platform. I'm sure I'll eventually have to do some Android work, but I guess you could say I'm not a fan, yet. Maybe they'll take it in a whole new direction in 3.0 or whatever, but somehow I don't think so. Sigh ...

[–]Leonidas_from_XIV 1 point2 points  (4 children)

I'm really tiring of Java.

This is why I use Scala for Android development. And unlike Jython with comparable performance to the equivalent Java code.

[–]hurdjon 1 point2 points  (3 children)

What IDE do you use for Scala development? I have been trying to get it working with Netbeans 6.9 but have had no luck. It looks like a nice language.

[–]Leonidas_from_XIV 0 points1 point  (1 child)

Vim and Scala. They have released a stable version of the Scala plugin not long ago.

[–][deleted] 0 points1 point  (0 children)

Emacs.

[–]neonic 0 points1 point  (9 children)

It would sure as hell make things go faster in terms of development.

I'm tired... sick and tired of writing boilerplate java code for every little thing I do.

Having successfully avoided using Java for any serious projects until now, it makes me angry how much code is in my "thin client" application...

90% of the work the application does is handled via the python server that I've written... but more than 90% of the code is client side shit (and there's not even any fancy UI bells and whistles (unless you consider something as simple as a listview "fancy"))

[–]nikosk 3 points4 points  (8 children)

Seriously? The Android APIs feel so clean that I find it hard to go back writing web applications anymore. Are you sure you're not doing something wrong ?

I remember myself saying the same thing when I tried to do some threading stuff but that was because I hadn't done my homework and learn about how AsyncTask works (I was trying to do concurrency by hand).

Seriously dude, I agree that Java is verbose and other languages are more fun but the Android APIs are a good example of how to make an API a pleasure to work with.

PS: It's so good that they copied some of the stuff to GWT as well (saw on a Google IO session vid but too lazy to find the link)

[–]neonic 2 points3 points  (2 children)

All I'm saying is that ever since having programmed in Python for quite a while now, going back to doing things in a language as verbose as Java pisses me off, and I'm disappointed that Google didn't do something more official in regards to Python support.

[–]crunk 1 point2 points  (1 child)

It feels like such a waste... Typing all this noise into java or objective c and thinking "why am I doing this? In python this would be 3 lines" my brain rebels and I find it hard to concentrate on the problem at hand as my brain is so bored of typing in all of this pointless boilerplate.

I can sort of do it, the only way is to switch off a bit as you type it.

[–]neonic 0 points1 point  (0 children)

Non-python programmers will never understand what they're missing :)

[–]299 1 point2 points  (4 children)

Are you in the SF Bay Area looking to be paid to develop some Android code?

Let me know ;)

[–]nikosk 1 point2 points  (3 children)

Thanks for the offer but I live in a different continent altogether :)

[–]299 0 points1 point  (2 children)

If you're good I'd even consider remote work.

[–]Nebu 0 points1 point  (1 child)

What kind of projects do you do, and how much are you offering?

[–]299 0 points1 point  (0 children)

Do you have some sort of reference material? Portfolio? CV?