Python, Machine Learning, and Language Wars. A Highly Subjective Point of View
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Python, Machine Learning, and Language Wars. A Highly Subjective Point of View
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Re: Python, Machine Learning, and Language Wars. A Highly Subjective Point of View
#2Quite interesting post. I feel that a lot of the numerical Pythonistas are in the same spot:
They tolerate most languages, but find R's syntax a bit unnatural, Matlab lacking when trying to go beyond pure matrix stuff, and are waiting to see if Julia picks up (which it seems to be from what I can tell)
Re: Python, Machine Learning, and Language Wars. A Highly Subjective Point of View
#3Re: Python, Machine Learning, and Language Wars. A Highly Subjective Point of View
#4Re: Python, Machine Learning, and Language Wars. A Highly Subjective Point of View
#5As someone who almost exclusively uses Julia for their day-to-day work (and side projects), I think most of the author's thoughts about Julia are correct. I think the language is great, and using it makes my life better. There are some packages that are actually better than any of their equivalents in other languages, in my opinion.
On the other hand, I've also got a higher tolerance for things not being perfect, I can figure things out for myself (and luckily have the time do so), and I'm willing to code it up if it doesn't already exist (to a point). Naturally, that is not true for most people, and thats fine.
The author isn't willing to take the risk that Julia won't "survive", which is fair. Its definitely not complete yet, but its getting there. I am confident that it will survive (and thrive) though, and continue growing the not-insubstantial community. I have a feeling the author will find their way to Julia-land eventually, in a couple of years or so.
Re: Python, Machine Learning, and Language Wars. A Highly Subjective Point of View
#6Quite interesting post. I feel that a lot of the numerical Pythonistas are in the same spot: They tolerate most languages, but find R's syntax a bit unnatural, Matlab lacking when trying to go beyond pure matrix stuff, and are waiting to see if Julia picks up (which it seems to be from what I can tell)
One of the hats I wear is 'does numerics in python'. R is fine when you're playing to its strengths, matlab is an abomination, and I have absolutely no interest in julia.
Re: Python, Machine Learning, and Language Wars. A Highly Subjective Point of View
#7I switched from mostly using R to Python about a year ago for gluing together my data pipeline (from data source all the way to production models and frontends/visualizations). It hasn't really impacted what I'm capable of doing or my productivity, except the standard extra googling that comes in the first couple years I use any language.
The main reason I went for Python is purely practical: it's a language people outside my team will respect and deal with. It makes it easier for me to collaborate in many different ways: share tools with other teams, transfer ownership of my code, get help when I need it, etc. Data science at some companies has the reputation of "hack something together and throw it over the wall for someone else to deal with". In my experience R only furthers this reputation. Which is too bad, it's really great at what it does.
Re: Python, Machine Learning, and Language Wars. A Highly Subjective Point of View
#8[deleted]
Re: Python, Machine Learning, and Language Wars. A Highly Subjective Point of View
#9Andrew Ng said in the Coursera Machine learning class that according to his experience, students implement the course homework faster in Octave/Matlab than in Python.
But yes, the point of that course is to implement and play around with small numerical algorithms, whereas the linked blog is about someone who mainly calls existing machine learning libraries from Python.
Re: Python, Machine Learning, and Language Wars. A Highly Subjective Point of View
#10As someone who almost exclusively uses Julia for their day-to-day work (and side projects), I think most of the author's thoughts about Julia are correct. I think the language is great, and using it makes my life better. There are some packages that are actually better than any of their equivalents in other languages, in my opinion. On the other hand, I've also got a higher tolerance for things not being perfect, I c…
Thanks for the comment (I am the author of this article).
> I have a feeling the author will find their way to Julia-land eventually, in a couple of years or so.
I have a strong feeling that this will eventually happen :). In an ideal, less busy, world, I would love to use Julia alongside to explore and battle-test it further. Or even develop useful packages, libraries, and functions for it. The truth is, I am currently lacking the time to do that :(. I mean, Python works for me, and I am currently more into the scientific problem solving so that I don't have the time :(. When I say that Python works for me I mean that I am currently happy since it can do everything for me I need, however, this doesn't mean that Julia couldn't do certain things better ;).
Anyways, I really like your comment. I am wondering if you would be okay with it if I include it in a "Other people's experiences and opinions" section at the bottom. I think this would be extremely helpful for people who are new to the "data science field" -- my article is strongly biased towards Python as you noticed :P