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What Pythonistas Think of Ruby

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Re: What Pythonistas Think of Ruby

#101

Post by jamesbritt »

tghw wrote: post #67
berntb wrote: post #50

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I have the definitive impression that the Pythonistas are more interested in this fighting than most other language cultures. I might be wrong, but I really can't mention any other group of people trolling Perl discussions. It is the same for Ruby? It really seems strange for a language which got the name from Monthy Python. (-: Is it some inferiority feelings to environments which are fun ? :-)

I've found quite the opposite; my experience with Python users has been consistently personable. If anything, the party line seems to be "this is the way we do things, if you like what you see, come on in, if not, no worries". I mean, this whole article is really just a troll post on Python by a Rube (that's what they're called, right?)

" ... just a troll post on Python by a Rube (that's what they're called, right?)"

Speaking of which ...

Re: What Pythonistas Think of Ruby

#102

Post by pyre »

drmock wrote: post #93
jerf wrote: post #90

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I just browsed over this entire thread, and you're by far the flamiest person here. There are always bashers. Their existence proves nothing. The question is whether they represent the bulk of the community. It's hard to speak for an entire community, but it is certainly true that the Python community leaders are not into bashing other languages routinely.

you're by far the flamiest person here. Flamier than the person who called Ruby developers "Rubes" after claiming Python is friendly to other developers? Interesting. Python community leaders are not into bashing other languages routinely Indeed, this is true. It's unfortunate that so many python developers don't follow suit.

Does 'Rube' have a negative connotation attached to it? I mean we're calling Python devs 'Pythonistas,' which I also don't necessarily associate with negative connotations. Maybe I just haven't participated in enough Python-Ruby flamewars to know all of the 'secret' lingo that's only offensive to you if you are already part of that flamewar culture?

> Indeed, this is true. It's unfortunate that so many python developers don't follow suit.

Do you have any numbers to back any of this up? Is it possible that Python just happens to have a small number of really vocal hyper-proponents that feel the need to bash everything else? Could it just be that you aren't a Python programmer so you take more offense to your language being bashed and therefore notice if more often than others?

Re: What Pythonistas Think of Ruby

#103

Post by silentbicycle »

brettnak wrote: post #69
pavelludiq wrote: post #55

Earlier quoted context omitted.

"Lisp, I would argue, is far more about the machine than the man and that is the simple reason why it's not more popular." Pleas do, i would love to hear your argument. I fail to see how lisp is less humane than python, when i find it to be exactly the opposite. Edit: what i meant was that lisp is more about the human, not that python is more about the machine, i hope i don't get misunderstood.

As a non lisp programmer, it is hard for me to automatically see what is going on in a lisp program because of mismatched " ' " and a lot of parenthesis. I believe this is one of his points. When I was learning python, or ruby, for that matter ( I use both! ) I never felt like I had no idea what was going on in the code even before I learned the languages.

Should this really be so surprising, though? Lisp is based on a different model of computation than Python and Ruby. You can't follow non-trivial C code without understanding pointers, or Prolog without understanding unification.

Syntax aside, the semantics of Python are intended to be unsurprising to people with a conventional programming background. I don't have any practical experience with Ruby, but it looks like a mishmash of Smalltalk and Perl to me, and I can usually get the gist of code snippets. Likewise, I can kinda-sorta follow written Dutch (since I've studied German and speak English fluently), but I wouldn't expect to be able to just read Thai.

Re: What Pythonistas Think of Ruby

#104

Post by drmock »

pyre wrote: post #102
drmock wrote: post #93

Earlier quoted context omitted.

you're by far the flamiest person here. Flamier than the person who called Ruby developers "Rubes" after claiming Python is friendly to other developers? Interesting. Python community leaders are not into bashing other languages routinely Indeed, this is true. It's unfortunate that so many python developers don't follow suit.

Does 'Rube' have a negative connotation attached to it? I mean we're calling Python devs 'Pythonistas,' which I also don't necessarily associate with negative connotations. Maybe I just haven't participated in enough Python-Ruby flamewars to know all of the 'secret' lingo that's only offensive to you if you are already part of that flamewar culture? > Indeed, this is true. It's unfortunate that so many python develop…

    Does 'Rube' have a negative connotation attached to it?
Yes, and it's been a common insult for at least a century: http://www.google.com/dictionary?aq=f&langpair=en|en&#38...

    Do you have any numbers to back any of this up?
We don't need to look any further than this thread: 30 points on the initial Ruby/Rails-bashing rant that also insults Ruby developers, 6 points on tghw's comment that insults Ruby developers with outright name-calling. Par for the course.

    Could it just be that you aren't a Python programmer
No, considering I've been using python on and off for almost a decade now.

    your language
Or it could be that there is no "[my] language" and I'm just willing to call out rampant hypocrisy and language-bashing when I see it.

Honestly, I find it interesting that people assume someone doesn't use Python just because they call out Team Python on their non-stop trolling and language-bashing. "Either you're with us or against us," apparently. Big surprise.

Re: What Pythonistas Think of Ruby

#105

Post by raganwald »

pavelludiq wrote: post #32
steveklabnik wrote: post #21

Earlier quoted context omitted.

>Neither python nor ruby are lisp. You may or may not agree, but you'll probably be interested in Why Ruby is an acceptable Lisp: http://www.randomhacks.net/articles/2005/12/03/why-ruby-is-a... Covered on HN previously here: http://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=416589

Yes, i have read that article. Here is my humble opinion: Having 80% of the expressibility, even if you don't need the other 20% that often, does not make you lisp. Which is why the title is not "Why ruby is lisp", but uses the word "acceptable". Its just semantics, and i don't want to argue about what makes something lisp, it wasn't even my main point.

Does this boil down to a case of Worse is Better?

Re: What Pythonistas Think of Ruby

#106

Post by 9oliYQjP »

sreque wrote: post #37
old-gregg wrote: post #34

As someone who did nothing but Rails since 06 (two Rails-powered startups, plus some Rails contracting), allow me to explain why I dumped Ruby/Rails and switched to Python/Pylons. Batteries. Ruby is great, but outside of Rails you are on your own. Even basic things like geometry needs to be coded by hand. Python (and almost anything else) simply destroys Ruby when it comes to generic non-web centric libraries. And th…

Do you really have to switch from one to another? I learned both languages, love them both, and use them both. There's too much hate in the world of programming languages.

You don't have to choose a single option, even for a particular project. I've worked on websites/apps that have integrated 2 or 3 different server-side languages and frameworks. If you have a programmer that says "eww I'm not touching the WordPress part because it's in PHP" they just aren't the kind of programmer I want working on the project. Also, if you have a programmer that goes out an freaking re-implements WordPress in Ruby on Rails simply to avoid using a second tool, they probably aren't commercially viable and I don't want them either.

Re: What Pythonistas Think of Ruby

#108

Post by [deleted] »

drmock wrote: post #93
jerf wrote: post #90

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I just browsed over this entire thread, and you're by far the flamiest person here. There are always bashers. Their existence proves nothing. The question is whether they represent the bulk of the community. It's hard to speak for an entire community, but it is certainly true that the Python community leaders are not into bashing other languages routinely.

you're by far the flamiest person here. Flamier than the person who called Ruby developers "Rubes" after claiming Python is friendly to other developers? Interesting. Python community leaders are not into bashing other languages routinely Indeed, this is true. It's unfortunate that so many python developers don't follow suit.

[deleted]

Re: What Pythonistas Think of Ruby

#109

Post by eru »

drmock wrote: post #88
berntb wrote: post #50

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I have the definitive impression that the Pythonistas are more interested in this fighting than most other language cultures. I might be wrong, but I really can't mention any other group of people trolling Perl discussions. It is the same for Ruby? It really seems strange for a language which got the name from Monthy Python. (-: Is it some inferiority feelings to environments which are fun ? :-)

Python is a dogmatic language. For the language, this is a good thing, helping it stay clean, simple and yet still powerful. But for the community, it breeds rabid fanboys, just like everything else that's dogmatic.

I don't know. Haskell is quite dogmatic in some ways. The people on the Haskell cafe mailing list don't strike me as rabid fanboys.

Re: What Pythonistas Think of Ruby

#110

Post by grandalf »

Deestan wrote: post #98
showell wrote: post #26

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I wholeheartedly agree that all languages should be judged on the quality of their libraries and implementation, as well as the success of the projects implemented on top of them. Ruby and Python have a pretty good track record there. One of the themes of Gary's talk was that Ruby is more expressive/flexible than Python, and lisp was thrown into the discussion as sort of a "gold standard" of expressiveness/flexibilit…

> I wish Python just had some kind of anonymous function syntax that was more rich than lambdas A lot of people keep saying this, including the article author, and I'm having trouble understanding why. Lambdas are for "one-liners", functions are for more-liners. Any time you want to write multiple lines in a lambda it's trivial to make it a named function. def listSomeTable(name): print name.center(40, "=") def getWe…

You are correct. There is no reason not to just use an inline function that happens to have a name. I think the "lambdas can only be one line" is a newbie python mistake.
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