What struck me the most was when he spoke about Java possibly borrowing string immutability from Python and then the realization that Python is an older language than Java.
What's better about Ruby than Python? - comp.lang.python
41–50 of 129 posts
Re: What's better about Ruby than Python? - comp.lang.python
#42Earlier quoted context omitted.
That may accomplish the same thing, but the direct translation would be: if baz > 10 func = method(:foo) else func = method(:bar) end result = func.call Here, we actually deal with the Method objects, rather than just sending a dynamic message. Although the send() approach would be closer to idiomatic Ruby, I wanted to emphasize that dealing with methods as first class objects in Ruby is indeed possible.
I HATE dealing with first class functions in Ruby. I understand that it was a design choice, but man, in Python you can pass a function or a lambda and you just don't have to worry about which one you're calling. In Ruby, () will explode on a Proc object. What is with that?!!?
Because () doesn't call a method, it's simply used where a method call occurs. To call a callable object, you use #call or (as mentioned by epochwolf) #[], the latter of which I personally detest.
It's fun to contrast this with Lua, by the way.
Re: What's better about Ruby than Python? - comp.lang.python
#43Earlier quoted context omitted.
I've never bought the idea that the opposite is a better trade off because it comes with costs too. Have you ever worked with a bunch of mediocre java programers? Heaven forbid they make an interface that isn't well thought out and needs to be changed later!
That extreme is also terrible. Python is somewhere in between.
if ruby is an extreme to the left, and java an extreme to the right, then python is also extreme to the left. The difference between python and ruby in dynamicity is really small.
Python is not in the middle of ruby and java. Python is virtually on top of ruby.
Re: What's better about Ruby than Python? - comp.lang.python
#44"Other syntax differences such as '@foo' versus 'self.foo', or the higher significance of case in Ruby vs Python" ...suddenly wonders if there's a language where both case and indentation are significant.
In Haskell, indentation is significant (Python-style), and case is used to separate values from various special names.
values, keywords: all lowercase modules, classes, types, constructors: initial capital
For example, it's impossible to declare a class named "string", or a value named "String".
Re: What's better about Ruby than Python? - comp.lang.python
#45"Other syntax differences such as '@foo' versus 'self.foo', or the higher significance of case in Ruby vs Python" ...suddenly wonders if there's a language where both case and indentation are significant.
Haskell I believe
Re: What's better about Ruby than Python? - comp.lang.python
#46The title made me nervous that this would be run-of-the-mill fanboy garbage. But I trust the author (Alex Martelli), so I read it, and I'm glad I did. It's reasonable and sane. My two big take-away points: 1) It's very nearly a wash. Ruby and Python are so close together (beneath any superficial differences) that distinguishing is almost an exercise in futility. 2) The key thing about Ruby he doesn't like is its "TOT…
Both languages offer the unvigilant programmer plenty of opportuities to shoot off his foot. If you're really concerned about this you should take a look at scala. I'm amazed at how much easier it is for me to maintain my own scala code than either ruby or python.
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Re: What's better about Ruby than Python? - comp.lang.python
#47The title made me nervous that this would be run-of-the-mill fanboy garbage. But I trust the author (Alex Martelli), so I read it, and I'm glad I did. It's reasonable and sane. My two big take-away points: 1) It's very nearly a wash. Ruby and Python are so close together (beneath any superficial differences) that distinguishing is almost an exercise in futility. 2) The key thing about Ruby he doesn't like is its "TOT…
We run probably one of the largest Ruby production systems that has ever been made and the dynamism and "monkey patching" are used daily to skillfully make the language better and better over time for the tasks that we solve. It's absolutely crucial to teams that internalize it's power and pitfalls.
"one of the largest Ruby production systems that has ever been made"
As an aside, I worked on a very large Ruby app (built by about a dozen developers over the course of years) and then later worked on another very large Ruby app of similar size. One of the employees there remarked that it was the largest Rails app built. I think the people who write very large Ruby apps tend to be very quiet about it (no blogs, no open-source, less community participation, etc.) so that if you're one of the ones writing a very large Ruby app you think yours is the largest. :)
Re: What's better about Ruby than Python? - comp.lang.python
#48The title made me nervous that this would be run-of-the-mill fanboy garbage. But I trust the author (Alex Martelli), so I read it, and I'm glad I did. It's reasonable and sane. My two big take-away points: 1) It's very nearly a wash. Ruby and Python are so close together (beneath any superficial differences) that distinguishing is almost an exercise in futility. 2) The key thing about Ruby he doesn't like is its "TOT…
We run probably one of the largest Ruby production systems that has ever been made and the dynamism and "monkey patching" are used daily to skillfully make the language better and better over time for the tasks that we solve. It's absolutely crucial to teams that internalize it's power and pitfalls.
Cool. What's the site?
Re: What's better about Ruby than Python? - comp.lang.python
#49Earlier quoted context omitted.
The fact that anyone at any point can monkey patch any built-in is a potential liability for large teams, with average programmers. It must be addressed by culture and code review that you may or may not have. Still worth it though :)
In what situation is it actually a good idea to employ a large number of bad programmers, rather than a small number of good ones? We shouldn't be making trade-offs for the sake of bad ideas ;)
...and all it takes is one rogue or bad programmer to mess up the code base.
Re: What's better about Ruby than Python? - comp.lang.python
#50That's an easy one... In Ruby, I can do string.reverse(). Python makes me type string[::-1] to reverse a string. In a nutshell, that is why Ruby is better than Python. I must admit that I use Python more than Ruby. I like both, but know Python better. I feel Ruby is more consistent though. Either is a good language!
You can actually say `reversed(iterable)`, which returns another iterable yielding everything backwards. Now, this is not returning a string, which leads to some warts:
* list(reversed(a_list)) * "".join(reversed(a_str))
and the like.