Using Python helped YouTube ship features faster than Google Video
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Re: Using Python helped YouTube ship features faster than Google Video
#2That's the power of scripting languages. You don't focus on the language but on solving the problem.
unrelated: the ui is impossible to navigate on mobile.
Re: Using Python helped YouTube ship features faster than Google Video
#3And Google still writes backends in C++ in 2018.
Re: Using Python helped YouTube ship features faster than Google Video
#4As much as I want to credit python, I doubt that was the cause. It's typically far easier to ship a new feature at a small company, because there's no bureaucracy, no wait for QA, no need to translate text into 20 languages, etc.
Re: Using Python helped YouTube ship features faster than Google Video
#5As much as I want to credit python, I doubt that was the cause. It's typically far easier to ship a new feature at a small company, because there's no bureaucracy, no wait for QA, no need to translate text into 20 languages, etc.
Yes. Perhaps also brilliant engineers don't want to hack together something half-assed that barely works, but does provide the feature.
I've always liked that youtube uses PHP - much derided, but its declarative "templating" is the easiest, simplest, most direct way to generate html. Maybe that was a factor too.
But I think the youtube engineers might have a more accurate opinion on why they were quicker, than the google video engineers.
Re: Using Python helped YouTube ship features faster than Google Video
#6As much as I want to credit python, I doubt that was the cause. It's typically far easier to ship a new feature at a small company, because there's no bureaucracy, no wait for QA, no need to translate text into 20 languages, etc.
Yes. Perhaps also brilliant engineers don't want to hack together something half-assed that barely works, but does provide the feature. I've always liked that youtube uses PHP - much derided, but its declarative "templating" is the easiest, simplest, most direct way to generate html. Maybe that was a factor too. But I think the youtube engineers might have a more accurate opinion on why they were quicker, than the go…
> but its declarative "templating"
Do you have any insight onto how much of the templating aspect of PHP is used at Youtube? I know of some large PHP installations where PHP is used as a general programming language that does produce web pages, but the templating aspect of PHP is pretty much minimal, and other engines actually produce the final output.
Re: Using Python helped YouTube ship features faster than Google Video
#7As much as I want to credit python, I doubt that was the cause. It's typically far easier to ship a new feature at a small company, because there's no bureaucracy, no wait for QA, no need to translate text into 20 languages, etc.
Yes. Perhaps also brilliant engineers don't want to hack together something half-assed that barely works, but does provide the feature. I've always liked that youtube uses PHP - much derided, but its declarative "templating" is the easiest, simplest, most direct way to generate html. Maybe that was a factor too. But I think the youtube engineers might have a more accurate opinion on why they were quicker, than the go…
YouTube doesn't use php.
Re: Using Python helped YouTube ship features faster than Google Video
#8I heard an anecdote where the actual first movers on a new video feature was porn sites. They were smaller still, and probably had a more tolerant audience.
Re: Using Python helped YouTube ship features faster than Google Video
#9As much as I want to credit python, I doubt that was the cause. It's typically far easier to ship a new feature at a small company, because there's no bureaucracy, no wait for QA, no need to translate text into 20 languages, etc.
A book named "Python Interviews: Discussions with Python Experts" might indicate some bias...
Anyway, I agree with your conclusion: big companies move really slowly in comparison with smaller ones.
Re: Using Python helped YouTube ship features faster than Google Video
#10As much as I want to credit python, I doubt that was the cause. It's typically far easier to ship a new feature at a small company, because there's no bureaucracy, no wait for QA, no need to translate text into 20 languages, etc.
No QA and not even a lengthy release process. The question always is - Are you done with the programming? Go release it.
Additionally, people are more tolerant of mistakes made by small companies. Features stopped working? Maybe couple of people will complain.
Google's features stopped working? Media, bloggers.. everyone will have an opinion on why this happened and how to resolve it.