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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

#31

Post by est »

peoplewindow wrote: post #16

I worked at Google during that period. It's not quite as simple as "Python > C++" although yes, for sure, you're going to produce new UI features at a far faster rate working in a high level language like Python than working with C++. Absolutely that was a factor. I don't think Google Video had hundreds of developers vs 20 though. That doesn't sound right to me. The real reasons YouTube won were strategic, not purely…

> search, transcoding, thumbnail serving, anti-spam, content id, video serving and so on

Python has some of the capabilities, but surely those libraries are also written in C/C++

Re: Using Python helped YouTube ship features faster than Google Video

#32

Post by tjoff »

Yeah, no. That is obviously not why, and it is quite telling that the guy being interviewed still, after the purchase, hasn't got the slightest clue as to why (or doesn't want to admit it).

It is disheartening to see this on the front page with so little substance.

Re: Using Python helped YouTube ship features faster than Google Video

#33

Post by codedokode »

DonHopkins wrote: post #27
grzm wrote: post #6

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> 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.

For a so-called templating language, PHP sure falls short, and thus has a plethora of ad-hoc, informally-specified, bug-ridden, slow implementations of half of many other templating languages implemented in it. https://www.smarty.net/ https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikipedia:Templates https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Greenspun%27s_tenth_rule

Smarty is something from 15 years ago. Nowadays people use Twig which is inspired by Python's Jinja template engine and has similar syntax.

Re: Using Python helped YouTube ship features faster than Google Video

#34

Post by m45t3r »

est wrote: post #30
nitwit005 wrote: post #4

As 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.

Fun fact: online code editing & hot reload is a thing for python folks.

Remember, YouTube born 13 years ago. That time, online code editing and hot reloading were big things only archived with dynamic languages like Python and Ruby.

Re: Using Python helped YouTube ship features faster than Google Video

#35

Post by swyx »

anabis wrote: post #8

I 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.

I feel like entertainment (gaming, porn, even say tourism for spaceflight) has always punched above its weight in leading technology. Really makes you think about whether we are more motivated to use our intelligence/resources to solve hard problems or to please ourselves.

Re: Using Python helped YouTube ship features faster than Google Video

#36

Post by swyx »

No affiliation at all to the author but if you want to read more he's @driscollis on twitter and the book is at https://www.packtpub.com/web-development/python-interviews

also I first heard this story on the Talk Python podcast https://talkpython.fm/episodes/show/156/python-history-and-p...

Of course its not the full story but it is an interesting comment and from a firsthand source. That's all I know, I dont have a dog in this fight :)

Re: Using Python helped YouTube ship features faster than Google Video

#37

Post by fwdpropaganda »

justonepost wrote: post #24
thisisit wrote: post #10

Earlier quoted context omitted.

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.

Startups are generally more tolerant of failure and half baked code. Googlers, who have lived there whole lives achieving perfection in school, not so much. I see this all the time at big companies that hire 4.0 GPA from ivy leagues.

Let me guess. You're not a 4.0 GPA from an Ivy League, are you?

Re: Using Python helped YouTube ship features faster than Google Video

#38

Post by swyx »

peoplewindow wrote: post #16

I worked at Google during that period. It's not quite as simple as "Python > C++" although yes, for sure, you're going to produce new UI features at a far faster rate working in a high level language like Python than working with C++. Absolutely that was a factor. I don't think Google Video had hundreds of developers vs 20 though. That doesn't sound right to me. The real reasons YouTube won were strategic, not purely…

thank you for sharing your insider view. I'm just a casual observer, so I do feel a little guilty posting this story here but it is a firsthand source.

Re: Using Python helped YouTube ship features faster than Google Video

#40

Post by bsder »

nandwidth wrote: post #26
bsder wrote: post #17

YouTube was also burning money for bandwidth like nobody's business. I suspect that Google Video tracked and limited bandwidth. If Google hadn't bought them, YouTube were headed straight for bankruptcy. People forget that the YouTube deal was a big time boardroom back scratch between Google and the VC's. The worst part is that Google subsidizing YouTube has set back a real monetization of video on the web.

I disagree with that. I think the web is monetizing video at an appropriate rate, considering most video itself is essentially worthless. That video content is costly to produce, and kills bandwidth indiscriminately, does not mean video is valuable. Just because there’s a high bar for video to exist, doesn’t mean that cost should get passed on to consumers. Most video is non-essential, and consumers get to be picky a…

> I think the web is monetizing video at an appropriate rate, considering most video itself is essentially worthless.

Um, I think you are confusing cause and effect.

Isn't worthless video exactly the problem that subsidizing video delivery caused?

If you have to pay even a penny to put your video on the web, most video disappears and suddenly the quality skyrockets.

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