Dropbox Hires Guido Van Rossum • Hacker News Board

Re: Dropbox Hires Guido Van Rossum

#141

Post by exit » Sat, Dec 08, 2012, 3:16 AM UTC

wheels wrote: post #127

Kind of a quirky note, but now the creators of all of the most popular web languages (Ruby, PHP and Python) have had a stint at YC companies: http://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=2756314 http://techcrunch.com/2010/04/27/php-founder-rasmus-lerdorf-...

Brendan Eich?

Re: Dropbox Hires Guido Van Rossum

#142

Post by justinator » Sat, Dec 08, 2012, 3:17 AM UTC

wheels wrote: post #127

Kind of a quirky note, but now the creators of all of the most popular web languages (Ruby, PHP and Python) have had a stint at YC companies: http://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=2756314 http://techcrunch.com/2010/04/27/php-founder-rasmus-lerdorf-...

Awww, Larry's in the corner, sobbing. It's OK, Larry, we still like you.

Re: Dropbox Hires Guido Van Rossum

#143

Post by koide » Sat, Dec 08, 2012, 3:48 AM UTC

SimHacker wrote: post #135

brandon wrote: post #85

Earlier quoted context omitted.

No such blanket prohibition currently exists.

Are any of those words weasel words? "blanket"? "currently"?

By themselves, no.

Now, it depends on if he actually knows more than what he stated. They could be weasel words if he actually knows on some future date such a prohibition will be made, or that they are currently prohibiting Python on some level.

My suspicion is that he was trying to be specific, not weasel-like.

Re: Dropbox Hires Guido Van Rossum

#144

Post by herval » Sat, Dec 08, 2012, 4:07 AM UTC

dgreensp wrote: post #107

untog wrote: post #4

" the adventure found at a nimble 250-person startup like Dropbox becomes more tempting " What is the definition of a startup these days, anyway?

PG's well-known definition is "a company designed for growth". http://www.paulgraham.com/growth.html

Meaning Apple is a startup?

Re: Dropbox Hires Guido Van Rossum

#145

Post by lispython » Sat, Dec 08, 2012, 4:07 AM UTC

I heard from a friend who talked with Guido this year, he couldn't let Google add Python to Android and Chrome, this make him disappointed.

Re: Dropbox Hires Guido Van Rossum

#146

Post by Evbn » Sat, Dec 08, 2012, 4:16 AM UTC

intropic wrote: post #104

j_baker wrote: post #50

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Having worked with Guido on App Engine, I believe I can answer this. Just because someone wrote a language doesn't mean they have no other talents as engineers. I will say that apart from being a good language writer, he is also a good Engineer. For us having so much invested in Python, Guido has been an important part of App Engine. But even if that wasn't true (as it may be for Dropbox), having well-known programme…

I'm not sure how I can see Guido having the effect at Dropbox that he had at Google. Dropbox's engineering difficulties, while large, are not near that of Google's. Is this more of a Matz being hired by Heroku scenario, in name only sort of thing.

They are language designers, not systems engineers. Any place with programmers has problems they can solve, and hopefully open source.

Re: Dropbox Hires Guido Van Rossum

#147

Post by Evbn » Sat, Dec 08, 2012, 4:17 AM UTC

freyr wrote: post #98

kibwen wrote: post #84

I wonder, will Dropbox still allocate 50% of Guido's time toward Python development? Further, donning our tinfoil hats, is it reasonable to suspect that Google is phasing out the use of Python internally? I've heard rumors that Python is no longer permitted for new projects within Google; hoping some Googlers here can confirm or deny this.

Any idea why they would phase out Python? Internal promotion of Go, or problems with Python?

Or internet commentators making stuff up?

Re: Dropbox Hires Guido Van Rossum

#148

Post by Evbn » Sat, Dec 08, 2012, 4:20 AM UTC

SimHacker wrote: post #138

rachelbythebay wrote: post #83

Earlier quoted context omitted.

When it worked, it was great. When it was down or slow (Friday at 4:15 PM, anyone?), it was miserable.

Hey wait, doesn't everybody at Google stay till 10:00 PM on Friday??!

Still need to beat the pre TGIF rush. Reviewing code after happy hour is a bad idea.

Re: Dropbox Hires Guido Van Rossum

#149

Post by SiVal » Sat, Dec 08, 2012, 4:35 AM UTC

bdesimone wrote: post #2

I'll be very interested to find out what role Guido will take up at dropbox. When someone like Matz/ Guido/ etc gets hired, what do their job responsibilities, for the community include exactly? Are language writer hires such as this purely symbolic?

This isn't just Dropbox deciding to hire Guido, it's Guido deciding to work for Dropbox and, perhaps most interestingly, deciding NOT to work for Google anymore. Surely a company the size (and type) of Google could come up with some pretty amazing projects for an engineer like Guido to work on if he got bored but, for some reason, Guido left. The reason could be something as boring as a big raise or a shorter commute, or something more interesting (a new internal policy to start replacing Python with Go, a clash with one of the big shots that leaves Guido forever on the shelf in the celebrity trophy case, or whatever.)

I'll have to admit I'm curious.

Re: Dropbox Hires Guido Van Rossum

#150

Post by shuzchen » Sat, Dec 08, 2012, 5:03 AM UTC

natural219 wrote: post #105

j-kidd wrote: post #102

Earlier quoted context omitted.

What Python package you tried to install that comes with "Unix dependency"? I have 163 packages in my local pypi, and they work fine on Linux, Windows, and OS X.

Perhaps I'm just unlucky. To be fair, I've only tried to run like 3 python packages.

If you're pulling a pure python package (like Django, Tornado or requests) then you're golden on any platform python is available for. If you're pulling a python package that contains C bits (like PIL, msgpack-python) then you'll need the compiler toolchain and associated libraries.

Luckily, most such packages (the popular ones at least) can be obtained in other ways (PIL through a win only download, or get a pure-python alternative like msgpack-pure-python).