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Extend Python 2.7 life till 2020

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Re: Extend Python 2.7 life till 2020

#231

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Try ANSI C then!

I heard Pascal is all the rage nowadays Or a good, supported, still used and very stable language: Fortran.

Fortran=Math. Wherever there are projects solving math problems, they are running Fortran code. Or at best code ported from Fortran libraries.

Re: Extend Python 2.7 life till 2020

#232

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print(x, end='') Not quite as nice, but not exactly unusable. https://docs.python.org/3.1/library/functions.html#print

It's a lot less "pythonic".

Dunno. The 3 way is more "Explicit is better than implicit." Though it's a shame Python 3 messes up http://xkcd.com/353/

Re: Extend Python 2.7 life till 2020

#233

Earlier quoted context omitted.

print(x, end='') Not quite as nice, but not exactly unusable. https://docs.python.org/3.1/library/functions.html#print

It's a lot less "pythonic".

Dunno. The 3 way is more "Explicit is better than implicit." Though it's a shame Python 3 messes up http://xkcd.com/353/

Re: Extend Python 2.7 life till 2020

#234
I just thought I'd like to know what Hacker News thinks. Will Python 2.x ever die?

I'm still writing lots of code with it and even quite a lot of new code. It's been around for ages and it feels like almost no libraries have been ported to 2.x yet. On a couple of occasions I've started a project with Python 3.x just to drop it or move to Python 2.x as a library I need doesn't seem to exist for Python 3.x and I don't want to port it over myself. I've never had this issue with 2.x (no libraries support 3.x only.)

Most Python 3.x "killer features" have been back-ported to Python 2.x and I honestly feel little reason to upgrade myself now. When support for Python 2.7 is officially dropped we could fork it and continue. I would hope it wouldn't take huge amount of effort for some people to support it? Just fix bugs and security issues and take pull requests? In that way might Python 2.x even outlive Python 3.x or at least remain more popular?

Re: Extend Python 2.7 life till 2020

#235
post #56
post #34

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On the other hand, if you are comfortable with Python 2, it will do the job, and you know it will be supported for a foreseeable future, why bother learning Python 3? I assume there is a good answer for switching to Python 3, but I honestly don't know (haven't bothered to do any research though). Harshly put: I care about getting my python script working as soon as possible and for a foreseeable future - I couldn't c…

Well, the one big reason was that you were going to lose support for Python 2. Guido just took that reason away and now tens of thousands of new Python apps are going to be written in Python 2 because they've got another 6 years to worry about it. Guido just created a bigger problem. No good deed goes unpunished.

> Well, the one big reason was that you were going to lose support for Python 2. Guido just took that reason away and now tens of thousands of new Python apps are going to be written in Python 2 because they've got another 6 years to worry about it.

This shows a serious disconnect from reality. Discontinued support for Python 2 was never a major reason to move to python 3 for apps. Library support is WAY more important in the choice to switch. If all of the libraries worked with Python 3, there would be no reason for app writers not to switch.

Re: Extend Python 2.7 life till 2020

#236

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No, I picked what I thought would be a lower bound. Do you think it will only be a few hundred or few thousand over 6 years? Python is an extremely popular language.

I really do not know. I prefer not to make specific guesses, even lower-bound estimates, when there is insufficient information available.

I've worked in industry for 20 years. People take the same version of the interpreter, or start with existing scripts, to create new scripts. Even if there's a one rev difference, people often don't bother to upgrade. There will probably be hundreds of thousands, if not millions of Python 2.x scripts written over the next 6 years. Many will be small, of course, but it's code that will have to be checked against 3.x at some point. I threw out the conservative number because I thought it would be obvious to most people that given Python's popularity, a lot of new 2.x code will be written.

Obviously, if people were moving more quickly there wouldn't be a need to push out 2.7 support until 2020.

Re: Extend Python 2.7 life till 2020

#237
post #151

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Gotta say I'm shocked the HN crowd downvoted this.

Really? Or are you being sarcastic? For the most part the HN crowd thinks like Kay from Men in Black: "No, ma'am. We at the FBI do not have a sense of humor we're aware of." Slashdot has always highly valued humor. "+5 Funny" is a highly sought after moderation. So, perhaps in reaction, HN usually downvotes attempts at humor. Neither approach is "better". It's just how the respective communities have evolved.

Ha ha. That's funny. My comment has been downvoted. So even meta discussions about humor are frowned upon in this establishment.

Re: Extend Python 2.7 life till 2020

#238
post #180

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> On both OSX and many Linux distros, Py 2 comes pre-installed but Py 3 does not. Because python 3 was not the most stable at the time of distribution of that operating system. Why would I the developer of said operating system release anything but the most stable versions of the language? This would in turn make my operating system at times less stable.

I totally agree. However, until Py3 is packaged standard it's always going to be easier to run Py2 code. For example, I have a friend who does data analysis on OSX and occasionally she gets data in a format that is ugly. I take a look at it and send her a python script that will massage it into something nice. She's ok with the occasional "sudo pip install ..." to get a library, but if my instructions started with "o…

It already is in many distros.

Re: Extend Python 2.7 life till 2020

#239
post #193

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I chose to learn Ruby in part because of the confusing Python 2/3 issue. I recognize that this is a largely stupid reason to choose a language, but when lots of people suggest that either language is great to pick-up, well, it was another easy reason to lean Ruby over Python.

Having a split like that in a language is terrible. You find libraries that work with not-your-version and you envy features that would make your code cleaner/faster/better, but you can't use them. - "Ugh, that thing is lacking/stupid/messy." - "Oh, no problem, that wart has been fixed in Python 3" - "Can we use it?" - "No."

But you can use Python 3, it is your business if you decide you don't want to.

Re: Extend Python 2.7 life till 2020

#240
post #34

This is really disappointing to see - I fear that it will slow adoption of Python 3 even further, when it was just reaching a tipping point[0]. When I first learned Python, I learned Python 3 first because it was newer, and I figured everyone would be using it soon enough. Little did I know that Python 2 would continue to be supported for over ten years after that! Some people make a big deal about figuring out "whic…

On the other hand, if you are comfortable with Python 2, it will do the job, and you know it will be supported for a foreseeable future, why bother learning Python 3? I assume there is a good answer for switching to Python 3, but I honestly don't know (haven't bothered to do any research though). Harshly put: I care about getting my python script working as soon as possible and for a foreseeable future - I couldn't c…

Python 3 will do the job, what is your argument against it?
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