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Python overtakes Java to become the second-most popular programming language

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Re: Python overtakes Java to become the second-most popular programming language

#101

Post by wainstead »

iainctduncan wrote: post #96

I was a Python dev for 14 years or so (now doing mostly personal projects in C/C++, Scheme, Clojure), and 10 years ago met my partner who is a biologist. I think one thing programmers underestimate is how many scientists and academics are using Python. It's not just ML, it's pretty much every kind of scientist and tons of non-science academics too. The fact that it's a great "casual" or part-time language is huge for…

As to how they get the numbers, this is TIOBE's methodology: [1]

   Since there are many questions about the way the TIOBE index
   is assembled, a special page is devoted to its
   definition. Basically the calculation comes down to counting
   hits for the search query
   
   +" programming"

   In the next few sections it is explained what search engines
   qualify, what programming languages qualify and how the
   ratings are exactly calculated.
   
   Search Engines

   There are 25 search engines that are used to calculate the
   TIOBE index. The selected search engines are the 25 highest
   ranked websites of Alexa that meet the following conditions:
   
   The entry page of the site contains a search facility
   The result of querying the site contains an indication of the number of page hits
   The results should be available in HTML with clear tags
   Search engines in languages with special characters should be encoded properly
   The search engine should at least return 1 hit for 1 query
   The results of querying the site shouldn't contain too many outliers
   Porn sites are excluded
[1] https://www.tiobe.com/tiobe-index/programming-languages-defi...

Re: Python overtakes Java to become the second-most popular programming language

#102

Post by vslira »

iainctduncan wrote: post #96

I was a Python dev for 14 years or so (now doing mostly personal projects in C/C++, Scheme, Clojure), and 10 years ago met my partner who is a biologist. I think one thing programmers underestimate is how many scientists and academics are using Python. It's not just ML, it's pretty much every kind of scientist and tons of non-science academics too. The fact that it's a great "casual" or part-time language is huge for…

From what I've seen, jupyter notebooks reach convoluted excel formulas-level of accessibility and efficacy for lay people.

Most of us really underestimate what "non" programmers can achieve with if/else, loops, equality tests, a repl and autocompletion.

Re: Python overtakes Java to become the second-most popular programming language

#103

Post by dep_b »

loblollyboy wrote: post #58
dep_b wrote: post #7

The past month I have used Python again after a few years and I have to say I didn't quite like the experience as much as before. On one hand I also used vanilla Python instead of something easier to use like Django but the amount of preventable run-time errors and the lack of IDE autocomplete support at various points was kind of off-putting after coming back from very strictly typed languages like Swift, Kotlin or…

Pycharm autocomplete is very good - I don’t know if that is what you mean by autocomplete support Requests is one of the modules that had more change on 2-3, but being basically the most popular language (for good reason), it’s pretty easy to find documentation for either version. I imagine a lot more than for Phoenix/elixir whatever that is. I think you’re being difficult for the sake of being difficult. I am not a…

> I think you’re being difficult for the sake of being difficult.

Why? I was just trying to get something done that I've done in a variety of different languages already so there's a perfect comparison.

> I imagine a lot more than for Phoenix/elixir whatever that is.

I don't know how you manage to come to Hacker News often enough to find exactly my post to answer to but at the same time managed to have never heard about Phoenix/Elixir. What's the point of coming here if you're not interested in staying current in your field?

Re: Python overtakes Java to become the second-most popular programming language

#104

Post by iainctduncan »

I was a total raving Python evangelist for the first 12 years of my coding career, and then got a job as the CTO for a Python based startup that had been running absent a technical leader for 5 years, with relatively junior coders making all the decisions. I still love Python, but I now have a completely different attitude to hyper-dynamic languages (like Python, Ruby, Clojure, Elixir, etc). In my new opinion, they are great for anyone making small projects, and good for disciplined, experienced teams making larger projects, but are really double-edged swords in large projects. If your team really knows what they're doing and can take advantage of the flexibility without creating a mess, they can let you move really fast and make elegant DSLs and so on. But if you let a team of juniors do whatever seems like a good idea, with nobody calling the shots who understands tech debt and the large-scale architecture problems, the mess that can be made is staggering. I never thought I'd say this before, but I would have been happier stepping into C++. :-/

Sure, this is a problem of people, not language. But there is something to the argument that absent discipline and experience, these can be dangerous. One can detangle a dog's breakfast in Java Spring a lot more easily.

(ever seen "import gc" in a Python program? yes, that means what you think it means..)

Re: Python overtakes Java to become the second-most popular programming language

#105

Post by iratewizard »

wainstead wrote: post #101
iainctduncan wrote: post #96

I was a Python dev for 14 years or so (now doing mostly personal projects in C/C++, Scheme, Clojure), and 10 years ago met my partner who is a biologist. I think one thing programmers underestimate is how many scientists and academics are using Python. It's not just ML, it's pretty much every kind of scientist and tons of non-science academics too. The fact that it's a great "casual" or part-time language is huge for…

As to how they get the numbers, this is TIOBE's methodology: [1] Since there are many questions about the way the TIOBE index is assembled, a special page is devoted to its definition. Basically the calculation comes down to counting hits for the search query +" programming" In the next few sections it is explained what search engines qualify, what programming languages qualify and how the ratings are exactly calcula…

> Chaturbate.com: PORN_SITE

Gave me a laugh. Engineers would initially qualify a porn search engine to search for this sort of experiment

Re: Python overtakes Java to become the second-most popular programming language

#106

Post by cryptos »

I'm somewhat tired of claims based on the "scientific" TIOBE index!

Although such rankings are mostly good for entertainment, I'd whish there were a better, more solid index. Redmonk is better, but a bit too limited in its data source (Stackoverlfow and GitHub).

Re: Python overtakes Java to become the second-most popular programming language

#107

Post by dekhn »

iainctduncan wrote: post #104

I was a total raving Python evangelist for the first 12 years of my coding career, and then got a job as the CTO for a Python based startup that had been running absent a technical leader for 5 years, with relatively junior coders making all the decisions. I still love Python, but I now have a completely different attitude to hyper-dynamic languages (like Python, Ruby, Clojure, Elixir, etc). In my new opinion, they a…

I've used 'import gc' in python programs. gc.get_referers and gc.get_referents is very helpful.

Re: Python overtakes Java to become the second-most popular programming language

#108

Post by stickfigure »

k_sze wrote: post #85
mumphster wrote: post #76

Earlier quoted context omitted.

What does typescript have to do with speed?

Static typing can be a bitch to get right. There are quite a few weird cases where it would be natural to write without types, but tricky once you introduce static typing and want to keep pleasing the TypeScript type checker, usually involving generics.

> Static typing can be a bitch to get right.

That goes away with experience. Typescript can be particularly bad because it has in incredibly complicated type system (to accommodate all the wacky things you can do in JS), but after you get "used to it", the puzzled pauses become fewer and fewer. Eventually it's no inhibition whatsoever, and actually makes you faster because of IDE code completion, refactoring, and bugs caught by the IDE/compiler.

This is that "blub" thing people talk about.

Re: Python overtakes Java to become the second-most popular programming language

#109

Post by dec0dedab0de »

iainctduncan wrote: post #104

I was a total raving Python evangelist for the first 12 years of my coding career, and then got a job as the CTO for a Python based startup that had been running absent a technical leader for 5 years, with relatively junior coders making all the decisions. I still love Python, but I now have a completely different attitude to hyper-dynamic languages (like Python, Ruby, Clojure, Elixir, etc). In my new opinion, they a…

(ever seen "import gc" in a Python program? yes, that means what you think it means..)

I recently spent half a day implementing a hacky workaround for something using gc. Once I was happy that I got it working, I immediately laughed at how absurd it was and deleted it.

I still don't think I will ever be happier in C++ but I'm only 11 years into python, and 6 years into coding full time, so who knows :-).

Re: Python overtakes Java to become the second-most popular programming language

#110

Post by iainctduncan »

dekhn wrote: post #107
iainctduncan wrote: post #104

I was a total raving Python evangelist for the first 12 years of my coding career, and then got a job as the CTO for a Python based startup that had been running absent a technical leader for 5 years, with relatively junior coders making all the decisions. I still love Python, but I now have a completely different attitude to hyper-dynamic languages (like Python, Ruby, Clojure, Elixir, etc). In my new opinion, they a…

I've used 'import gc' in python programs. gc.get_referers and gc.get_referents is very helpful.

I'm guessing you've been doing this for a while though... when you see that in a code base that you know has major issues and was made by fairly new programmers, it's like "oh god please tell me that doesn't mean garbage collector, I'm going to need a stiff drink"... :-)
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