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Dear Python, Why Are You So Ugly?

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Re: Dear Python, Why Are You So Ugly?

#51

Post by givanfp »

Trufa wrote: post #43
cageface wrote: post #38

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Good design is a signal. If the people behind a product took the time to make something look good it's likely that they sweated the other details too. Especially when two products are close to functionally interchangeable, like Ruby and Python, design can be decisive. Engineers chronically underestimate the importance of design and marketing.

This is true, I'm really more likely to put my credit card in a website that looks awesome than in one that doesn't. It immediately gives you some sense of trust. Disclaimer: you should't base your credit card use only on design!

Have you ever seen MSDN or JDK docs?

Re: Dear Python, Why Are You So Ugly?

#52

Post by jlarocco »

studiofellow wrote: post #24

(Disclaimer: I'm the author of one of the books linked at the end of the post.) Design is not just important for usability, but also for marketing. If you have an awesome framework, you have to get the word out so people know about it and want to use it. It's not the same kind of marketing a business uses because it's not directly tied to revenue, but it is important if you want said framework to be used and its surr…

Maybe Python is marketing itself to developers who can read well over those who are impressed by eye candy?

Looking through the screenshots, there's consistently more information on the Python side.

I don't want my web framework's developer website to be "sexy", I want it to get me the information I need as quickly as possible so I can get the job done.

Re: Dear Python, Why Are You So Ugly?

#53

Post by ionforce »

davidu wrote: post #9

Misleading title. Link Bait. What does the aesthetics of a web page have to do with the quality of the language? If the usability is in question, that's one thing -- but the author isn't arguing the less "Sexy" (his words) sites are less usable, simply less attractive to him. Who cares? If you pick a language based on the sexiness of various websites that are related to the language, you are probably not in the right…

You don't care. But other people care. Duh.

Re: Dear Python, Why Are You So Ugly?

#54

Post by llimllib »

jurre wrote: post #16
davidu wrote: post #9

Misleading title. Link Bait. What does the aesthetics of a web page have to do with the quality of the language? If the usability is in question, that's one thing -- but the author isn't arguing the less "Sexy" (his words) sites are less usable, simply less attractive to him. Who cares? If you pick a language based on the sexiness of various websites that are related to the language, you are probably not in the right…

>>If the usability is in question, that's one thing -- but the author isn't arguing the less "Sexy" (his words) sites are less usable, simply less attractive to him. No, he does: It’s not just that Python sites are ugly (even though they are). It’s that the uglyness makes sites hard to navigate and hard to use.

He makes that strong assertion with no evidence other than "I say so".

I agree that the ruby sites demonstrate better visual design, but he needs way more evidence to convince me that they're more useful.

Re: Dear Python, Why Are You So Ugly?

#55

Post by cnlwsu »

cageface wrote: post #38
davidu wrote: post #9

Misleading title. Link Bait. What does the aesthetics of a web page have to do with the quality of the language? If the usability is in question, that's one thing -- but the author isn't arguing the less "Sexy" (his words) sites are less usable, simply less attractive to him. Who cares? If you pick a language based on the sexiness of various websites that are related to the language, you are probably not in the right…

Good design is a signal. If the people behind a product took the time to make something look good it's likely that they sweated the other details too. Especially when two products are close to functionally interchangeable, like Ruby and Python, design can be decisive. Engineers chronically underestimate the importance of design and marketing.

Some overestimate the importance of design, take a look at some ugly sites that are successful http://www.ebay.com/ or http://www.craigslist.org

Re: Dear Python, Why Are You So Ugly?

#56

Post by stonemetal »

viraptor wrote: post #45
cageface wrote: post #38

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Good design is a signal. If the people behind a product took the time to make something look good it's likely that they sweated the other details too. Especially when two products are close to functionally interchangeable, like Ruby and Python, design can be decisive. Engineers chronically underestimate the importance of design and marketing.

Ruby and Python are. But look at the origin of popularity. Python was popular in academia / system scripts for a long time. Ruby's popularity comes in a large part from Rails. Now guess which community has better graphical design skills? Or from the other end - all other things being equal (and of course they aren't in reality, there are many small differences), I'd rather use a language designed by someone who speci…

From Matz's wiki entry: He graduated with an information science degree from University of Tsukuba, where he was a member of Ikuo Nakata's research lab on programming languages and compilers.

Doesn't sound like someone who specializes in creating websites to me.

Re: Dear Python, Why Are You So Ugly?

#57

Post by cageface »

cnlwsu wrote: post #55
cageface wrote: post #38

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Good design is a signal. If the people behind a product took the time to make something look good it's likely that they sweated the other details too. Especially when two products are close to functionally interchangeable, like Ruby and Python, design can be decisive. Engineers chronically underestimate the importance of design and marketing.

Some overestimate the importance of design, take a look at some ugly sites that are successful http://www.ebay.com/ or http://www.craigslist.org

You can succeed without good design if you have no real competition. Both those sites also established themselves when design standards on the web were very primitive. Good luck finding the same success with that approach now.

Re: Dear Python, Why Are You So Ugly?

#58

Post by CognitiveLens »

Sure, it's a provocative title, but the post is clearly not about comparing languages as languages - he's using programming languages as a grouping variable for people and their websites. It's a terrible post if you're trying to learn something about the two languages, but a great post if you're interested in seeing examples of how design aesthetics might correlate with chosen programming language communities.

To all the people criticizing the post, please realize this has little to do with computer science and is almost entirely sociology. It's not a particularly rigorous "study", but it's not really trying to be be.

Re: Dear Python, Why Are You So Ugly?

#59

Post by [deleted] »

stonemetal wrote: post #56
viraptor wrote: post #45

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Ruby and Python are. But look at the origin of popularity. Python was popular in academia / system scripts for a long time. Ruby's popularity comes in a large part from Rails. Now guess which community has better graphical design skills? Or from the other end - all other things being equal (and of course they aren't in reality, there are many small differences), I'd rather use a language designed by someone who speci…

From Matz's wiki entry: He graduated with an information science degree from University of Tsukuba, where he was a member of Ikuo Nakata's research lab on programming languages and compilers. Doesn't sound like someone who specializes in creating websites to me.

[deleted]

Re: Dear Python, Why Are You So Ugly?

#60

Post by pfanner »

davidu wrote: post #9

Misleading title. Link Bait. What does the aesthetics of a web page have to do with the quality of the language? If the usability is in question, that's one thing -- but the author isn't arguing the less "Sexy" (his words) sites are less usable, simply less attractive to him. Who cares? If you pick a language based on the sexiness of various websites that are related to the language, you are probably not in the right…

>> Misleading title. Link Bait.

true, that's why I didn't continue reading the article.

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