Yeah, I thought so when I was reading the list of "problems". In fact, many of those are features (e.g. lists & tuples being different, list comprehensions, lazy evaluation, distinction between maps/dicts and objects, ...) but the author doesn't actually understand them. I hate to sound so negative, I guess I just didn't realize how bad a programmer knowing (only/mainly) JavaScript causes you to be.
Hey now - not all of us ECMA devs are total crap, but, I guess I know a fair bit of other languages. This guy is just totally ... I have words for it but I'd rather not get the mods on me.
I struggled with an appropriate way to say this but I think he's super pretentious and just sounds frustrated with learning a new language. I mean, we've all been there but typically we don't post ignorant BS to HN/GitHub about it... Every time I jump into a new language I'm always stubbing my toes on things I find "awkward", only to learn later that there's usually a reason people design languages certain ways.
If he wants to shoot his social media reputation in the foot as a developer then so be it I guess =/
But while Python itself I think provides an awesome developer experience, django seems less than awesome, and it's taken a while for me to feel proficient in Django.
That all said, I do love me some Python though! I use it as a general purpose tool to get semi-complex things done that are more scripting/job oriented vs. needing the orchestration that Django brings to the table. You could say it's a "cog" for me vs. the overall machine/engine.
It's on my TODO list to get into some other Python framework libraries because I've seen lots of promising ones pop up since Django, if anyone has suggestions of what to poke my nose into I'm all ears!
> Too many other weirdo bits of magic syntax, like [list comprehensions].
I sadly have to agree with you.
I think Python is pretty awesome, but to pretend that it's super clean is a bit of a stretch.
(a,) for a single-elem tuple-- avoiding colliding with (a) as a paren'd expression-- is wonky, too.
x = 1,
x = (1,)
Using (a,) is the belts-and-suspenders way of saying "this is a 1 element tuple".
Either way, if the number of idiosyncracies in your language is confusing to junior developers it's absolutely something worth considering.
In python, I can have the
if __name__=='__main__': main()
at the end if a script, and easily import the script's functions into
- pytest for testing
- some other module for larger modules
- into a cli.py file to slap a Click interface on it.
What a great blend of flexibility while retaining coherence.
Why? Aiming for the lowest common denominators and the simplest systems tends to not create scalable long term solutions.
You also seem to really undercount what a properly trained junior developer is capable of understanding.
Java rode a couple of different trends at the same time: it provided a somewhat smooth upgrade path from C++, cross-platform compatibility, and an astronomical marketing budget.
Many languages in the top-10 that we believe are popular or mainstream got there by having one of platform lock-in, smooth upgrade from a prior language, or a killer, exclusive app. It's a lot less about what is good or objectively better and more about being in the right place at the right time.
I've heard some claim that Python got there by being slow and steady. At one point I think I would have agreed but it does have a killer app and that's in the analysis, scientific and machine learning communities.