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Comment by grandalf | Hacker News Reader

as someone who has been exploring python lately but who has spent the past few years using mostly ruby and javascript, i have really enjoyed observing how the python community approaches problems ...

- code readability is generally very important (unlike ruby, where magic-fu is quite important)

- there is more heterogeneity

- there is less of an obsession with testing and boasting about it.

Most importantly, I haven't read any blog posts promoting automated code quality measurement tools (are any of your methods over 3 lines?) -- those things are incredibly backwards in my opinion, and the gravitational pull of the ruby community toward them is unfortunate, and suggest that too many ruby programmers are squandering their gains in productivity refactoring code into 3 line methods...

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I know this may be hearsay, but I've been using pylint and have been generally pleased with the results. I don't take everything it says as the ultimate source of coding standards, but it will pick up on some silly mistakes one might make and generally make my code more maintainable.

Granted, I'm still in University, but I think your disdain for automated code quality tools may be misplaced. Instead blaming the tools, why not blame the community as a whole for engaging in arcane coding practices.

You mean heresy. Hearsay is information you learned from a friend. :)

He may have learned that from a friend. Who here really remembers what they did during one of those all night coding sessions?

Could be, but sadly no. Chalk this up to a fatal reliance on Firefox spellchecker and laziness.

There are definitely legitimate uses of such tools... I myself occasionally use jslint, to minimize the chances of obscure browser compatibility issues.

However some poeple run these "code quality" measures as part of a regular test suite, so if you write a method that has more than 3 lines you get a warning or failure.

In my opinion this leads to less readable code, as methods are prematurely refactored simply for size, and coders tend to do things like putting a hash literal on a single long line rather than formatting it for maximum readability.

This is just my opinion... I don't hold it against someone to use them, I just think they can make code less readable, not more.

I think testing is an ok thing to be obsessed about... Oddly i just wrote that in my profile just a few minutes ago.

I like to view the Ruby VS Python discussion as pointless. There's a lot to learn from each other. In my opinion those two languages are poised to, if not already, lead web-development into the future.

Totally. They are both awesome. It's fun to be a part of both "cultures" :)

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