I knew i was suspicious of python for a reason
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honey the codewitch wrote:
and then there's pass. Pass seems like it should never exist in any language.
Like, a keyword? Maybe it's there to serve as a warning...those who know, should pass on any language that has a "pass" keyword...
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As someone who taught a few CS courses... for a NEW programmer, the Python Syntax makes MORE sense than the C style syntax. x = 3 if I_Need_A_Small_Number else 3333 which is even cleaner in error checking: addError("You can't have this") if X = 0 addError("You can't have this") if Y = 0 ... showErrors() This was a feature of DEC Basic-Plus 2 (I called it an outside if) and in a world where something had to be tweaked in a block of code, and you did not want to affect program flow... Wow, it was a gift. The C syntax is best explained as a "fake function" IIF() => X = IIF(cond, true_val, false_val); but invariably the kids ask the correct question: Wouldn't that be BETTER/CLEARER syntax? (And I would explain that is why we have a PRE-PROCESSOR, LOL). And again, I LOVE the PL/SQL DECODE() statement, which is "?:" on Steroids: X = Decode(v0, V1, R1, V2, R2, V3, R3, R4) -> Where R4 (the extra param is the ELSE condition) It is literally a CASE statement in function form! That said. Python has ONE THING I absolutely hate. THE WHITESPACE inequity. I wish they treated a single tab as 2 spaces. Life would be simply. My editors convert Tabs to spaces. But ONLY when I edit a line. OMFG this *might* be bad in Python. LOL.
significant whitespace in a programming language is just a terrible idea
Real programmers use butterflies
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The grammar for python is ridiculous to me. Significant whitespace being the leading cause of my WTF. But I just taught myself python so i could try out some particular python code in C# I'm looking through some examples and i find this gem:
multiple = 1024 if a_kilobyte_is_1024_bytes else 1000
Which presumably means
var multiple = (a_kilobyte_is_1024_bytes)?1024:1000;
WTF and then there's pass. Pass seems like it should never exist in any language. That is all.
Real programmers use butterflies
I don't get the hate on python. It's a typical 1980s language. It is what it is because it's a product of the time it was invented in. You can't apply today's values to a language whose syntax was designed almost 40 years ago and expect it to hold up. Yeah, I know C was around back then, and is the dominant syntax today, but back then, C didn't have much penetration and Fortran was king. Python is kind of an ugly stepchild of Fortran, and shows it.
I live in Oregon, and I'm an engineer.
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I don't get the hate on python. It's a typical 1980s language. It is what it is because it's a product of the time it was invented in. You can't apply today's values to a language whose syntax was designed almost 40 years ago and expect it to hold up. Yeah, I know C was around back then, and is the dominant syntax today, but back then, C didn't have much penetration and Fortran was king. Python is kind of an ugly stepchild of Fortran, and shows it.
I live in Oregon, and I'm an engineer.
patbob wrote:
Python is kind of an ugly stepchild of Fortran
The explains a lot. Honestly, I didn't know Python was that old. However, significant whitespace there's really no excuse for in any language, as the problems with it - both lexing it and using it - were pretty well known by the 1980s, AFAIK. :sigh: That's why i'll never adopt it. Half my editors won't even work with it very well. (tabs to spaces can easily kill a python program)
Real programmers use butterflies
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patbob wrote:
Python is kind of an ugly stepchild of Fortran
The explains a lot. Honestly, I didn't know Python was that old. However, significant whitespace there's really no excuse for in any language, as the problems with it - both lexing it and using it - were pretty well known by the 1980s, AFAIK. :sigh: That's why i'll never adopt it. Half my editors won't even work with it very well. (tabs to spaces can easily kill a python program)
Real programmers use butterflies
Fortran didn't require any whitespace. If you were parsing DO2I=1 you might have an assignment statement or, if the next symbol was a comma, a DO loop. How about DO2INUMBR(JPARM1,KPARM2,LPARM3)=LRESLT(MINDEX,INDEX2,INDEX3) You still don't yet know if it's a DO loop or an assignment!
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Fortran didn't require any whitespace. If you were parsing DO2I=1 you might have an assignment statement or, if the next symbol was a comma, a DO loop. How about DO2INUMBR(JPARM1,KPARM2,LPARM3)=LRESLT(MINDEX,INDEX2,INDEX3) You still don't yet know if it's a DO loop or an assignment!
*cries*
Real programmers use butterflies
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I always feel dirty when there's the need to do that. I usually just unravel the loop construct so there's a loop body.
cheers Chris Maunder
Same here. I have an inherent distrust of
whileloops with more than 3 or so condition expressions, and I despiseforloops with termination conditions that are unrelated to the iteration.Software Zen:
delete this; -
HA HA HA.... Excellent. COBOL 2 point O What goes around, comes around.
Peter Shaw wrote:
COBOL 2 point O
One of my claims to fame is that I've successfully avoided learning COBOL, even though a couple of my positions had me skidding really close to it. I seem to remember one of the [dis]honorable mentions in the Obfuscated C/C++ Contest was a header file that let you write 'C' in a form closely resembling COBOL. As I recall, it was voted "Worst Abuse of the Preprocessor" that year.
Software Zen:
delete this; -
Peter Shaw wrote:
COBOL 2 point O
One of my claims to fame is that I've successfully avoided learning COBOL, even though a couple of my positions had me skidding really close to it. I seem to remember one of the [dis]honorable mentions in the Obfuscated C/C++ Contest was a header file that let you write 'C' in a form closely resembling COBOL. As I recall, it was voted "Worst Abuse of the Preprocessor" that year.
Software Zen:
delete this;Unfortunately it was pushed upon me with great vigor during my University Years. One of my programming teachers was an ex British Telecom COBOL programmer (Where talking 1994 ish here) and she was absolutely rabid about the virtues of the language. She used to fail assignments for stupid things like putting 2 spaces in a comment line where there should only have been one, she treat code layout and formatting like it was a fashion statement and refused to even mention the names of any other languages. Thankfully, the "digital electronics" parts of my studies covered C/C++ and my accountancy part had some Pascal parts... so that stopped me from going insane :-)
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I don't get the hate on python. It's a typical 1980s language. It is what it is because it's a product of the time it was invented in. You can't apply today's values to a language whose syntax was designed almost 40 years ago and expect it to hold up. Yeah, I know C was around back then, and is the dominant syntax today, but back then, C didn't have much penetration and Fortran was king. Python is kind of an ugly stepchild of Fortran, and shows it.
I live in Oregon, and I'm an engineer.
AWK was invented in the 70s. Its basic structure has been around from the beginning, and it is as elegant today as it was back in the day. Need to process a text file in some way? Use AWK (GAWK) to do it and you can spend your time thinking about what it is you want to do with the file's contents. You need to spend no time thinking about or writing code to open the file, read its contents, or break it into meaningful tokens--AWK does it all for you. ;)
FormerBIOSGuy