[Info-vax] Python for x86?

[Craig A. Berry]

On 4/14/23 7:19 AM, Simon Clubley wrote:
> On 2023-04-13, Arne Vajhøj <arne at vajhoej.dk> wrote:
>>
>> I remember back when Perl, Python and Tcl was 3 equivalent choices
>> for scripting.
>>
>> They evolved very different - Perl stayed where it was, Python became
>> a widely used language and Tcl is practically dead.
>>
>> Why did Python become such a success while the other did not?
>>
>> My guess:
>> - Python managed to get into education - not just CS like
>>     Perl but much broader

The P in Perl stands for "Practical." Larry Wall is a linguist, not a
computer scientist, and computer scientists can rarely be accused of
being practical :-).  There have been books on such things as functional
programming in Perl but I don't think it was ever big with computer
scientists.

>> - Python web approaches with Django etc. turned more future oriented
>>     than Perl CGI

The use of a web framework like Django has nothing to do with the
presence or absence of CGI.  You can in fact run Django using CGI and
people used to do that.  But for some time now you wouldn't because WSGI
is better. It's no different in the Perl world.  While you can run Perl
scripts via CGI, today you'd be more like to use PSGI.

>> - Python got on the big data / analytics / ML / AI  train
>>     and when that took off it pulled Python with it
>>
> 
> Add:
> 
> - Python is an excellent way to add automation/scripting capabilities to
> a wide range of applications.
> 
> Try doing the following with Perl: :-)
> 
> https://docs.blender.org/api/current/info_overview.html

I saw the smiley, but what exactly is your point?  That you can embed a
Python interpreter in another application?  Perl has that capability
too, and has had for decades.

I'm not trying to start language war and I have a lot of respect for the
accomplishments of the Python community. But the capabilities of Python
aren't as unique as some people seem to think and probably haven't
played that big a role in its market dominance.