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python is great

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Nomen Nescio

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Jan 3, 2009, 8:30:02 AM1/3/09
to
python is great.

Méta-MCI (MVP)

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Jan 3, 2009, 3:50:30 PM1/3/09
to

> python is great.

No.

Python is VERY GREAT !!!!!!!


Dotan Cohen

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Jan 6, 2009, 9:35:11 AM1/6/09
to Nomen Nescio, pytho...@python.org
2009/1/3 Nomen Nescio <nob...@dizum.com>:
> python is great.
>

No, those are anacondas.

--
Dotan Cohen

http://what-is-what.com
http://gibberish.co.il

א-ב-ג-ד-ה-ו-ז-ח-ט-י-ך-כ-ל-ם-מ-ן-נ-ס-ע-ף-פ-ץ-צ-ק-ר-ש-ת
ا-ب-ت-ث-ج-ح-خ-د-ذ-ر-ز-س-ش-ص-ض-ط-ظ-ع-غ-ف-ق-ك-ل-م-ن-ه‍-و-ي
А-Б-В-Г-Д-Е-Ё-Ж-З-И-Й-К-Л-М-Н-О-П-Р-С-Т-У-Ф-Х-Ц-Ч-Ш-Щ-Ъ-Ы-Ь-Э-Ю-Я
а-б-в-г-д-е-ё-ж-з-и-й-к-л-м-н-о-п-р-с-т-у-ф-х-ц-ч-ш-щ-ъ-ы-ь-э-ю-я
ä-ö-ü-ß-Ä-Ö-Ü

Joe Strout

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Jan 6, 2009, 12:36:47 PM1/6/09
to Python List
I've actually been rather frustrated by Python lately. It's great at
some things, but rather poor at others. In the latter category is
building a neatly packaged executable that can be shipped to users and
run reliably on their machine. On the Mac in particular, if you want
your app to run on any PowerPC or Intel machine runing 10.4 or later,
and you're using anything not in the standard framework (such as
MySQLdb), it's a bit of a nightmare.

Compare this to, say, REALbasic, where you just check "Mac OS X
Universal" in the Build Settings, click Build, and you're done. (RB has
its own issues, of course.)

So I would say that Python as a language is great, and its standard
framework is great. But its (many) IDEs are pretty poor, and the
process of building a polished, packaged app is abysmal. And there are
some things (such as Flash-style web applets) that you still can't do at
all in Python, even after all these years.

But of course, the nice thing about an open-source environment is that,
with enough motivation, time, and expertise, one can fix the most
annoying limitations oneself. And if I stick with Python over the
upcoming years, I'll certainly do my part.

Best,
- Joe

sturlamolden

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Jan 6, 2009, 1:18:29 PM1/6/09
to
On Jan 6, 3:35 pm, "Dotan Cohen" <dotanco...@gmail.com> wrote:
> 2009/1/3 Nomen Nescio <nob...@dizum.com>:
>
> > python is great.
>
> No, those are anacondas.

Unless Nomen Nescio is thinking of the giant serpent Python from greek
mythology.

- Python lived in a cave near Delphi. CPython can be embedded in
Delphi.

- Python was made of slime. CPython runs equally slow.

- Python had pythian games. CPython has PyGame.

- Pythian can be made pythonian.

- Pythians are benevolent. Pythonistas are not (except for Guido).

I think that sums it up.

J. Cliff Dyer

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Jan 6, 2009, 1:55:36 PM1/6/09
to Joe Strout, Python List

On Tue, 2009-01-06 at 10:36 -0700, Joe Strout wrote:
> I've actually been rather frustrated by Python lately.

OFF TOPIC!!!

Please try to stay within the subject presented by the subject header.
The subject in question is "python is great," not "python is
frustrating."

Speaking of which, python is truly great.

Dotan Cohen

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Jan 6, 2009, 1:59:50 PM1/6/09
to sturlamolden, pytho...@python.org
2009/1/6 sturlamolden <sturla...@yahoo.no>:

> On Jan 6, 3:35 pm, "Dotan Cohen" <dotanco...@gmail.com> wrote:
>> 2009/1/3 Nomen Nescio <nob...@dizum.com>:
>>
>> > python is great.
>>
>> No, those are anacondas.
>
> Unless Nomen Nescio is thinking of the giant serpent Python from greek
> mythology.
>

The word "great" means large, as well as "doubleplusgood". So I
mentioned something related, but larger.

M.-A. Lemburg

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Jan 6, 2009, 3:02:36 PM1/6/09
to Joe Strout, Python List
On 2009-01-06 18:36, Joe Strout wrote:
> I've actually been rather frustrated by Python lately. It's great at
> some things, but rather poor at others. In the latter category is
> building a neatly packaged executable that can be shipped to users and
> run reliably on their machine. On the Mac in particular, if you want
> your app to run on any PowerPC or Intel machine runing 10.4 or later,
> and you're using anything not in the standard framework (such as
> MySQLdb), it's a bit of a nightmare.
>
> Compare this to, say, REALbasic, where you just check "Mac OS X
> Universal" in the Build Settings, click Build, and you're done. (RB has
> its own issues, of course.)

You're looking for py2app:

http://undefined.org/python/py2app.html

(creating a button that invokes it is left as exercise to the interested
reader :-)

> So I would say that Python as a language is great, and its standard
> framework is great. But its (many) IDEs are pretty poor, and the
> process of building a polished, packaged app is abysmal.

It's certainly work, but that's always the case for nicely polished
apps :-)

For packaging, you can choose from a multitude of installer builders -
none of which are really Python specific.

We tend to use InnoSetup on Windows, the Mac OS installer for Mac OS X
and an installer shell script for Unix. More recently we've found
InstallJammer which looks very promising, esp. when building applications
for multiple platforms.

> And there are
> some things (such as Flash-style web applets) that you still can't do at
> all in Python, even after all these years.

You're looking for Silverlight:

http://www.voidspace.org.uk/ironpython/silverlight/index.shtml

> But of course, the nice thing about an open-source environment is that,
> with enough motivation, time, and expertise, one can fix the most
> annoying limitations oneself. And if I stick with Python over the
> upcoming years, I'll certainly do my part.

--
Marc-Andre Lemburg
eGenix.com

Professional Python Services directly from the Source (#1, Jan 06 2009)
>>> Python/Zope Consulting and Support ... http://www.egenix.com/
>>> mxODBC.Zope.Database.Adapter ... http://zope.egenix.com/
>>> mxODBC, mxDateTime, mxTextTools ... http://python.egenix.com/
________________________________________________________________________

::: Try our new mxODBC.Connect Python Database Interface for free ! ::::


eGenix.com Software, Skills and Services GmbH Pastor-Loeh-Str.48
D-40764 Langenfeld, Germany. CEO Dipl.-Math. Marc-Andre Lemburg
Registered at Amtsgericht Duesseldorf: HRB 46611
http://www.egenix.com/company/contact/

r

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Jan 6, 2009, 3:13:56 PM1/6/09
to

Joe,
At post.readlines()[:1] i was quite angry, but from [2:] i started
agreeing very much with you. I very much love the python programming
language(and everyone here knows that) but app packaging is dismal in
python. And many improvements need to be made to IDLE. You make some
very good points and hopefully i will be able to give my time shortly
to help fix some of these deficiencies.

PS: Whoever rated the OP with one star needs to hang out somewhere
else!

Joe Strout

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Jan 6, 2009, 3:24:40 PM1/6/09
to M.-A. Lemburg, Python List
M.-A. Lemburg wrote:

>> On the Mac in particular, if you want
>> your app to run on any PowerPC or Intel machine runing 10.4 or later,
>> and you're using anything not in the standard framework (such as
>> MySQLdb), it's a bit of a nightmare.
>>
>

> You're looking for py2app:
>
> http://undefined.org/python/py2app.html

No, I'm *using* py2app. I've been trying to use it for a couple of
weeks now, with the generous help of such people as Robin Dunn, and I
still don't have it quite working properly. (I'd be happy to send you
my notes on what was required to get as far as I've gotten, but it's
several pages, a bit long to post here.)

(py2exe works a little more easily, thank goodness.)

>> So I would say that Python as a language is great, and its standard
>> framework is great. But its (many) IDEs are pretty poor, and the
>> process of building a polished, packaged app is abysmal.
>

> It's certainly work, but that's always the case for nicely polished
> apps :-)

In Python, yes. :) Not in all environments.

> For packaging, you can choose from a multitude of installer builders -
> none of which are really Python specific.

I'm not even talking about that level of packaging -- I'm just talking
about making something that appears to the user like a normal
executable, which they can double-click on their system and have it
actually run, rather than aborting with something unhelpful like "No
module named MySQLdb".

>> And there are
>> some things (such as Flash-style web applets) that you still can't do at
>> all in Python, even after all these years.
>

Maybe. I'm not a big fan of anything so Microsoftian, but I'll admit
that this does mostly fit the bill I described above (or has the
potential to, anyway).

Thanks,
- Joe


Dotan Cohen

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Jan 6, 2009, 4:05:58 PM1/6/09
to Joe Strout, Python List, M.-A. Lemburg
2009/1/6 Joe Strout <j...@strout.net>:

> No, I'm *using* py2app. I've been trying to use it for a couple of weeks
> now, with the generous help of such people as Robin Dunn, and I still don't
> have it quite working properly. (I'd be happy to send you my notes on what
> was required to get as far as I've gotten, but it's several pages, a bit
> long to post here.)
>

If you want to save me the trouble, then I'd like to see those notes.
If you want, I can host the notes at dotancohen.com to that they will
be publicaly accessible.

M.-A. Lemburg

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Jan 6, 2009, 4:09:52 PM1/6/09
to Joe Strout, Python List
On 2009-01-06 21:24, Joe Strout wrote:
> M.-A. Lemburg wrote:
>
>>> On the Mac in particular, if you want
>>> your app to run on any PowerPC or Intel machine runing 10.4 or later,
>>> and you're using anything not in the standard framework (such as
>>> MySQLdb), it's a bit of a nightmare.
>>>
>>
>> You're looking for py2app:
>>
>> http://undefined.org/python/py2app.html
>
> No, I'm *using* py2app. I've been trying to use it for a couple of
> weeks now, with the generous help of such people as Robin Dunn, and I
> still don't have it quite working properly. (I'd be happy to send you
> my notes on what was required to get as far as I've gotten, but it's
> several pages, a bit long to post here.)

Perhaps not post it here, but put it up on the web somewhere and
link to it from the Python.org wiki.

> (py2exe works a little more easily, thank goodness.)

We're using py2exe to wrap up apps on Windows and then pass them on
to InnoSetup for creating the installer.

On Unix, we tried using cx_Freeze, but that had too many issues.
We've then modified and updated an old project of mine, called
mxCGIPython, to create a one file Python interpreter and use that
with the applications:

http://www.egenix.com/www2002/python/mxCGIPython.html

One of these days, we're going to release the new version as OSS.

>>> So I would say that Python as a language is great, and its standard
>>> framework is great. But its (many) IDEs are pretty poor, and the
>>> process of building a polished, packaged app is abysmal.
>>
>> It's certainly work, but that's always the case for nicely polished
>> apps :-)
>
> In Python, yes. :) Not in all environments.

Hmm, I'm not only referring to nice looking GUIs. Those are only part
of the game. More important is well working application, without any
annoying bugs.

>> For packaging, you can choose from a multitude of installer builders -
>> none of which are really Python specific.
>
> I'm not even talking about that level of packaging -- I'm just talking
> about making something that appears to the user like a normal
> executable, which they can double-click on their system and have it
> actually run, rather than aborting with something unhelpful like "No
> module named MySQLdb".

That's part of polishing the application, IMHO.

For point-and-click apps, you need to include all the required
dependencies together with the application.

>>> And there are
>>> some things (such as Flash-style web applets) that you still can't do at
>>> all in Python, even after all these years.
>>
>> You're looking for Silverlight:
>> http://www.voidspace.org.uk/ironpython/silverlight/index.shtml
>
> Maybe. I'm not a big fan of anything so Microsoftian, but I'll admit
> that this does mostly fit the bill I described above (or has the
> potential to, anyway).

Ok, how about a Firefox Extension, then...

http://pyxpcomext.mozdev.org/

together with a shell:

http://pyxpcomext.mozdev.org/samples.html#pyshell

With this plugin you write the GUI using XUL and JavaScript... and after
some polishing, which includes dropping the Firefox GUI and turning to
XULRunner, you can create apps such as Miro:

http://www.getmiro.com/

and watch TED videos driven by Python (and a gazillion other tools
working for you behind the scenes).

Mike Driscoll

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Jan 6, 2009, 4:24:10 PM1/6/09
to

I use Andrea Gavana's GUI2Exe to create my binaries. He recently added
a py2app wrapper to it. I don't have a Mac, so I haven't tested that
part of his app. However, the py2exe portion rocks! I put in the path
to my main Python executable, add any special 3rd party modules and it
just works! I've written a tutorial for the py2exe part of it if
you're interested...

Mike

Дамјан Георгиевски

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Jan 6, 2009, 8:24:31 PM1/6/09
to
>> And there are
>> some things (such as Flash-style web applets) that you still can't do
>> at all in Python, even after all these years.
>
> You're looking for Silverlight:
>
> http://www.voidspace.org.uk/ironpython/silverlight/index.shtml

or clutter which has Python bindings http://www.clutter-project.org/


--
дамјан ( http://softver.org.mk/damjan/ )

Hi! I'm a .signature virus! copy me into your .signature file to help me spread!

greg

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Feb 11, 2009, 6:23:39 AM2/11/09
to
>> python is great.
>
> No.
>
> Python is VERY GREAT !!!!!!!

All right now, everyone...

Every Python's sacred, every Python's great,
If any Python's wasted, Guido gets irate!

--
Greg

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