

Python is now Blub! Run! - prakash
http://arvindn.livejournal.com/91103.html

======
pdubroy
Oh no, the [programming language I favour | band I like] is now mainstream.
Well, I [use the more obscure features | prefer their older albums].

I [am a much better coder | have way better taste] than those other people
anyways.

~~~
IsaacSchlueter
I liked [band I like | programming language I favor | dinosaurs] when they
were still underground.

<http://xkcd.com/460/>

------
rglullis
False premise. Google chose Python as the first language for GAE because it
would be the most appealing language _among the programming languages already
used at Google_. It has nothing to do with "being a language widely used and
understood by the masses".

Javascript/Rhino would be also a cool choice, but I think that is what Steve
Yegge is working on.

------
tptacek
"Because if you want to do a startup, you should have some reason to believe
that you are several times more productive than the average programmer, an
order of magnitude even."

Uhh... what? Who said that?

~~~
mrtron
I would hope my organization was several times more productive per employee of
an average company. I wouldn't put all my faith in it being the direct result
of a specific programming language.

------
paul
Even worse, he's writing blog posts in English! (the same language used by
millions of semi-literate people)

~~~
gills
"millions." "semi-literate." haha...you made my day.

~~~
utx00
now. now.

~~~
eru
Sorry, accidentally down voted. Slippy fingers clicked to fast.

~~~
utx00
sorry, accidentally up voted.

~~~
utx00
someone downvoted my accidental upvote :)

wow.

there goes a loser.

~~~
utx00
loser

------
pavelludiq
What about Bluby..err Ruby? :D

well, if i look on the situation more seriously, python is more popular than
ruby, and ruby has some features that make it a tiny bit more powerful in some
situations so if the author if such an underground freak, he can use ruby for
a few months until it becomes Bluby too.

~~~
cstejerean
Python more popular than Ruby? To me it always seemed that Ruby and Rails are
more popular.

~~~
BrandonM
I would say that RoR is more popular than, say, Django, but that Python the
language is more popular than Ruby the language.

~~~
pavelludiq
Yeah, thats what i meant. Do you use ruby for scripting blender or anything
else other that RoR? Do you use it for scientific computation? Do people use
it for shell scripts and small games, or GUI apps?You can do that with ruby,
but for me, people learn ruby because rails is popular, python doesn't have
that one big killer app, people learn python because its generally fun and
useful for many stuff.

~~~
stcredzero
I think this is a great indicator of whether a language is a success: Do
people learn it because its generally fun and useful? (Versus, do people learn
it because of corporate PR, or because it's the accepted/official way to do
[X])

------
mtts
If it were true, Guido at least would be happy (how much more "blub" can you
get than "programming for everyone"?)

Unfortunately, it isn't true at all. As it stands, no one but hardcore web app
enthousiasts use Google Apps. That hardly makes it mainstream, I should think.

~~~
stcredzero
Is OOP a Blub-level paradigm now? I suspect that it has been for awhile now.

------
parbo
You can't say that a language is Blub. It becomes Blub only if the programmer
using the language fails to realize that there are more powerful languages. It
has nothing to do with mainstream or not.

~~~
gaius
Every language is Blub to someone. What do Haskell types think about Lisp?

~~~
eru
Common Lisp is ugly to look at. (Compared to Haskell or Scheme.)

------
globalrev
I didn't understand if the article is ironic or not.

------
utx00
could lisp be blub for something else? if yes, what is that something. if you
think not, why not?

~~~
inklesspen
X is blub if there is a language which is more powerful than X and you can't
understand that the "extra stuff" in that language is actually power, as
opposed to meaningless stuff.

For example, an argument could be made that Lisp is a blub, because of the
libraries problem. I'm not a lisp user myself, though I'm learning Scheme, so
I don't know for sure if the libraries problem is an actual problem. But if it
is, you could say that Lisp is a blub for Python, because while Lisp users are
spending their time inventing a DSL that's incompatible with everything else,
Python users type 'import awesomelibrary' and get the job done.

So, really, it depends on your notion of power. In pg's original Blub essay,
power is Lisp-y-ness (or macros, perhaps), so by definition Lisp can't be a
blub. But if your notion of power is something else, maybe it can be.

~~~
emmett
Specifically, the Blub idea applies to _language_ power. You could build
python's libraries in Lisp, but you can't build a macro in Python without
changing the language.

On the other hand, Lisp isn't at the top of the theoretical Blub hierarchy.
Users of erlang can to some degree look at lisp as a Blub - what do you mean
there's no lightweight concurrency, and you can't start millions of threads
and have the messaging just managed? Lisp is broken! A language with Lisp's
(lack of) syntax and erlang's concurrency might be able to look down on both.

~~~
inklesspen
"You could build python's libraries in Lisp"

Then why doesn't someone do so?

~~~
emmett
Just because one could do something, doesn't mean one will do something. I'm
not arguing you should use Lisp over Python, merely that the strength of
libraries is not a language feature per se. Clearly, it's one of the most
important things to consider when picking a language, but it's not a feature
of that language any more than how helpful the people in that language's IRC
chat room is, or how good the documentation.

------
maxklein
Wait a minute. How did he come to this realisation? Did he just suddenly
INVENT it? Did he just MAKE UP that graph? Because to me, it sure seems that
way. He does not backup his assertion that python is now in the middle of the
programmer world.

------
Hexstream
"This doesn't mean that I'm going to start programming exclusively in Lisp
from now on—the libraries just aren't there."

What libraries does he need that "just aren't there"?

------
MoeDrippins
Python became blub the second the "one true way to do it" mantra was
conceived.

~~~
olavk
Blubbiness is not a property of the language per se. Is it the phenomenon that
you don't recognize if an unfamiliar language is _more_ powerful than the
currently most powerful language you know. The more powerful languages just
seem bizarre are annoying. But you immediately recognize when a language is
_less_ powerful than one you know.

Therefore many developers think they are using the most powerful language in
the world ("Blub").

So if Python is the most powerful language you know and you don't understand
the power of eg. Lisp macros or the Haskell type system, then Python is Blub
for you.

If Lisp is you favorite language and you don't understand the power of the
Python readability, the concept of "one obvious way" and so on, then Lisp is
Blub for you.

~~~
utx00
the assumption is that languages vary in power, and furthermore that lisp sits
pretty high on this power ladder. let us assume further that lisp is more
powerful than python (i think that's safe. in this forum anyways). so to say
that python readability makes lisp blub sort of implies python is blub to you.
unless, of course, you think python is more powerful than lisp.

my question is, what leads people to believe lisp is so high up on the
language power scale?

ps: incidentally, macros are all about readability. if you took all the macros
out of your program and substituted them by their macro expansion (by copying
and pasting) you would end up with exactly the same program. exactly. it would
just be less readable ;)

~~~
olavk
I assumed the definition of blub from the original PG essay, which argues that
Lisp is near or at the top of the power scale.

I don't really believe in a linear power scale though. Some languages are
strictly more powerful than others, but there are also (i believe) different
axes of power. I mention Haskell, Lisp and Python because they are three very
powerful languages, but powerful in different ways. If you think that any one
of them are strictly more powerful than the others, then its probably because
you don't understand the power of the other.

~~~
utx00
i don't know what you mean. could you provide an example? let's take lisp and
python. in which "axis" is python more powerful and how? (i'm talking about
core language features).

~~~
olavk
The power of Python is a consequence of a design with focus on clarity,
readability and consistency. GvR understands that code is as much
communication to humans as instructions to the computer, and that code is read
much more than written. This makes the language very productive, but is
especially valuable when you have to read or maintain code written by others.
It is easier to learn from each others code and libraries.

Related languages like Perl or Lisp with a focus on TMTOWTDI are more
immediately gratifying because you can easier tailor the look of the language
to your personal preferences. This however have a long term cost to
maintainability and sharing in the community.

The power of Python is an emergent property caused by readability and clarity
combined with the network effect in the community.

