
Python in the browser - r11t
http://blog.jimmy.schementi.com/2010/03/pycon-2010-python-in-browser.html
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alttab
Silverlight... with "performance" stuff in C#? What kind of client-side
scripting is going on that we need to push it down to C#?

Javascript does a great job manipulating the DOM, especially with Prototype
and the like.

Having a stronger scripting language in the browser like python (even ruby?)
would be great if it didn't come at a significant cost and increased
performance. If you'd ask anyone who spends a significant amount of time
writing js code, they'd want it faster. Not Python that is built on top of a
proprietary engine (plugin based!), that uses... JAVASCRIPT to embed it.

On top of that, the python code looks semantically identical to DOM
manipulation in Prototype. So really the only thing you've gained is "writing
client code in python" while dumping proprietary formats and a huge initial
download on your users. I'll excuse myself as sensationalist when I say that
it seems a little selfish on the developer's part.

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pingswept
This was quite interesting, until, "This is because Silverlight is the Python
execution engine."

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euccastro
And now, Python in the browser without Silverlight (i.e., on pure JS):

<http://www.skulpt.org/>

~~~
VBprogrammer
"Skulpt surely isn't done yet...I'd call it something like 0.12 alpha if it
had a version..."

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asmosoinio
"Python in the browser" ... with Silverlight.

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daeken
As much as I love .NET, I just can't get excited about Silverlight. When you
require your users to install a new plugin, it raises the barrier to entry
pretty significantly -- especially when you're talking about technical users.

Personally, I took a different route: I created a Python->Javascript compiler
with a real macro system. Allows me to quickly hack damn near anything
together and keeps me away from JS (which I can't stand, largely for aesthetic
reasons), without imposing anything at all on my users.

~~~
Qz
So basically Silverlight loses out because Flash was first-to-market? They're
essentially the same thing.

I mean, I don't do Silverlight either, but your reasoning seems suspect.

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mclin
I find JavaScript and Python are more similar than they are different.

Coming from Python, learned JavaScript, felt right at home. (just have to
remember the vars, {}s and ;s)

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njharman
This is interesting in a very narrow niche. But even being a Python fanboy I'm
more likely to bring JS into the server than Python into the browser. It just
makes huge piles of sense.

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silversmith
1.5 MB, even if one-time only (assuming no cache-cleaning on client side), is
quite heavy. Too heavy for vast majority of web applications.

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adamc
Depends on your audience. For a lot of in-house applications, that wouldn't be
much of a problem. But if you are trying to build a new social media web site,
it might well be.

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jdietrich
What an ugly hack.

