
2019 Python Developer Survey - luord
http://pyfound.blogspot.com/2019/10/the-2019-python-developer-survey-is.html
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bjt2n3904
Seems like the survey was HEAVILY weighted to learn about how people use
python for web / big data / cloud.

As an embedded stick-in-the-mud Python2 developer, I'm mildly frustrated. It
seems that the python community has been taken over by people trying to
compete with NodeJS. Other use cases exist!

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paulddraper
I learned Python in 2011 for a Django project.

> embedded stick-in-the-mud Python2 developer

Python (CPython) is also getting crowded out on the low-end thanks to native
languages getting easier: Rust, Go, even modern C++.

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bjt2n3904
I've been putting off learning Rust. From everything I read about the two, I
like rust more than go -- but I'm not fond of the massive binary size.

I'm also not fond of the nodejs style "download another copy of these 300
microlibraries and compile them all".

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sethammons
Even if (or especially if) you are not on the latest and greatest Python
version(s), I think it is still valuable to take the survey. We are locked in
at 2.6 no matter what on one of our projects. We slowly whittle it away into
other services, but making it modern is not feasible.

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downerending
The reality is that Python2 and Python3 are really two different languages,
not unlike C and C++. This is being recognized more as time passes.

Should Python2 be consigned to history? Should C have been? I'm not so sure
now. Python3 has a lot more to _know_ , but not necessarily a lot more that's
_useful_ for what I do.

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pjmlp
Try to compile any post C89 code with a C++ compiler to see how far you will
go.

And even then there is stuff like implicit conversions or the ?: operator,
whose semantics differ between C and C++.

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downerending
Indeed, C and C++ have always been two different languages. Hence the "not
unlike".

I still occasionally see people trying to compile or link C++ with 'gcc'. Does
that work? Maybe or even most of the time, but doing that is a sin.

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floki999
I think the python ‘developers’ this survey targets is only the tip of the
iceberg.

I’ve been using python for 15+ years, writing production tools, yet I’m not a
developer and this is not the focus of my job. I expect there are vast numbers
of Python coders out there who develop meaningful tools using Python and know
the language well, but whose main activity is not software dev.

Clearly, the survey reflects the audience targeted by JetBrains i.e. web and
data scientists - whatever the latter really means.

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c4urself
Take the survey here: [https://surveys.jetbrains.com/s3/c9-python-developers-
survey...](https://surveys.jetbrains.com/s3/c9-python-developers-survey-2019)

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EllipticCurve
Thanks for the link, participated.

Nice concise, adaptive survey.

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mixmastamyk
FYI, the link to start the survey was in the center of the page. A bit hard to
see on my mobile.

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baq
No questions about mypy?

~~~
phonethrowaway
The way they implemented type hinting has been a huge turn off to me. What are
your thoughts?

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azhenley
What in particular? Do you have any suggestions on how you would like it to
work?

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tinix
The syntax is what gets me... it's so unpythonic. Like the walrus operator...
No thanks!

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ilovecaching
Is there actual hard data out there that suggests that Python provides
significant benefits over a statically typed compiled language?

I’ve been thinking quite a bit about how it seems that despite how fun Python
is to write the dynamic types are really just a determinant with upsides that
are essentially anecdotal. Why would one take a performance hit and give up a
type system without hard evidence that there would be significant improvements
to other metrics?

~~~
The_rationalist
Developper productivity is order of magnitude more important than performance
on most software. Dynamic typing is by design more productive at first. Static
type systems _might_ allow better productivity on the long term
(maintenability, scalability of à big, complex codebase). If this advantage of
static typing is a myth, or a truth (and by how much does it increase average
productivity, for which project size?) is a really interesting question and I
don't know any scientific study on the topic. I did read a study that showed
that static types catch only a few percentage of bugs and that practices such
as systematic code reviews, documentation/comments, unit testing and
integration testing, and methods such as TDD, each of them has a far bigger
impact than static typing. (it would be nice if they had measured too the
impact of fuzzing, analytics, debuggers and language features such as having a
GC). This study does not say that using all those practices obscolete the need
of static typing but it show the irrationality that many "purist/religious"
developpers have by claiming writing a program in a dynamically typed language
is a maintenance nightmare while not saying anything about enforcing the said
practices despite them having empirically a far bigger impact on bug catching
and thus "code quality".

~~~
sethammons
Having cut my professional teeth on php, perl, ruby, and python, I find no
reduced speed working in Go. In fact, I think it is faster to develop in Go.
The only time this is not the case is very simple run-once scripts where I
don't need tests, and even then I'm not convinced that python is faster.

