I think one reason for Python growing popularity is because it's become the default tool in some domains whether it is the best tool or not.
This week our Director ordered a total rewrite of two years of work in Python. His rationale: it's what everyone else uses in this space. No reason specific to our use case, just simply to follow the herd. I realise that a large community translates into easy hiring and rich ecosystems, but I despise the mentality as it promotes a monoculture.
... and Python _became_ the default tool because the de facto developer consensus (after years of competing languages) is that an interpreted language should
= be usable, and
= provide a set of data structures that an educated programmer *expects to find when scripting*.
Python literally sucked less than the alternatives.
Python gets introduced to students, so for many people it's the first language they learn. Half the programming community have less than 5 years of experience. I question their ability to evaluate suckage, lol.
What are you rewriting from? At director level focus is usually more on things like how easy is it to staff / get support for something. Python is strong here - you can find programmers globally who can do pretty well with it.
Yes. The entire reason I like using Java at my day job is that the rest of the company uses it the most and supports it well. I would never use Java on my own, but that's a different situation.
It reads as a little bit of a tautology. "People are using it because people use it". I get that from a hireability standpoint it's a real thing to consider, but the statement doesn't say anything about whether or not Python is actually a good language to use
> This week our Director ordered a total rewrite of two years of work in Python
WTF? Unless your system is originally written in a proprietary language that literally no one outside your company knows, I'll say it's a good sign that you need to change team (or change job). Don't work under a director like that.
Sorry if it sounds too cynical, but that's probably the intended effect of a rewrite from what the team knows into Python: staffing changes. A bunch of the (expensive) old guard will leave and they can be replaced with cheap grads, who all know Python.
This week our Director ordered a total rewrite of two years of work in Python. His rationale: it's what everyone else uses in this space. No reason specific to our use case, just simply to follow the herd. I realise that a large community translates into easy hiring and rich ecosystems, but I despise the mentality as it promotes a monoculture.