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Overcoming the fear of Python January 16, 2008

Posted by xk0der (aka Amit Singh) in : Programming and software development, Random musings , 6comments

As all C, C++ and Perl devotees, I too looked upon Python with apprehension. Python? What? I asked. The very idea of white-spaces being part of syntax gave me jitters and I convulsed with disgust. Why Python? Perl can do it. OOP? Perl has it … errm .. Kind of.

After reading numerous articles about python by putting the search terms “I hate pyton“, “python will die” and the like, I started getting a grasp of differences and likeness between python and other languages. One thing more I learned was, never be judgmental about a programming language if you have not used it. So after traversing threads at various forums related to “Love Python” and “Hate Python” I started understanding the various mumbo-jubo related to python. And then the thought occured to me, let’s give it a try. I downloaded python on my Windows XP machine at home and Vim for windows. Then jumped right into coding a problem that was asked to me in an interview. It was a design problem actually, but nevertheless a design can be implemented :) .

Within minutes I was automatically indenting code as I used to with C,C++ or Perl (or other free form languages I had used, for that matter). So the frown over mandatory white-spaces soon turned into a smile. And by the time I could realize I was finished creating a four road junction traffic simulator. I did searched the net for some reference, but the best thing was I just looked at the example and understood what it was, no reading what the code does or will do. Other syntax came so naturally that I didn’t even had to look online. That is I guess the beauty of Python.

In around half an hour or so, I had a complete running program in Python, using classes, random number, lists and other subtle features. The code was so readable, I thought, do I need some of those comments I’ve put in there? Some were required. But most of the time the code was itself very much self-explanatory.

Later I booted my laptop (it has FC7 installed) and copied the code on my Lappy. Python comes bundled with FC7 so I straight-away executed the code. Wow! … Its faster than windows .. Ha ha … yes this is what I noticed. Then I tinkered a bit more with the code, optimizing some things and learning new stuff in the process. Overall I enjoyed my first step into Python, very much.

I’m not going to shun C,C++ or Perl for that matter. For quick one-liners Perl is still the best. My domain is embedded systems and Linux Kernel programming so C and C++ are essential. But this discovery about Python has really give me an option. Option to create large and manageable programs in less time. They say in the python community, You spend more time solving the problem as you code and less time worrying about the language and its syntax. I Agree!

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How to pick a programming language June 19, 2006

Posted by xk0der (aka Amit Singh) in : Random musings , add a comment

I happen to read this very interesting article by Tim Daneliuk

http://www.tundraware.com/Technology/How-To-Pick-A-Programming-Language/


I really don’t know if it will help anybody pick out the language of their choice, but the article makes a very good reading, specially if you like nerd humour.

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C# and .NET will die! June 8, 2006

Posted by xk0der (aka Amit Singh) in : Random musings , 1 comment so far

Not yet, but slowly!

They may rise to a certain level before they die, but they will!

Clarification
Before I continue let me clarify that this post is not about whether C# or .NET is a good technology or not; .NET might be very good concept coming out of Microsoft’s closet, but again popularity and sustainability of a language is not governed by a language being the best in terms of syntax or it’s robust compiler or the object code it generates and the like.

Desktop
For the desktop we already have a plethora of languages available, so C# might eat into that share but wouldn’t be able to dominate that domain. VB6 is far better in terms of development time and ease of code writing that the new VB.NET and C# for creation of desktop applications. And now that Microsoft has announced that their new OS, Vista, will have support for legacy VB6 and COM objects, there is no point for these developers to switch to something entirely different from what they are used to.

Let’s face it, still the majority of desktop apps written in .NET use the interop mechanism to interface with COM objects. And that’s not going to change any soon. This means extra burden for the programmer, interop is more of a workaround than a feature. Most of my peers have this to say about interop wrappers “When I can write do_this( ); to do a thing, why write do_this( ); do_that( ); do_this_too( ); do_that_too( ); now_using_something_else_do_what_I_want( );” Not a pretty thing to look at too!

Web
After the prospects of desktop apps being bleak for C# and .NET, the other arena where C# might try to fight a losing battle is the web! The reason it will be a losing battle is that there are already many scripting languages available for server side scripting and development. The other fact that Unixes and Linux Boxes are now becoming the first choice for web servers makes it even more difficult for .NET to survive. At least I don’t see, that, in foreseeable future windows will release a .NET framework for *nix boxes. There have been some attempts by some people and groups to create a .NET framework for Linux, but they have all not been a hit to the extent required.

PHP, Python and even Perl are the choice of programmers for server-side development. C# does not provide any uniqueness that the programmers will love to adopt, at least not on the surface level.

The final words
All said, programmers do not want to learn a new language just for the sake of the language being new. The new language needs to have that something “special” in to attract the masses. C# and .NET family of languages lack this very basic essence. They are essentially camouflaged Java!

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Ruby @ Yahoo Groups June 5, 2006

Posted by xk0der (aka Amit Singh) in : Miscellaneous , add a comment

You may join the Ruby group on Yahoo here!


Click here to join ruby-central
Click to join ruby-central

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Ruby - *The* programming language June 4, 2006

Posted by xk0der (aka Amit Singh) in : Programming and software development , add a comment

I Happen to stumble upon Ruby lately, and this is one heck of a cool language!

You may say! Oh! no… I don’t need another language now! Probably most of us(the coder specie) have spent years on our favourite language(or not so favourite language?). And would certainly not like to plunge into yet another language. We’ve already got a bunch of them in our heads already!

But take my word! I too had the same apprehension, but after just spending ten minutes futzing with the Ruby interpreter … I had the same fun when I started learning QBasic during early 1990s. (Yeah!, you may try and guess my age from this fact!)

This language is simple, yet powerful. And as the creator intended it to be the language with “least-surprise”, it really has features that come intuitively to the programmer specie. I would surely recommend to all my programmer friends to give this cool new toy(or weapon!) a try!

Here are some links to get you started

Ruby Tutorial
http://www.math.umd.edu/~dcarrera/ruby/0.3/chp_01/first_steps.html

Download Ruby (Homepage)
http://www.ruby-lang.org/en/ (English version)

Ruby on rails
http://www.rubyonrails.org/ (a web development framework for ruby!)

Interview with the creator of Ruby (Yukihiro Matsumoto ~aka~ Matz)
http://www.artima.com/intv/ruby.html

Ruby on wikipedia
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ruby_programming_language

I Hope these links will get you started and most importantly interested in this serious yet fun (to code) language.

Obviously, I’m not getting converted (from *my* language to this new one) but I’m surely enjoying every bit of code I write in Ruby!

Regards
- xk0der

PS: I would love to receive comments about new members who join the force!

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