Books on Python now vs in 8 months.

[Christopher Petrilli]

Phil Voris  wrote:
>I've been considering learning Python as a means of getting insight into
>OO thinking.  I have been reluctant to by the snake or rat books because
>I have read that future versions of Python -- mayber even versions as
>early as later this year -- will be radicaly different and in some ways
>backwards incompatible.  I ask myself if it's worthwhile to learn it one
>way if it will change so quickly.  Does anyone have insight as to how
>much it's _really_ going to change...?

Well, I'd use my crystal ball to tell you, but the proximity to Guido's
time machine has caused it to show me Dan Quayle as president, so you
know you just can't trust it! <wink>

Seriously, while Python2 is bantied around a lot, it's still stuck somewhere
in the flying Dutchman's head, and nobody else really know what will
change.  Having said that, I'm willing ot bet nothing Earth shattering
will occur, a lot of niggling problems will be fixed, some new "optional"
features (maybe pseudo-static types for performance) will reappear,
the libraries might be reoganized (see Paul Prescod's thread on hierarchical
packages), etc etc, but I don't htink you're going to see:

	* Curly braces
	* 1/2 = 0.5 :-)

Seriously, the basic syntax and structure won't change... you'll be able to
take all knowledge and work with it... there will just be some small
adjustments to things here and there.  This won't be like your standard
Java x.x.1->x.x.2 release where everything changes, and 1->2 where nothing
significant happens :-)

Chris
-- 
| Christopher Petrilli                      ``Television is bubble-gum for
| petrilli at amber.org                          the mind.''-Frank Lloyd Wright