Why is Python so slow?

[M.-A. Lemburg]

William Dandreta wrote:
> 
> I am just learning Python and I wrote a little program to modify a text file
> with 120,000 lines. It took 1hr and 30 mins. I wrote a C program that
> created the text file from a .dbf and it only took 2 mins.
> 
> Both programs ran on the same machine (486-133mhz) under Concurrent DOS (a
> multi-user mutitasking OS).
> 
> The Python version was 1.2.

Python latest stable version is 1.5.2 -- perhaps you should
upgrade ? Python 1.2 was released sometime around 1993, IIRC.

If you want to run Python under DOS with extender, you should
consider using PythonDX:

	http://www.cuci.nl/~hnowak/python/python.htm

For fast text processing, check out mxTextTools which should be
included in PythonDX.

-- 
Marc-Andre Lemburg
______________________________________________________________________
Business:                                      http://www.lemburg.com/
Python Pages:                           http://www.lemburg.com/python/