"Portability" (was: How to create a Unix Domain Socket?)

[Steve Holden]

Cameron Laird wrote:
> 
> I'm going to grumble briefly--or perhaps ask for help.
> I'm getting tired of calling Python "wonderfully por-
> table" or whatever it is I say when I'm acting as an
> advocate.  I know what I mean by it, but for most
> people, most of the time, Python's not quite up to the
> portability of C, and almost every other language is
> equally tender on the point.

Don't know that I'd agree with that.  In my (limited)
experience with C, the thing that tripped me up most moving
between platforms was differences in library semantics: i.e.
the language is the same on all platforms, but the underlying
support code differs, sometimes in subtle, non-obvious ways.

Given that the Python library offers MUCH higher-level
functionality, I find there's a remarkable degree of poertability.

>				  So:  what's a good word
> to express, "available on lots of platforms, more or
> less, and, whatever the semantics are on any particular
> one, there's an entertaining story to explain why it's
> so"?

Might I suggest "The usual portability concerns apply to Python
just as much as any other language"?  The fact is that it's always
tempting to implementors to expose underlying OS support in
scripting systems such as Python, and when there's a variety of
platforms then there'll be a variety of non-portable constructs
in library usage.

> --
> 
> Cameron Laird <claird at NeoSoft.com>
> Business:  http://www.Phaseit.net
> Personal:  http://starbase.neosoft.com/~claird/home.html

regards
 Steve
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