Deposing Dictators

[Jeff Shannon]

Dirck Blaskey wrote:

> When I first heard about this back then, I had a
> knee-jerk-dogmatic-negative-reaction to it.  Now, I believe
> I understand the motivation for the change better, and I also
> understand where the reaction comes from.

I'd just like to add my wholehearted concurrence on this.  My initial thought on division
change was one of horror.  After having read through the (relatively few) reasoned
responses, my opinion has changed.  It is obvious that Guido *does* know what he's doing,
even if not everyone agrees with the direction he wants to take.  I think that part of the
problem, that inspired such FUD, was the lack of a clearly explained rationale in the
relevant PEPs and early discussions here--probably in part because the rationale had been
explained to death in other fora.  Seeing the division change as a necessary precursor to
full numeric-model integration makes this an entirely different issue than "we think the
current division might confuse a few people", which (unfortunately) is the impression that
some people (I at least) received at the start of this mess.

In short, I think we should all try to have a little more faith in Guido, even if we don't
agree with all of his proposals.  His design instincts have proved to be right, time and
time again.  Python is a wonderful language to work with, and is an *incredible* relief to
come back to after dealing with some of the other mess I have to work with.  (A primitive,
proprietary dialect of basic that makes VB look clean, and an ugly proprietary language
that makes *that* basic look pleasant! And all on a platform where *every* variable is
global.... >shudder< )

Thanks, Guido, and all of the PythonLabs crew.

Jeff Shannon
Technician/Programmer
Credit International