The Evolution Of Python

[Robin Becker]

In article <8beb91f5.0107282158.4785ae5e at posting.google.com>, Ben C
<benc1 at today.com.au> writes
>IMHO the reason why C has survived as a language and not become an
>endangered species like Rexx, pascal et al is because it has it's own
>'niche' ... initially evolving alongside of the unix environment it
>has become the most suited language (currently) for systems
>programming ... this has been both its strength and its weakness ...
>to add more functionality it has had to fragment itself into other
>competing 'species' and hence we now have C++ (and all its sub
>species) ... C is analogous to the carnivore of the programming
>languages ... yes fast and efficient ... but is also in a lot of
>respects quite crude ...
>
>I don't think Python has it's own true 'niche' ... it competes well
>with many other languages ... hence it has to either keep evolving
>into a 'better' competing language or find a niche or other languages
>will inevitably supplant it ... what will happen to all your Python
>code then? Will you invest the time learning and re-writing it to the
>newer language? ...
>
...
I believe that well designed languages define their own niche. A
language that constantly needs changing is clearly bad. That's not to
say that programming languages shouldn't evolve. The Pascal family, the
B family each had something. Perhaps the Python family will develop,
perhaps not. Constant syntax change for a programming language is a sign
of weakness not strength.
-- 
Robin Becker