python vs kung fu

[Kemp Randy-W18971]

Kung Fu! Karate! Jujitsu. Aikido.   
Python.  Perl.  Java.  PHP.
Now I wouldn't want to get into a fight with anyone who is a black belt from
the major four martial arts.  But given a preference, I would choose Aikido,
since it redirects the attackers force.  
But some people like debates that lead nowhere, and language debates are a
key example.  Now smart software developers actually appeal to all the major
camps.  Let's look at the open source database sapdb at www.sapdb.org.  They
actually have developed interfaces for Java, Perl, and Python.  Rather then
saying one language is better, they opened the spectrum to what they feel
are the major players.  And activestate at www.activestate.com has developed
tools and language versions for Perl, Python, and TCL.  
Language debates remind me of the old joke about life in Communist Russia.
A supervisor saw a worker digging a hole, and another filling it up.  After
this happened with a dozen holes, he went over and asked what was going on.
They replied that the one worker who plants the trees is sick, but they
still wanted to be productive for the day.

-----Original Message-----
From: neil at qualica.com [mailto:neil at qualica.com]
Sent: Tuesday, July 17, 2001 8:22 AM
To: python-list at python.org
Subject: python vs kung fu


It seems that, just like in chinese kung fu circles, lots of people
are trying to justify their style (python in this case) to themselves,
myself included. why ?, all styles can be equally effective , it
depends on how you use them !

good programming comes from experience and the ability to develop in a
smart way , not from what language you choose to use ! and we all
really like python or else we wouldnt feel so passionately about it .
so rather than get into endless arguments with java guys or perl guys
about the virtues of python , lets just try to beat them at their own
game !

jython , zope , .net etc these projects are what i mean ! if we can
keep building stuff like this pretty soon people will respect python
development and what clever programmers do with it as opposed to some
oo scripting language.