PEP scepticism

[Bernhard Reiter]

In article <kklmjtkhk17011nkjkigoh6u5f5otospuu at 4ax.com>,
	Steve Horne <sh at ttsoftware.co.uk> writes:
> On 28 Jun 2001 14:47:19 GMT, bernhard at intevation.de (Bernhard Reiter)
> wrote:
> 
>>This a general warning against the second system syndrom in Python.
> 
> I think you may have a good point for the future, but I'm actually a
> big fan of some of those recent additions to Python.

As I wrote in my post, I do not want to discuss the advantages or
disadvantages of single additions even though I have mentioned them.
I hope I can explain my cause without being specific.

> Extremely familiar to anyone with a C, C++ or Java background, and
> something that I was annoyed to have to live without when I first used
> Python. 

I am not sure if this is good reasoning, 
just because people know a feature from other languages might not 
make it a good one (or we all end up with perl :) ).


> Another large group of Python programmers have a background in
> functional languages, and will immediately understand 

In my experiences a lot of functional programming language features
are too complex and abstract for most people to really 
add them to their active programming vocabulary.

> I can understand the wish to only have one way to solve any problem,
> but it really isn't that great an approach. 

> have you ever met an
> electrician who only owns a single screwdriver? - I think not. Doing a
> good job means using the right tool for the job, not forcing a single
> tool to do every job.

Of course this is a matter of balance, I prefer a minimal set of tools
which gives me maxmimum power. There will always be some overlap of course.
Still one aim is to keep the number of tools small.

Some additions to python are of course badly needed.
	Bernhard
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