Scripting lanuages for laboratory tests

[Jacob Hallen]

In article <aagkfm$6kf$1 at news5.svr.pol.co.uk>,
Etta Makwetta <etienne at coetzeee.freeserve.co.uk> wrote:
>To whom it may concern
>
>I am tring to decide on which scripting language to use in one of our
>laborities during testing procedures, and I don't really know what the real
>advantages and disadvantages are.  I have made the following list, and would
>like to know if anybody knows of any obvoius other advantages/disadvantages
>that Python has compared to Tcl.  Any other comments about Ruby, Perl etc.
>are also welcome.
>
>Tcl:
>
>Pros: Easy to learn, Easy for simple applications, Easy GUI tool (tk),
>Portable, Easy Embeddability (from c-functions), Easy Extension (to
>c-functions), Free, (Can be object oriented with extension [incr Tcl]

Having learned both Python and Tcl, I found Python much easier to grasp.
As soon as you do anything slightly complicated with parameter passing in
Tcl, you'd better think very carefully or you will get things wrong.

For extensibility and embeddability, it is about as easy as with Python.

>
>Cons: Less exception handling, No overflow checking, Less support for
>complicated data structures, Not support calling an arbitrary dll,

Object support not built in from the start. Smaller standard library.
"Everything is a string"-paradigm painful to use.
>
>Python:
>
>Pros: Object oriented, Modular (name scope etc), Portable, Overflow
>checking, Exception handling, Easy Embeddability (from c-functions), Easy
>Extension (to c-functions), Support for complicated data structures,
>Copyrighted but free
>
>Cons: GUI slightly more complicated than Tcl, More to learn, Not support
>calling an arbitrary dll

Tkinter is much easier to use than plain tk. I have built fairly substantial
applications in both. You pay a small price in the form of having to have
both Python and tcl installed on your machine, and there are a few very
small spots where the tcl base of tkinter shows through.

Jacob Hallén

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