where python is slower?

[Cameron Laird]

In article <Se80a.186428$AA2.7271929 at news2.tin.it>,
Alex Martelli  <aleax at aleax.it> wrote:
>Enrique Palomo wrote:
>   ...
>> I would like to know where python is slower, reading files, writing,
>> string manipulation...
>
>None of the above.  File I/O speeds are essentially determined
>by your disk, operating system and runtime library (and Python
>uses the C runtime library), and string manipulation is quite
>well optimized in Python -- it's unlikely, in general, that you
>can easily code custom C code to do much better (in a few very
>special cases it might be possible, because Python strings are
>immutable -- if the specific manipulation you need is, e.g.,
>"change the 277th character into a 'K'", then C lets you do
>that in-place while Python requires making a new string object).
>
>
>Alex
>

Excellent summary.

I feel compelled to add that there have been many real-life
cases in which custom-coded C-based applications focused on
text manipulation have turned out to be *slower* than their
Python correspondents, because the latter so often employ
superior algorithms.
-- 

Cameron Laird <Cameron at Lairds.com>
Business:  http://www.Phaseit.net
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