Perl Vs Python, Associative arrays, regex, and other considerations.

[John Smith]

David:
   this is good stuff. Knowing neither language I was trying to learn one or
the other, rather than both.
I do not know what are associatives arrays, (can guess though), and will
look it up.
I also wish to get some feedback on things like:

Speed
Code size,   Interpreter size.
Cleanless  (I have heard Python to have an advantage there).
Ability to compile, and/or encapsulate the interpreter, in order to have an
executable, on most platforms.
    Real (easy) Portability is a big thing in my view.
Interfacing with other languages and GUI,s
Tools: debuggers. A friend told me ddd for Perl is great. How would be
Python?
Ease of leaning (this may be subjective.. transfert of existing knowledge,
like C or ...).
Thanks for the answer.

"David" <perl-dvd at darklaser.com> wrote in message
news:9f77a.33$7g4.9683 at news-west.eli.net...
> "John Smith" <someone at microsoft.com> wrote in message
> news:ixT6a.239117$tq4.5756 at sccrnsc01...
> > Hello:
> >   do Perl & Python do similar things?
> >   What should be the rationalle to one or the other?
> > Thanks.
>
> If you want a lot of replies you should post to comp.lang.perl.misc
> rather than comp.lang.perl
>
> PS. I don't know much about Python, but some of the best features of
> perl are associative arrays, and regex.  If python does not have one of
> those two, I would exclusively use perl even if I knew python.
>
> Regards,
> David
>
>