Alternatives to Python ?

[Alex Martelli]

Gary Duncan wrote:


> There's been occasional not-unfavourable comments in this news-group
> about the pros-and-cons of other so-called "high-level-languages" like
> Ruby, and Haskell , and others too.
> 
> I can't afford to buy more than one such book from the list of HLLs;
> so what would you suggest ?

Ruby and Python occupy pretty much the same technical niche; exposure
to Ruby would not significantly broaden your horizons wrt exposure to
Python.  Haskell occupies a completely different niche, and is pretty
much guaranteed to be very horizon-broadening.  The most popular book
on Haskell is probably Thompson's "Haskell: The Craft of Functional
Programming", Addison-Wesley.  Personally, I've enjoyed the somewhat
idiosyncratic approach in Hudak's "The Haskell School of Expression"
(Cambridge University Press), but I've heard from some that do not
consider it a good first book on Haskell.


Alex