So, how long does it take to learn

[Francois Pinard]

[Graham Nicholls]

> [...] how long would you reckon it takes to get to be fairly productive,
> bearing in mind I've been preogramming for years ?

It took me a few weeks to become really productive in Python.  However,
it could have been two or three days if I only had a better attitude.

A few hours were surely enough for me to write working programs.  It took
me something around two days to acquire a minimum familiarity with the
library, enough at least to find relatively quickly what I needed to use.

However, before really deciding that Python was to me my next language of
preference, I was full of apprehension that I would meat some usual problem
for which Python would not be proper, and I was admittedly obsessed with
speed comparisons with other languages.  So, if I was not productive with
Python, this is merely because I was not allowing myself to be.

No doubt that I knew how to swim in Python in a few hours only.  Would I
only have been less experienced that I would not have been so cautious:
I would have dived much sooner, and likely become productive very fast.

Nowadays, I use Python for almost everything, and only rarely consider
other languages.  There is no speed concern for which I could not find
a reasonable compromise able to keep the bulk of the project in Python.
People working around me or with me are pretty convinced as well.

On the other hand, Python is very richly featured, and there are Python
aspects I'm not mastering yet, after years of usage.  I do consider myself
productive, but it seems there is about no limit to sophistication :-).

-- 
François Pinard   http://www.iro.umontreal.ca/~pinard