Python and Ruby

[Jonathan Gardner]

On Jan 30, 8:43 am, Nobody <nob... at nowhere.com> wrote:
> On Wed, 27 Jan 2010 15:29:05 -0800, Jonathan Gardner wrote:
> > Python is much, much cleaner. I don't know how anyone can honestly say
> > Ruby is cleaner than Python.
>
> I'm not familiar with Ruby, but most languages are cleaner than Python
> once you get beyond the "10-minute introduction" stage.
>

Probably too little, too late (haven't read all of the replies yet...)

I judge a language's simplicity by how long it takes to explain the
complete language. That is, what minimal set of documentation do you
need to describe all of the language? With a handful of statements,
and a very short list of operators, Python beats out every language in
the Algol family that I know of.

I can think of only one language (or rather, a class of languages)
that can every hope to be shorter than Python. I doubt you've heard of
it based on your comments, but I suggest you look into it.
Unfortunately, to fully appreciate that language, you're going to have
to study a textbook called "SICP". At the end of that textbook, you
are blessed to not only see but understand the complete compiler for
the language, in the language itself.