float / double support in Python?
Erik Max Francis
max at alcyone.com
Thu Feb 13 18:53:42 EST 2003
Brandon Van Every wrote:
> If Python doesn't broaden its use cases, it doesn't gain mainstream
> acceptance and the language dies, beaten out by things such as Java
> and C#.
Except that what you're asking for is not a broadening of its use cases,
it's an attempt to cuddle up to a very specialized special interest
group. There's simply no reason for Python to do this natively, given
that Numeric/NumPy does handles packaging of C floats/C doubles just
fine.
You're complaining that Python doesn't have low-level support for C
floats (not Python floats, which are C doubles). But you're planning on
using Python as a high-level driving language _anyway_, so what the hell
difference does that make? As long as you can pass around and quickly
manipulate large bundles of C floats -- which you can, with Numeric --
then it makes no difference whether Python natively supports them or
not. If you're going to be doing a computation in Python, then
low-levelness or absolute performance requirements are not at issue ...
because if they were, you'd be writing them in your C++ layer, not the
Python layer.
This entire subthread has been a complete red herring, with you playing
the part of the herring.
--
Erik Max Francis / max at alcyone.com / http://www.alcyone.com/max/
__ San Jose, CA, USA / 37 20 N 121 53 W / &tSftDotIotE
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