Python Secret Weblog for 2006 April 12

(33) Wed Apr 12 2006 19:30 Ruby misconceptions about Python:

I just ran into a rather misleading article claiming to compare Ruby and Python. Let's please be done with some of these misconceptions:

• Python 1.5.2 was released in april 1999. Talking about supposed design flaws in a version released in 1999 is a bit misleading. We're seven years past april 1999. Maybe the referenced article was written in 2000, in which case it's somewhat more understandable. I do not believe it was, as it talks about Python's support for sets, which was added later.

• the opinion sketched about booleans is an opinion. Python did add an explicit True and False quite recently, in Python 2.3 I believe (we're at 2.4 now), but 0 is still considered to be False (try bool(0)).

• Yes, empty sets, like other empty sequences, are False in Python. Sets are built-in in Python 2.4, and were a library in Python 2.3, and empty sets are False in both. I happen to like empty sequences being False, but this particular opinion has the benefit in at least being original. :)

• Let's please cut the crap about OO being a bolt-on in Python. This is FUD. It's probable that many people who repeat this meme are not even aware of enough deep OO issues to ever have to care even if it were true.

• Python's OO implementation has indeed been improved in version 2.0 (released in 2001). That doesn't mean we haven't been happily using multiple inheritance in Python 1.5.2; the notion that it was critically flawed is rather exaggarated. I think this needs to be said to back up the OO bolted-on FUD. Like, "if OO in Python is bolted on, why has Python had multiple inheritance support since forever and Ruby doesn't?" Advocate's answer: "Well, that's because that multiple inheritance was critically flawed in versions as recent as 1.5.2!"

• You can add and remove methods from classes in Python. This has been possible for years and years (including Python 1.5.2):

  class Foo(object):
     pass
  def mymethod(self):
     print "hello world"
  foo = Foo()
  Foo.mymethod = mymethod
  foo.mymethod()
  

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