The unreasonable effectiveness of C
Linked by MOS6510 on Thu 10th Jan 2013 23:25 UTC
General Development "For years I've tried my damnedest to get away from C. Too simple, too many details to manage, too old and crufty, too low level. I've had intense and torrid love affairs with Java, C++, and Erlang. I've built things I'm proud of with all of them, and yet each has broken my heart. They've made promises they couldn't keep, created cultures that focus on the wrong things, and made devastating tradeoffs that eventually make you suffer painfully. And I keep crawling back to C."
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C and Python
by FunkyELF on Fri 11th Jan 2013 21:48 UTC
FunkyELF
Member since:
2006-07-26

I love C and Python.... and I love the fact that they're fairly simple to intermix.

Porting C to Python and Python to C is pretty straight forward (as long as you're not doing OO programming in Python obviously).

To me... I see Python as C but with a nicer syntax and just the right amount of built in data structures.

I love being able to create a throw-away list, dictionary, or other structure right inline a statement.

See if the first two letters of a string match one of several other strings?

In Python:

if foo[:2] in ['XX', 'YY', 'AB', '!!']:
print 'woo hoo'

In C:

if ( strncmp(foo, "XX", 2) == 0 ||
strncmp(foo, "YY", 2) == 0 ||
strncmp(foo, "AB", 2) == 0 ||
strncmp(foo, "!!", 2) == 0 ){
printf("woo hoo\n");
}

... its the little things.

Is the Python going to perform faster?... hell no, but I love the readability. And if it needs to be ported to C for performance, it is straight forward.

Reply Score: 5

RE: C and Python
by tylerdurden on Fri 11th Jan 2013 22:23 in reply to "C and Python"
tylerdurden Member since:
2009-03-17

I sympathize. I have found that prototyping stuff quasi interactively in python and then porting it over to C/C++ can be a very productive way of programming.

Edited 2013-01-11 22:23 UTC

Reply Parent Score: 3

RE[2]: C and Python
by FunkyELF on Mon 14th Jan 2013 13:29 in reply to "RE: C and Python"
FunkyELF Member since:
2006-07-26

I sympathize. I have found that prototyping stuff quasi interactively in python and then porting it over to C/C++ can be a very productive way of programming.


Exactly.
Previous generations might have prototyped on paper or a chalk board before "finalizing" the C code.
Thats from a time where it made sense to plan ahead because you might be using punch cards or had to wait your turn for computer time.

Python makes a great prototyping language because it has been described as executable pseudo-code. Not too low or high level.
When I prototype in Python I'm doing the same thing, I'm just using a text editor rather than pad of paper.

Reply Parent Score: 2