I would like to create a web-based tool for risk management. The tool actually currently exists, but it was programmed in about 1998 using old VB, etc, and we are updating it & moving it to the web. Basically, as a first step, i'd like to create a basic web site that takes user input, gets data from MySQL (i might pickle it, not yet sure) and then runs some numpy routines & outputs the results. This will give us a platform to develop the backend. My intermediate goal is to have an asynchronous site in which as users adjust settings, the computations are run & graphs updated. (the computations are pretty simple, btw). My fantasy goal would be to combine that w/ google gears so the users could use it online or offline, but that's probably just fantasy.
So, here are my constraints: I know Python & HTML (and lots of other non-germane languages) but I don't know any javascript or ruby or XML. What is the lowest cost path from here to there? I have been totally out of the loop for this whole web 2.0 thing (I'm an economics professor). Will it be possible for me to put together an async site with only python? (I hesitate to use the term AJAX, b/c its unclear to me how generic it is--do all async sites use javascript? can someone clarify this?) If so, does it make sense to go ahead and start trying to learn Turbogears or Pylons? Will they be able to create async sites? Is there an easier way to do it? (Easy defined as me not having to learn a 7th programming language) I have looked at Spyce, and that seems an easy way to do the basic (step 1) site, but its not at all clear that I can do async with it. CherryPy looks like it has a steeper learning curve, but it also appears that the route to async is clearer. I know where I want to go, and I know what I can do now. I don't mind getting deeper into Python, but I'd love not to have to learn a bunch of other languages if I can avoid it. Any thoughts/comments? TIA, Matt. -- http://mail.python.org/mailman/listinfo/python-list
