On Jun 24, 7:10 am, Grant Edwards <inva...@invalid> wrote: > On 2009-06-24, Couper, Tim T <tim.cou...@standardbank.com> wrote: > > > Your prof. may find this thread of interest > > >http://mail.python.org/pipermail/python-list/2000-June/039779.html > > > My experience is that developers who know C and C++ can be productive in > > less than 1 week in python, and find it liberating, and educational, to > > do so. And at the same time they will have added a second language to > > their toolbox. As Kurt points out, learning C/C++ takes considerably > > longer (weeks/months to attain a level of competence). > > I agree. Your professor is deluded and knows nothing about > software development [not that either is particularly unusual > in an academic setting]. Converting a Python program to C or > C++ is a complete waste of time (both now _and_ later) unless > there are severe, insurmountable performance problems with the > Python version.
What if the point of asking a student to convert Python to C is to teach them this: > Python is a far, far better language for both real-world > production application development and for algorithm R&D. With > Python, you spend your time working on algorithms and solving > real-world problems. In C or C++, you spend your time fighting > with the bugs in your code that are preventing the program from > running. An algorithm that takes a few hours to implement and > test in Python will take weeks in C or C++. If that [teaching them this] is the case, it might be best use of time they will ever have. Carl Banks -- http://mail.python.org/mailman/listinfo/python-list
