Thomas, Thanks for the excellent suggestions.
Generator is certainly an interesting subject. >From what i understand, the advantage of generator is mainly about saving memory, right? (i.e. no need to create a list in memory before iterate thru it) Duck typing... Although it can be easily demonstrated, I find it hard to explain its advantages to Java developers who are so used to Interfaces. (Is it about the certainty of type info... I am not sure about their concern actually) Jython is not a possibility, but I will show them an example anyway. We can use it to write some support script, I suppose. (Off topic) Monkey patching - It is a term used by Ruby developer a lot. If it means to change a function's implementation in run-time, i think python can achieve the same, right? Is it equivalent to Mixin? Cheers On Tue, Jul 12, 2011 at 2:00 AM, Thomas Jollans <t...@jollybox.de> wrote: > On 07/11/2011 05:07 PM, Anthony Kong wrote: > > Hi, all, > > > > Lately I am giving some presentations to my colleagues about the python > > language. A new internal project is coming up which will require the use > > of python. > > > > One of the goals of the presentations, as told by the 'sponsor' of the > > presentation, is to help the existing Java/Excel VBA programming team to > > become productive in python asap. > > > > I have a feeling that they are asking it based on their Java/Eclipse > > experience. By productive they are actually looking for some GUI tools > > that are as helpful as Eclipse. > > > > Having done Java programming before, I am thinking of answering the > > question this way: > > > > 1) For many of us, vi/emacs are sufficient for python development. (I > > used vim + ctags as my primary IDE for a very long time) > > > > 2) For a feature-rich GUI environment, we can consider pyCharm. (I was > > totally 'wowed' by it, and has convinced my last employer to purchased a > > few enterprise licenses) > > > > 3) The Python language itself is actually small and concise. The need > > for a full-blown IDE is less. The language itself could be counted as a > > part of the productive tool. > > If your colleagues are used to Eclipse, it's almost certainly best to > continue using Eclipse, with PyDev. Don't make a big deal of the tools, > just say that many Pythonista don't use a heavy IDE, mention PyDev, and, > if you want to, recommend pyCharm. > > > 4) The functional aspect of the language (e.g. map, reduce, partial) > > helps to make program shorter and easier to understand > > Don't overemphasize this. Those functions can be very useful, and using > them can lead to very concise and simple code, but (big BUT) more often > than not, they're overly cryptic when compared to list comprehension and > generator expressions. > > Do make a huge case for generator expressions/list comprehension, and > generators. > > > 5) The 'battery included' standard library helps to avoid the need of > > complicated build tool. > > > > 6) The interactive shell helps to test out solutions in smaller units. > > Speaking of testing: introduce them to the doctest module. > > > It is probably not the team is expecting. Do you have more to add? What > > do you think about this 'answer'? > > If using Jython is an option, present it! Jython will allow Java > programmers to use their existing knowledge of the Java standard library. > > Explain, and make the case for, duck typing. > > While actual functional programming is, as I said, a bit "out there" > from a Java/VBA standpoint, do show off function objects. > > If you know what they're going to do with Python, you should point them > to relevant libraries/modules. > -- > http://mail.python.org/mailman/listinfo/python-list > -- Tony Kong *blog:* www.ahwkong.com Don’t EVER make the mistake that you can design something better than what > you get from ruthless massively parallel trial-and-error with a feedback > cycle. That’s giving your intelligence *much* too much credit. - Linus Torvalds
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