On Sun, Jul 11, 2010 at 4:53 PM, Steve Holden <span dir="ltr"><<a href="mailto:steve@holdenweb.com">steve@holdenweb.com</a>></span> wrote:<br><div class="gmail_quote"><blockquote class="gmail_quote" style="margin:0 0 0 .8ex;border-left:1px #ccc solid;padding-left:1ex;">
<div class="im">Stephen Hansen wrote:<br>
> On Sat, Jul 10, 2010 at 9:23 PM, Guilherme Polo <<a href="mailto:ggpolo@gmail.com">ggpolo@gmail.com</a><br>
</div><div class="im">> <mailto:<a href="mailto:ggpolo@gmail.com">ggpolo@gmail.com</a>>> wrote:<br>
><br>
> By "never had a problem" do you mean using some of the latest versions<br>
> ? Here, running "idle" from a mac terminal and trying to type: print<br>
> "hi" crashes when entering the quotation mark.<br>
><br>
><br>
> Huh? Works fine for me. Python 2.6.1, OSX 10.6.3, intel.<br>
><br>
</div>One of the good things about the python-dev community is its commitment<br>
to test-driven development. If you are prepared to define "fine" as<br>
'successfully runs \'print "hello"\'' then I guess we should be<br>
perfectly happy about IDLE.<br></blockquote><div><br></div><div>Er, how hostile.</div><div><br></div><div>My point is, the poster made an assertion-- that you couldn't do the simple act as launching idle from a command line, and printing Hi. Maybe they can't, I have no idea.</div>
<div><br></div><div>I know I can. I know that I have also opened random python files, saved them, and ran them with IDLE. I don't use IDLE beyond that though: I live in TextMate on my mac.</div><div><br></div><div>My point was not, "IDLE is perfect". My point was, "You've claimed you can't even print out a word in IDLE, so its utterly and completely non-functional" -- and that assertion surprises me and I challenge.</div>
<div><br></div><div>I don't define IDLE as "fine", because I'm not qualified to speak to its larger aspects-- as I only rarely use it. But the level of utter brokenness that the poster I was replying to spoke of, I've never seen. Across multiple versions of Python, IDLE, and OSX.</div>
<div><br></div><blockquote class="gmail_quote" style="margin:0 0 0 .8ex;border-left:1px #ccc solid;padding-left:1ex;">
<div class="im">> From the lurking crowd-- Please don't consider removing IDLE until there<br>
> is a compelling replacement ready. It's better to have a limited IDE<br>
> that works everywhere (even if in a limited fashion-- people are free to<br>
> try out one of the many excellent full-featured Python IDE's out there<br>
> after they advance to that point) then not.<br>
><br>
</div>1: I refuse to see why we need a "compelling replacement" for a piece of<br>
software whose performance might be actively deterring people from<br>
taking up the language. ["Have you thought about Python?" "Yeah, but I<br>
tried it {meaning "I downloaded some random Python release and tried<br>
IDLE, which by modern standards appears completely lame"} and it<br>
sucked". If this is our standard for "compelling" then it appears the<br>
command-line interpreter is the competition.<br></blockquote><div><br></div><div>The claim that IDLE is "actively deterring" people from taking up Python is in my opinion unsupported. I know a lot of people who have and do use it, and I am personally (in my own experience) unaware of anyone who is actively deterred from using Python because of it. Therefore, I see no negative, and only a positive of IDLE's presence-- and so I'd want a compelling replacement available before that positive was wiped out.</div>
<div><br></div><div>Perhaps your experience is different. </div><div><br></div><div>So be it: but -- uh, really, Hostile. I was just sharing my own experience with using and talking to people who use IDLE. I've found it -- on the mac, but on other platforms as well -- an adequate but limited sort of IDE. I've found more issues with it with the people I know who use windows then mac (in particular, details of when the subprocess runs). But my comment was simply: it has constantly worked for me in the limited use I make of it, and I have a positive experience with the people I know that have used it.</div>
<div><br></div><div>If your experience is different, that's fine. Perhaps your experience is more broad, more compelling, and representative of more people. </div><div><br></div><div>But I, personally, would consider it a significant loss if IDLE went the way of the dodo or a third-party module. </div>
<div><br></div><div>-- Stephen</div></div>