This should be brought up on the python-3000 list; I'm moving it there
using a Bcc to python-ideas.
To some extent it is up to the vendors who distribute binaries -- they
decide what to call it.
Perhaps we should only install "python3.0" and not "python". That is a
valid choice already and always has been (python2.1, python2.2, etc.
are always installed by default, "python" is just a convenient alias).
I think that worries about Python becoming the laughingstock of the
language world are highly exaggerated. The post you refer to sounds to
me like the typical cynical one-liner from someone who doesn't really
care, not about a position of someone who is influential in the world
of language users.
--Guido
PS. Java is the VB of this decare.
On Feb 1, 2008 10:41 PM, Ralf W. Grosse-Kunstleve
This is regarding the transition to Python 3, and the confusion caused by using the same executable name for two incompatible interpreters. The consequences of this struck me today when I saw this message appear on an important bulletin board for the field I'm working in:
http://www.jiscmail.ac.uk/cgi-bin/webadmin?A2=ind0802&L=ccp4bb&T=0&F=&S=&P=1562
This posting is from a heavy-weight in the field (lookup his name with Google or better The Web of Science). Basically he's suggesting to forget about Python because it is an unreliable environment.
There is also this reply calling the original posting "alarmist":
http://www.jiscmail.ac.uk/cgi-bin/webadmin?A2=ind0802&L=ccp4bb&T=0&F=&S=&P=1464
And this one making fun of the whole thing:
http://www.jiscmail.ac.uk/cgi-bin/webadmin?A2=ind0802&L=ccp4bb&T=0&F=&S=&P=1675
I interpret these messages as early signs of an imminent decade of confusion. Therefore my plea:
PLEASE GIVE THE PYTHON 3 EXECUTABLE A DIFFERENT NAME AND THE SCRIPTS A DIFFERENT EXTENSION.
It will be a terrible political setback otherwise. Many people don't *want* to understand even if they could. Mixing up two incompatible interpreters under one name will give them plenty of ammunition for cheap jokes and for defending their not-invented-here-or-before-I-was-16 attitude.
Ralf
P.S.: My wife is from Hungary. It seems all men in Hungary have to have one of exactly three names: Andras, Laszlo, or Balazs. I never know whom she's talking about...
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