[EuroPython] Reality Check in Winter

[kirby urner]

Plus on another front I wanted to add how encouraging it would seem,
to me at least, to have a way to toggle into Cyrillic versions of the
Europython site, for two reasons:

(1) having Europython as far eastward as Vilnius is a deliberate
invitation to would-be attenders even further east, or in the same
general area

and

(2) a big theme of our Python community these days is the
transition from 2.x to 3.x and what that means in terms of unicode
becoming the native format, whereby source code might start
to diffuse more successfully outside of Latin-1 and ASCII.

Having the Europython website show off these breakthroughs in
internationalization would be ipso facto a positive advertisement
for Python and its world class sophistication etc.

AsiaPython and/or AfricaPython will give Python 3.x even deeper
workouts, but that's for other lists to work out.

I realize that Europythons have compromised on English a lot,
given Esperanto never took.

However, I think Europython is a lot like Starbucks:  it's a trusted
brand whereby newbies become inducted and persuaded that this
*is* a great way to build one's career (same with Pycon in North
America).

This message feeds back to the local user groups, where the most
local and regional dialects are hard currency.

The message is: you can take Python into these local classrooms,
without forcing a lot of mandatory English instruction as a consequence.

It still helps to be able to read in multiple human languages, no question,
but decoupling reading source code from reading only in Latin-1 will make
many learning curves less steep, helping with recruitment and retainment.

Plus this new chapter of unicode source code (not just Python is trail-
blazing here) mitigates any fears of any single geek monoculture taking
shape (i.e. we're not The Borg, much as we might look like it some days).

Kirby

On Nov 26, 2007 12:57 PM, kirby urner <kirby.urner at gmail.com> wrote:
> Yo EuroFolk! (Volk or whatever)...  Just thought I'd drop in from a
> frosty Pacific coastal rain forest, heavy into chip fab, to ask about
> the state of the web framework as of today.
>