Newbie deluxe

[Cliff Wells]

On Sat, 2002-06-15 at 01:50, Zach wrote:
> I've just started taking a look at Python (experienced in Delphi) and so far
> it looks very clean and comprehensible.  My question is, what are the
> fundamental differences and similarities between it and Perl?  

IMO, Perl is a scripting language, Python a programming language (the
fact that they are both interpreted being incidental).  Obviously what
qualifies as a "scripting" language versus a "real" lanaguage is
arguable (scripts can be written in C, if you like, and applications in
a combination of sed, awk and sh... oh, wait... that's Perl ;) 

While Python makes an excellent scripting language for doing sysadmin
chores, text parsing and whatnot, its clean design lends itself to large
projects, even more so than languages traditionally used in that
endeavor (C/C++, etc).

I hear so
> much about these two languages, especially in Linux circles and just
> wondered what sets them apart.  Can full fledged graphical applications be
> built with Python or does it lean more towards scripting? 

Check out wxPython: 

http://www.wxpython.org

There are also bindings for Win32, Qt, GTK, Tk and several others.

 I'm aware that it
> has OOP capabilities so I assume it reaches beyond just scripting but like I
> said, I've no experience with it.  I would like to broaden my coding skills
> with the addition of another language so any general opinions with regards
> to its usefulness are appreciated.

Try it and see =)

Regards,
Cliff