how fast is Python code - another detail

[Peter Hansen]

beliavsky at aol.com wrote:

> "Terry Reedy" <tjreedy at udel.edu> wrote in message news:<mailman.5.1078451040.19534.python-list at python.org>...
>>Speed is secondary to correctness, appropriately defined.
> 
> In production use, both are often vitally important. If you are
> modelling a lot of data, a slow compiler or programming language may
> force you to use an oversimplified model.

Terry's still right: correctness comes *first*, even if both are 
"vitally important".  Only once you have the thing correct (as proven by 
passing tests) should you focus on speed.

This leaves aside the possibility that you should consider speed before 
even picking your programming language, architecture, hardware, and 
such, which of course for a problem requiring *real* speed would come 
first.  This thread was about a small detail of Python performance and 
the possibility of having the compiler do some optimizing, however, and 
these are not concerns that would show up in the initial stage of such a 
project.

-Peter