My learning python initial experience, from a old Perl and C developer to a fresh new python dev. I wrote on terms of the first walls of dificulty and how I proceed to pass through them.

The first wall

It is hard to get used with a life without braces, commas and where your personal preferences about how the code should be are way more strict. Took me years to get real interest on python just because of that. Only when I felt that my first choice, Perl, was really fading that I managed to get into it.

I assume that after one month my code still with a strong Perl accent but the way I found to overcome it was doing really small scripts and gradually changing my “default” language to it. Getting used with it totally renewed my interest on it. So my first advice is get used with the layout and look of a python code. I can tell you that I find it totally fine now, even if I still prefer brackes to define blocks.

The second wall

The natural second wall is that coming specially from Perl, the feeling is like loosing freedom. What I noticed at the sametime I broke the first wall, is that the things are not that tight. Python has a lot of TMTOWTDI, but is just not endersed. The end result is that I use the preferred way 95% of the time and still have the “freedom” to do they way I like or think is better when required.

Third wall

pip is not like cpan, will never be, but you can get used to that. To be honest right now I also like the apparent chaos that it is. But like the second wall, we are 95% covered, so when you stop minding it you got a nice reward: Most of the modules are updated and for “modern” developement it gaves you more options.

My first tool

This site is kept by a simple script, that reads the markdown files and convert to html and generate a simple index with a table of content. I kept both versions for historic reasons and to be honest both are very hackish but today I prefer to look on the python version.

Keep in mind that is just a hackish script and not a comparison between languages, I am describing my feelings on moving on to learn a new trick.

What is still hard

Regexes still hard, somewhat string manipulation on Perl makes much more sense, to me. Won’t comment more than that for now because is just my personal opinion.

What is nice

Until now, two thinks keep me going on. The sense of freashness and support and the threads support :) I found on my own black magic that the mixture of threads and fork that I can do easily on Python is everything I always wanted. This is subject to other text to be written.

Python cheatsheet

This one is a cool one