I encourage every one to at least stop writing code in Python.
replies(5):
Use a type checker! Pyright can get you like 80% of Rust's type safety.
And that's assuming the codebase and all dependencies have correct type annotations.
It's not true you can't build reliable software in python. People have. There's proof of it everywhere. Tons of examples of reliable software written in python which is not the safest language.
I think the real thing here is more of a skill issue. You don't know how to build reliable software in a language that doesn't have full type coverage. That's just your lack of ability.
I'm not trying to be insulting here. Just stating the logic:
A. You claim python can't build reliable software.
B. Reliable Software for python actually exists, therefore your claim is incorrect
C. You therefore must not have experience with building any software with python and must have your hand held and be baby-sitted by rusts type checker.
mypy's output is, AFAICT, also non-deterministic, and doesn't support a programmatic format that I know of. This makes it next to impossible to write a wrapper script to diff the errors to, for example, show only errors introduced by the change one is making.
Relying on my devs to manually trawl through 80k lines of errors for ones they might be adding in is a lost cause.
Our codebase also uses SQLAlchemy extensively, which does not play well with typecheckers. (There is an extension to aid in this, but it regrettably SIGSEGVs.)
Also this took me forever to understand:
from typing import Dict
JsonValue = str | Dict[str, "JsonValue"]
def foo() -> JsonValue:
x: Dict[str, str] = {"a": "b"}
return x
x: JsonValue = foo()
example.py:7: error: Incompatible return value type (got "dict[str, str]", expected "str | dict[str, JsonValue]") [return-value]Love this.
Regarding the ~80k errors. Yeah, nothing to do here besides slowly grinding away and adding type annotations and fixes until it's resolved.
For the code example pyright gives some hint towards variance but yes it can be confusing.
https://pyright-play.net/?pyrightVersion=1.1.403&code=GYJw9g...
Sort of like closing 80% of a submarine's hatches and then diving.
But I can build reliable software without types as well. Many people can. This isn’t secret stuff that only I can do. There are thousands and thousands of reliable software built on Python, ruby and JavaScript.
When done, do typing similarly.
We had sentry installed so I know exactly how many exceptions were happening, rare to zero. Lots of tests/constraints on the database as well.
That said I like a nice tight straitjacket at other times. Just not every day. ;-).
P.S. Python doesn’t have the billion-dollar-mistake with nulls. You have to purposely set a variable to None.
As a solo dev, I find that I start off in Python, but at a certain project size I find it too unwieldy to manage (i.e. make changes without breaking things) and that's when I implement part or all of the project in Rust.
(But if you must use Python then definitely use Pyright.)
Nobody would claim that. But are you trying to say that the language has no effect on reliability? Because that's obviously nonsense.
Language choice has some effect on reliability, and I would say Python's effect is mediocre-to-bad. Depending on if you use Pyright. Not too bad if you do. Pretty awful if you don't.
But not equally flawed.
https://www.lesswrong.com/posts/dLJv2CoRCgeC2mPgj/the-fallac...
(Also, it means that you don't get any performance benefit from static typing your program.)
Yes, exactly. It doesn’t happen that often, but it does.
And folks have forgotten, not sure why, but Python was always billed as a prototyping language in the “olden tymes.” Or even “executable pseudocode.” At those it excels.
https://python.plainenglish.io/how-instagram-uses-python-sca...