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Clojure

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Clojure vs F# vs Python: What are the differences?

# Introduction
In this comparison, we will highlight the key differences between Clojure, F#, and Python.

1. **Type System**: Clojure is a dynamically typed language, meaning type checking is done at runtime. F# is a statically typed language, where type checking is done at compile time. Python is dynamically typed like Clojure but also optionally supports static type checking through tools like MyPy.

2. **Syntax**: Clojure uses prefix notation (also known as Polish notation) for function calls, which can be unfamiliar to programmers coming from other languages. F# follows a more traditional syntax influenced by ML languages, using camel case for naming conventions. Python uses a more familiar infix notation for function calls and follows indentation for code blocks.

3. **Concurrency**: Clojure provides robust support for concurrency through its immutable data structures and software transactional memory. F# also offers good concurrency support through asynchronous programming with asynchronous workflows. Python, on the other hand, lacks built-in support for parallelism and concurrency, requiring third-party libraries like asyncio or multiprocessing.

4. **Community and Ecosystem**: Clojure has a smaller but highly active and passionate community, with a focus on functional programming paradigms. F# has a strong community within the .NET ecosystem and benefits from a rich set of libraries and tools. Python boasts a large and diverse community with extensive libraries and frameworks for various use cases.

5. **Performance**: In terms of performance, F# typically outperforms both Clojure and Python due to its closer integration with the underlying .NET runtime. Clojure's performance can be optimized through the use of Java interop or specific Clojure features, while Python's performance can be a concern for intensive compute tasks due to its interpreted nature.

6. **Learning Curve**: Clojure and F# might have a steeper learning curve for beginners due to their unique syntax and functional programming concepts. Python, with its easy-to-read syntax and extensive documentation, is considered more beginner-friendly and suitable for quick prototyping and scripting tasks.

In Summary, Clojure, F#, and Python differ in their type systems, syntax, concurrency support, community ecosystems, performance characteristics, and learning curves, catering to different preferences and use cases in the software development landscape. 
Advice on Clojure, F#, and Python
Sadie Flick
Needs advice
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JavaJavaJavaScriptJavaScript
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PythonPython

Generally speaking, what are the most important things you expect a junior developer to know and be able to do from day 1 in your respective tech stack? Firm grasp of OOP? SQL? MVC? ORM? Algorithms and Datastructures? Understanding CRUD & the request response cycle? Database design? framework familiarity? Postman? Deployment? TDD? Git? Language-specific knowledge? Other things?

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Replies (5)
Prashant Singh Ahluwalia
Head of Engineering - AIOps at Microsoft · | 13 upvotes · 295.2K views
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at

Start with building a solid understanding of computer science fundamentals. Understand the basics of building blocks - memory, processing, storage, networking. Understand what CPU bound, memory bound, I/O bound, network bound processes are. Understand the cost of accessing data from Memory vs. Disk vs Network. Understand how multiple CPU threads help in optimizing the performance of a single machine.

Build expertise on a programming language. You may pick any language of your choice. I would recommend starting with Java / Python. Make sure you know one language really well. Build a strong understanding of Data Structures and Algorithms. You should be able to develop an intuition on when to use what. You may practice DS and Algorithm problems, using the language of your choice, on a competitive coding platform (e.g. Leetcode) or by building your own App!

Next, get familiar with basic cloud computing and distributed system concepts. Here is a good resource for that - https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=p7NkTUyEE1o&ab_channel=JeffreyRichter If you understand the computer science fundamentals well, you will be able to apply those concepts here as well.

Hope it helps!

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Ability to read code and willingness to try to reason flow of operations and information. Tools and technologies change, one doesn't need to have them in toolbelt from day one. All things you name are relevant in some contexts, so it's not bad to understand them.

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Luan Himmlisch
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Just learn to learn. Learn to search and develop your logical thinking, that's all you need. No books, no deep study of how computers work, just logic and willingness to learn

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For me, it is less of a specific technology you know (although I would prefer you have some knowledge of some of my team stack). It is more the way you get into a problem, the eagerness to learn more, the true sincerity to say "I don't know", the open mind to find solutions in different ways and the "Yes we can" mentality no matter how hard it is.

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Most employers don't expect from you to know how to implement CI/CD or any other funcy stuff. As junior developer you should focus on building a good toolset of good software practices & principles. Your soft skills are important as well. Learn about soft skills. Be eager to learn, be humble and show you talent and your creativity through your work. If you want to become a good developer ( at first) and a star engineer (at a later stage) then computer programming (coding) is your number one priority . Coding is like painting. Putting aside your talent, you have to practice a lot and improve your outcome each time. As junior developer you can learn how to write good code by studying existing code found in public git repositories (i e , github). As junior developer you should study some good software principles (i.e., DRY, KISS, YAGNI) and always recall them each time you write software code. As junior developer you should learn about coding standards and conventions. You will have to follow to your company's coding conventions (soon or later) as well as you will realize that you have to write code cosistent to the existing code base. At the end of the day, code consistency matters a lot. You have to improve your code day by day. If you manage to follow some good software practices you will find out that you will need an ORM to work with your database. Then you will realize that you need the X web framework to build your REST API etc. To sum up, you will start building a toolset with a single programming language and some good software practices & principles and then you will put new tools in it day-by-day.

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Needs advice
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ElixirElixirGolangGolang
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PythonPython

Hi! I'm currently studying Flutter for mobile apps, but I also have a demand to automate some tasks on the web and create backends' for my apps, so thinking about which one of those could be better? Considering the performance and how easy it's to learn and create stuff? (I'm already familiar with .NET stack but want something more "simple" to write)

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Amit Mor
Software Architect at Payoneer · | 5 upvotes · 219.8K views
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PythonPython

Definitely Python. Lots of libraries, dead simple syntax. Lots of code examples and reference projects. Elixir is pure functional and takes time to grasp the concepts. Go is great, with simple syntax and performant runtime, but more strict as it is statically typed. For quick coding, nothing beats Python. As you come from .net I’d consider similar approach and be considering Java with SpringBoot as it makes Java faster and much more fun to code web servers

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ElixirElixir

Elixir really has a good performance for the web (and in general). Its framework Phoenix for the web is a great tool, easy to install and to use, with features for websockets (and Pub/Sub) or LiveView to write reactive and real time app with only HTML (and Elixir) so basically everything is in one place

It can take some time to learn a few things in Elixir but I really think it's worth it, and it's very easy to go distributed and concurrent with Elixir. Also it's easier to code quickly with some features like the pattern matching or some operators like the pipe or the capture one

And in the case you need it you can still connect and interface Python and Elixir pretty quickly, and now Elixir has a lot of different frameworks : web, embedded or even neural networks now

Never went far with Go but I have some trouble with its syntax, I find it a bit messy

I don't have a lot of experience with the web with Python but I don't have a good experience with the little I did

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GolangGolangPythonPython

Judging your previous experience we will benefit from Golang in terms of portability and speed. If you want to go simplier use Python. If it's only scripts use Python.

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Shivam kr Shiv

Hey Vitor, You can use Node and Express JS to create a backend for your app. You can create REST APIS to connect your front end with the backend. It is a very simple and scalable solution for building backend web apps.

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Needs advice
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JavaJavaJavaScriptJavaScript
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PythonPython

I'm making my university community web service with a team. (6 members myself included)

And we decided to use JavaScript, HTML, CSS (for sure, it's the basic of websites) but couldn't decide for the back end part.

There are tons of languages, tools, etc., but I'm really new to programming, so I'd like to get some help to figure out what tools we need.

So my question is this: are there any good examples of web community services we can mimic the tools or get an insight from them?

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Since you're following Python, I would recomend using Django as your main back-end language. If you know Python it would be a great experience. Django is well documented on their official website: https://www.djangoproject.com/ I would also use React for front-end as well. Also this article is worth reading, I think progressive web app is something worth learning these days: https://web.dev/progressive-web-apps/ Hope that helps :)

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Since your team is already using JavaScript, there's a great number of examples for backend services written with NodeJS. I'd recommend using Firebase, or any backend as a service (you can use that term to find alternatives), for setting up your backend as it is much easier for newer people to understand and lets you focus on your core application logic, and not provisioning servers, databases, etc.

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anas mattar
Technical Lead at DPO International · | 2 upvotes · 245.5K views
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JavaScriptJavaScript

Since you're team is already using JavaScript, there are alot of examples and open source projects written with NodeJs, so I preffer this language in your backend application and also I am recommended using Mongo DB with It for saving data in it, and also for your frontend application I am recommanded using VueJs.

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Nash Nziramasanga
Software Developer at Billow Software · | 1 upvotes · 245.4K views

Since you are already using JavaScript on the front end it would be easy to adopt the MERN (MongoDB, Express, React, NodeJS) stack which s all javascript based making it easy to transfer knowledge with the backend and front end

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Jamal Abdinasir
Product manager at abdinasirjamal171@gmail.com · | 1 upvotes · 245.7K views
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Kindly I don't find any help that solve this mystery I need more help if it will happen

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Hüseyin Özkılıç
Senior Full-Stack Developer at RADSoft · | 1 upvotes · 245.3K views
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JavaScriptJavaScriptLaravelLaravel

Make it simple, most of projects doesnt need a AI, ML or big algorithms. If your project just serving end users take it to the web ready compatible. (Javascript, .Net, PHP Laravel)

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Needs advice
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C++C++JavaScriptJavaScript
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PythonPython

Hello, I am interested in learning how to program. I am a beginner, and many articles saying I should go with Python if I am new to programming. I considered Lua a long time ago, but for my career, I believe major programming languages should be better for me. I'm considering Python at this moment, but if you have other tools I should use, let me know.

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Replies (3)
Pat Fitzner
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PythonPython

Although Lua is a very simple,efficient, elegant and welcoming language, Python is extremely versatile. Therefore, if you want to get into programming without a defined direction, Python is the way to go. It has a lot of libraries, the ability to do anything and it is closer to other languages than Lua is (yeah I know about Lua and C, but from a learner's point of view, it makes sense). Additionally, Python will be a marketable skill, but I for one have not yet seen job offers for Lua devs.

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C langC langC++C++C#C#JavaJava

The language you choose is also dependant on the type of career / area of programming you wish to focus on: Web Based and mobile applicaitons I would lean towards Java, PC Applications I tend to like C#, Embedded industry C, C++

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anas mattar
Technical Lead at DPO International · | 2 upvotes · 223K views
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my advice , you should answer me for this question, what do you like to work: web base or mobile native or cross platform. if you like web base you should choose PHP or ASP.net or Node.js or if you like mobile native you should decide Android or IOS platform and else if you like cross platfrom you should learn Flutter with dart language. thanks

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Brayden W
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Hey, 👋

My name is Brayden. I’m currently a Frontend React Developer, striving to move into Fullstack so I can expand my knowledge.

For my main backend language, I am deciding between Python, Rust, and Go. I’ve tried each of them out for about an hour and currently, I like Python and Rust the most. However, I’m not sure if I’m missing out on something!

If anyone has advice on these technologies, I’d love to hear it!

Thanks.

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Replies (4)
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GolangGolangPythonPython

Rust is still in low demand. It's a great language but you'll have a hard time finding jobs. Go is the mix of both Rust and Python. Great language with modern features, fast, scalable, fun to write, and at the same time it has high demand (not as much as python).

Python on the other hand is a language that you can't go wrong with. Look around you and see what your job market prefers. If there isn't much difference to you personally, pick the one with more demand.

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All of these are solid options, however considering your expertise currently, I would probably suggest Node.JS considering your past experience with JS. However Python offers a similar development environment to JS in my opinion, and Go is a good sort of intermediate between Rust and Node.JS and Python. It's fast, but not as fast as Rust, and offers a development experience that combines C-styled languages (like Rust), and Python-y languages... So: Rust for the fastest, Node for familiarity, Python for ease of development, and Go for a good middle ground. I have used all in personal projects... If you use Go, I suggest a easy to use web server framework like Fiber.

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Akihito KIRISAKI
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PythonPythonRustRust

Rust is a challenging choice, but worth to be chosen. It has strong memory-safety and type-safety, this gives you no bother about those errors. However, static typing languages often slow our developing speed down in early stage. In that case, it's effective to write prototype in an easy language like Python, and rewrite it in a hard language. It's important not to be afraid to throw away first code you write.

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Donald Tran
Software Engineer at T-Mobile · | 3 upvotes · 412.5K views
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RustRust

The other answers are excellent, but I want to be a bit of a contrarian and say you should learn Rust. While the number of jobs for it are (relatively) low(er), it is certainly expanding and you'd be surprised at which companies do use Rust (Discord, for example, is starting to move away from Golang to Rust!).

But the main reason is that learning Rust itself will teach you a lot about systems design (/backend) because of its borrow checker. You can try out a lot of ideas and make a lot mistakes and the borrow checker will always be there guide you to a better solution (thereby teaching you in the process).

Also, I wouldn't underestimated how important managing memory (and memory safety) is. While Golang is great in some ways, it doesn't protect you from pushing memory leaks into production. And eventually you'll come upon a scenario where you'll have to make your Python code run faster and the optimizations you'd have to do won't look pretty (or be very Pythontic).

And Rust is freakin fast! If you have Rust, you wouldn't need any other language for the backend (or any other systems level code). Check this blog post: https://blog.discord.com/why-discord-is-switching-from-go-to-rust-a190bbca2b1f?gi=dd8bc5d669d. Discord found that even after spending months optimizing Golang code it still wasn't fast enough. But unoptimized, first-draft Rust code was (is) faster by an order of magnitude!

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piusha kalyana
Senior software engineer at Getir · | 13 upvotes · 380.8K views
Needs advice
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GolangGolangPHPPHP
and
PythonPython

Hi

I want to build a tool to check asset availability (video, images, etc.) from third-party vendors. These vendors have APIs. However, this process should run daily basis and update the database with the status. This is a kind of separate process. I need to know what will be the good approach and technology for this?

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Hannes Holst
at 365 Consulting Services Ltd. · | 7 upvotes · 379.6K views
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PythonPython

hi - I think this depends on how you want to provide the information to the user. If you want to build a Wordpress-plugin: PHP If you want to build your own website: Python+Django / PHP / JavaScript+Node.js As Desktop application?

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anas mattar
Technical Lead at DPO International · | 3 upvotes · 366.5K views
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on
PHPPHP

for what technologies you should use, this is depend on what technology do you prefer? your should think best structuing for your code because each API vendor has different to a nother one so it's better no merege code vendores together. your code must be using SOLID principle pattern and some design pattern such as Factory Pattern

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GolangGolang

The major advantage of Go is that you can run queries in parallel. Fire off a Go thread for each vendor and each thread can check the availability of assets from a specific vendor and update the database. Go supports hundreds of threads with ease.

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anas mattar
Technical Lead at DPO International · | 1 upvotes · 362.6K views
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on
C#C#GolangGolangPHPPHP

your decision depend on what language do you know. if you know php you can use laravel framework

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Oluwafemi Lawrence
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GolangGolang

Hi, I would recommend Go because of strongly-typed nature which makes a developer more productive as it is less error prone compared to the other dynamic-typed language. Go also has cron-job library(powered by goroutines) that can help with your automated tasks.

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Needs advice
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C#C#F#F#
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KotlinKotlin

Hi there. I want to expand my coding toolset. So I want to learn a second backend language besides Kotlin. Kotlin is fantastic. I love it in every aspect, and I think I can never return to Java. And also why should I? It is 100% interoperable with java and can co-exist in every project.

So my question here is. Which language do you think will bring me more joy? I think F#; it is more like Kotlin. Then C# (it's more or like 100% java). But, let's say I learn F#. Is it 100% interoperable like Kotlin? can they live side by side? Can I, then, apply to .NET jr jobs after a while, for example, or is C# the holy cow? I would like to learn .Net.

If it is the worst and only C# is acceptable, then which language should I learn? Dart? Go?

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Replies (3)
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C#C#

animefanx1,

First let's get your questions sorted: Which language do you think will bring me more joy?

This you will have to decide for yourself, I am a long time C# developer and have seen it grow into a very compelling platform. The language and I'd compare it more to Kotlin than Java (by a long margin). More on .NET in a bit.

say I learn F#. Is it 100% interoperable like Kotlin?

You can have 100% interop with a caveat, your F# libraries have to implement certain guidance in order to be referenced from C#. Some (dare I say most) of the differences between F# and C# are predicated on language constructs that are not available in C#. For instance F# functions that return Unit.

can they live side by side?

Yes.

Can I, then, apply to .NET jr jobs after a while, for example, or is C# the holy cow?

I don't know if I take your meaning, but let me say this: Learning either C# or F# will likely force you to understand concepts such as garbage collection, primitive types, etc. which apply to all .NET languages, thus a lot of the effort you put into .NET is bound to pay off regardless of your choice.

If it is the worst and only C# is acceptable, then which language should I learn? Dart? Go? You can't go wrong with any of these and I venture to say whether you select C#, F#, Dart or Go as your next adventure, your willingness to learn will take you to try other languages, some which mey not even exist yet!

PS1: .NET is an end to end environment now. With the introduction of Blazor and Razor pages one does not need JavaScript or other browser scripting languages, it even interops with JavaScript. PS2. Microsoft is working on unifying .NET. Soon there will be only one version: .NET 5! Caveat: Some features such as WinForms will still be specific to the windows environment but all of those are likely things you don't need in Mac or Linux

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C#C#KotlinKotlin

Exceptional decision to go with Kotlin. For the other story, go full with C#. "is C# the holy cow? Yes it is.". Specially now when netCore is crossplatform and you can build asp.net core applications on Windows, Linux and macOS via Visual Studio Code which is also multiplatform. Nothing will beat C# in the near future. Also, at the end of 2021 Microsoft will release Net 6.0 which will include MAUI.

"For those new to .NET MAUI (standing for .NET Multi-platform App UI), Microsoft says it's "the evolution of Xamarin.Forms extended from mobile to desktop scenarios with UI controls rebuilt from the ground up for performance and extensibility."

So, C# all the way sire!

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GolangGolang

I think you can learn go instead C#. C# is cool, but Golang also cool. It can run on any OS without specific software. C# can run on linux too but it's only the .NET Core as I know. But golang is flexible. So try it and decide what do you think about Golang

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Needs advice
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PowerShellPowerShell
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PythonPython

I am technical support. I work daily with Windows Server / Exchange, Active directory. I would like to learn scripting and automation to make my life easier. I just started learning PowerShell but not really sure about the correct study path from where I can start. I am taking some courses on Udemy and YouTube. Is it enough?

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PowerShellPowerShell

My first foray into programming was with powershell and it continues to be an enormous help for me in my career (caveat being that I have primarily worked on windows boxes). That being said, PowerShell is a weird language that has some unique syntax and operators that don't translate well to other languages. Python is weird too, but for other reasons (spacing!). I suspect you'll get more immediate benefit spending some time on Powershell since your working in an environment that fully supports the ps toolset.

As for learning, I read "PowerShell Toolmaking in a Month of Lunches" and found that helpful. However, I think your course of study is sufficient. Think the most return for the effort was just messing around in the powershell IDE on my local computer and working the Microsoft documentation.

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Witt Allen
DevOps Engineer at Provisions Group · | 5 upvotes · 128.5K views
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PowerShellPowerShell

Taking courses on Udemy and YouTube will be helpful I'm sure, but don't neglect the power of practice. If you work largely with Windows right now, pick powershell. Take opportunities to convert the knowledge you already have (example: unlocking an account in Active Directory or adding an email alias in Exchange) from a manual process to a powershell method. Sometimes that's a single cmdlet (Unlock-AdAccount) and sometimes it's a script.

Once you have a good understanding of variables, the pipeline, and foreach loops, you'll be in a position to accelerate your learning. Looking up Microsoft docs is part of the process :)

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PowerShellPowerShell

I would consider reading "Powershell for sysadmins" from No Starch Press. Start small with the ActiveDirectory and AzureAd modules. Start with read only operations like pulling AD Group Members into a variable and then pipe that variable into a .csv file with Export-CSV cmdlet. Once you feel more comfortable with the syntax, specific cmdlets, and piping data start looking at specific techniques like using hashtables (dictionaries) and globbing. From there you can begin to construct your own functions and modules. Just start small and don't let yourself get overwhelmed.

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Needs advice
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RustRust

I am a beginner, and I am totally confused, which of these 3 languages to learn first. Go, Rust, or Python. As my studies are going which of them will be easy to learn with studies that is, I can learn and do my studies also. Which one of them will be easily handled with my studies, and will be much much useful in future?

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Replies (17)
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PythonPython

python is a good language to start for the beginner.

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Will Vandebelt
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GolangGolangPythonPython

Python is a great language to learn as a beginner. However, Go is really easy to learn as well and has a much more powerful standard library that will allow you to build very complex and powerful applications in the future. Go is becoming a standard in Cloud computing and concurrency. Both of which are very advanced but important.

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PythonPython

I have experience in all three languages, and you should learn python first. These are three different languages (read: tools) to solve different problems you may have. Python is a high level language you can use for writing cross-platform scripts, web servers, AI, websites (e.g. Django) and the list goes on. Python can be used for most programming tasks while being the easiest to learn of the three and probably the most productive as well.

A lot of tech companies start out with Python for their web services, but due to Pythons slow speed and the pain that comes with dynamically typed languages when the code base grows, switch to Go later on when they need to scale. Go is a systems language that thrives when used for high performance cloud/web or networking services. Go is used in performance critical networking situations such as Twitch's streaming services and Uber's geofence services. It's also very clean and simple syntax that makes it very easy to quickly understand what code does.

Python is an interpreted language and Go is a garbage collected language, but Rust is a highly performant and reliable compiled programming language without the extra baggage of runtime memory management. Rust forces you to follow coding patterns that assure memory safety. This makes Rust a perfect fit for high performance algorithms, game engines or safety-critical systems, but would be overkill for web servers or scripts on modern hardware.

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GolangGolang

I'd definitely start with Go. I know Python, Go and quite a few other languages.

Rust is not easy to learn as a beginner.

Python has way too many features to be called "easy" to learn. While it is very forgiving to beginner mistakes it feels like playing in a puddle of mud. It does not teach you clean programming at all. Unless of course you like messy.

Go on the other hand is very easy to learn. As a professional you can learn the entire language in under 2 hours. I have already given the tour of Go (https://tour.golang.org/) to complete beginners and they went through it very thoroughly and thereby knew the entire Go language in less than 5 days. While it is very easy to learn and very easy to read, it is quite strict on other things, guiding you to write clean code. For one it is a typed language and it is good to learn very early about types.

Knowing the entire language is of course not all there is to know. There is the standard library and a lot of other libraries to get to know in every language. Also one has to learn patterns in every language, get experience on how to structure code, dig deeper into the language itself to understand its inner workings, etc. That takes years in every language.

That being said, it depends very much on what you want to do with a language. If you want to go into ML and science you definitely need Python. If you want to go into cloud computing, distributed servers (which in my opinion any server should be nowadays), use Go. If you want to do systems level programming, e.g in hardware programming, use Rust.

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C#C#PythonPython

If all you want is a gentle intro and have access to tools and libs that can help with your tasks, Python is the way to go. It's ecosystem is huge and the language is easy to pick up. However, if you are aiming to get into software industry, I'd highly recommend you also pick up another classic language like C++/C#/Java. It really helps you cement some CS & programming fundamentals and get more familiar with the concept of software design and software architecture. Not saying you cannot achieve good architecture in Python or Go, but traditionally you have more materials covering these classic OOP languages. And once you learn them, you can apply your knowledge to other languages and it helps you understand other languages faster.

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Kudos Beluga
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PythonPython

Rust is probably a bad choice for starting out. It is a low level language where garbage collection is not done automatically, and has to get you thinking about all the technical aspects. It is statically typed and compiled, so it's very strict with how you code. I do love Rust though, it's a nice language. Golang is also compiled and statically typed, but it aims to be for quick development, which makes it a better choice for starting out.

Python though can be great for starting out and getting a hold on how to program. You don't need to worry about things such as types, garbage collection, or an overwhelming amount of data types. Since I'm a JavaScript fanboy I can't help but say another great popular choice to start is JavaScript 😁

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Stanislav Petrov
Senior Software Engineer at GfK · | 3 upvotes · 332.5K views
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on
PythonPython

If you start learning programming I'd suggest Python language. I have no experience with Go and Rust so I cannot give you advice for them.

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Recommends

Python has the broadest reach as it's been around the longest; rust is much more difficult for a beginner to learn; I work with Go every day and it's probably the most productive general use language.

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GolangGolangPythonPython

Go and Python are going to be much easier to learn than Rust. The memory management for Rust is pretty hard to wrap your head around when you are first learning how to do basic things with the language. Get familiar with programming first, then learn Rust.

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Recommends

I'd choose python because with a good knowledge of python and it's libraries, you could do literally anything. Also it has a relatively simple structure, so it won't be tough for a beginner.

Later on if you wish to learn Rust and Go, please do by all means.

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PythonPython

Python is a great language to start programming with, there is an awesome python course on coursera by Dr. Charles Severance called Programming for everybody, check it out :)

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I agree with most of the other answers here. Python is the best choice because it is super user-friendly, has an easy syntax, and can do many complex things in relatively fewer lines.

While Rust is a more recent and a great language nonetheless, it is slightly more complicated as it involves compiling and the syntax isn't so great.

And Go is the not a great choice either. While it has a decent syntax, keep in mind that Go won't be of much use unless you plan on working in Google. Even if you want to learn it, you can do so later.

I hope this helped you in making your decision, and welcome to the world of programming! I hope you enjoy.

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Amity International School Sec Gurugram
Vice Cyber Captain at Student · | 1 upvotes · 332.2K views
Recommends
on
PythonPython

Python, because its the easiest to learn as a beginer. Its often called "English without grammar" because its terms and writing style is quite similar to English. Python also has a diverse range of applications like Web App, Desktop App, Data Science etc

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Recommends

Learn/start with C; don't rush after buzz words. Python is easy to learn but you would not get the underpinnings of memory and pointers, an important aspect of programming.

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Recommends
on
PythonPython

Python is the easiest of the languages to learn, and while the slowest in production, it will teach many of the basic fundamental concepts of programming, especially if you're not going to be doing anything low level or at a system level.

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Recommends
on
PythonPython

Python is the best programming language for starting out as it is quite easy to learn, but it also is very powerful and you can do plenty with it. It will be useful for a long time. Python is my recommendation.

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on
GolangGolang

Study, machine learning = Python | High performance computing, safety-oriented programming = Rust | Backend, feel productive with less runtime performance drawback = Go

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Needs advice
on
C#C#DjangoDjango
and
PythonPython

Hi all, I have been working on the development and automation of construction software using C# and Python. Recently I have started working on Django python web framework and basic frontend for web development. I am really confused to choose between C# and Python to move forward in my career. Seeking your advice on these technologies and their future market value from a career perspective. Thanks,

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Replies (3)
ALESSIO SALTARIN
Distinguished IT Architect at IBM · | 10 upvotes · 220.1K views
Recommends
on
C#C#DjangoDjangoPythonPython

In my opinion, a modern developer should have deep knowledge about Object Oriented (OOP) and Functional Programming (FP). The programming language is something that must come later. Any good programmer should be able to switch from one programming language to another easily, if they follow OOP and FP. There are languages, though, that must absolutely be in the portfolio of a modern developer: Java, C#, Python and JavaScript. But be prepared to know also Scala, Kotlin, Swift, Go, Ruby, Rust and TypeScript.

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Recommends
on
DjangoDjango

It depends on your preferred career path, if you want to work in start-up/scale-up environments, you probably want to go with a language like Django for the rapid development (fast to production). On the other hand, C# or Java would be better for building long term and large scaled applications, although, Django could certainly achieve this as well. I also want to second that it won't hurt to know both languages, pick your technologies wisely according to the use case, don't stick to a single technology stack. :)

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Carlos Iglesias
Recommends

C# and Python are both great languages. With great communities, libraries, frameworks, opportunities. I think it will be the same in a near future.

It’s matter of your likes, and your next jobs.

Dot net core is a little faster on performance. Python more popular with dynamic types. Probably the most lovable language.

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Decisions about Clojure, F#, and Python

We chose Rust for our web API because the Warp crate makes it easy to compose high-performance and asynchronous APIs. Rust allows us to achieve high development velocity because it provides zero-cost abstractions and enforces strict type and memory-safety checks with high quality and actionable error messages.

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Python will be used in order to train machine learning models from our data. We chose python for this task because it is the most common language for machine learning. It has very performant libraries like numpy and scikit-learn that provide functionality for manipulating data and creating models that you cannot get in other languages like JavaScript and Java. Additionally, it is the most familiar language for us to use for machine learning because almost every machine learning course teaches ml using python.

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Javascript will be used for both our frontend and backend on the web service. JavaScript is ubiquitous as the language to use for the frontend. For the backend, we decided to create our server using JavaScript because of its easy setup; using Express we can create a server in just a few short lines of code. It is simple not only to run the server locally, but to host it as well because any major service will support the language. JavaScript is a simple language to code in and familiar among our team members, so using it will help speed up development. Using JavaScript allows us to use NodeJS and npm, so we can use packages to easily set up the server, connect to a database and other convenient utilities. We also considered Python for our server. It is also very simple to create a server in Python, especially using flask. However, the extra familiarity with the JavaScript language and the ease of using packages were enough for us to pick JavaScript as our language of choice.

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MACHINE LEARNING

Python is the default go-to for machine learning. It has a wide variety of useful packages such as pandas and numpy to aid with ML, as well as deep-learning frameworks. Furthermore, it is more production-friendly compared to other ML languages such as R.

Pytorch is a deep-learning framework that is both flexible and fast compared to Tensorflow + Keras. It is also well documented and has a large community to answer lingering questions.

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Python: The top language in machine learning area because of the various open-source libraries. Our company will rely on open-source libraries for development as well.

Amazon EC2: Training machine learning model needs to be running on independent 3rd party computing resources. AWS EC2 can provide a variety of virtual computing resources based on what users need.

React+Javascript: React is popular and everyone in the team is familiar with it. React is an open-source JavaScript library that is used for building user interfaces specifically for single-page applications.

ExpressJS: Everyone in the team has used expressJS for development. It can create server-side web applications faster and smarter.

Amazon RDS: relational database service and free to use

Postman: Tool for the team to test API endpoint.

Circle CI: is lightweight and open. Therefore for faster deployment jobs, one can execute their codes on CircleCI as it deploys on scalable and robust cloud servers.

Docker: Easily pack, ship, and run any application as a lightweight, portable, self-sufficient container, which can run virtually anywhere

Github+Git: Julian is from Github so no other choice for us 😎

Slack: Everyone likes it and it's free

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Python: Top one language in machine learning area because of the various open source libraries. Our company will rely on the open source libraries for development as well.

Amazon EC2: Training machine learning model needs to be ran on independent 3rd party computing resources. AWS EC2 can provide variety of virtual computing resources based on what users need.

React+Javascript: React is popular and everyone in the team is familiar with it. React is an open-source JavaScript library that is used for building user interfaces specifically for single-page applications.

ExpressJS: Everyone in the team has used expressJS for development. It can create server-side web applications faster and smarter.

Amazon RDS: relational database service and free to use

Postman: Tool for the team to test API end point.

Circle CI: is lightweight and open. Therefore for faster deployment jobs, one can execute their codes on CircleCI as it deploys on scalable and robust cloud servers.

Docker: Easily pack, ship, and run any application as a lightweight, portable, self-sufficient container, which can run virtually anywhere

Github+Git: Julian is from Github so no other choice for us 😎

Slack: Everyone likes it and it's free

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2 major challenges for which JS comes as a handy tool, 1st its integration with AWS SDK was at par as Python and .net and the solution comes to hand with the reverse proxy solutions for the application to be running as an instance taking the situation of inside organization demography of resources expertise over the technology.

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Alexandre Desroches
Founder & Developper at Finance D · | 71 upvotes · 377K views

I had a goal to create the simplest accounting software for Mac and Windows to help small businesses in Canada.

This led me to a long 2 years of exploration of the best language that could provide these features:

  • Great overall productivity
  • International wide-spread usage for long-term sustainability and easy to find documentation
  • Versatility for creating websites and desktop softwares
  • Enjoyable developper experience
  • Ability to create good looking modern UIs
  • Job openings with this language

I tried Python, Java, C# and C++ without finding what I was looking for.

When I discovered Javascript, I really knew it was the right language to use. Thinking of this today makes me realize even more how great a decision this has been to learn, use and master Javascript. It has been a fun, challenging and productive road on which I am still satisfied.

Obviously, when I refer to Javascript, it is not without implying the vast ecosystem around it. For me, JS is a whole universe in which almost every imaginable tools exist. It's awesome - for real. Thanks to all the contributors which have made it possible.

To be even clearer about how intense I am with Javascript, let's just say that my first passion was music. Until, I find coding with Javascript! Yep, I know!

So in conclusion, I chose Javascript because it is versatile, enjoyable, widely used, productive for both desktop softwares and websites with ability to create modern great looking user interfaces (assuming HTML and CSS are involved) and finally there are job openings.

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Python has become the most popular language for machine learning right now since almost all machine learning tools provide service for this language, and it is really to use since it has many build-in objects like Hashtable. In C, you need to implement everything by yourself.

C++ is one of the most popular programming languages in graphics. It has many fancy libraries like eigen to help us process matrix. I have many previous projects about graphics based on C++ and this time, we also need to deal with graphics since we need to analyze movements of the human body. C++ has much more advantages than Java. C++ uses only compiler, whereas Java uses compiler and interpreter in both. C++ supports both operator overloading and method overloading whereas Java only supports method overloading. C++ supports manual object management with the help of new and delete keywords whereas Java has built-in automatic garbage collection.

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Kirill Mikhailov

Go is a way faster than both Python and PHP, which is pretty understandable, but we were amazed at how good we adapted to use it. Go was a blessing for a team , since strict typing is making it very easy to develop and control everything inside team, so the quality was really good. We made huge leap forward in dev speed because of it.

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Pros of Clojure
Pros of F#
Pros of Python
  • 117
    It is a lisp
  • 100
    Persistent data structures
  • 100
    Concise syntax
  • 90
    jvm-based language
  • 89
    Concurrency
  • 81
    Interactive repl
  • 76
    Code is data
  • 61
    Open source
  • 61
    Lazy data structures
  • 57
    Macros
  • 49
    Functional
  • 23
    Simplistic
  • 22
    Immutable by default
  • 20
    Excellent collections
  • 19
    Fast-growing community
  • 15
    Multiple host languages
  • 15
    Simple (not easy!)
  • 15
    Practical Lisp
  • 10
    Because it's really fun to use
  • 10
    Addictive
  • 9
    Community
  • 9
    Web friendly
  • 9
    Rapid development
  • 9
    It creates Reusable code
  • 8
    Minimalist
  • 6
    Programmable programming language
  • 6
    Java interop
  • 5
    Regained interest in programming
  • 4
    Compiles to JavaScript
  • 3
    Share a lot of code with clojurescript/use on frontend
  • 3
    EDN
  • 1
    Clojurescript
  • 53
    Pattern-matching
  • 42
    Makes programming fun again
  • 38
    Type providers
  • 32
    Delightful
  • 30
    Frictionless
  • 26
    Static type inference
  • 21
    Composable
  • 19
    Ml syntax
  • 17
    REPL
  • 17
    Succinct
  • 10
    DDD
  • 9
    Making invalid states impossible
  • 7
    Great community
  • 7
    WebSharper
  • 7
    Language support for units of measure
  • 6
    Functional Programming
  • 6
    Powerful
  • 5
    Beautiful Code
  • 5
    Compact
  • 5
    Multiplatform
  • 5
    Functional paradigm
  • 5
    Computation Expressions
  • 5
    Open source
  • 5
    Less bugs
  • 5
    Productive
  • 4
    Allow use JS and .NET libraries
  • 4
    Object oriented features
  • 4
    Fun to write
  • 1.2K
    Great libraries
  • 963
    Readable code
  • 847
    Beautiful code
  • 788
    Rapid development
  • 691
    Large community
  • 438
    Open source
  • 393
    Elegant
  • 282
    Great community
  • 273
    Object oriented
  • 221
    Dynamic typing
  • 77
    Great standard library
  • 60
    Very fast
  • 55
    Functional programming
  • 50
    Easy to learn
  • 46
    Scientific computing
  • 35
    Great documentation
  • 29
    Productivity
  • 28
    Matlab alternative
  • 28
    Easy to read
  • 24
    Simple is better than complex
  • 20
    It's the way I think
  • 19
    Imperative
  • 18
    Very programmer and non-programmer friendly
  • 18
    Free
  • 17
    Machine learning support
  • 17
    Powerfull language
  • 16
    Fast and simple
  • 14
    Scripting
  • 12
    Explicit is better than implicit
  • 11
    Ease of development
  • 10
    Clear and easy and powerfull
  • 9
    Unlimited power
  • 8
    Import antigravity
  • 8
    It's lean and fun to code
  • 7
    Print "life is short, use python"
  • 7
    Python has great libraries for data processing
  • 6
    High Documented language
  • 6
    I love snakes
  • 6
    Readability counts
  • 6
    Rapid Prototyping
  • 6
    Now is better than never
  • 6
    Although practicality beats purity
  • 6
    Flat is better than nested
  • 6
    Great for tooling
  • 6
    There should be one-- and preferably only one --obvious
  • 6
    Fast coding and good for competitions
  • 5
    Web scraping
  • 5
    Lists, tuples, dictionaries
  • 5
    Great for analytics
  • 4
    Beautiful is better than ugly
  • 4
    Easy to learn and use
  • 4
    Easy to setup and run smooth
  • 4
    Multiple Inheritence
  • 4
    CG industry needs
  • 4
    Socially engaged community
  • 4
    Complex is better than complicated
  • 4
    Plotting
  • 4
    Simple and easy to learn
  • 3
    List comprehensions
  • 3
    Powerful language for AI
  • 3
    Flexible and easy
  • 3
    It is Very easy , simple and will you be love programmi
  • 3
    Many types of collections
  • 3
    If the implementation is easy to explain, it may be a g
  • 3
    If the implementation is hard to explain, it's a bad id
  • 3
    Special cases aren't special enough to break the rules
  • 3
    Pip install everything
  • 3
    No cruft
  • 3
    Generators
  • 3
    Import this
  • 2
    Batteries included
  • 2
    Securit
  • 2
    Can understand easily who are new to programming
  • 2
    Should START with this but not STICK with This
  • 2
    A-to-Z
  • 2
    Because of Netflix
  • 2
    Only one way to do it
  • 2
    Better outcome
  • 2
    Good for hacking
  • 1
    Best friend for NLP
  • 1
    Sexy af
  • 1
    Procedural programming
  • 1
    Automation friendly
  • 1
    Slow
  • 0
    Keep it simple
  • 0
    Powerful
  • 0
    Ni

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Cons of Clojure
Cons of F#
Cons of Python
  • 11
    Cryptic stacktraces
  • 5
    Need to wrap basically every java lib
  • 4
    Toxic community
  • 3
    Good code heavily relies on local conventions
  • 3
    Tonns of abandonware
  • 3
    Slow application startup
  • 1
    Usable only with REPL
  • 1
    Hiring issues
  • 1
    It's a lisp
  • 1
    Bad documented libs
  • 1
    Macros are overused by devs
  • 1
    Tricky profiling
  • 1
    IDE with high learning curve
  • 1
    Configuration bolierplate
  • 1
    Conservative community
  • 0
    Have no good and fast fmt
  • 3
    Microsoft tend to ignore F# preferring to hype C#
  • 2
    Interop between C# can sometimes be difficult
  • 1
    Hype
  • 1
    Type Providers can be unstable in larger solutions
  • 53
    Still divided between python 2 and python 3
  • 28
    Performance impact
  • 26
    Poor syntax for anonymous functions
  • 22
    GIL
  • 19
    Package management is a mess
  • 14
    Too imperative-oriented
  • 12
    Hard to understand
  • 12
    Dynamic typing
  • 12
    Very slow
  • 8
    Indentations matter a lot
  • 8
    Not everything is expression
  • 7
    Incredibly slow
  • 7
    Explicit self parameter in methods
  • 6
    Requires C functions for dynamic modules
  • 6
    Poor DSL capabilities
  • 6
    No anonymous functions
  • 5
    Fake object-oriented programming
  • 5
    Threading
  • 5
    The "lisp style" whitespaces
  • 5
    Official documentation is unclear.
  • 5
    Hard to obfuscate
  • 5
    Circular import
  • 4
    Lack of Syntax Sugar leads to "the pyramid of doom"
  • 4
    The benevolent-dictator-for-life quit
  • 4
    Not suitable for autocomplete
  • 2
    Meta classes
  • 1
    Training wheels (forced indentation)

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What is Clojure?

Clojure is designed to be a general-purpose language, combining the approachability and interactive development of a scripting language with an efficient and robust infrastructure for multithreaded programming. Clojure is a compiled language - it compiles directly to JVM bytecode, yet remains completely dynamic. Clojure is a dialect of Lisp, and shares with Lisp the code-as-data philosophy and a powerful macro system.

What is F#?

F# is a mature, open source, cross-platform, functional-first programming language. It empowers users and organizations to tackle complex computing problems with simple, maintainable and robust code.

What is Python?

Python is a general purpose programming language created by Guido Van Rossum. Python is most praised for its elegant syntax and readable code, if you are just beginning your programming career python suits you best.

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What are some alternatives to Clojure, F#, and Python?
Scala
Scala is an acronym for “Scalable Language”. This means that Scala grows with you. You can play with it by typing one-line expressions and observing the results. But you can also rely on it for large mission critical systems, as many companies, including Twitter, LinkedIn, or Intel do. To some, Scala feels like a scripting language. Its syntax is concise and low ceremony; its types get out of the way because the compiler can infer them.
Haskell
It is a general purpose language that can be used in any domain and use case, it is ideally suited for proprietary business logic and data analysis, fast prototyping and enhancing existing software environments with correct code, performance and scalability.
Common Lisp
Lisp was originally created as a practical mathematical notation for computer programs, influenced by the notation of Alonzo Church's lambda calculus. It quickly became the favored programming language for artificial intelligence (AI) research. As one of the earliest programming languages, Lisp pioneered many ideas in computer science, including tree data structures, automatic storage management, dynamic typing, conditionals, higher-order functions, recursion, and the self-hosting compiler. [source: wikipedia]
Elixir
Elixir leverages the Erlang VM, known for running low-latency, distributed and fault-tolerant systems, while also being successfully used in web development and the embedded software domain.
Julia
Julia is a high-level, high-performance dynamic programming language for technical computing, with syntax that is familiar to users of other technical computing environments. It provides a sophisticated compiler, distributed parallel execution, numerical accuracy, and an extensive mathematical function library.
See all alternatives