goon's Journal: IronPython 0.6 released as CPL

Update: how alpha is IronPython?

reading from the readme with the download you can see it's pretty bare.

• The only two Python programs that I know for sure run on IronPython are pystone.py and the parrotbench benchmark/test-suite. Of course, IronPython is the only Python implementation other than CPython-2.3 that can successfully run the parrotbench benchmark/test-suite, so this shows that the implementation can handle the majority and trickiest parts of Python's core semantics successfully.

and ....

• Most of the standard Python library is not currently implemented, so it is unlikely that many existing Python scripts will run successfully under this early alpha release of IronPython-0.6.

and ...

• it's an implementation of the Python language, you should be able to use all of the language constructs that you're familiar with. By default, IronPython doesn't ship with any of the standard Python library, so if you wish to use these libraries you'll have to provide them yourself.

Ed Dumbill whacked up a comment on IP. Come on Ed. If your going to show a bit of code what about showing the steps to reproduce it? Seems Miguel could run it out of the box. Must be my crappy path setup.

mine for what it's worth is something along the lines of ....

• d:\IronPython-0.6\bin\d:\mono\mono-1.0\bin\mono IronPythonConsole.exe hello.py

but my python paths are out so I cant load pyGtk. So I'll have to fiddle around with path environment variables. Shouldn't have this problem with Linux. I've got installed Python 2.3.n, Gtk, pyGtk, Mono-1.0, IronPython-0.6 on a win2k box. Looks like I'll have to reproduce this on the linux box.

IronPython 0.6 released as CPL
Hackers coding only in Python. Gimme a break. What we're largely seeing is *script* hackers coding in Python. cgi-bin. shell crap. webbots. It's where Python shines. But there's an awfully big collection of code projects that need to straddle the speed of C++ and the dynamicism (to some degree) of higher-level languages. And there's a lot of hacking opportunity there. Java does that region very well, thank you.

might be time to try IronPython (~1.7 times faster than standard Py2.3). Here's some performance benchmarks comparing cpython to ironpython for those interested in the numbers. interestingly, IronPythons creator Jim Hugunin designed Jython.

Thanks for prompting me to look as Jim just completed a talk at OSCON, 28 ~ IronPython: A fast Python implementation for .NET and Mono and has released the source.

btw it's released under CPL

I'm no hacker

[stoolpigeon]

I'm just a wannabe.

That said, roughly 2 weeks ago I started reading a python book. I have been looking for a rad language that is cross platform to replace VB. I learned VB at a trade school and use it professionaly (2 tier database apps mostly).

This week I started writing my first python gui. Just something little to start actually doing something. I made a form in glade using GTK+ and started writing code in Python. It's coming along and I really see this as something that could go somewhere. No

Re:I'm no hacker

[goon]

Python ODBC module
Because the one thing still holding me back on Python is the database stuff

repeat after me, the python globle module index [python.org] is my friend. If you ever have a question about what is possible/not possible in python you should start reading here [python.org].

However I cannot find ODBC there. But if I peak over to the python documentation topic guide [python.org] at python.org you will find those missing gaps. For instance here's the database topic guide [python.org]. And here the list of python database modules [python.org]. But here's wh

Re:I'm no hacker

[stoolpigeon]

Thanks for all the links. I will keep working over this stuff and see how it goes. I don't get to spend a lot of time playing with it on my own, but I do enjoy what I've done so far.

VB gets a bad rap around here-- but there are some things that I really like about it, but I don't like the price and the fact that it is limited to Windows. I will take a look at wxWindows for python-- but I am assuming that would mean doing all the GUI code work by hand, as opposed to something like Glade. (Which still l

most commercial tools have a open source equiv

[goon]

• VB gets a bad rap around here-- but there are some things that I really like about it, but I don't like the price and the fact that it is limited to Windows.

try channel9 @ msdn [msdn.com] for their VB Express [msdn.com] (knobled demo vb.NET). But I'd stick with mono. You can do a lot with mono using vb.NET language (sans GUI) and it's zero $.

• but I am assuming that would mean doing all the GUI code work by hand, as opposed to something like Glade.

you need the Boa~constructor [sourceforge.net]. most commercial apps have an opensource equiv,

Re:most commercial tools have a open source equiv

[stoolpigeon]

Actually I did pick up a copy of Vb.net standard by watching some tutorial videos MSN had up and filling out surveys- then they sent me the software. But the thing is, the costs are all over.

This is a great example. My VB.net standard cds came in the mail. I was impressed with all they sent me. A VB.net cd, visual studio .net prerequisites cd, win2k service pack 4 cd, 3 msdn cds, and a little 130 page book, "Getting Started with VB.net". I mean that's pretty great to give away.

So I hurried home to in

Re:most commercial tools have a open source equiv

[goon]

"...here had been talk of porting the SWT gui toolkit and porting Sharp Develop to Linux..."
already done. It's called MonoDevelop (http://www.monodevelop.com/). pretty fast hey... I cannot believe the speed of the ports.
There are the usual caveats, it's steps behind the Sharp develop.

Look into purchasing a $5 dollar version of (http://www.mandrake.com) Mandrake 10 as a MSWin replacement. It should run on most machines (from P100 upwards) and is a worthy Windows replacement development platform.

Btw here's