[From the wind-up school of technology strategizing] Is it game over for language choice? Python will now run on: .NET Mono Windows Linux Solaris JVM Apple In other words, not only will Python run on most of the operating systems you might care about, it will also run on most of the managed runtimes you might care about and will do so in a less politically sensitive manner than other languages. Which raises the bar, both for actually portability and for protecting a software investment in these turbulent times for anyone tasked with choosing a middleware container or an operating system. Some notable past objections against the language appear to have died away: PythonWhatsThat (1999) JavaJavaJava (2000) NetNetNet (2001) DynamicTypingIsADangerousAndMorallyQuestionableActivity (2002) ItsNotFastEnoughForRealWork (2003) In 2004, the objections against Python seem to be reduceable to two: MyIDERocksAllPythonIDEsSuck WhoWillMaintainMyPythonLegacy Now, personally I don't care too much about the first (I merely have to wear a O'Reilly tee-shirt to not need an ide), and I can certainly help answer the second question for Ireland at least - Ireland has in the region of 20 Python developers, enough for any small nation - and all told, there may be up to 200 within the European Union. Nonetheless these are reasonable objections, worth addressing. The solution? Some corporate entity should immediately sponser a port of Emacs to Python along with a cool GUI, as that kills two birds with one stone (shiny ides tending to appeal to developers and the people that hire them). ;-)...
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