ubuntu terminal directory

[lemmuh-Re5JQEeQqe8AvxtiuMwx3w at public.gmane.org (David Hummel)]

On Sun, Mar 28, 2010 at 3:19 PM, Jerry Feldman <gaf-mNDKBlG2WHs at public.gmane.org> wrote:
> The initial Perl version ran very, very slow,
[...]
> Much faster than Perl,
[...]
> The Python version runs in about 10 seconds, the C++
> version in about 30 seconds without copying to the other server, and the
> Perl took an hour.

It sounds like you're dealing with some very poorly written Perl code.
 Perl excels at parsing and is actually more suited to this task than
Python is.  Performance-wise Perl and Python compare favorably in this
regard and in many cases Perl wins out.

> I also find that Python files are more readable than Perl, bash or Cshell scripts.

IMHO, readability is less about the language and more about coding
style.  You can write very readable code in any language.  I
personally dislike Python's reliance on indentation level, and the
silly double underscore name mangling for class-private members, among
other things, but in general I think both Perl and Python are great
languages.

One should use the language that is suited to the task.  For anything
having to do with parsing and text processing, I'd use Perl.  For a
quick UI or admin interface, I'd use Python.