[Pyrex] Pyrex at Pycon

[Paul Prescod]

I gave two talks on Pyrex at Pycon. They were both well received. There 
are many enthusiastic Pyrex users out there and also many people who 
wanted to learn about it because they plan to use it in the future.

I'll put my slides up in PDF later today...

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The main positive feedback I heard from Pyrex users:

  * it usually "just works" (modulo some bugs around complex inheritance 
structures)

  * it is incredibly easy to use

  * it is fun

Ted Leung, of the Open Source Application Foundation (the Chandler/Mitch 
Kapor group) says:

""The most important talks for me tomorrow (today) are the Pyrex talks, 
because every time I say performance to a knowledgeable Pythonista, the 
answer I get is "Pyrex".""

      http://www.sauria.com/blog/2004/03/25#876

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Some negative feedback:

  * C++ is really important to many people. Without C++ Pyrex is a 
non-starter

  * Performance is as much an attraction for people as bridging (maybe 
more!) but Pyrex is much better at bridging than at performance. Philip 
Eby's first trial program was slower in Pyrex than in Python (it didn't 
take advantage of static typing and some of Pyrex's known issues bit him)

  * The lack of a roadmap makes it harder for people to commit to 
learning or developing Pyrex.

They ask me: "how soon do you think Pyrex will have autogeneration from 
headers?" I can only answer: "I don't know if anyone is even working on 
it." "Is Pyrex likely to add C++ support? If so, when?" I don't know 
that either. Uncertainty and opacity can have a huge impact on people's 
willingness to invest in a technology.

But I think we should focus on the positive. Pyrex has an amazing 
opportunity. Everyone who hears about it is enthusiastic (except those 
who hate static type checking on principle). It could revolutionize how 
Python is extended and even how Python itself is developed. We just need 
to find ways to harness our collective brainpower more effectively than 
we have so far (e.g. more tutorials, open bug list, access to interm 
releases, more talks at conferences, etc.)

Back to Ted Leung:

"""I finally understand what Pyrex is and how it helps with Python 
performance and wrapping C code. I think that its an approach that can 
be fruitful for a sizable number of problems."""

  * http://www.sauria.com/blog/2004/03/26#877

  Paul Prescod