Hacker News new | ask | show | jobs
by fny 1458 days ago
There are definitely as many ways to do things in Python if not more... I've worked extensively in both languages. Frankly, the Python ecosystem is a lot more complex to navigate (dependency management is a nightmare) and much less friendly.

I think the biggest difference is (1) Python more institutional backing (2) Python is taught in academic settings (3) Python has more robust scientific computing (4) Node stole Ruby's thunder in the web application space (5) Python works out of the box on Windows.
2 comments
Trasmatta 1458 days ago
> dependency management is a nightmare

I don't know if it's better these days, but dependency management was one of the reasons I stuck with Ruby over Python back in the early 2010's. I never had issues with it in Ruby, but was constantly battling with dependency management in Python.

link
jjgreen 1458 days ago
> I don't know if it's better these days

It's not

link
SoleilAbsolu 1458 days ago
I think #5 is huge, until Windows Subsystem for Linux came out there was no easy way to compile all needed gems on Windows. Most Ruby/Rails tutorials assumed you were running *nix and DHH's dismissive attitude to Windows didn't help. Git Bash for Windows bridged some of the gap and probably Cygwin did the rest, but batteries were not included for Ruby on the most popular OS.
link