[librasteve]

that’s very interesting as far it goes, but wouldn’t Mathematica or Python be better choices than Raku for this kind of thing?

[antononcube]

Ah, yes, Raku's "LLM::Graph" is heavily inspired by the design of the function LLMGraph of Wolfram Language (aka Mathematica.)

WL's LLMGraph is more developed and productized, but Raku's "LLM::Graph" is catching up.

I would like to say that "LLM::Graph" was relatively easy to program because of Raku's introspection, wrappers, asynchronous features, and pre-existing LLM functionalities packages. As a consequence the code of "LLM::Graph" is short.

Wolfram Language does not have that level introspection, but otherwise is likely a better choice mostly for its far greater scope of functionalities. (Mathematics, graphics, computable data, etc.)

In principle a corresponding Python "LLMGraph" package can be developed, for comparison purposes. Then the "better choice" question can be answered in a more informed manner. (The Raku packages "LLM::Functions" and "LLM::Prompts" have their corresponding Python packages implemented already.)

[ab5tract]

In that case, when would Raku ever be a better choice than something else?

I personally don’t see what advantages Python as a language (not an ecosystem) would have here.

[librasteve]

Python is more widely known and a very popular tool for “LLM engineering”, so I’m curious what would be the reason to choose Raku in this case and wondering how the feature benefits of Raku outweigh the general incentive to use more popular tools.

[antononcube]

Mostly, because Python is not a good a "discovery" and prototyping language. It is like that by design -- Guido Van Rossum decided that TMTOWTDI is counter-productive.

Another point, which could have mentioned in my previous response -- Raku has more elegant and easy to use asynchronous computations framework.

IMO, Python's introspection matches that Raku's introspection.

Some argue that Python's LLM packages are more and better than Raku's. I agree on the "more" part. I am not sure about the "better" part:

- Generally speaking, different people prefer decomposing computations in a different way. - When few years ago I re-implemented Raku's LLM packages in Python, Python did not have equally convenient packages.

[ab5tract]

I don’t personally find “why didn’t you do it in X like everyone else?” to be very motivational for explaining my coding choices.

But antononcube has thicker skin than me so..

[librasteve]

Ah - sorry. I plead guilty to trying to add some controversy to this thread to try and get a debate going - and thus maybe achieve the HN front page listing. I thought that Anton would be OK with this level of spice. OTOH I do see that it was rather unkind, so in hindsight I should have stuck to the motto "be kind".

For me, it is a mystery how programmers "decide" as a group that a new tool or language is better than the established & familiar ones. But I would love to see more folks open to try new tools like Raku that could make their lives easier and more fun.