Python Programming Language¶

Why Choose Python?¶

If you’re going to write programs, there are literally dozens of commonly used languages to choose from. Why choose Python? Here are some of the features that make Python an appealing choice.

Python is Popular¶

According to research by Dice Python is also one of the hottest skills to have and the most popular programming language in the world based on the Popularity of Programming Language Index.

Due to the popularity and widespread use of Python as a programming language, Python developers are sought after and paid well. If you’d like to dig deeper into Python salary statistics and job opportunities, you can do so here.

Python is Interpreted¶

Many languages are compiled, meaning the source code you create needs to be translated into machine code, the language of your computer’s processor, before it can be run. Programs written in an interpreted language are passed straight to an interpreter that runs them directly.

This makes for a quicker development cycle because you just type in your code and run it, without the intermediate compilation step.

One potential downside to interpreted languages is execution speed. Programs that are compiled into the native language of the computer processor tend to run more quickly than interpreted programs. For some applications that are particularly computationally intensive, like graphics processing or intense number crunching, this can be limiting.

In practice, however, for most programs, the difference in execution speed is measured in milliseconds, or seconds at most, and not appreciably noticeable to a human user. The expediency of coding in an interpreted language is typically worth it for most applications.

Python is Free¶

The Python interpreter is developed under an OSI-approved open-source license, making it free to install, use, and distribute, even for commercial purposes.

A version of the interpreter is available for virtually any platform there is, including all flavors of Unix, Windows, macOS, smartphones and tablets, and probably anything else you ever heard of. A version even exists for the half dozen people remaining who use OS/2.

Python is Portable¶

Because Python code is interpreted and not compiled into native machine instructions, code written for one platform will work on any other platform that has the Python interpreter installed.

Python is Simple¶

As programming languages go, Python is relatively uncluttered, and the developers have deliberately kept it that way.

A rough estimate of the complexity of a language can be gleaned from the number of keywords or reserved words in the language. These are words that are reserved for special meaning by the compiler or interpreter because they designate specific built-in functionality of the language.

Python 3 has 33 keywords, and Python 2 has 31. By contrast, C++ has 62, Java has 53, and Visual Basic has more than 120, though these latter examples probably vary somewhat by implementation or dialect.

Python code has a simple and clean structure that is easy to learn and easy to read. In fact, as you will see, the language definition enforces code structure that is easy to read.