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Date: Fri, 18 Jul 2014 12:39:15 +1000
Subject: Re: Python 3 is killing Python
From: Chris Angelico <rosuav@gmail.com>
Cc: "python-list@python.org" <python-list@python.org>
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On Fri, Jul 18, 2014 at 12:24 PM, Rick Johnson
<rantingrickjohnson@gmail.com> wrote:
> I would even venture to say, and the comments on this list
> have supported my evidence for years, that i may be the
> *SOLE* heavy user of IDLE in the *ENTIRE* community.
> ...
>
> If *ANYBODY* in this damn community has a *RIGHT* to
> complain about IDLE, then *I* am that person. HOW DARE YOU
> chastise me for voicing my grievances regarding a
> software that *YOU* most likely have *NEVER*, or only
> *SLIGHTLY*, used!

Even if it is true that you're the only *user* of IDLE (or Idle; Terry
seems to spell it the latter way, I'm not sure what's the official
recommendation now), that does not give you any right whatsoever to
complain about it. There are two valid reasons for claiming a right to
complain:

1) You are the primary *developer* of the system, and put in many
hours of work actually making it happen; or
2) You have paid money to someone, paying them a reasonable hourly
rate for the same sort of level of work.

So I would say Terry has a right to complain. I certainly don't, even
though it's my primary Windows Python interface (on Linux boxes, I
usually use 'python' or 'python3' in a regular xfce4-terminal; I do
use IDLE on Linux as well, but not as often and certainly not as my
primary interface to Python). To me, IDLE is a gift; a freely-granted
boon to my use of this language. It's a huge step up from REXXTry (or
even EREXXTry, the 'extended' version that has decent command-line
editing tools); due to limitations on the REXX 'INTERPRET' command,
it's impossible to define functions interactively, and a few other
things. (That said, though, EREXXTry was for over a decade my sole
interactive interpreter for any language. It was either that or save
something to a file and run it.) Do I whine and complain because my
gift isn't absolutely perfect? No. I might *humbly* open a discussion,
but it's with the attitude of "these people have given hugely of their
time" rather than "these people have done something which is WRONG".

ChrisA