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I have been exploring and developing an application in Python for mission critical work in the commercial banking arena.
Banks are way conservative in selecting new applications.
I need real proof of stability and others using.
Have looked at the Python site but now I'm hoping this crowd can tell me more.
So far I don't have a development bank partner which I will need next stage, so I'm gathering proof and pitch info. All help and comments appreciated.
Banca d'Italia (roughly the Italian equivalent of the Fed, except that, since the introduction of the Euro, all countries using euros as their currency, including of course Italy, have "outsourced" monetary policy to the European Central Bank) uses Python, is very happy with it, and plans to extend its use. The talk I'm pointing to is in Italian, but if you search around for the authors I think you can find similar papers of theirs in English.
Sungard's FrontArena, a widespread "next generation cross-asset trading" system, uses Python (e.g., see here).
This post gives a good summary of Python use in banking (as of a couple years ago) with focus on the City of London.
Considering how banks like to "play them close to their vest" I think it's amazing that there's as much information as this about the use of Python in banking -- if these few cases "leak", just imagine how many must be staying under wraps!-)
Of course you can implement mission-critical software (whatever that is in your case) using Python. At the end of the day the success of your application is going to weigh more on its capabilities than whether it is written in Python. Some all .NET companies will even bring in Python applications provided that there is a way to talk to the system from .NET.
I would not market your application as being a Python application. This is going to cause you trouble down the road because you will run into roadblocks. This often happens when you satisfy a business customer and he speaks to their IT guy who says "whoa we can't support that" without a full analysis of the cost/benefit to the business. This is the place that references to use of Python in mission-critical systems will arise. Try to avoid this area.
With Python you can always target the popular platforms if you build your application under certain constraints. IronPython runs on .NET and Jython runs on Java. Being able to fire back with info on how to run your application on these platforms might be helpful.
There is a rather famous application heavily used in both banks and hedge funds called FrontArena. I believe that this is written in Python.
Additionally the numpy numeric processing libraries and concise, clear syntax means that Python is very popular with Quantitative Analysts (or quants) within the financial sector.
CCP Games uses a version called Stackless Python in their MMO, for both the client and server. A large part of the game is based on a market/trade simulation, and accurately tracks and reports millions of market transactions on thousands of items daily. It may sound odd, but considering how fickle and downright whiny my fellow gamers can be, the decision to use Python in that type of high availability environment should count for something.
There's always ResolverOne.
Sungard Front Arena makes extensive use of Python in its system architecture. This is a trading floor system with quite a substantial market share in its space. And, yes, it is used extensively by investment banks.
It's not exactly extensive proof, but this blog describes a bit of an overview of how Google is using Python.
I might argue that Google is more "mission-critical" than (almost?) any bank out there.
There's obviously plenty more resources besides that link on how Google is using Python, but if Google, the company indexing virtually the entire internet, can use Python as a core language, surely Python would meet a bank's criteria.
i know topic is rather old, but anyway.
if we talk about mission critical.
Python is widly used in Thales software provided with is hardware encryption solutions.
and in PayShield application for example, which i believe really mission critical.
Although Java is being used there more than Python.
I'll try again.
My employer (we're huge) did a study to resolve an internal conflict over what 'platform' to standardize to. Platforms were judged on technical depth, business alignment, and company viability. The one that won was middle of the road technically and had superior business alignment and company viability. The customers don't care about the technical bits; the customer wants to make sure there will be no major strategic roadblocks in 4 years like if the supporting company folded.
All of the links I've clicked on in this thread are not enterprise systems, they're applications. As far as I have seen, no company has the balls to write a mission critical enterprise system in python, except for Eve Online, which is a game--downtime isn't going to get anyone killed or sued.
Python doesn't have anywhere close to as much money backing it as MSFT or Redhat etc. If Guido gets hit by a bus, Python is in trouble.
I <3 python for a lot of things, but a financial transaction system probably wants a real, trusted, stable company backing it.
Edit: this isn't flame bait; this is a major lesson learned from watching a colleague push a platform backed by a small company, and the resulting 'business-strategic' nightmare that ended with his project getting dropped in favor of someone using a far crappier project with lots of money. There's more to project success than the technical bit.
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I'm in that horrible questioning state. I'm trying to decide between Django and Rails.
From what I've read, Django probably fits my needs better, both from a "cultural" and goal point of view. The baked-in admin interface pretty much sells me alone. However, I have one critical concern: it looks like the Rails community is much larger. This could be a plus OR a minus; read on.
I have experience hanging my hat on a technology that does not have as vibrant a commmunity as its "competitor." I run a Mac consulting firm in the Bay Area. Up until very, very recently (like the last year!), finding resources for very difficult issues (especially server- and network-related) was so difficult that it was often not even worth trying. This is now changing rapidly due to the Halo Effect, but if it wasn't for Steve Jobs' return to Apple and the iPhone, the future would look just as bleak as the past.
So, while Django looks awesome, I am concerned about pigeonholing myself in yet another niche. I'm less concerned with my theoretical job prospects as a Django developer (I like my job) than I am with simply having resources available to create and maintain cutting-edge projects that can evolve with the Web, and not lag too far behind.
From the above point of view, it looks like Rails has the advantage. However, here's a problem I've noticed that seems to come from the vibrancy of the Rails community: Want to accomplish a particular Rails programming task you've never done before? Google it; you'll find three to six+ different plugins, each with as many advocates as detractors. How do you decide which to use without spending hours and hours learning and prototyping? How do you know that the one you choose won't be end-of-lifed in 12 months, and you'll have to redo that part of your app in order to stay current with the latest Rails distribution?
My latter point brings me right back to where I started: Django seems like a time-saver. Except now I have two reasons to think so, not just one.
I should mention that I've already spent a significant amount of time learning Ruby and Rails, dabbled a bit in Python, and quite prefer Ruby.
Would love your thoughts.
If the size and the vibrancy of the community is the main problem, than maybe you should look at other framework stacks not just Django and Rails (those two make allot of noise and hype, but there are other much more bigger that don't get that loud - e.g. Java/JVM based framework stacks have users in a few order of magnitude higher than those two you mention).
If the game however is just between these two, when I would decide, I would take in consideration especially the available tools (how good the IDE support is) - at least for me they're very very important, since they're what make a productivity difference.
Even if on the Mac the hype is of course TextMate, with all the respect, that is just an advanced editor - not an IDE with "smart" features like error highlighting in code, smart and correct completion, etc.
The smartest existing IDE for Rails is RubyMine, so considering that for Python (Django) there's nothing not even close that advanced, I would choose Ruby on Rails even for this just only reason. Of course, another plus point for RoR is the bigger number of books available (so when in doubt, I have better chances to find a solution in one of them).
What about Pylons?
From what I have seen neither one looks like it will become a niche any time soon, both have active communities and dedicated developers. Ruby and python are both great languages, and both are being actively developed as well. At some point Django will have to migrate from python 2.x to 3.y, which may be a little bit painful, but the same sort of thing can be expected from rails at some point in the future.
I think you have narrowed it down to the right two for being main stream yet not stagnant. They both have advantages and disadvantages, and if there isn't a clear reason to chose one or the other for your project, I would say go with the language you prefer. Python is my language of choice, so baring some killer reason to chose RoR, Django is the natural way to go to continue developing the way I like to. If you prefer ruby, I would recommend going with RoR unless Django seems to fit your application in a way RoR does not.
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Before you jump to conclusions, yes, this is programming related. It covers a situation that comes under the heading of, "There, but for the grace of God, go you or I." This is brand new territory for me so I'm asking for some serious help here.
A young man, Honza Ripa, in a nearby town did the classic Dumb Thing two weeks after graduating from High School -- he dove into shallow water in the Russian River and had a C-4/C-5 break, sometimes called a Swimming Pool break. In a matter of seconds he went from an exceptional golfer and wrestler to a quadriplegic. (Read the story ... all of us should have been so lucky as to have a girlfriend like Brianna.) That was 10 months ago and he has regained only tiny amounts of control of his right index finger and a couple of other hand/foot motions, none of them fine-grained.
His total control of his computer (currently running Win7, but we can change that as needed) is via voice command. Honza's not dumb. He had a 3.7 GPA with AP math and physics.
The Problems:
Since all of his input is via voice command, he is concerned that the predominance of special characters in programming will require vast amount of verbose commands. Does anyone know of any well done voice input system specifically designed for programmers? I'm thinking about something that might be modal--e.g. you say "Python input" and it goes into a macro mode for doing class definitions, etc. Given all of the RSI in programmer-land there's got to be something out there. What OS(es) does it run on?
I am planning on teaching him Python, which is my preferred language for programming and teaching. Are there any applications / whatevers that are written in Python and would be a particularly good match for engaging him mentally while supporting his disability? One of his expressed interests is in stock investing, but that not might be a good starting point for a brand-new programmer.
There are a lot of environments (Flash, JavaScript, etc) that are not particularly friendly to people with accessibility challenges. I vaguely remember (but cannot find) a research project that basically created an overlay system on top of a screen environment and then allowed macro command construction on top of the screen image. If we can get/train this system, we may be able to remove many hurdles to using the net.
I am particularly interested in finding open source Python-based robotics and robotic prostheses projects so that he can simultaneously learn advanced programming concepts while learning to solve some of his own immediate problems.
I've done a ton of googling on this, but I know there are things I'm missing. I'm asking the SO community to step up to the plate here. I know this group has the answers, so let me hear them! Overwhelm me with the opportunities that any of us might have/need to still program after such a life-changing event.
Update: I just registered computingforquads.org and I'll be creating pages for all sorts of solutions to all sorts of problems. Thanks for you help so far and keep those answers coming!
I have sports injuries, and I cannot type more than few characters without serious pain.
Instead, I use emacs together with Dragon NaturallySpeaking.
I have written macros and scripts to help it get by. The system is not perfect, but it works.
I program mostly in C++, but I also use python.
If you want to, I will help you with that.
I have to warn you, it takes few months to get used to speech to text software and train it. moreover, I am not native English speaker, am sure that gets in the way
Do not despair, there are solutions.
here a link to emacs and Dragon files (unfortunately have not documented yet)
http://code.google.com/p/asadchev/source/browse/#svn/trunk/home/Dragon
http://code.google.com/p/asadchev/source/browse/#svn/trunk/emacs/elisp
also, if you need more info, my number is 515 230 9363 (United States, Iowa).
I will be glad to help you if I can
It's worth looking at the Dasher Project, which makes it possible to enter text reasonably quickly even for the severly disabled. Dasher is built on a probabilistic model of languages, so that more likely utterances are easier to enter into the system. The demonstration system comes with a fairly impressive collection of natural languages. It should be easy to get a large corpus of programs written in Python, load Dasher with the corpus, and create a special-purpose version for entering Python programs.
This isn't part of any professional software, but when I saw this, I've thought it would be good for text entry using eye movement tracking or minimal mouse movement. See Ken Perlin's Processing page, and look at the applets for "pen input".
I know someone in a village in India who is a paraplegic, who uses Dragon Speech to Text software to write on her computer. I don't know how well suited it is for a programmer (she is not a programmer), but it's a start.
You might also want to look into Natural Point. It's an eye controlled mouse, which might help Honza
Hope this helps
iPython with completion
On the python side, iPython shows parameters, functions, etc, and has command completion. Perhaps it could also be customized to respond to the various input devices as well?
http://ipython.scipy.org/moin/
One thing that may help (i got it from this question) is http://shorttalk-emacs.sourceforge.net/ . It seems to be an interface between emacs and speech recognition. And regarding languages, i would recommend using Lua over Python. It has a more natural English flow to it.
I know this question is quite old now. I wonder how things are going for Honza with respect to programming. It would be nice to hear back.
For what it's worth, I suffer from RSI and now try to minimize use of the keyboard and especially the mouse.
My own experience of voice recognition is that this stuff DOES work. I use Windows's inbuilt speech recognition software for Windows 7 (WSR). I've also used voice finger (http://voicefinger.cozendey.com/) to help move the mouse pointer. Some key points I would mention are:
Learn the shortcuts. You can do almost anything using shortcuts and speaking them works great using Voice Recognition when in "typing mode" (see below).
Use Typing mode. Unless you are dictating text this is great for speaking short cuts to the computer or for spelling weird words. Interestingly it is not a clearly "advertised" function of WSR.
Phonetic Alphabet. To make good use of typing mode learn the phonetic alphabet: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/NATO_phonetic_alphabet You can't realistically get by without this when using any form of speech recognition.
VIM. (or emacs I guess - not sure). Vim is a great for editing text without touching the mouse - ever. This makes it great for editing texts using WSR. I am only a VIM beginner myself but find it incredibly helpful.
Web browsing. In my experience web browsing is still an extremely difficult thing to do without a mouse. There are simply too many situations which require you to hover with the mouse in order to get to the underlying commands. This is a great shame. Nevertheless there are some really good Firefox plugins to help browsing without a mouse.
Mouseless browsing: https://addons.mozilla.org/en-us/firefox/addon/mouseless-browsing/ This is a neat little tool with lots of configuration options for putting numbers next to all links. You can then type these numbers to activate the link
Vimperator: http://vimperator.org/ This goes quite a lot further than mouseless browsing. It basically gives you complete vim like control of firefox. I find this works better than mouseless browsing, but can be annoying in instances where it changes default Firefox behavious.
These are just my own personal experiences. It would be great to hear back about how Honza is getting on.
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This will not be a "programming" question but more technology / platform related question. I'm trying to figure out whether Python can be a suitable Java alternative for enterprise / web applications.
Which are the ideal cases where you would prefer to use Python instead of Java? How would a typical Python web application (databases/sessions/concurrency) perform as compared to a typical Java application? How do specific Python frameworks square up against Java based frameworks (Spring, SEAM, Grails etc.)?
For businesses, switching from the Java infrastructure to a Python infrastructure .. is it too hard/expensive/resource intensive/not viable? Also shed some light on the business case for providing a Python + Google AppEngine based solution to the end customer. Will it be cost effective in an typical scenario?
Sorry if I am asking too wide a question, I would have liked to keep it specific, but I need your help to evaluate Python as a whole from the perspectives of the programmers, service providing company and end business customer.
For an SME, a Python/GoogleAppEngine based technology stack is a clear scalable and affordable platform. But what about a large MNC that already has a lot invested in Java.
Thank you so much. I am researching this myself and will gladly share my conclusions here!
Thank you,
Srirangan
An enterprise that already has a terabucks of Java investments should add jython to their mix of technologies -- it can be adopted gradually and progressively, at first for ancillary functions such as testing, "one-off" data migrations &c, prototyping of new functionality, cases in which using some existing open source Python library is obviously very handy, and so on, and so forth -- then, as the many Java developers in the company learn to use Jython, some of the prototypes will just be put in production as Jython code because there would be no advantage recoding them, some old subsystem needing recoding will be recoded in Jython, and so forth.
It's never really a wise decision to throw away a huge existing and working codebase and the ginormous investment it represents -- Python's strengths include its wealth of strong, production-level implementations, how well they "play with others", and how well Python can gradually and incrementally infiltrate most any development shop.
The larger your investment in an existing technology is, the more expensive it is to move away from it. COBOL is perhaps the best example here.
That investment isn't just in porting existing solutions, but also in retraining or hiring new staff so that you have the skill sets to build and support the new technologies even while still maintaining your legacy solutions.
Add to that the fact that for most large Multinational Corporations, software isn't their core business. As long as it functions effectively and fulfills the business need, they don't tend to care so much about the 'details'.
You need to be able to offer some pretty compelling benefits to overcome this kind of inertia.
Sad but true.
If you need to do the sort of things you can do with Django, then Django and Python is totally what you want. Google App Engine runs Django as well. So, you can do a Django app and host it on Google App Engine, and later change your mind and switch to conventional server hosting, or self-hosting if you have your own server.
I haven't tried Google App Engine but my understanding is that the price is quite reasonable for what you get. Google's IT department does a great job of keeping their data centers going; if you outsource the hosting to Google App Engine you know your data is backed up, you know the servers won't go down, and even if a backhoe takes a whole Google data center off the Internet, some other Google data center will keep serving up your application to your customers. You also know that if your application suddenly becomes hugely popular, Google App Engine wil l scale up automatically to handle the load. (I think you set a cap for the maximum you are willing to pay, and it scales until it hits the cap. But as I said I haven't used it and I'm not certain.)
I haven't used Java yet, but from what I have seen of it, Python is a much more expressive language and skilled Python coders can get more work done in a day just because the language is that much better. However, if you already have invested in Java and have in-house expertise in Java, you would be crazy to walk away from that overnight. The correct thing is to pick one new project to just try out that crazy Python thing.
And I really do recommend Django. You can get the Django book and try out the tutorial. If your first pilot project in Python is a Django project, you should have an easy time of things.
The answer to your question is yes. Python can be well suited for Enterprise because python is a language which has raw power, flexible and can be glued with other programming languages. What enterprise really requires is a language which does everything and i feel python is already enterprise ready. If you want examples then i believe there can be no bigger example than google. Google is running python internally and externally for its business critical applications. The only problem with python is that it is not very well recognized by top MNC company and we as a python programmer find hard time convincing the management team. I guess you will face the same issue. But i guarantee you once you get your feet wet in python, you will understand its true power
There is -- almost -- no usable "Business Case" for any technology choice.
"what about a large MNC that already has a lot invested in Java" Ask around. See if there's a business case for Java.
I doubt you'll find anything. Most companies drift into technology choices slowly.
There was no business case for COBOL -- it was the only game in town in the olden days.
There is rarely a business case for Java. What usually happens is that some visionary individual started building the first web site (probably in Perl). The "web thing" gained traction, and some vision individual started building web sites in Java. Eventually, the success of those small teams indicated to others that Java had advantages over COBOL.
Managers say the words "make a business case", but watch what they actually do. They listen to (1) their peers, (2) successful people.
To make the "business case" for Python, you have to be that visionary individual.
1) Use Python.
2) Be successful.
3) Share your successes.
4) Be prepared to explain that your success is due to your tools, not your personal level of genius and charisma.
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Businessmen typically want a web application developed. They are aware of .net or J2EE by names, without much knowledge about either.
Altho' Rails and Django offer for a much better and faster development stack, it is a big task to convince businessmen to use these platforms.
The task begins with introducing Django (or Rails), quoting some blog/research. Then making a case for the use of the framework for the specific project.
Lot of the task is repetitive. What are the sources/blogs/whitepapers and other materials you use to make a case for django (or Rails)
Don't you think there should be a common brochure developed that many development agencies could use to make the same case, over and again. Are there any such ones, now?
There seems to be enough discussion on Django vs Rails. Whereas the need is (Django and Rails) vs (.net and J2EE), at least so, while making a business case. Both represent a faster pragmatic web development in a dynamic language.
It's easier to ask forgiveness than permission.
First, build the initial release in Django. Quickly. Build the model well (really well!). But use as much default admin functionality as you can.
Spend time only only reporting and display pages where the HTML might actually matter to the presentation.
Show this and they'll only want more. Once they've gotten addicted to fast turnaround and correct out-of-the box operation, you can discuss technology with them. By then it won't matter any more.
You need to speak the language of business: money.
"If we do it Rails, it will cost you 50% less than the same functionality in Java."
Your percentage may vary, and you might need to also include hosting and upkeep costs, to show how it balances out.
When you're convincing other programmers, sure, talk about development speed and automation of repetitive tasks. But talk bottom-line cost to a business person.
Before you begin making the case for Django or Rails, you have to be convinced it's the right stack first in the context of the business person's needs. If the business person is an entrepreneur, he may have other factors that go beyond how quickly can the solution be developed. For example:
If its an enterprise play that's being developed (something like SalesForce.com, SugarCRM, etc.) it may make sense to have it written in Java because this makes acquisitions and mergers easier with potential Java-based suitors.
If its an internal IT play for a custom solution in a large company, they may already have a significant amount MS infrastructure in place. It may not make sense to have your client install SQLServer or complicate their stack further with a Rails/Django friendly stack.
If you've cross this chasm and are convinced you have the client's best interest in mind, then I would look for examples on the Internet where the same application has been authored in both Java and Rails/Django. Here's an example of the Pet Store implemented in Rails.
http://www.anassina.com/projects/railspetstore/
You can download the source code and demonstrate to your client how much less code is needed to achieve the same result.
Explain to the client why less code is valuable: the less code you write, the fewer bugs you will have.
The first 2 arguments from the top of my mind:
Easier and faster development = cheaper product, less time to market.
SO optimization out of the box.
While many of you made some good suggestions, WRT the talks/resources for using these frameworks, you may also note to have a look at talk on redesigning yellow pages in ROR:
Summary from the site:
This talk explains how
YELLOWPAGES.COM, one of the
highest-traffic websites in the U.S.,
was written using Ruby on Rails, how
it was scaled to handle the traffic
and how the software architecture
evolved. Also: the reasons for
choosing Ruby on Rails.
The best case to be made for either of these frameworks is their ability to automate repetitive and time-consuming tasks. This allows developers to be faster and more productive which in turn means projects are delivered faster.
The problem with a "brochure" approach is that it doesn't address the clients needs. Putting the language/platform of choice into a presentation that addresses the clients goals is much more likely to sell them - both on the tools you want to use, as well as you as a provider. As long as you can show that your approach will solve the problem (preferably with the least amount of expense), you'll have fewer objections and less of the "but I've heard that xxx is the best".
I am in the field of data crunching and very soon might make a move to the world of web programming. Although I am fascinated both by Python and Ruby as both of them seem to be having every similar styles when it comes to writing business logic or data crunching logic.
But when I start googling for web development I start inclining towards Ruby on Rails my question is why is the web world obsessed with ruby on rails and active records so much?
There seem to be so many screencasts to learn Ruby on Rails and plethora of good books too
why is Python not able to pull the crowd when it comes to creating screencasts or ORM's like active record.
Ruby and Python are languages.
Rails is a framework.
So it is not really sensible to compare Ruby on Rails vs Python.
There are Python Frameworks out there you should take a look at for a more direct comparison - http://wiki.python.org/moin/WebFrameworks (e.g. I know Django gets a lot of love, but there are others)
Edit: I've just had a google, there seem to be loads of Django Screencasts.
Ruby gets more attention than Python simply because Ruby has one clear favourite when it comes to web apps while Python has traditionally had a very splintered approach (Zope, Plone, Django, Pylons, Turbogears). The critical mass of having almost all developers using one system as opposed to a variety of individual ones does a lot for improving documentation, finding and removing bugs, building hype and buzz, and so on.
In actual language terms the two are very similar in all but syntax, and Python is more popular generally. Python's perhaps been hindered by being popular in its own right before web frameworks became a big deal, making it harder for the community to agree to concentrate on any single approach.
If you want Python screencasts, see ShowMeDo.com. I'm a co-founder, it is 3.5 yrs old and has over 400 Python screencasts (most are free) along with 600+ other free open-source topics:
http://showmedo.com/videos/python
In the Python section (linked) you'll see videos for Django, the entire TurboGears v1 DVD (provided freely courtesy Kevin Dangoor, the project founder), Python CGI (old-skool), web-scraping and plenty more.
About 1/10th of the content is subscriber-only, the other 90% is created by 100 open-src authors with 100,000 users/month.
Note that both Kyran and myself (co-founders) are A.I./math researchers in the UK with strong academic connections. Many of the Python videos have some links with starting out in data processing, I'll be creating new series over the coming months focused on math/stats/graphing/science purely for Python to accompany those that are already present.
HTH,
Ian.
Ruby and Python have more similarities than differences; the same is true for Rails and Django, which are the leading web frameworks in the respective languages.
Both languages and both frameworks are likely to be rewarding to work with - in personal, "fun" terms at least - I don't know what the job markets are like in the specific areas.
There are some similar questions in StackOverflow: you could do worse than clicking around the "Related" list in the right-hand sidebar to get more feel.
Best thing is to get and try both: pick a small project and build it both ways. Decide which you like better and go for it!