> When you're writing working code nearly as fast as you can type and your misstep rate is near zero, it generally means you've achieved mastery of the language. But that didn't make sense, because it was still day one and I was regularly pausing to look up new language and library features!
This really jives with my experience. I learned Ruby first and used it as my scripting language of choice for years, but I constantly found myself having to lookup how to do even the most basic tasks.
A day or two after learning Python I was already as productive as I had been with Ruby, it was wild.
This isn't so much a jab at Ruby, just that Python worked the way I thought a programming language should, which made everything easy.
It goes to show how your upbringing affects these things. Before Ruby I spent a lot of time in Smalltalk which really shaped the way I thought about language and program structure, APIs, etc. I'd also spent a metric ton of time writing Perl. Jumping into Ruby was like putting on a comfortable pair of shoes.
Meanwhile Python always felt like an ill-fitting suit to me. I just personally didn't connect with the language design.
This really jives with my experience. I learned Ruby first and used it as my scripting language of choice for years, but I constantly found myself having to lookup how to do even the most basic tasks.
A day or two after learning Python I was already as productive as I had been with Ruby, it was wild.
This isn't so much a jab at Ruby, just that Python worked the way I thought a programming language should, which made everything easy.