Python the programming language of the future.

Programming language is the language of the computer. By definition, it is a formal language that comprises of a set of instructions which produces various output. Computer cannot understand our normal language and to make the computer perform our needs, we use programming languages.

They are usually classified as Low level and High-Level languages. There also exists another category – Middle-Level language. The high-level languages include Python, C, C++, Java etc. They are very similar to human language and are usually converted to machine language using compiler or interpreter.

Till now, programmers or software developers used C or C++ for writing programs. But recently, Python is becoming increasingly popular. Python is general-purpose, high-level language that uses an interpreter. Interpreter uses line by line execution compared to a compiler which debugs the whole programs and shows the errors altogether. It was created by Guido Van Rossum and first released in 1991.

Python is a language that is being adapted a lot these days. Schools and colleges that used to teach C or C++ have switched over to teaching Python these days. It is because of its easy and elegant syntax. It is very simple to learn and adapt.

Right now, Python tops several of the popular and must learn programming language lists. But when we ask the question,” Is Python the programming language of the future? “, there is no clear answer. Let’s look at some of the pros of Python.

• Since Python has been there since decades, lots of tutorials and related resources are available making it very beginner-friendly. Python has many friendly features compared to other languages like C etc. These include no declaration of data types, no need of punctuation etc.
• It is increasingly being used in the latest technologies like data science, machine learning etc.
• It supports many operating systems. Since it is an interpreted programming language, it allows to run the code on multiple platforms without recompilation.
• It has extensive library support. It is a very versatile language. There are packages available for almost every purpose. Some Python packages include NumPy and SciPy.
• Uber, Dropbox, Netflix, Google and Instagram are some of the tech giants that uses Python. Apart from these, it is also used extensively in robotics and embedded systems.
• One of the biggest advantages of Python is that it is open-source software. There is an ever-growing community dedicated it. It helps a lot in solving problems and bring in updates.

Everything in this world has its pros and cons. So does Python. The cons include-

• Since Python uses an interpreter, it results in slower execution as the interpreter does line by line execution.
• Since it specifically doesn’t define data types, each variable has to allocate enough memory to store the value that user inputs. This memory in some cases can be a waste. That is memory consumption is high.
• When it comes to mobile computing, Python is a weak language. It is used but very rarely.
• It has issues with database access. The database access layer is still found to be underdeveloped and primitive.
• The design still has numerous issues. Since it is dynamically typed, it has errors that show up only during runtime and hence still requires more testing.
• Its simplicity itself is a problem. It makes it difficult for the programmer to learn and work with other languages.

So now we discussed some of the pros and cons of Python programming language. These are not all the pros and cons but some. We can never say whether the pros outweigh the cons or vice versa.

Every day new software and technologies are being developed. Stuff gets outdated very quickly. The latest trend today maybe tomorrow’s outdated thing. One can never predict the future. Right now, Python is one of the ifs, not the most popular language. There is no one language that has all its advantages as well as doesn’t have its disadvantages. There are languages that can be used as a solution to the problems that Python faces. Some of the competitors of Python include Go, Julia etc. Now, all we can do is wait and see which languages come up and which become less used.