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Andy Arthur

After getting COVID at the end of 2024 and sleeping through much of the holiday season, πŸ›Œ it's good to be up and back at my game again. It's cold and dark this time of year, πŸ₯Ά but I figure focus on learning and working, while counting down the days until Punxsy sees or does not see his shadow. 🐻

People get all hung up about taking sides these days.

Last week I had a project that was best done with a Python script. So I wrote it in Python. Not a big deal. I usually prefer R but for this project Python was better. The python script produced a bash script which executed a bunch of sql commands to update records. I also still use Perl at times, bless you. My photo managing software I wrote in Perl and until 15 years ago my blog ran entirely on Perl CGI scripts I wrote by hand.

Truth is use the tool that is best for the job, one that you are fluent in but also suits the job well. I really like R for many things I do but I try to keep up on all the latest developments in Python and be knowledgeable on many of the popular libraries. I have read dozens of books on Python even if it’s not my preference.

Maybe my dislike of Python is it’s really popular. But R still has superior graphics – ggplot is amazing – and much better spatial and census libraries. The tidyverse maggitir pipes are great, and all of the tidyverse makes data manipulation easy once you get it. But I also get the advantages of Python – it’s everywhere and most people know what it is – and it can be a lot faster for certain kinds of operations. Outside of academia, people are like what the heck is R.