Tuesday, 3 October 2006

The New Reliable, Faster Python 2.5

More than a year and a half ago, Python 2.4 was released to the market. As is often the case with programming languages, Python’s proponents hailed it as a step forward, while its detractors espoused the virtues of various other languages....

More than a year and a half ago, Python 2.4 was released to the market. As is often the case with programming languages, Python’s proponents hailed it as a step forward, while its detractors espoused the virtues of various other languages. The stage is set for that bipolar reaction cycle, as version 2.5 of the Python language makes its debut today.

The open source programming language has gained popularity as a complement to other open source server technologies, collectively known as the LAMP stack — Linux, Apache, MySQL and Python. (PHP and Perl are alternative candidates for the letter P.)

The update includes more than 350 patches and 450 bug fixes since version 2.4, according to developers.

The language is more reliable due to the use of the Buildbot tool for cross-platform testing, developers said. "This allows us to spot problems faster during development, and resulted in a much more robust release," developers said in the language's release notes.

A project called NeedForSpeed in Iceland contributed a number of optimisations, speeding up performance. "There were major speedups in exception handling and string operations, as well as a number of other changes to improve performance," developers said.