[webkit-dev] Script programming language: Perl, Python, or Ruby?

[Maciej Stachowiak]

On Sep 1, 2010, at 9:28 PM, Dirk Pranke wrote:

> Hi Sam,
> 
> Did you see the reply I sent on this thread? There are actually decent
> reasons to rewrite the code into Python, to simplify and speed up the
> new-run-webkit-tests implementation. Given that, do you still object
> to the patch landing (since the work has already been done)?

If there is a practical improvement that is best achieved by rewriting the tool in another language, then by all means let's do it. And I would also prefer to see fewer different languages used for scripts, since it is hard to be good at all of them. (I know Perl a lot better than Python or Ruby, but I would not recommend it for new tools.) I do agree with Sam that language rewrites just to use a new language are not so great.

I am mildly skeptical that using PrettyPatch as a library is a major performance win, since in the common case of running tests there are few failures so it should not need to be invoked many times. (If it is invoked even for tests that didn't fail, then a much better performance improvement would be to not do that.) My skepticism would be 100% cured by a measurement of the actual performance improvement.

I also note that the "make new-run-webkit-tests faster" motivation was not cited at all in the bug, just a "reduce dependencies" motivation, which doesn't seem well-aligned with where we are currently. If this was our only Ruby script I might feel differently.

I think for new tools, we should definitely encourage a particular language, not just make it a free-for-all. And Python seems like the most plausible candidate going forward (Perl is too crufty and Ruby is less popular without being clearly better). OTOH it seems like some third-party tools such as bugzilla or iexploder will continue to use Perl or Ruby respectively since it would be unwise to work them just to change the language.

Regards,
Maciej

> 
> -- Dirk
> 
> On Wed, Sep 1, 2010 at 7:40 PM, Sam Weinig <sam.weinig at gmail.com> wrote:
>> Sorry, I seemed to have missed this thread.  Please do not rewrite scripts
>> just to rewrite them in a language you like. WebKit's dependency on Ruby is
>> here to stay. Just because python is common at Google does not make it
>> universal.
>> -Sam
>> 
>> On Wed, Sep 1, 2010 at 4:48 PM, TAMURA, Kent <tkent at chromium.org> wrote:
>>> 
>>> Thanks.
>>> So porting PrettyPatch to Python will make good benefit and should have no
>>> drawbacks.  I should go ahead.
>>> 
>>> On Wed, Sep 1, 2010 at 09:21, William Siegrist <wsiegrist at apple.com>
>>> wrote:
>>>> 
>>>> On Aug 31, 2010, at 4:43 PM, TAMURA, Kent wrote:
>>>> 
>>>>>   Can we run python scripts on bugs.webkit.org server?
>>>> 
>>>> Yes.
>>>> 
>>>> -Bill
>>>> 
>>> 
>>> 
>>> 
>>> --
>>> TAMURA Kent
>>> Software Engineer, Google
>>> 
>>> 
>>> 
>>> 
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>>> 
>> 
>> 
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