Python for decision makers and business leaders Transcripts
Chapter: No Python here
Lecture: Probably not for mobile apps
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We've spent some time talking
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about why Python is so awesome
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how many of the great things it does
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and how flexible it is.
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And flexibility it does have
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but there are times
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when you should not use Python
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to solve certain problems.
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Maybe this is because Python
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is not very efficient at this problem.
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Or, it might not work at all.
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So we're going to talk quickly
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about some of those situations.
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You got a sense of that already.
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Remember we did Python vs C++, vs MATLAB and so on.
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And Python scored pretty high, I think.
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There's a lot of green
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but there are a few standouts
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where there's some red in there.
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And that's around mobile apps
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and, to a lesser degree, desktop apps
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but still, it's not maybe the best story
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you got going on there.
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So let's talk about those two situations
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and just packaging up applications, in general.
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Mobile: maybe you've heard of these things
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these little smartphones, everybody has one everywhere
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and having a mobile app is super important.
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It turns out the story
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of Python on mobile is not incredible.
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Here's a data point for you to consider.
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One of the biggest Python training sites out there
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that teaches people how to build stuff with Python
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the website that is built with Python
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the company, the podcast that is about Python
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when we had to go build our mobile apps
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I went around and I looked at all the different options.
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How could I possibly build this in Python?
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You know what I decided?
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There's not a reasonable way to do that.
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Technically, I maybe, maybe could have pulled it off
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with some of the things that are out there.
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But it is not the mainstream way
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and it's going to be jumping through a ton of hoops.
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So, at Geniusy, we have an app
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in the Apple App Store, and on Google Play.
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Those were written in C# and .NET
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using the Xamarin platform.
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We have one code base for these two projects
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which is actually pretty killer.
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We're able to share almost all the logic
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across those two operating systems
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and there's two phones. So that's great
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but, even though I wanted to
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even though I tried, I could not find a way
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to reasonably build our apps in Python, on mobile.
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Now you might be saying
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Michael, you can build your apps in Python on mobile
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there's this thing called Kivy, K-I-V-Y.
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Yes, technically, there is Kivy.
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To me, my impression, I haven't built anything
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in earnest with it
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but my impression is it is mostly about building
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kind of simulator game like interfaces.
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And its ability to say, drag over a button here
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and put a text box there
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and have this stretch when it does this
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and a video player goes there.
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Didn't really think that it could do it.
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And by the way, until we have something that looks like
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this, a really cool development environment
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were I can have a UI definition and a UI designer
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and then my Python code, then I push a button
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and it compiles into a thing that I drop on the App store.
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Until I have that, there is no way Python is on par
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for building mobile apps compared to, well, this.
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This is literally how we built our mobile apps
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for the App Store at Talk Python Training.
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Thing you see on the screen is login page not XAML.
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The code is on the left
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this is XAML, like a WPF type of thing on .NET.
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On the right we have both Android and IOS preview.
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You can interact with the stuff on the right
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the tool box or you can drag over buttons
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and Carousel views and all kinds of stuff.
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On the left we have our code
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these compile all into like the final version
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that gets shipped to the App Store.
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Not only is there not something that's really
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not quite close to this in Python.
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There is like not anything that even approaches
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this concept, not even close in Python.
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And so until Python is on par with things like this
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on Android studio or working with Android directly
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in Kotlin or Xcode and Swift. Until its something like that
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I personally would not use it. As much as I want to
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unfortunately we are stuck doing something like this.
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It worked out fine, but I would it's prefer python, it's just it's not.
