Experimenting with IronPython

I’ve been playing around with IronPython for a little while now. Until recently, not really doing much more than spelunking around the .NET Framework with the IronPython console. It’s been great for exploring unknown parts of the framework as I can largely throw away the fluff associated with instantiating objects and bothering with types. Dynamic typing is just beautiful.

I’ve been engaged in a really sticky project – one of those projects that I wish I figured out some completely different way of doing – and by and large have been reasonably happy using C# and VB.NET to build it.

When I get completely jaded with Visual Studio and C# / VB, I’m discovering that SharpDevelop and IronPython make not only a refreshing change but really help with making progress when I’m building out a sticky piece of code. Previously, I’d open a fresh project in C# in Visual Studio and go from there. It’s OK, but switching to a dynamic language that is C-like has been great. SharpDevelop even has a console with (hallelujah!) Intelli-Sense! :-)

Once I figure out what I need to do, it’s not a big deal to translate the IronPython into C#. Now all I need to do is convince the boss that there’s no need to do the translation – IronPython is great just as it is (except for not supporting LINQ very well)!

Cheers!