How Does Python Compare to Go?

In 1991, Guido van Rossum released the Python programming language, which has amassed a massive following since then. It is used by tech juggernauts such as Google, Netflix, Meta's Instagram, and more. But Google, in 2012, publicly released Go (also known as Golang), a language it designed in 2007. Given the differences in the release dates, which signifies that both languages are at different stages of maturity, how does Python compare to Go?

Python Programming Language

Python is a portable, extensible, object-oriented, high-level, and general-purpose programming language. It emphasizes code readability, a design philosophy that has been maintained since its initial release. This philosophy has made it easy to learn, read, and code.

Features of Python

The features of the Python programming language include:

• Free and open-source: Anyone can download and install it from the official website
• High-level language: it is not tied to a specific system architecture
• Object-oriented language: it represents or organizes the design of software around objects that, in turn, contain data
• Interpreted language: Python executes code line by line
• Easy to read, code, and debug
• Supports multiprocessing
• Extensive standard library: there are more than 137,000 libraries and frameworks, including the Python Requests library, NumPy, Django, Flask, Web2Py, SciPy, PyTorch, and more
• Extensible and integrated language: Python code can be written into C++ code
• Portable: it can run on any operating system/platform
• Dynamically typed language

Advantages of Python

• Python offers the following advantages:
• Robust and extensive standard library, including the Python Requests library
• It is free and open source
• Python is portable
• Supports multiprocessing (parallelism)
• It is easy to read, learn, and code
• Python is easy to debug (because it is an interpreted language)
• A programmer does not have to declare variables and data types (Python automatically assigns the data type while executing the code)

Disadvantages of Python

The disadvantages of Python are:

• It is slow: this is because it is both an interpreted and dynamically typed language
• Python is not memory efficient
• It is prone to runtime errors because the variables and other data types are not declared and can change at any time
• Python does not support seamless database access

Uses of Python

Python is used for:

• Server-side web development
• Data science, including data collection through web scraping, data analysis, and handling complex mathematics
• Machine learning and artificial intelligence
• Scripting
• It can be used to connect database systems

Go Programming Language

Google first designed Go/Golang in 2007 with the intention of using it in-house. At the time, the tech company wanted a language that could enhance programming efficiency and productivity, especially with the increasing use of multicore, network computers, and large codebases. Go was meant to address the shortfalls of the languages in Google's tech stack while maintaining some of the positive characteristics. The language was then publicly released in March 2012 and has been embraced by many organizations besides Google.

Features of Go

Go has the following characteristics:

• Free and open-source
• Object-oriented language/programming (inspired by Smalltalk)
• Statically typed language (inspired by C++)
• Runtime efficiency (inspired by C++)
• Easy usability, readability, and codability (inspired by Python and JavaScript)
• Supports concurrency (inspired by Newsqueak): computations are managed and run at the same time
• High performance in multiprocessing and networking
• Concise syntax
• Robust standard library and development tools
• Supports testing: it allows you to write a unit test while writing the app code
• Garbage collection: this feature recovers memory by freeing up pointers
• Portability

Advantages of Go

The pros of the Go programming language are:

• It is easy to use, read, and code
• As a portable language, it supports cross-platform development
• It boasts faster compilation and execution because it uses the Golang development environment rather than a virtual machine
• Go is highly scalable
• The language reduces development time by supporting testing during the writing phase, garbage collection (reduces latency), and fast compilation
• It is free
• Go has a robust standard library and multiple development tools
• As a statically typed language, it makes accurate code compilation easy

Disadvantages of Go

• Go is still maturing
• Its simple design does not provide a lot of opportunities to perform abstractions and other complex processes
• It does not have or natively supports a graphical user interface (GUI) library
• Go lacks frameworks
• It has poor error-handling capabilities

Uses of Go

Go is used for:

• Creating cloud-based and server-side applications
• Artificial intelligence and data science
• Writing command-line tools
• Site reliability automation and DevOps

Python vs. Go

Similarities between Python and Go

• Both are easy to read, code, and learn
• They have robust standard libraries
• They are portable languages
• Python and Go are free and open source
• Both are object-oriented languages

Differences between Python and Go

Conclusion

Python and Go are at different stages of maturity, with the former being more mature. That said, they have some similarities as well as differences.