Hi everyone,
I've been planning to move to Python from PHP for some time now. I use PHP extensively for web scripting, with mod_php, Apache, and a DB (I would characterize my knowledge of PHP as advanced). Here are three stumbling blocks I've experienced, for which I couldn't seem to find any helpful information via Google:
1) Mod_python on OSX. I use a Mac as my primary development environment, so I need mod_python to get anything done. Compiling mod_python from source fails under OSX 10.3, and mod_python does not appear to be included in Fink. I've found plenty of other questions about this on other mailing lists, but so far no conclusive answers - is mod_python on OSX currently a dead-end?
2) Session management. Cookie-based sessions in PHP are pretty transparent, with a small library of basic functions that do 95% of what anyone may need to store session data in serialized files and associate them with cookies. I've seen python code that accomplishes this, but so far no pre-built server-side session management modules.
3) Structured request variables. PHP has a really handy feature where request variables with name like "foo[]", "foo[bar]", or "foo[bar][baz]" are automatically structured into nested associative arrays. I can see that the python cgi module will make a list of MiniFieldStorage objects when more than one variable with the same name is provided, but that's about the extent of it that I've seen.
2 & 3 are problems I can solve on my own, but they're so transparently automatic in PHP that it's a real pleasure to use them. I can probably implement my own fixes, but I'd rather not have to. Alternatively, are these just "PHP-isms" for which python has a more native, more appropriate response?
An "RTFM" answer with a URL for the M would be great. :)
Thank you, -mike.
------------------------------------------------------ michal migurski- contact info, blog, and pgp key: sf/ca http://mike.teczno.com/contact.html
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