IronPython at PyCon 2010

PyCon 2010, the annual international Python conference is coming soon (February 17th 2010 in Atlanta US). The schedule of talks is now up, and as usual there are several IronPython related talks.

• 67. IronPython Tooling

 By Dino Veihland, core IronPython developer:

One of the most popular requests for the IronPython team is tooling support. During this talk I’ll show you some of the existing tools available to help create IronPython applications. I’ll also look at the latest IronPython features which can help you debug, profile and improve your applications. I’ll also compare and contrast these with the solutions available for CPython that you may already be familiar with.

• 71. Python in the Browser

By Jimmy Schementi (Microsoft program manager for IronPython / IronRuby Silverlight integration):

You write your server code in Python because you want to. You write your browser code in JavaScript because you have to. But with IronPython and Silverlight, you can write your browser code in Python and leave JavaScript behind. This talk provides an overview of Silverlight for Python developers, including out of browser applications as well as the new “just text” model where Python code is embedded directly in HTML pages. Even if you develop on Linux or Mac, you can still take advantage of Silverlight in the browser.

As well as these talks the conference starts with a Virtual Machine (VM) summit, with attendees from the major implementations of Python plus those implementing other popular dynamic languages and Virtual Machines for dynamic languages.

Dave Fugate (IronPython tester and infrastructure guy) is also planning a Testing IronPython poster session.

After the summits are the tutorials and I will be repeating the IronPython tutorial I gave last year. If you're interested in getting some hands on experience of developing with IronPython then come along.

For those interested in alternative implementations of Python you will also appreciate these talks:

• 148. Pynie: Python 3 on Parrot

By Allison Randal of the Parrot Foundation:

Pynie is an implementation of Python 3 on Parrot. The goal of Pynie is to duplicate the pure-Python behavior of CPython 3.x, and perhaps eventually a C API compatibility layer. Parrot provides a set of compiler tools and core functionality common to many dynamic languages, so the core code of Pynie is lightweight. Pynie allows Python 3 libraries to be shared between multiple languages. This talk is an overview of the features Pynie currently supports and the work left to be done, together with an introduction to the internals of Pynie.

• 13. How and why Python is being used to by the Military to model real-world battlefield scenarios

By Mr. Eric Silverman (ALATEC Inc. / US Army):

Leveraging the power of Python, military analyst and software developers out at White Sands Missile Range in New Mexico have converted a closed-form model, which was developed for scripted Cold War scenarios, into a more sophisticated and adaptive system. COMBATXXI is a premium wargaming model, which now is poised to answer questions that have a direct effect on military operations currently in theater, in large part because of Python.

• 65. Extending Java Applications with Jython

By Frank Wierzbicki (core Jython developer):

Jython is an implementation of Python for the JVM. This talk covers the options available for integrating Jython and Java code, especially Java calling into Jython, since this is the trickier case. This talk will also cover some Java specific deployment options, such as deploying your Jython application as a jar file. Jar files allow you to package Java/Jython applications into a single archive. In many environments a user can click on a jar file to launch the contained application.

• 83. The speed of PyPy

By Mr. Maciej Fijalkowski (PyPy core developer):

The first part of the talk will cover PyPy's speed achievements resulting from the last year's work on the Just-In-Time Compiler. I'll present and discuss a number of benchmarks and compare against other Python-speed projects. I'll also cover the basics of how the JIT works and what sort of programs it can greatly speedup (and which ones it can't).

• 101. How to write cross-interpreter Python programs

By Mr. Maciej Fijalkowski (PyPy core developer):

This talk will cover basics about writing cross-interpreter
python programs. What to do and most of all what not to do. This will help you if you want at some point in time to
run program on for example Java platform or faster python
interpreter, but also if you want to keep it running between CPython releases.

• 189. The Ring of Python

By Holger Krekel (PyPy and py.test developer):

CPython 2.5/2.6/3.1, Jython, IronPython, PyPy, StacklessPython, UnladenSwallow, Cython ... what do we make of all these cool interpreter projects and versions? Where does competition help and where does it hamper?

This talk is for stirring discussion and thoughts on making the most out of wealth/curse of interpreters. I am also going to showcase and discuss 'execnet' one of my own related projects.