Are very many people using Python? It seems like most people use PHP or Perl.

PHP and Perl are the language of choice for most scripting needs.

One of the people i work with is a Python developer, but there are not too many around. Perl and PHP are the unofficial standards these days.

Ahem. Language of choice? I would not go that far, its all what you know. Perl has been around for a long time and there is a big base of scripts out there. But Python turns up increasingly.

If I were to advise a PHP programmer what language to pick up next, my bias would direct them to Python, not Perl. Without getting into religious wars, my simple rationale includes:

- it is a modern object oriented language

- its very clean and predictable

- it is very easy to pick up. Small and concise, the basic language can be learned at a basic level in one sitting. The large array of standard library functions that extend the language mean you'll be able to do what you need to do when you get there.

- its available on virtually every platform imaginable. There are some very good multi-platform graphical environments for Python that run on Windows

In short, it is the ideal integrators tool. Need to build a little Windows based GUI for a database front end? No problem. Need it to run on Gnome? No problem and no recoding. CGI scripting? Easy. Shell scripts? Sure. Control Windows via COM? You bet. High performance web applications? Yes.

Now there are Perl counterparts for many if not all of the tasks I've described, but to compare the two at a deeper level invites religious wars and I won't go there.

I think a programmer with no experience in Perl or Python but experience in other languages is faced with picking Perl or Python solely on how productive they can be after a single session of learning, they will pick Python.

There are plenty of Pythonistas around... and who could not love a language named after the creators of the Knights Who Say Ni!

:D