[BiO BB] Python or Perl

[Dr. Christoph Gille]

It is really a question of taste what language
to chose. It also depends on whether you want to do
text processing or number crunching or 3D-visualization
or Web-programming. Also look at the respective
www.xBio.org libraries
whether they contain the methods you need.

Number crunching in Python and Perl is slow whereas the
string libraries in Python and Perl are very fast. Both
are about 10x faster than PHP.

Number crunching in Java is as fast (about as fast as C++)
and has the advantage that
many errors already show up at compile time and not only at
runtime which is good for large projects.
String processing in Java however is slow.

Python and Perl have more elegant syntax and you
programs are much shorter.