Advantages of Python | Disadvantages of Python

Everything has its pros and cons. Similarly, every programming language also has its advantages and disadvantages.

While learning a programming language, it is a good option to know about these. It helps to take full advantage of the language being conscious of the negatives. So, let us know about the advantages and disadvantages of Python.

Advantages of Python Programming Language

1. Easy to read, learn and code

Python is a high-level language and its syntax is very simple. It does not need any semicolons or braces and looks like English. Thus, it is beginner-friendly.

For example, to print “PythonGeeks” you have to write one line, i.e., print(“PythonGeeks”). This gives ease while learning, reading code and coding in Python.

Due to its simplicity, its maintenance cost is less.

2. Dynamic Typing

In Python, there is no need for the declaration of variables. The data type of the variable gets assigned automatically during runtime, facilitating dynamic coding.

3. Free, Open Source

It is free and also has an open-source licence. This means the source code is available to the public for free and one can do modifications to the original code. This modified code can be distributed with no restrictions.

This is a very useful feature that helps companies or people to modify according to their needs and use their version.

4. Portable

Python is also platform-independent. That is, if you write the code on one of the Windows, Mac, or Linux operating systems, then you can run the same code on the other OS with no need for any changes.

This is called Write Once Run Anywhere (WORA). However, you should be careful while you add system dependent features.

5. Extensive Third-Party Libraries

Python comes with a wide range of libraries like NumPy, Pandas, Tkinter, Django, etc.

The python package installer (PIP) helps you install these libraries in your interpreter/ IDLE. These libraries have different modules/ packages. These modules contain different inbuilt functions and algorithms. Using these make the coding process easier and makes it look simple.

6. Wide Range of Applications

Python has many applications like web development, making desktop GUIs, app development, artificial intelligence, data science, etc. It has become a preferred language by the professionals in many areas like engineering, mathematics and science.

7. Extensible and Integrable to Other Programming Languages

In addition to having libraries like CPython and Jython, it can extend to other languages like C, C++. This feature helps while building projects.

It can also integrate with C, C++, and Java, helping in cross-platform development and also in using the strong features of each language. This makes Python a powerful language.

8. Interpreted Language

Python is an interpreted language. The code gets executed line by line till an error is encountered if any.

If an error occurs at a line, it stops execution and gives that error to the console. This leads to an easier and step-by-step debugging process.

9. Functional, Object-Oriented, and Procedural

It is a procedural, functional, and object-oriented language. Procedural means the code gets executed in the top to bottom fashion.

A functional language works based on functions, rather than just statements. A function is a collection of codes that takes input and gives output.

Information is treated as a real-world object with properties and behaviors in object-orientated language.

10. Involvement in Large Projects.

It is used for implementation in big projects and software like YouTube, Google, Yahoo. It is also a preferred language by many companies in various fields like education, medical, research, etc.

11. Memory Management

Python also excels in managing its memory by using a separate library for this purpose. It uses a private heap to hold all the objects and data structures. And a built-in memory manager handles this heap. This property of Python makes it stand out from the other programming languages.

12. Improved Productivity

The fact that the syntax of python is very easy and short, allows more productivity. Developers can focus more on the algorithm, rather than on coding.

13. Vast Community

Python has an active and big community that helps in doing continuous additions to it. It also allows the availability of the information on Python at ease to the developer.

Some other advantages include

• Integration to IoT devices like Arduino, Raspberry Pi, etc.
• It does not lead errors to a segmentation fault.
• It is also very easy for asynchronous coding, like coding blocks including loops.

Disadvantages of Python

1. It’s Simple Nature

Are you wondering how this feature under advantage also is coming as a disadvantage?

Then the answer is Yes! Its simplicity is making it hard for a programmer to adjust to the syntax of the other programming languages.

For example, a coder might forget to declare a variable in C falling into an error.

2. Slow Speed and Memory Inefficient

The interpreter in Python executed the code line by line, which increases the overall time. The dynamic typing feature also decreases the speed. This is because it has to do extra work during runtime. It requires a large amount of memory too!

3. Weak Mobile Computation

Python has many applications on the server-side. But it is hardly seen on the client-side or in mobile applications. The main reasons for this are:

• It occupies a lot of memory.
• This makes the process slow.
• It also does not facilitate security

4. Poor Database Access

Python databases are weak compared to other technologies like JDBC (Java DataBase Connectivity) and ODBC (Open DataBase Connectivity). This limits its use in high enterprises.

5. Runtime Errors due to dynamic typing

Because it’s a dynamically typed language, you do not need to declare any variable and a variable storing an integer can store a string later. This might happen unnoticeably but leads to runtime errors while doing operations.

This is a restriction on the design of the Python programming language. Also, all errors show up only during runtime. So, it is difficult to test.

There are some other disadvantages like:

• It does not allow multithreading. To achieve multithreading in Python, a developer can extend Python to C extensions, PyPy, JPython, and IronPython.
• Besides being a functional programming language, it does not support functional optimization. In addition, it also falls behind due to a lack of basic features.

Interview Questions on Python Advantages and Limitations

Before we conclude, let us discuss some Python Interview Questions to revise and learn.

Q1. What are the advantages specific to Python over other languages?

Ans 1. Some of the strengths specific to Python could be:

• It requires less coding to do the same task in comparison to other languages.
• It plays its role in many fields like web development, machine learning, game building, and so on. So one can use this to build their career of interest.
• Companies and organizations can freely afford and take advantage of this popular language along with the community support.

Q2. We know Python is comparatively Slow. But some packages take less time to execute. Why? Give an example.

Ans 2. Python has slow speed because running is slower than compilation. But because of its extensible nature Python includes C-bases extensions. This increases the speed of some packages. For example, code employing the NumPy package runs quickly because a lot of crunching is not done by Python.

Q3. Does Python have runtime errors? If yes, give an example of such an error. If not, what is the reason?

Ans 3. Runtime errors do exist in Python. These are the errors that show up in the console on running the program.

One of the examples could be missing double quotes as shown below.

Example of runtime errors in Python:

print(PythonGeeks)

Output:

This can be avoided by writing

Conclusion

In this article, we learned about the different merits and demerits of Python.

While simple, dynamic, vast libraries, versatility, etc. come under advantages. The other features like slow speed, high memory, rare mobile applications, etc. come under the disadvantages.

Overall it is a nice choice of language to learn and has a very good scope. Happy coding, in Python!