History of Python programming: Python’s Journey with Jython, Cython, and IronPython, and a Dive into the Secrets of the ABC Language

Ayan Sakib
9 Min Read
History of python programming language

Python programming language is a high level, Multi-purpose programming. Python is dynamically typed and garbage-collected. Let’s overview of history of python. Python is so special because it supports multiple programming paradigms, including structured, object-oriented and functional programming. Nowadays many people writing or learning Python for their own benefits. Python is easy to learn and understand. That’s why right now, Python is one of the most and biggest programming language in the whole world.

Python is used for web development, data science, machine learning and scientific computing. In every section Python has very friendly framework for working with the desire system. For web development, Python has most popular framework called Django. For data science, Python has most popular framework called pandas. And for scientific computing, Python is used most popular form of called Numpy, Scipy, Seaborn etc.

Python programming language

Let’s overview the history of Python Programming Language :

Python is start creating in 1980 by Guido van Rossum (a Dutch programmer) at Centrum Wiskunde & Informatica (CWI) in the Netherlands as a successor to the ABC programming language. However, the fast version of Python released in February 1991.

When Guido van Rossum was working at Centrum Wiskunde & Informatica (CWI) in the Netherlands, he feels to create a multi-purpose easy programming languages. He working with ABC programming languages very long time. When Guido van Rossum created Python programming language, he said he inspired with ABC programming language for creating Python. However, he felt ABC programming language is a bit more complex. That’s why he started to creating a new programming language.

Guido van Rossum

Python is not a commercial project when it’s started development. Python is a hobby project that created by Guido van Rossum. However, when Python was released it breaks the whole thing of programming section and become the most popular programming language in the world. That’s why in 1995, the Python Software Foundation was created to observe the development and management of this language.

  1. In 1980 Guido van Rossum is started working with Python programming language. He thinks that ABC programming language is a bit more complex. That’s why he start a hobby project for a new programming language.
  2. In February 1991, Python first version is available on the programming community and the version is 0.9.0.
  3. There are a TV show that Guido van Rossum liked very much. This TV show airs on BBC. Baby show called A very interesting named “Python’s Flying Circus”. Guido van Resume Named Python Programming Languages based on this TV show.
  4. The first version of Python hasn’t many more functions and features. Thats why the second version of Python is going to under development.
  5. For the popularity of Python programming language in 1995, the Python Software Foundation was created to observe the development and management of this language.
  6. In 2000 Python 2.0 version was released with major features including comprehensions, garbage collector (in addition to reference counting) for memory management and support for Unicode.
  7. In 2008 Python 3.0 released With significant number of changes including new syntax and handling string and integers. Python 3 introduced with various improvements, including better Unicode handling, a more consistent and cleaner syntax, and a focus on encouraging developers to write more idiomatic and efficient code.
  8. 2021 Python 3.10 was released with New pattern matching and F string features. However after 3.0 Python has increased. Now Python has a large community.

Why ABC language is disbanded?

After releasing Python, ABC language is decreasing their popularity. After 1991, ABC languages didn’t used very much by other programs. Everyone talks about Python programming language. That’s why ABC language is disbanded in 2001.

  1. ABC Language is a nonprofit organization. After releasing Python, ABC Languages fall a big lack of funding problem.
  2. ABC Language didn’t have a strong community. That’s why the development of ABC language is stopped after releasing Python.
  3. ABC Language has not feature of object-oriented programming and gapless collection. Python provides this kind of feature and advance techniques. That’s why ABC language is disbanded. Because People didn’t use ABC Language very much.

There are other programming language created based on python :

  1. Jython : Late 1990s the idea of creating a Python implementation for the Java platform began more important. Guido van Rossum and other Python developers understand the potential benefits of having Python code integrated with Java and running on the JVM. That’s why Jython was developed.
import java.io.File
import java.io.IOException

def read_file(filename):
    try:
        with File(filename, "r") as f:
            contents = f.read()
        return contents
    except IOException as e:
        print(e)
        return None

print(read_file("my_file.txt"))

In 1998, the first Vashon of Jython officially released. This version is based on Python 1.5.2. In 2000, Zaiton is continuously involved. In 2007 Jython 2.2 was released marking significant progress in the project development. In 2011 Python 2.5.2 war released offering compatibility with Python 2.5. The latest version of Jython is 2.7.3 was Released on September 10, 2022, for python version 2.7, and it includes a number of bug fixes and performance improvements.

2. Cython : Based on Pyrex project in 2007, the first version of Cython Released. Cython was released based on C and C++ programming language. I don’t can be faster than Python code. There’s oil. Cython is popular in child Python languages. Cython is faster than Python in bytecode.

# This is a Cython file, so we need to import the Cython module
import Cython

# We define a function called `fibonacci` that takes an integer as input and returns the nth Fibonacci number
def fibonacci(n):

    # We use the `cpdef` keyword to tell Cython that this function can be called from Python
    @cython.cfunc(int, int)
    def _fibonacci(n):
        if n == 0:
            return 0
        elif n == 1:
            return 1
        else:
            return _fibonacci(n - 1) + _fibonacci(n - 2)

    return _fibonacci(n)

# We print the 10th Fibonacci number
print(fibonacci(10))

In Cython, developer can develop C style syntax and declarations. Cython code is compliant with C and C++ code, which is C and C++ compiler. The second version of Cython released in 2009, added python 3 support, most powerful type system and improved performance. 2015 Cython 0.29 was relesed With module as Python packages. The latest version of Python released in 2023 and the version is 3.0.0 with fully supported in Python 3.10.

3. IronPython : IronPython is an open source programming language that is tightly integrated with the.net framework. This programming language works with .net libraries applications.

The first version 0.4 of IronPython released in 2006. And the latest version of Iron Python is 3.10.0 supported Python 3.10 with improved performance and compatibility in .net framework.

import System.IO

def read_file(filename):
    with open(filename, "r") as f:
        contents = f.read()
    return contents

print(read_file("my_file.txt"))

We will talk about Python framework modules and other things in another article. We will also learn about Python And Python programming language in various ways like web development, ethical hacking and data analysis. Also, we will line about escaping and data management in Python.

Read More about Python : Change MAC Address in Linux Using Terminal and Python – A Comprehensive Guide (cyber24bd.com)

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