Communications of the ACM
Revamping Python for an AI World
Python is one of the most popular programming languages in existence. Easy to learn and easy to use, it has been around for years, so there is a large community of Python developers to support each other, and it has built up an ecosystem of libraries that allow users to drop in the functionalities they need. It does, however, come with downsides: its programs tend to run slowly, and because it is inefficient at running processes in parallel, it is not well suited to some of the latest artificial intelligence (AI) programming.
Hoping to overcome those difficulties, computer scientist Chris Lattner set out to create a new language, Mojo, which offers the ease of use of Python, but the performance of more complex languages such as C++ or Rust. He teamed up with Tim Davis, whom he had met when they both worked for Google, to form Modular in January 2022. The company, where Lattner is chief executive officer and Davis is president, provides support for companies working on AI and is developing Mojo.
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