Boo vs. IronPython

Question

After having looked at each of these two projects, it seems that both are VERY similar. Both run on top of the CLI, both have python style syntax, both use .NET instead of t

Answer 1

Boo is statically typed, but has optional duck typing (which works fairly well, in my experience). Boo is also specifically designed to be "wrist friendly" -- in other words, to minimize the need to use Shift-key combinations. It has good IDE support in SharpDevelop.

As is pretty evident, Boo takes a lot of inspiration from Python, but is also designed to take good advantage of .NET features.

Performance-wise, Boo feels marginally faster than IronPython, and in particular lacks the noticeable startup lag of IronPython.

Boo is still an immature language, and lacks the community of Python. I'd personally be a bit wary about using it in production. Also, I don't agree with all the departures it's made from Python, such as getting rid of explicit self in classes.