Open Menu
AllLocalCommunitiesAbout
lotide
AllLocalCommunitiesAbout
Login

Why This Python Performance Trick Doesn’t Matter Anymore

⁨68⁩ ⁨likes⁩

Submitted ⁨⁨1⁩ ⁨day⁩ ago⁩ by ⁨abhi9u@lemmy.world⁩ to ⁨technology@lemmy.world⁩

https://blog.codingconfessions.com/p/old-python-performance-trick

source

Comments

Sort:hotnewtop
  • JohnnyCanuck@lemmy.ca ⁨1⁩ ⁨day⁩ ago

    TLDR: 3.11 is twice as fast as 3.10 at doing global name lookups, so an old speedup hack of aliasing a global function locally isn’t needed.

    For example, when calling len() in a loop, going l=len, and calling l() in the loop was faster in 3.10. In 3.11, moreso in 3.13, it’s almost a wash.

    However, the author says this:

    Accessing functions through a module [e.g. math.sin()] or a deep attribute chain can still carry overhead. Creating a local alias or using “from module import name” continues to be effective in those situations.

    But when I look at the numbers, I would say 3.13 is pretty close to making it an unnecessary optimization in general. A little subjective on how you interpret the numbers.

    Great info, but this was like trying to use a recipe and reading the author’s life story to get there.

    source
    • squaresinger@lemmy.world ⁨21⁩ ⁨hours⁩ ago

      Thanks for the summary!

      Yeah, in Python each . is a dictionary lookup. The cost of having a dynamic language where the compiler can do pretty much no optimizations (and yes, Python does have a compiler).

      In static languages these lookups can be collapsed to a single pointer address by the compiler.

      source
    • sugar_in_your_tea@sh.itjust.works ⁨21⁩ ⁨hours⁩ ago

      I’m surprised about the module lookup thing, since I assumed it was just syntax sugar to do from … import …. We do the from syntax almost everywhere, but I’ve been replacing huge import blocks with a module import (e.g. constants) just to clean up the imports a bit and git conflicts.

      Looks like I’ll need to keep this in mind until we upgrade to 3.13.

      source