[joske2]

I've worked on such huge Java programs being maintained and updated for over 5 years. I actually don't think it is Java as a language which helps in maintenance. Type checking by the compiler does help, but in reality you have Spring, Hibernate, JSF, JSP,.. where compile time checking doesn't apply anyway.

In my opinion there are 3 things that help with maintenance: * automated tests (to see what breaks if you change something) * refactoring tools (helps in keeping code clean) * domain driven design (helps in mapping a business concept to a piece of code)

These are all things you could do in Python as well.

[fierarul]

Isn't refactoring much harder without static typing ?

[joske2]

I believe one of the first refactoring was for Smalltalk, so it's not impossible. These days you also have IDEs with basic refactoring support for Python, Ruby, Javascript, Actionscript,.. from JetBrains.