> What terrible consequences does someone who prefers python to shell scripting face?
Terrible consequences? Probably not. Shell script dependencies are easier to handle, because the commands you're relying on are built right into the OS. They're going to be there because they have to be. How often does sed, grep, awk, and cut change?
It's a matter of complexity. If you're munging files and using regexps, shell is fine, and quicker than Python. If you're starting to think "I need a set" or "I need real error handling", it's about the time I move to Python or Perl.
Terrible consequences? Probably not. Shell script dependencies are easier to handle, because the commands you're relying on are built right into the OS. They're going to be there because they have to be. How often does sed, grep, awk, and cut change?